2016 from Gero's eyes

Hurray! It's this time of the year again, where we are going to look back and make fun of our fails and celebrate our wins.

How it starts?

My personal 2016 was the weirdest, coolest & depressing year of my life. It started casually with a few drinks on 1st of January, which was pretty nice, but the real show started a few weeks later, when I've decided to move my life from а "retiree" to a newborn working machine.

Back then I was working at Devrix as a Junior WordPress developer. But after the moment of enlightenment, I've took some points and not so far behind I took the promotion too. And after a while I was promoted to a Senior.

On this position I had not only to do my full stack web development job, but I had to manage a team of three people, who were working with me. This was one of the most interesting things which I've done this year and one of the things that gave me a lot of "food to think on". Everyday was different because of the different cases which appeared in every different aspect of our work. And as usual there where good and bad days, but probably the most important part of the success was NOT TO MIX your personal problems with your job. I've learned that by the hard way and it wasn't pretty.

Anyway let's continue with the story...

After the mashup I've started to burnout. And as you've thought all of this stress reflected on me. But I haven't really realize that until the moment when my face literally started to fall. Strange but obvious my up layer skin was started to fall because of the lack of vitamin B & D. Then I've started to ask my self if its worth it... And actually I've thought on that for a very long time until one day when I've woke up and *puf* I knew that I had to quit and start something new.

What happened after I've quit?

There aren't any words that may describe that feeling. It's like staying on a hot beach sand and after a 3 hours of burning skin you jump directly in the cold sea water. That's pretty much it.

You start to feel alive and free again and everything was perfect in the first two weeks. After that I've saw that my bank balance started to go dooown and I've started to look for a new place where to start my path. Sadly I've "hit on a stone" because of the summer season which I choose to start looking for a new job. It took me one month of meetings and presentations before I've found a new place where to continue my path.

"That wasn't that bad tho. During that time I've built great friendships with a lot of beautiful and smart women in the face of HRs."

New page of my book!

At the new place I wasn't doing a lot of programming job. There the things were more related to the marketing and advertising sphere. On first look this depressed me a little bit, because by profession & by heart I am a software developer. But after I started to learn more and more about the different marketing strategies and advertising tricks, I've told my self - "Why don't you start your own company?". That was the second great step that I've made in 2016.

After a two weeks of design and development it was finally ready for start. The newborn was called Dloober. and only two days after the official start and the first promotion, there comes our first client. During the client meetings I've learned a lot about the human psychological conditions.

"If you want to win a client, make him to feel you close."

If you follow this simple rule, you won't have any problems in winning an argument with a client or with a random beauty on the street.

In the end of 2016...

In the end of 2016 I would like to say, THANK YOU! To everyone who was part of it and make it one of the most dynamic years of my life...

Today is 10 of January 2017, so let's see what is laying ahead.

Cheers and good luck everyone,

See you in 2017!