Aaron Francis

Aaron Francis joins Kent to discuss his talk at Epic Web Conf, Epic Bets: Practical Tips for Betting on Yourself. In this conversation, Aaron reflects on his non-traditional path into tech, his experience being laid off, and how he prepared himself to be resilient in the face of career uncertainty. He shares insights on why developers should focus on skill stacking, personal branding, and long-term sustainability in their careers rather than chasing trends. Kent and Aaron also explore: • How to future-proof your career without falling into the trap of chasing hype. • Why writing and sharing your knowledge can open unexpected doors. • The importance of building a professional network before you need it. • How to balance ambition with family life and personal values. • Why giving your absolute best—both professionally and personally—is always worth it. Aaron’s perspective is both practical and inspiring, offering a roadmap for developers who want to take control of their future without sacrificing what truly matters. Watch this episode (https://www.epicweb.dev/conf/aaron-francis) . Meet Aaron at Epic Web Conf (https://www.epicweb.dev/conf) . Guest: Aaron Francis • 𝕏: @aarondfrancis (https://x.com/aarondfrancis) • GitHub: @aarondfrancis (https://github.com/aarondfrancis) • Website: aaronfrancis.com (https://aaronfrancis.com/) Host: Kent C. Dodds • Website: kentcdodds.com (https://kentcdodds.com) • 𝕏: @kentcdodds (https://x.com/kentcdodds) • GitHub: @kentcdodds (https://github.com/kentcdodds) • YouTube: Kent C. Dodds (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz-BYvuntVRt_VpfR6FKXJw) • Epic Web: epicweb.dev (https://www.epicweb.dev)

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Transcript

Kent C. Dodds

00:00:00 – 00:00:05

Hi, everybody. I'm so excited to be joined by my friend, Aaron Francis. How are you doing, Aaron?

Aaron Francis

00:00:05 – 00:00:07

I'm good. It's good to see you again.

Kent C. Dodds

00:00:08 – 00:00:13

Likewise. I'm very excited to see you in person again. And remember oh, yeah. He's, like, quite tall.

Aaron Francis

00:00:15 – 00:00:21

Yeah. The first time we met the first time we met in person was just a couple months ago. I feel like we're IRL friends now, so it's kinda

Kent C. Dodds

00:00:21 – 00:00:31

nice to meet you. Well, that like, that's something that I keep on talking about with people is when when you meet somebody in real life for the first time, it changes the relationship and, like, improves it a big time.

Aaron Francis

00:00:31 – 00:00:32

Yep.

Kent C. Dodds

00:00:32 – 00:00:40

Like, even people you don't really vibe with, once you meet them in person, you may still not vibe with them, but at least you understand them better and, like, you can relate better.

Aaron Francis

00:00:40 – 00:00:47

Yeah. You you might find out that Dax is actually a really sweet, nice person. It's gonna be a huge surprise to everyone.

Kent C. Dodds

00:00:47 – 00:00:48

Yes. I'm so excited.

Aaron Francis

00:00:49 – 00:00:56

I've I've met him. I've met him once in person, and it was it was awesome. So I'm excited to see everybody. It's gonna be a lot of fun.

Kent C. Dodds

00:00:56 – 00:01:01

Yeah. Yeah. I'm super super stoked about that. Have you met Ryan Florence yet? No.

Kent C. Dodds

00:01:01 – 00:01:05

I haven't. No. That'll be great. Yeah. Good good to get the two of you together.

Kent C. Dodds

00:01:05 – 00:01:19

Prepare to a lot of people are surprised to find out that he's, like, my height, which is pretty, like, medium height, person. So people are like, I thought you'd be taller. And, he's always like, what does that even mean? Why would you say that?

Aaron Francis

00:01:19 – 00:01:33

Yeah. I've heard I've heard a lot of people that have met, particularly Ryan Florence in person, and they're like, man, in person? He is so sweet and nice. And online, he's kind of a curmudgeon. And so I'm actually really excited to

Kent C. Dodds

00:01:33 – 00:01:41

meet him in person. Yeah. Yeah. It's gonna be great. Well, so, Aaron, you're gonna be speaking at the conference.

Kent C. Dodds

00:01:41 – 00:02:09

I I reached out to you specifically because you have this, like, work ethic and this attitude toward life in general that I just really admire, and I want more people to embody that and to to, have that down to earth mentality. Your talk title is Epic Bets, Practical Tips for Betting on Yourself. I would like you to expand on that a little bit. So what what are you, like, what's your history around this topic, and and what are you hoping to share with everybody?

Aaron Francis

00:02:10 – 00:02:31

Yeah. I'll start with what I'm hoping to share and then go back to to history. I'm I'm hoping to, I'm hoping to assuage some fears. I think there's a lot of, like, uncertainty as to what the future of our kind of industry is. And I think there are some things that you can do as a developer to make yourself more resilient.

Aaron Francis

00:02:31 – 00:03:17

And so that's kind of the crux of of what I want to share with people is, like, how do you as a working developer become a more resilient working developer? And so we can't become, like, we can't become layoff proof and we can't become AI proof, but we can, become less fragile to those things. I got laid off not too long ago, and and so I feel like I have a lot to share there because a lot of the things that I did before I got laid off set me up to be resilient, through that layoff and eventually take the big bet on myself, which was to go full time with my friend Steve doing our own thing. And so that leads a little bit to the history. I am not a, I am not a, college educated CS developer.

Aaron Francis

00:03:17 – 00:04:02

I am college educated, but in accounting. And so, there's been a lot of things that I've, like, had to learn by myself on the fly, and I've navigated a lot of, honestly, a lot of career changes, which is weird at, you know, 35. But that's I think that is normal now that by 35, you've changed careers, like, four times. And so, you know, I started as an accountant and then was in development and then did some marketing analyst stuff and then was, you know, a developer educator. And so I've done all of these things, but I think, looking back, I am grateful to myself for having stacked certain skills on top of each other that allow me to then kinda just pick and choose where I wanna go next.

Aaron Francis

00:04:02 – 00:04:15

And so those are some of the things that I wanna, you know, share with the audience and hopefully, leave people feeling like, yes, the future is uncertain, but I am taking steps to make sure that I am I am ready for that uncertain future.

Kent C. Dodds

00:04:15 – 00:04:20

Yeah. Yeah. Have you read the book Antifragile? I can't remember who authored it.

Aaron Francis

00:04:20 – 00:04:21

I haven't. Uh-uh.

Kent C. Dodds

00:04:21 – 00:04:50

Yeah. It it, the idea is that, even you you set up your company or or yourself in in such a way that when there are turbulence, you actually become stronger, which is a very interesting concept and kind of made me think of that. I think another concept that I think about with this is, you wanna build the bridge before you need to cross the chasm. Totally. And it takes a like, occasionally, a chasm is gonna show up unexpectedly.

Kent C. Dodds

00:04:51 – 00:05:01

Like, you're gonna get laid off, and you want to have, some kind of network there or something ready so that you don't have to take a leap of faith, but it's just a natural next step.

Aaron Francis

00:05:01 – 00:05:25

Yeah. And I think, I think I'm in maybe a unique position to do this because of my background, which is nontraditional. I I live in Dallas, Texas. It's not a hub for anything except, I guess, oil money. But, like, I I was able you know, I got I got laid off, and then the next week, I had literally 40 calls.

Aaron Francis

00:05:25 – 00:05:52

And so it's one of those things where I think a lot of people from the outside look and think, oh, okay. Well, they, you know, went to Stanford or whatever. They worked at some big start up or they're in the valley or, you know, whatever. And it's like, I'm just I'm kind of a guy that's been remote here in Dallas without a proper education for, you know, the past fifteen years, and, like, I'm making it work. And so I I hope that it becomes relatable that, like, hey.

Aaron Francis

00:05:52 – 00:06:13

Listen. If I can if I can write some stuff on a blog and end up getting jobs, you can absolutely do that. And that I mean, that's that is truly my story is just, like, writing stuff down and talking about it and getting opportunities. And I think that's, like, that's available to everyone. It's just really scary to do.

Aaron Francis

00:06:14 – 00:06:44

And so my goal is to hopefully encourage people to be like, you can do this. Here are some practical ways to do it, and I don't know what this will give you in the future, but I can say that it is something good. So I can't promise you're gonna get a job at x y z, and I can't promise that you're gonna go on to, you know, start a start up or whatever. But I can pretty much promise that by doing these things, you will set yourself up for some sort of good outcome, and that's that's the goal.

Kent C. Dodds

00:06:44 – 00:07:02

No. That is that is so true. Like, it's the the pursuit of greatness may not get you to the, like, place that you were trying to go, but, that that pursuit is what gears you up for wherever you end up, and and gives you more opportunities. It increases your luck surface area, all of that stuff.

Aaron Francis

00:07:02 – 00:07:03

Yep. Exactly.

Kent C. Dodds

00:07:03 – 00:07:16

Well, I'm looking forward to that talk. I think that's gonna be a really good one. People should definitely not miss it. And once you get off stage, there are gonna be a lot of people who wanna talk with you. What are some topics that you think would really get you fired up and excited to to talk with them?

Aaron Francis

00:07:17 – 00:07:47

Oh, goodness. On the off chance that anyone is, like, super into databases or Laravel, those are always those are always safe bets. I think more, broadly applicable and more, sorry, Laravel and databases, more interesting to me would be, like, living a life where it's like you're proud of what you do. Like, I've got, you know, I've got four kids under four. I've got a wife that works incredibly hard but doesn't get paid.

Aaron Francis

00:07:47 – 00:08:20

I've got a ton of, like, I've got a ton of pressure, and I want to I want to be able to look back on this stage of life and say, I tried my absolute hardest. I did my best, and hopefully, things went well. That part's outside of my control. But the concept of, like, the concept of giving it everything you got because that is the right pure and noble thing to do even when it is hard and, like, being honest and open about that. That's the kind of stuff where I'm like, I could talk about that for hours, databases too.

Aaron Francis

00:08:20 – 00:08:45

But that's the kind of, like, human stuff that I'm like, yeah. It is hard. Let's talk about how to be a dad or a mom and try to run your own company and try to show up online and not do rage bait and, like, actually share, like, part of yourself with the online world even if the algorithm doesn't like it because that's the right thing to do. And so those are the kind of things where I'm like, yeah. Let's talk about that.

Aaron Francis

00:08:45 – 00:08:46

I think it's very necessary.

Kent C. Dodds

00:08:47 – 00:09:13

Yeah. I I totally love that, and I I actually, think that your company's name embodies a lot of that. TryHard Studios. I I, I actually think about that quite often. Here on your profile page, it says Aaron Francis, cofounder of TryHard Studios, and I just think that's the coolest thing, that it's it's just such a part of who you are is that you're just gonna do your best in in whatever capacity you're in.

Kent C. Dodds

00:09:14 – 00:09:24

And there's, there are rewards, like, natural rewards from doing that, but also just, like, internally, you feel so much better about yourself because you know you did your best.

Aaron Francis

00:09:25 – 00:09:42

That's exactly right. Yep. I want to be able I want to be able to go to sleep at night and to one day hopefully look back on a long life and say, I did not leave anything on the table. And that includes on the family side. I'm not giving it all up just to, like, be some online success.

Aaron Francis

00:09:42 – 00:09:57

No. I wanna look back on my life and say, I tried my hardest at being a good dad, at being a business owner, at being a husband. And if I can do that regardless of what, you know, success I have or have not, I will feel very, very, good about the way that I lived my life.

Kent C. Dodds

00:09:57 – 00:10:06

I I absolutely love that. I feel like that's inspiring. That's exactly the sort of thing I want on stage. So thank you, for giving us some of your time to Of course. Talk about that.

Kent C. Dodds

00:10:06 – 00:10:06

And,

Aaron Francis

00:10:06 – 00:10:10

There's plenty more where that came from, so y'all y'all make sure not to miss

Kent C. Dodds

00:10:10 – 00:10:16

it. Yeah. Yeah. We got we got energy, coming to Salt Lake. So, Aaron, this has just been awesome.

Kent C. Dodds

00:10:16 – 00:10:34

There's I I could continue to talk with you about this forever, but we're gonna keep it short to encourage people to come and and have this conversation in person. So, yeah, really looking forward to having you at the conference, just two months away now. So we'll see you in, in March.

Aaron Francis

00:10:34 – 00:10:35

Sounds good. See you there.

Kent C. Dodds

00:10:36 – 00:10:36

Bye, everybody.

Epic Bets: Practical Tips for Betting on Yourself with Aaron Francis

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