235: Take a Proactive Approach to Your Career with Stephen Kuenzli

<p>Phil’s guest on this episode of the IT Career Energizer podcast is Stephen Kuenzli. He has designed, built, deployed and operated highly available and scalable software systems in high tech manufacturing, banking, and e-commerce sectors, for nearly 20 years.</p> <p> </p> <p>He has a B.S. in Systems Engineering and he loves working through challenging design problems and building solutions that are safe and enjoyable to use.</p> <p> </p> <p> In this episode, Phil and Stephen Kuenzli discuss the need to develop non-technical skills to be able to progress your career. Stephen shares and effective way to be a continuous learner without over-stretching yourself or letting other things slide.</p> <p> </p> <p>They also talk about the importance of sticking to your standards and refusing to be pressured into shipping a faulty product and how to do that. He also explains how to maintain the balance you need to stay successful.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>KEY TAKEAWAYS:</strong></p> <p><strong>(2.27) TOP CAREER TIP</strong></p> <p>Be proactive about managing your career. Throughout his career, Stephen has blocked out at least 4 hours a week to be used to learn or practice a new skill.</p> <p> </p> <p>It is also important to ask for help. This is especially the case when you are trying to develop non-technical skills. Learning things like effective communication and project management skills is crucial.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>(5.04) WORST CAREER MOMENT</strong></p> <p>Sadly, Stephen was involved in launching a product before it was ready. They knew it was buggy, but the pressure was being applied by several influential parties. Now, Stephen would simply refuse to ship a product at that stage of development. To ensure he can do this, he built up a cash buffer to make himself comfortable with standing firm on quality, even as an employee.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>(9.59) CAREER HIGHLIGHT</strong></p> <p>His career highlight came about while fixing that flawed system that had led to his worst career moment. During the fix, they