My Dearest Readers,
I heartily welcome you to my first newsletter post! If you have subscribed voluntarily, I am profoundly delighted that you are here. If you have not, then please know that I have added you personally to my email list and you are free to unsubscribe at any time - no strings attached. But I would be really glad if you stay over and motivate me.
Who am I?
To begin with… “It's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me.” - I have been always inspired by this quote from Nolan’s Batman Begins. So we shall be skipping the who part here and jumping on directly to what I do. But if you are hooked on to know me, I am just a LinkedIn search away :) Here’s what I do -
I build! Yes, it’s simply these two words. I build. And it’s fun! I started building professionally at 19. Over the past 1.5 years, I have built this product at a bootstrapped data analytics startup that has witnessed a 25x YoY increase in revenue and an 11x YoY increase in user traffic. I was one of the early team members involved in shooting the startup from 0 to 1 and taking it to profitability. I have been promoted 2 times in 1.5 years and as of now, at 21 I am leading tech and product at Airbtics with a direct impact on product conversion and revenue growth. We will come to more on what I do later in this newsletter series (after all, this is all that it’s about). And did I forget to mention that I have been doing all these while still being in school?
When I say I build, I do not only refer to Engineering or Software Engineering to be more precise. Being an early team member of a hyper-growing coven, I had quite an amount of my skin in the game. Fortunately, I got to wear several hats - Software Engineering, Product Management, SEO, Marketing, Customer Support, Recruiting, etc. to name a few. Building to me is more of nurturing a product from ideation to shipping and beyond that than mere development. The complete lifecycle. How much it may sound intimidating, in this entire magical process I just need to answer only one question throughout - “Is it simple enough?”.
And last but not least I write, travel, and explore. I am Subhayan and this is my story.
Why this newsletter?
It must be evident from the previous paragraph that my journey has not been quite similar to the pack out there. I chose the road not chosen (by the most). Choosing - this is a very important word to me. I believe that when we choose something for ourselves, we give our 100% to it since we are the only ones accountable for it. This is necessary to sustain our intellectual development in anything and everything that we pursue.
Lately, I have been reading this book called The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel and I encountered a wonderful quote by Nassim Taleb. It goes like this -
True success is exiting some rat race to modulate one’s activities for peace of mind.
I was resolutely inspired by his fine line and could relate to it. I chose to exit the rat race at 19 after my freshman year of college and writing here today I can say that it was the best decision that I took for my peace of mind. This is what this newsletter is about. I want to take you along with me in my journey on this road not taken. I would also like you to share it with your friends and acquaintances. It will be an eternal feeling of satisfaction to me even if I can declutter some of your thoughts through this newsletter in a positive way let alone have an impact on your life whatsoever.
How did I get here?
Until now we talked about who and why behind this newsletter. Now we are getting started with the current issue. I will be surprised if you are still here. I am not sure if I was able to tap into your attention till now. But if you have read on till here, please do stay for a few more minutes as I will be diving into some of the most important events that brought me here.
I failed to get a seat at the premier IITs - the pinnacle of Indian engineering education after graduating high school. It wasn’t the end of the world for me but I was pretty sad. But life has to move on right? I took admission at a standard private engineering school and started focusing on the next chapter of my life. College was fun but I was not enjoying the traditional courses being taught there. There is a lot of debate on the education system out there so I am not going to talk about it. What I will be telling you instead is what action did I take. And before that, let me share with you another thing that I didn’t like. This constant rat race of getting a FAANG job. My batch (2019 - 2023) actively witnessed the rise of Competitive Programming and its transformation to being the de-facto standardized test for getting into Big Tech.
CP is great. FAANG is great. But I did not like how it became the next JEE (the engineering entrance examination for getting into top engineering schools in India). Like JEE coaching institutes, numerous million and billion-dollar FAANG/CP preparation centers (read EdTech companies) were created and it became a rat race. I was physically and mentally not prepared to enter a rat race again. One important lesson we learn from probability is to maximize our chances of success at every possible opportunity. Carpe Diem - seize the day my friend! I seized it.
Engineering means building stuff and I started doing so from my second semester. Accelerated by my urge to exit the rat race, I started looking for alternative paths into the tech industry. Fortunately, I stumbled upon Airbtics (a remote startup) and was able to prove my competitiveness to work with them through proof of work. I did a week-long freelancing task with them as a part of my interview process and even got paid for that. How awesome does that sound?! Eventually, I joined Airbtics as a Software Engineer Intern in October 2020 in my third semester.
Startups work at light speed and the work is challenging too. But somehow I think I fitted in. I liked being challenged and I liked that sweet smell of victory after successfully solving each challenge. You would not believe but I was offered a full-time role as a Software Engineer just after 3 months of my internship while still being in school (in my fourth semester). I accepted the offer and went all-in because every day in the last 3 months of internships was so full of learning and growth for me. I could feel it in my bones. The thrill is incomparable. What helped me more was having a mentor at Airbtics. Yes, a mentor and not a manager. A manager manages you but a mentor guides you. The difference is subtle but substantial. My mentor (and founder) is an ex-Facebook engineer at their London campus. He was one of the early team members of WhatsApp. He knows the work and culture of big tech. He has been there. It is easy to get swayed by dreamy LinkedIn posts and the FAANG hype. But only you will know about working somewhere from someone who has already worked there. And I knew FAANG is not for me. At least now. I do not know about the future.
One year down the lane and I have created awesome products used by thousands of Airbnb hosts and I am leading tech and product at Airbtics at 21. Something my 18/19-year-old self couldn't have imagined back then. The only thing that mattered in the entire journey till now was the road not taken. Success is like SENSEX/S&P500. It will rise in the long run only if you stick around and believe in it. An important point to note here, what worked for me may not work for you. Through this newsletter, I am presenting to you my situation. It is your job to decide what’s best for you after evaluating all that you have in your hand.
Today I have somewhat modulated my activities to my peace of mind and I am happy about it. I am not sure of what lies next. What I am sure about is that I will continue doing what I love - building!
Footnotes
Thanks for reading through. I would love to hear your thoughts on my take. I would love it more if you present your take on the topic. In the next issue, I will talk about Impact and how it helped me in choosing this road. Stay tuned! Until next time!
Cheers,
Subhayan