Luki Danukarjanto - Stuff I Wish I Knew Earlier: Unlock Your Career Potential

Copyright 2017 Luki Danukarjanto

Published by Iguana Books

720 Bathurst Street, Suite 303

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

M5S 2R4

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise (except brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of the author or a licence from The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For an Access Copyright licence, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1-800-893-5777.

Publisher: Mary Ann J. Blair

Editor: Jen R. Albert

Front cover image: Jessica Albert

Author photograph: Ariana Kris Photography http://www.arianakris.com

ISBN (paperback): 978-1-77180-239-0

ISBN (hardcover): 978-1-77180-242-0

ISBN (EPUB): 978-1-77180-240-6

ISBN (Kindle): 978-1-77180-241-3

This is an original print edition of Stuff I Wish I Knew Earlier.

To all the people who are lost or stuck in their careers, this is for you.

But also for my wife, kids, and family in helping me reach my potential.

Thank you for taking the time to read this book. You could have been doing something else, yet you chose to read my content. I hope that you can turn this knowledge into results.

I want to thank my wife, Clara, for supporting me throughout my transition and the growth that has come since. I love you. To my two sons, Keane and Lochlan, it will be interesting to see what they become given all the SIWIKE theyll be getting.

Thank you to my parents, who gave me all the support a son could ask for, and to my sisters and brother, who each had a hand in teaching me while we continue to grow up together, and who were all subjected to the early version of this book before we passed the first editing hurdle (sorry for that and hopefully this version makes up for it).

Many thanks to the GNO boys: my high school friends who still support me. To all my mentors and colleagues from Deloitte with special recognition to John Mavriyannakis, Stephen Resar, Ravi Mohabir, Cielito Ward, DArcy Mathias, Jeff Bowman, Karl Lui, Kelvin Kang, and Paul Held. Whether you knew it or not, I learned a ton from you. I would love to single out everyone else, but this would be the consulting address book of Canada if I were to list everyone. To everyone who has formally and informally mentored me, I truly appreciate you and this SIWIKEs for you.

Thanks to the (official and unofficial) team that helped evolve FOCUS Inspired: Bonnie Wong, Stan Ly, Eva Yung, Garros Fung, Ben Wan, Karee Chen, and Josephine Ahady, who continue to be great champions of the FOCUS Inspired mission to unlock the career potential of everyone. They are constant (or just occasional) sounding boards for my crazy ideas, and they provide sanity checks to keep me focused and grounded.

Thanks to Jen Albert for doing a fantastic editing job and making my writing more readable. As well as Kelvin Kong, Mary Ann Blair, Greg Ioannou, Maggie Langrick, Michelle MacAleese, and Scott Fraser, who helped with various stages of the publication of the book. Thanks to my initial version proofreaders: Jason Yeung and Youyee Chen. To Martin Buktaw for cover art concepts and Jessica Albert for the cover art design. Plus all the friends who voted for their favourite cover design.

Thanks to all my clients who let me help them. Ill be a little corny and say that youve probably helped me more than I helped you.

And finally, to my mentors I have yet to meet, I hope I have done justice in DJing out your messages. I plan to personally shake your hand one day to thank you for the insights youve provided.

I call myself a DJ for personal and professional development. A DJ (or disc jockey) mixes different sources of recorded music, sometimes adding their own beats to produce a different experience. I mix what Ive learned from others with my own experiences and play it back. Many popular beats are just a repackaging of music from generations before. The same thing can be applied to advice about personal and professional development. Many of these concepts have been popularized in recent years, but some have actually been around for decades, centuries, and sometimes millennia. Did Christopher Columbus create the Americas? Perhaps. He definitely made it known to a part of the world that was previously unaware of its existence. Similarly, I give credit to those from whom I have learned. The material theyve produced echoes what I understand. I have by no means consumed all the content out there, and if something is not attributed, it does not mean that I created it. It just means that I havent yet encountered a specific resource that details the content, and I am looking to popularize it for the benefit of the readers.

As you read the content of the book, dont do anything because I say so. Do it because you agree with it and feel it would add value to you. Dive into the content in more detail just as you might listen to the original track in the DJs mix. And consult a professional if youre really stuck!

With that said, lets get on with the show!

You have amazing potential. You know it. In your heart. In your soul. The feeling might be exceptionally strong, or a little more subdued. But you know you have the potential for greatness.

You might know exactly what that potential is, but not how to use or unlock it. Or you might not know what it is, but you feel you can give the world much more than youre on track for now. But how

Dont worry. I was exactly the same as you. And Ive helped many like us to get on a path to reach their career potential. I hope that you are excited to join me as I recount my journey from moderate achievement to success, as I know you will see parallels to your own journey.

Before I share the guidance that will get you on the path to unlocking your potential, I should tell you a bit about myself, shouldnt I?

I was born in Jakarta, Indonesia, and my parents decided to move to Canada when I was about three years old. I had a typical middle-class upbringing. (Nothing to make a movie about.) I grew up and decided on a degree in computer science for a few reasons: my dad worked at IBM, the dot-com bubble was growing (so everything was about Silicon Valley this and Silicon Valley that), and I was a teenage boy who liked video games. My university life wasnt anything special. Oh, I almost failed out of my co-op program in first year. Sorry, Mom and Dad, if youre reading this for the first time, but hey, I made it through. Eventually I settled in and started doing reasonably well. Enough to pass at least. But not enough to make the deans list and achieve what most parents want for their kids.

And great timing on my part, as I graduated just as the dot-com bubble burst. Luckily, I had some work experience through the co-op program. So I was getting interviews and job offers here and there. Luckier still, I had a friend whose brother was looking for a coder. He helped me get an interview, and I ended up getting the job (actually, I jumped for joy after the recruiter hung up the phone, so it was a big deal). The job was as a coder, and perhaps luckiest, it was with Deloitte as part of their technology consulting service area. And it started out great! Unfortunately, I realized a few short months later that I didnt like coding. I had thought I didnt like coding in school because it was school. So, it was tough to say to myself that maybe I didnt make the right decision. Crap! I was stuck. Or was I?