Episode 15 – How Jeff Johnson went from being an apprentice to working for Microsoft

Jeff’s Bio:
Jeff Johnson is a Seattle based engineer passionate about the craft and the end user. He has been a startup CTO, Program Manager, and most recently Software Engineer working on Microsoft Office Graphics. Originally from Ohio and earning a degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Illinois Tech in Chicago, Jeff has been working his way out west to enjoy the vibrant tech community and amazing landscapes.
You can find Jeff’s work on Github.
Episode Highlights and Show Notes:
Arsalan: I know Jeff from a long time ago and I mentored him and now he’s off to really good things.  Who is Jeff Johnson? Jeff, please describe yourself.
Jeff: I am a computer guy by day/night and hike guy by weekends. I’ve been passionate about engineering since childhood. Now, I’m able to do it professionally as a software engineer at Microsoft.
Arsalan: I know you have done different things at Microsoft. Please tell us a little about what you’ve done.
Jeff: I began as a program manager. Fresh out of college, I joined the charting team: Data Visualizations. We are responsible for visualizations throughout Office. Our platform runs in Word, Excel, and Powerpoint. It was a great experience. We would actually go to people’s houses and watch them use Excel. It was great having that kind of interaction.
Arsalan: You’ve been on both sides. You’ve been a manager and you’ve also been a hardcore developer. From my own experience working with you, I know that you are a top-notch developer. It’s very interesting that you are interested in managing because a lot of developers are not.
Jeff: It was something that I was interested in, but it was really hard to get away from engineering. I’ve had some startup experience and see myself doing something similar in the long-term. Whether as part of a large corporation or on my own, part of my interest is finding out what kind of problems people need solved, whether they know about it or not. I’m looking for ways to make their work or their lives better. It was very attractive to me.
Arsalan:  For someone thinking about going into programming, they might be unsure what it is going to be like. I think it would be helpful for them if you could walk through your first encounter in programming so that other people can get inspired by it.
Jeff: My first experience would have been in 5th or 6th grade and starting out in PHP. I was playing video games at the time. I wanted to make a website for our clan. I started out chugging through tutorials online, which at the time were pretty fragmented. It was hard to hold together some of those resources. I started with copying and pasting things and watched what just a few lines will do to stuff right on my computer. It was amazing to me having that kind of control and ability to make something work like that on my own.
Arsalan: The feeling of creativity is very exciting.
Jeff: One of the things that I love about programming is that you are building upon either what you have built or something that others have built. There are very little instances of throwing something away and starting something fresh. It’s more incremental progress. Everyday you’ve moved the needle a little more because maybe one day you started at zero, but the next day you started somewhere else. I think that’s one of the things that are truly unique about the field itself. It’s because you are building bigger and bigger progress.
Arsalan: A lot of people think that software development can be a vehicle for change in society. People talk about making a dent in the universe. They want to bring about changes and they think that is the way to do it.
Jeff: Computers are able to be duplicated because once you build it once; you can put it in so many places. Anyone can have influence on a local sphere, but with programming you can distribute it to so many people...

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