Сomputer Science Overview: Petr Stukalov

In the world of infrastructure, nothing can replace experience. I am from the last generation that learned to program from paper books. Now there are a lot of opportunities to gain experience faster: YouTube, courses, internships. But the point is still in the number of different problems that you have solved.

Finding my first job was difficult. I had no idea how to do it. I submitted thousands of applications, and there was not even a single interview. Then, for one of the vacancies, I was asked to call back tomorrow. I was very glad that they did not refuse me right away. It so happened that the CTO forgot his phone at home that day. When he returned home in the evening, he found 249 unanswered calls from me, and immediately called me back. Yes, I got this job. And I also realized that persistence can break through any walls.

My first job was technical support engineer. I found this vacancy on hh.ru, this is the Russian equivalent of Linkedin. There was only one interview, with the CTO. It was a job in a chain of stores. If a store employee had a problem with a PC, I would come or connect remotely and solve the problem.

Then I became a System Administrator in the same chain of stores. My area of responsibility began to include the entire network and server infrastructure of the chain of stores, in addition, I resolved issues related to the interaction of local technical support engineers. So I got good experience with the network infrastructure, including Cisco, Linux and FreeBSD operating systems, databases. I liked these operating systems much more than Windows. In a couple of years, I completely rebuilt the entire infrastructure. It became much more reliable and more manageable.

After a couple of years, I realized that I wanted further growth and at my current job I would not find anything new and interesting. I went to hh.ru again.

Again, I did thousands of responses to hh.ru. Due to the fact that I already had some experience, there were more interviews. I did not really believe in myself, suffered from impostor syndrome. Finally, I found a job in the Azimut Hotels chain of hotels. There was only one interview with the CTO and the team. In technical terms, it was like the previous chain of stores. But here the remote objects were located all over Russia, the network was much larger and more complex. There were more servers and services and they were more complex. And most importantly, the company had much more money to implement new technologies, which was critical for me, since I wanted professional growth. At that time, the cloud had not yet been invented and each company built and maintained its own infrastructure. Like last time, after a couple of years I realized that I would not see anything new here and it was time for me to look for a new job. And again hh.ru and a thousand responses. I found a new job at IMMO. There were two interviews, one with a recruiter, the second with the CTO and one of the engineers. Before getting a job at this company, I thought that I already understood networks and UNIX servers very well. After I saw their infrastructure, I realized that I was still a child and I still had a lot to learn. Their network was huge, hundreds of different routers all over the planet. There were hundreds of servers, not dozens. Before that, I used the IaC (Infrastructure as Code) approach, but I didn't focus on it, the scale was too small, it didn't give much profit. Here I found myself in a situation where it was simply impossible to manage the infrastructure without IaC. Here I was already working in a team of a dozen engineers, they were real professionals with huge experience, they taught me a lot. I worked there for three years, it was the hardest job in my life.

Then I heard about cloud technologies and the Devops approach. In IMMO, this was not used for some business reasons, I was never able to get a clear answer. And this means that it's time to look for a job again.

And again hh.ru, and again thousands of responses and thousands of refusals, I was looking for a job in a field in which I had no serious experience. But patience and persistence are always rewarded. I found a job at Dr. Web. This is a Russian antivirus developer. There I was responsible not only for networks and physical servers, but also the cloud part and Devops. It was much easier than my previous job and much more interesting. But there was also a significant drawback, the salary was very small.

After I got all the possible experience in this company, I realized that I was now much more in demand and highly paid specialist. And this means that it was time to change jobs again.

And again hh.ru but thousands of responses. But now I had already discussed with recruiters a completely different salary and I was much more picky in choosing a new employer. I will not describe all the work and projects here, reading this will take too much of your time, I will only mention the most significant events.

I wanted to enter the international labor market and I began to actively study English. Then I thought that working in a large corporation, with a worldwide reputation, was what I need. And again my persistence was rewarded. I found a job at Intel. There were 6 interviews, with recruiters, department heads, security service, what then with incomprehensible managers and finally with engineers. They painted sky-high prospects at the interview, and offered a very good salary, equity and an entrance bonus. Gorgeous conditions, if you don’t know what’s going on inside. But inside there was unimaginable bureaucracy, political games, and an image of vigorous activity. If you fire 90% of the employees, then the overall productivity will increase. For three months, I honestly tried to get used to this approach, but I couldn’t. I returned the bonus and quit. I’m not ready to waste my life on bureaucracy and lies. I don’t know if such a mess was only in the Russian branch of Intel or in the whole company. I suspect that in the whole company.

Then I successfully passed the interview at IBM, they offered relocation to the EU, but a beggarly salary. I didn’t agree.

I started looking for startups with foreign funding (and this is almost all startups in Russia). And it was a very good idea. It was really interesting there and they paid well.

Then I left Russia. Traveled the world, worked remotely. Until now, startups and small companies are my priority. Minimal bureaucracy, interesting projects, good salary. Interviews are usually two. One with a recruiter, the second with a CTO and an engineer.