Small steps, Big dreams

proudly announcing Tech and Tea

I’m excited to officially announce this newsletter, Tech and Tea.

What is Tech and Tea?

Tech and Tea is sitting down to a steaming cup of tea with a trusted friend who you can talk to openly about navigating the messiness of life with a career in tech and figuring all this *waves hands* out.

How do you show up as a good partner, parent, and employee?

How do you figure out what’s next in work and life?

What do you want, actually want, if climbing the career ladder sounds utterly uninteresting to you?

How do you find time for self-care, family time, work, exercise, and partnership?

What the heck is going on with crypto/web3/NFTs/chat-gpt? (And how much should you be paying attention?)

How do you deal with growing cynicism of the VC system and capitalism?

Let’s talk about the real stuff, not the filtered topics that make it to conference talks and most blog posts.

If you’re new here, you can check out the main page to get a sense of what I like to write about.

From small miracles to big dreams

It’s one of my dreams to write full-time.

I’ve been a bit afraid to put it out there, without knowing how exactly I’ll get there, but now I have. Not writing to sell you a coaching program, or as a small part of my other employment, but to write what I want as the bulk of my income-generating work.

For a long time, I’ve felt unsure of where to write. Should I separate out my writing into buckets around engineering leadership, parenting, partnership, and coaching?

But life isn’t like that, as much as focused publications would like you to think, and neither is my writing. Lessons that originate in any of the above spaces ripple through all aspects of my life.

I think there’s a place for this kind of writing that’s less about technical topics and more about navigating life in tech. It’s certainly what I want to read more of.

Now, as many of you in tech probably know, bridging the gap between tech salaries and full-time writing salaries is a bit daunting, and I’m really not entirely sure how and when it’s going to work, but this is a step towards figuring it out.

As an exceedingly practical person, for most of my life, I’ve mostly gone for what is right in front of me, what I know I can easily achieve (with a few big leaps here and there). This approach has brought me pretty far in a fulfilling and rich life. But if I were to find one place where I want to dream big and work towards big goals, I’m going all in on writing.

For the past few years, this newsletter has represented a space that I’ve carved out for myself and tucked away from the many many demands of startup and parenting life, a space for me to write and share with all of you. If you are a parent or have spent time with parents of young kids, you know that just this feat is a small miracle.

Over the past few months, I’ve felt a quiet internal simmering, a steady gestation and growth in my desire to write more, and to build on this space. I’ve kept an eye on that feeling, checking in on it week over week, not forcing it to be something it’s not, enjoying its steadfastness and trusting in its persistence.

Now, I’m finally at a place in my life where I’m ready to dream a little bigger, and for this space to expand from a little closet I carved out for myself, into something much more.

It’s time for this newsletter to graduate from Jean’s Newsletter to Tech and Tea.

I’d love to have you join me for tea

I’ve been wanting to turn on paid subscription for awhile now, and a lot of thoughts have held me back:

I need to publish 3x a week, and I don’t have the time to do that yet.

People pay for subscriptions to stuff that is run full-time, is well-researched, and includes interviews. I don’t do any of those (yet).

Once I make it paid and have to write on a schedule, it’s going to feel like a chore, and I won’t enjoy it anymore.

I need to prepare a whole week’s worth of launch posts (as recommended by substack’s guide to going paid) and when am I going to find the time to do that?

I need to think of the perfect name.

All these thoughts and more have crossed my mind these past few months. Maybe you too know what it’s like to have these sorts of thoughts…

Thankfully, I’m not a perfectionist, and I’m also an impatient person, so I’m going to dream big and also take an iterative approach, trusting that inching my way forward is better than being paralyzed by indecision. It may not be the optimal launch, but done is better than perfect. Over time, I believe that my newsletter will reach those who it’s meant to.

What does it mean to subscribe?

What you get as a subscriber will evolve as I carve out more time for writing, and I’m excited by this forcing function for me to make space for more self-expression.

For now, for free subscriptions, you can roughly expect biweekly posts.

For paid subscriptions, probably an extra members-only post or two per month, along with ability to start chat threads about whatever you want!

For founding members, I’d love to connect with you over a phone call, and chat with you about whatever you’d like. If you’re in the US, I’ll also send you my custom tea blend, which I’ve gifted to friends over the years, and I recently found out is sometimes referred to as “Jean Tea.”

Let’s figure this out together, and let’s have fun. Please share this post with any friends who would be interested in joining the conversation as well.

With so much gratitude,

Jean