353Solutions - A Year in Review

353Solutions was founded a bit more than a year ago. I wasn't planning on doing consulting, I'm a techie and love the development abstraction layer that companies give you and let you code most of the time. (If this is not the case in the company you're working at - consider finding a better one :)

However as the old saying goes - "Man plans and god laughs". I found myself owning a teaching/consulting company called 353Solutions. So far it's fun and provides for the family - what else can you ask for?

Here are results from a short retrospective we did lately.

The Numbers

• 6 clients
• 204 work days
• 204 hours teaching Python (7 courses)

Thoughts

I like working from home, however most companies I talked to wanted some office time. This is understandable since I don't only code but also do system and process design - these roles require more face to face communication. I'm still looking for something that will allow me to spend most of my time working from home.

Teaching is fun! I did that on and off most of my professional carrier, but now it's a big chunk of my time. I'm grateful to Raymond Hettinger who started me off and showed me what a top-notch class/workshop should look like. So far I'm mostly going to companies and teaching there, but just now we launched our own classes - it will  be awesome!

The downside for teaching is that it takes me away from home. For a limited amount this is great (I spend about a week every month teaching Python in the UK). However I'm looking for opportunities that will let me teach from home - stay tuned.

The social network is by far my biggest source of new jobs. Talking to other people - it's not just me. Investing time in making connections and keeping them will pay off. The main downside for is that people want to hire me and not 353Solutions. This means I need to work harder to market the other people who I work with - I can't do everything.

Learning to say "no" was the hardest thing for me. So many interesting things to do, so many cool companies ... But I like spending time with my family, friends and hobbies. You need to find the things that make you happy and pay enough, going cheap is not a good thing in most cases. What I did in some cases was to take less money and get equity instead. Something like "technical" investing in startups.

The main point I need to improve is marketing. It's not something I like to do but feel the need, especially now that we have our own classes. I'm learning and looking for the best thing that will get maximal impact with minimal amount of time. Or maybe hire someone for that? If you know a good option  - please let me know :)