A Hero's Journey
Background#
At the time of writing this, I have roughly 12 years of customer service experience, with five of them in Trust & Safety. This department means something a little different to each company, but the underlying theme is content and user moderation. Content moderation pertains to anything the user posts on the platform, while user moderation focuses on how users interact with each other. I am currently a junior at Arizona State University pursuing a Bachelor of Science in cybersecurity and information technology. This will be the first of three degrees I plan to earn. Before this pursuit, my technical expertise did not extend past being the family’s resident computer genius growing up, or building a PC in 2020 when everyone had extra time on their hands.
Warning Signs#
When I first began at Uber in July 2024, AI was not a major focus for the company. For the longest time, its use was limited to triaging user concerns before a case was eventually handed over to a human. A little over a year later, during a slow period in our workload, my team was assigned a special project that involved closing thousands of old cases. The catch was that these cases had been archived for several months, and most were inadequately resolved. Unbeknownst to us, this backlog was the result of an earlier test of AI’s ability to solve cases. It became clear to me and the higher-ups who ordered the project that the AI was simply not ready for the task. What remained unsaid, and never officially confirmed, was that our work on these cold cases served as training data for the very AI that would eventually replace us.
Within a few months of that project, Uber’s chief technology officer revealed in an interview that the company had spent over a quarter of a billion dollars in the first quarter alone with no tangible results. Dozens of articles cited this figure as a clear indicator that AI integration was an expensive and complicated endeavor. Still, the company was not dissuaded from its goal.
Rising Tides#
The following summer brought an influx of cases, leading to several consecutive weeks of overtime. While taking on extra hours every chance I got, an opportunity arose to join Uber’s Global Security team. This move would allow me to handle cases more closely aligned with my education and long-term career goals. My performance reviews leading up to this moment were strong, I had a supportive team lead, and I was putting in the extra effort needed to stand out. I submitted my application and waited a few weeks for a response.
The deadline for this short-term assignment was July 21st. Although this fell on my day off, I woke up bright and early to check my email for next steps. While optimistic, I was not necessarily expecting good news right away, as they had only just stopped accepting applications. Instead, my inbox greeted me with quite a surprise.
Turning Tables#
Eighteen minutes. That is how old the email was that set everything in motion. The fresh message in my inbox was a brief, semi-ambiguous note from a department head, informing me and an undisclosed number of colleagues that our roles had been dissolved. This was the first of three emails on the matter, with the second explicitly citing the company’s new AI direction as the reason for the layoffs. A subsequent meeting outlined what to expect over the next thirty days to assist with our transition. By the end of that meeting, all of our system permissions had been revoked, preventing us from even saying our last goodbyes to our former coworkers.
I was disappointed but not the least bit surprised. I had already spent months looking for a new role while at Uber, applying for various data center, entry-level help desk, and cybersecurity positions. I even applied for a fair number of internships. Once I was let go, I hit the ground running. I resumed my job search immediately, fueled by the focus of someone with forty newfound hours of free time every week.
Just two days later, on July 23rd, a GitHub recruiter contacted me regarding a Trust & Safety Specialist I position. Before I even finished reading the job description, I was sold. The idea of working for GitHub, a Microsoft company, was the coolest thing I had ever heard. It had not even crossed my mind that GitHub would hire anyone outside of elite software engineers, so I had never checked their careers page. I had, however, applied directly to Microsoft for a data center role. A phone screening was scheduled for later that week, kicking off a month-long interview process.
Preparation#
The preparation for this moment did not start after my layoff. When I mentioned the extent of my technical expertise earlier, that was not the whole story. I joined Uber in July 2024 after working multiple jobs in tech and accounts receivable. I have always been fairly adept at navigating Windows, having used the operating system since I was about eight years old. Six months into my tenure at Uber, once I became eligible, I enrolled at ASU through their partnership program. I initially majored in Information Technology until Cybersecurity and IT became an available major during my second semester.
My academic journey is where I discovered what computers are truly capable of beyond pushing high frame rates in games I rarely play. I used to believe that servers were a completely different breed of computer requiring specialized hardware. Learning the reality led me down the rewarding path of self-hosting, Docker, Linux, and free open-source software. I had the foresight to document these projects so I could feature them on my resume. These included setting up a multi-node home lab cluster on an isolated router-on-a-stick network powered by OPNsense, and building a project I vibe-coded and rigorously tested for function, security, and performance before publishing it to the world. Even now, it is in an iterative development cycle with semantic versioning for provenance and accountability.
During the interview process, I learned the role involved investigating packages and repositories within the NPM registry. Thanks to my previous experience building my CircuitBreaker project, I already had some exposure to the NPM ecosystem. To prepare, I immersed myself in researching NPM and brainstorming how to apply my investigative skills to the role. I accepted that I was not going to learn JavaScript from scratch in any meaningful time frame, so I focused all my energy on mastering NPM.
Being Open to the Signs#
Around this time, I listened to an audiobook on Spotify called You Can Just Do Things. Its core philosophy is that the constraints holding us back from pursuing difficult goals are often imaginary shackles of our own creation. Much like the author, I found opportunities constantly falling into my lap; the recent GitHub recruiter message is a perfect example. The wisdom shared in just the first thirty minutes of the book was deeply impactful. It gave me the confidence to excel in a technical interview that I hastily scheduled for 5:00 AM on a Tuesday.
We have all seen the familiar horror stories floating around LinkedIn. Candidates get ghosted by recruiters after exhausting interview loops, and highly qualified applicants face trick questions designed to make them fail. One post from a recruiter detailed an applicant who fabricated a competing job offer for 30% more pay, only to lose the real role because the company refused to negotiate. Knowing LinkedIn, it was likely a fabricated story that circulates every few months. Nevertheless, the lesson stayed at the forefront of my mind when it came time to discuss my desired salary.
On Twitter (X), another trending topic kept appearing on my timeline: people asking Black professionals earning over $100,000 a year what they do for a living. This piqued my interest because that specific annual compensation was on my vision board for the year. Every day as I sit at my desk, I look up at that board hanging above my monitor. It serves as a constant, subconscious reminder of what I am working toward. The threads featured incredible roles in and out of cybersecurity, tech, science, and various director-level positions.
Execution#
There was a minor scheduling conflict that caused my technical interview to be moved from an 8:00 AM Monday slot to 5:00 AM the following Tuesday. After completing the technical assessment and my 8:00 AM behavioral interview, I took a moment for honest reflection. I rated my technical performance an 8.5 out of 10 and gave my behavioral interview a solid 10. Early the very next morning, the recruiter’s name lit up my phone screen with the best news of my life. My performance had impressed the team, and they wanted to extend an offer immediately! I could not have been more thrilled as I verbally accepted. Two days later, I received the official paperwork, allowing me to place the most satisfying check mark on my vision board. Exactly thirty days after becoming unemployed, I signed the offer letter for the biggest role of my career.
A week later, my background check cleared, and I was given a September start date! I am officially a Hubber. What felt like the longest process ever ultimately proved to be an incredibly exciting and rewarding experience.
Based on the actual day-to-day responsibilities, it might be more accurate to call the role an NPM Supply Chain Vulnerability Analyst. However, no one has the time to say all that, so Trust & Safety Specialist I covers the bases and carries an established history.
Unexpected Doors#
As I mentioned, this position is much closer to supply chain vulnerability analysis than standard content moderation. There is no user interaction, and every case requires a rigorous investigative process. I will be hunting for signs of account takeovers (ATOs), differentiating between vulnerabilities and malware, and weighing the potential impact a compromised package could have on the company, its users, and stakeholders. If this sounds exactly like cybersecurity, that is because it is.
I always pictured my first cybersecurity job having those exact words in the title, like Cyber Security Analyst. While having a specific target is helpful, a title like that would still make me a generalist. One glance at the roadmap.sh guide for cybersecurity makes it abundantly clear just how much material there is to learn, and nowhere does it point to one specific job title. That is because this industry encompasses dozens, if not hundreds, of distinct roles.
I frequently watch a YouTube channel called Low Level, which covers supply chain security incidents like the Axios maintainer ATO in March 2026, TeamPCP’s LiteLLM PyPi compromise from March 2026, or the TanStack Mini Shai-Hulud worm bug from August 2026. I watched every single one of those videos faithfully, sometimes just as background noise without a clear purpose. Then, one day, a clear purpose was dropped right into my lap. True wisdom was simply keeping my hands open to catch it.
Return with the Elixir#
The story above is mine. What follows is for anyone reading this who is where I was: a student, a career changer, or someone who just got the email. I sat down and answered the questions I wish someone had answered for me.
What did "hitting the ground running" actually look like?
I applied to roughly 7 jobs a day. About 70% of those came from LinkedIn, and the remaining 30% from Indeed. I did submit a fair number of Easy Apply applications, but for the positions I genuinely wanted, I made sure to apply directly on the company’s career site.
What surprised me was how much of the outreach I received could not be tied to a specific application. Those were usually positions relevant to older job titles on my resume, specifically in accounts receivable. What I had more of were automatic declines: the company moving on to other candidates, likely because my resume never made it past the ATS. Some positions consistently closed before reaching my resume. Amazon was one of those. I have only ever made it into one hiring process with SRP, and never again since, despite my increasing qualifications for every role they post and repost.
You were already job hunting before the layoff. What pushed you to start, and would you recommend others do the same?
Before the sudden increase in overtime near the end, I spent months where my 10-hour shifts consisted of clearing my queue in the first few hours and spending the rest of the day trying to look busy. I was not avoiding work. There was simply not a lot to do for a long time. On top of that, there were no opportunities for growth. The short-term assignment that came at the end of my tenure was only the second time something like that had come around. They had also discontinued the ASU partnership that paid for employees to go to college for free, as long as it was their first degree.
In my experience, when companies go through long lulls like that, it becomes a race to figure out who is going to make the next move. A similar situation happened at ZipRecruiter in March 2020, but seniority saved my position then and I exited on my own terms. Every time I have experienced something similar, I took the temperature and left before I was forced out. The middle third of my tenure at Uber was also not enjoyable due to my team lead at the time. That does not make for an environment conducive to staying long term.
If you see the signs, do not wait.
The GitHub recruiter reached out to you two days after your layoff. What about your LinkedIn profile made you findable?
The keywords on my profile certainly helped. I have over 5 years in Trust and Safety, and those words appear on my profile more than once. That likely put me on the radar. My role descriptions explain what I did at a high level, in terms that people who do not have my job can understand. My LinkedIn profile tells a whole narrative.
I do have experience at Circle K, Harkins, Jack in the Box, Arby’s, and AMC, but those roles are irrelevant to where I want to go. I also try to engage with posts occasionally, even if it is just a like. That puts me in more people’s network. I had the Open to Work banner on my profile. I have heard anecdotally that it turns serious recruiters away, but that has never been my experience.
How did you present your home lab and CircuitBreaker project on your resume and in interviews?
Circuit Breaker played a direct part in explaining my experience with NPM. I have been building that project in public for 6 months, and I have used NPM extensively throughout, even as a vibe-coded project. The vibe coding portion was instrumental when I was asked how I balance the use of AI agents for various tasks, like when to use a frontier model versus an open-weight model. As a security professional first, I always focused on making sure vulnerabilities were minimized.
My home lab came into play when explaining how I might test malicious packages safely. It spoke a lot toward my overall technical competence.
None of it matters if no one knows about it. Before I brought Circuit Breaker to life, I created a prototype and posted it online to a group of 32,000+ home lab enthusiasts. It received over 800 likes and 300+ comments in under a week, which gave me the motivation to bring it to fruition. I have been building in a public repo and keeping the audience informed along the way. Having a public example of your work, whether it is a portfolio or a GitHub with easy-to-follow documentation, goes a long way.
You rated your technical interview an 8.5 and your behavioral a 10. What did each involve, and how did you prepare?
Because of an agreement I signed, I cannot go into much detail about the assessments. What I can say is that the assessments cover the work you will actually be doing. Nowhere in my job description did it mention coding programs. However, it is safe to assume that most interviews will include at least a sample or hypothetical question about how to handle things technically.
The behavioral assessment was similar to many others I have taken. Adhering to the STAR method is a foolproof way to ensure good responses. I spent about 60% of my prep time on NPM-specific questions and 40% on behavioral. Querying AI for realistic interview questions and printing them out to study helped tremendously. At least 40% of the questions I practiced for each assessment were asked in some form.
What actually happened in your salary conversation, and what advice would you give?
The day after my interview, the recruiter called to say the company wanted to move forward. She asked what pay rate I would be comfortable with. The posted range for this position was between $34.xx/hr and $43/hr. My last role was almost $4 below the low end of this range, so I requested somewhere in the $35 to $37 range. My reasoning was simple: I was already satisfied getting the minimum, but if they were reaching back out that fast, I had at least a bit of runway. Throughout the process, they were clear that the runway for this position was about 6 months, after which I would be working comfortably without supervision. With that in mind, I figured there was a lot for me to learn, and the pay should reflect that.
The $100K vision board item was about speaking something into existence, not about directly requesting it from the recruiter. A combination of intentional energy and humility in my presentation is what helped me check that box. You Can Just Do Things helped. The Richest Man in Babylon helped. 50 Cent’s audiobook about his life helped.
What did the financial and logistical reality of 30 days unemployed look like?
Uber has a strong separation package. I received pay for the next 30 days, and the severance itself was sufficient to cover expenses without interruption. That allowed me to conduct my job search stress-free. Health insurance was maintained for 90 days following my separation date. The cherry on top was that they approved one final tuition payment to ASU, a program they were discontinuing at the end of the year.
This is a multi-billion dollar company, so I am well aware this was a unique package that not many people receive. It underscores the importance of being with a company that offers benefits beyond just the salary.
How did you manage your time and mental health while balancing school, job searching, and a home lab?
The busiest part of my schedule was when I had a full-time job, attended 16+ credits during the fall, 12 during the summer, and worked on my home lab. Home lab work functioned as reinforcement learning for what I was studying in school. Online courses teach the same material as in-person courses in half the time, so there are not a lot of hands-on opportunities. The lab filled that gap.
My mornings consisted of running system updates on my lab while applying to jobs I found on LinkedIn for the first 2 hours of the day. I wake up at 4 AM every day, so there is plenty to accomplish in that time. I walk my dog right after or in between applications. By then, it is about time to cook breakfast for the family. After I eat, I study and learn new material while it is still the morning. I might have an occasional workout in the afternoon, some light chores, and review material in the evening with leisurely tinkering in the lab.
Eating healthy and drinking plenty of water goes a long way for mental health. Keeping a productive routine as if you still have a job keeps your body motivated and ready to punch a clock when the time comes.
You moved from customer service into cybersecurity. How did you frame your non-technical experience as an asset?
Where there were connections to be made, I leaned on them heavily. At the end of the day, the weakest link in any security system is people. With that in mind, I simply needed the perspective to frame it properly and the determination to apply it where relevant. At Uber, there were people from all walks of life in Trust and Safety: former legal professionals, law enforcement, sales, billing. The field is not as gatekept as it appears.
Speaking with confidence comes from doing research, rehearsing, speaking things into existence while no one is around, involving your significant other in your plans to keep you accountable, and practicing.
What would you do differently, and what advice would you give to three different people: a graduating student, a young adult looking for their first real role, and an experienced professional facing a layoff?
I was let go on July 21st, contacted by GitHub on the 23rd, and in a screening call by the 27th. I signed an offer on August 21st. A majority of my time unemployed was spent in the hiring process with the company of my dreams. There is not a lot I would change about what I did once I was let go.
In the months leading up to it, I would have spent time studying for my Security+ certification. My academic pursuits combined with my experience and a Security+ certification would have made me a much more competitive candidate for entry-level cybersecurity positions.
To the graduating student: put all of your projects somewhere people can see them. Be loud and proud about your accomplishments and the work that you do.
To the young adult looking for their first real role: the pay rate is not the end-all be-all. Look at the whole package and who is presenting it. Most people have heard of ZipRecruiter, Uber, and GitHub.
To the experienced professional facing a layoff: be patient and vent your frustrations anywhere but in public. I am not saying that not making a LinkedIn post following my separation was what set me apart. However, not making one was consistent with how I explained my separation in interviews. I was non-emotional and explained that it had nothing to do with performance. It helped that several dozen of my former colleagues had already made posts, along with the global 10% reduction making the news.