Even before he finished his degree at University of The West Indies, Javon was already on the hunt for job opportunities. That quest lead him to Udacity, a Massive Open Online Courses’s (MOOC’S) platform for persons wanting to work in tech and other digital spaces.
He used up all the money he had in his savings to pay for a Udacity Nanodegree. This program matches successful participants with Udacity’s hiring partners.
Well Javon did so well he was head-hunted straight out of the program by Lyft, a popular Silicon Valley ride share company to work with their self-driving car team. He knocked every stage of the interview process out the park and was eventually offered what would’ve been a big deal job.
Alas, it wasn’t to be, he was denied a work visa, the dream had collapsed.
If at this point he had tucked his tail between his leg and wondered off in a corner somewhere, everybody would’ve understood and even sympathized. Instead, Javon was hella proud, he had beat out serious competition from Ivy leaguers to get that job offer and that in and of itself was validation, he was good enough.
He was imbued with a confidence that lit a fire bigger than any visa disappointment, he kept pushing, practising and honing his skills. As it turns out a project he started working on in his spare time for practice was the ticket to landing a job at Automatic, the parent company for WordPress and WooCommerce, two of the most popular CRM platforms in the world.
He spent hours, practically the whole night learning how to edit the video from his inlaw Annesha Adams who is also a Canadian Based Jamaican Youtuber. He sent his first video out to family and friends who gave him unbiased feedback that he used to produce even better videos.
Javon is a nonconformist out-of-the-box thinker, not restricted by geography nor limited by anyone else’s myopia. That is why he never felt pressured to go the traditional route of entrepreneurship. His ultimate goal is to become a Chief Technology Officer, he just wanted to use technology to solve problems.
“I never wanted or and I still don’t want, you know that whole entrepreneur kind of lifestyle. It’s sensationalized and pushed a lot, but it’s just not something that, you know, really interests me. I enjoy solving problems and you know, running a business doesn’t seem that exciting.”
At the core Javon is a creative who challenges himself to always create value with every piece of code he writes. Now having successfully transitioned to working with Apple, Canada he has given himself the opportunity to do just that.
“I just like to create. I just wanted to keep creating things at the highest level possible. So that’s always the goal I had in mind.“
You can find Javon online on Instagram and on LinkedIn.
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