I gave a career day talk at Imagine High, the local arts and technology high school here in Chilliwack. This is the kind of school where the kids who don’t fit in, fit in. All the artistic, neuro-spicy, creative, weird, geeky kids who tend not to enjoy, or thrive, in a “normal” high school gravitate to Imagine. And it was a strange talk to give, not just because I recently lost my job, but also because I wasn’t talking about having a career but rather having many careers throughout your life. Unlike the police officers, firefighters, paramedics, colleges, or universities giving their talks, I was saying not only is your career path wide open, it’s not going to be a single path at all.
Friends know my story. From scientist to web developer, consultant to writer and more, I’ve done a lot of things. I’ve broken new ground along the way, paving the way for people behind me. Professional blogging became the creator economy, business blogging became content marketing, social media management is now just part of the communications mix. My talk covered the whole timeline from wanting to be a paleontologist when I was a kid to now, 50 years later.
Here’s the deck as I gave it. I don’t use notes in my decks, so you’ll have to piece the parts together. On the other hand, you’re spared all the dad jokes, bad puns, and attempts at humor that didn’t always land on the high school crowd. Which is more than I can say for the poor teacher who had to listen to my shtick four times. On the plus side, I showed the teacher how to use ChatGPT to kick start her lesson plans and my standing bet that you can’t stump me for a blog post idea based on whatever topic you throw at me remains unbroken (but I came close to having to pay up. Really close.)