For the first time ever on this website, here is the blog that I want to share about my journey for the last year. This is not absolutely related to tech stuff, it is just my
food for thought and to remind me how I'm being here now. Hope you can find some sympathy and inspiration for your upcoming challenges ahead. The last year, 2022 remarked the biggest and most risky decision I have ever made: moving to Finland to pursue experience, knowledge, and balance in life. Things started back in Jan that year, the agent recruiter approached me for the amazing opportunity to relocate to Finland with the job that I have been chasing for some time. But this move is not as easy to decide as it looks. Firstly, I was having a good job at a big-tech bank enterprise with a branch in Ho Chi Minh City, its good salary package with benefits has always made me stay though I was not really fond of the daily tasks I was doing. That steady source of income has helped me significantly through lots of my problems. But as a hungry person chasing knowledge, I felt there was no more room for me to grow in all the skills I wanted to focus on (coding and automation stuff). Please don't get me wrong here, I always am thankful for the time being there, working with amazing people and managers, I did not become a better automation engineer but absolutely became a better quality engineer with a stronger mindset. As the result, the first problem is the job that is not so much related to the skills I want to improve for my long-time career.
Secondly, about income, from bottom of my heart, I believe I can do better and get what I really deserved. I still want to push myself harder. A lot of YES but also lots of NO from interviews, it was a bit displeasing but I finally got what I want, another offer (a fintech company providing solutions for banking) with 150% more in salary than my current job. It is ideally high salary than any Automation Test Engineer with 3 YOE at that time (even higher than my friends with Developer positions and way even higher than p90 >5-YOE automation engineers). But does that really ease the pain that this position would cost me more time and a less balance job to deal with? The last problem, work-life balance, I strongly believe we have to go after this in our life. Being a part of this industry can cost us several health issues (eye symptoms, backache, obesity, and so on). It's better to work at your best and rest when you can, recharge your batteries, and keep the good work up. In the end, this move to Finland answers all problems above but I have to get out of my safe zone and always be ready for big challenges ahead to be a part of this society. It started with no friends, no relatives, everything is new in many aspects. I'm happy that things are way better now after 6 months of being here. I got new friends, amazing co-workers, and a great company where I can do what I love and a clear to-do list for upcoming months later. All I can advise is to fight for your dreams, life would not be easier even when you are down. Everyone has the same amount of time a day but the difference is how you spend it.
Happy new year 2023 everyone and happy testing to my followers 😁.