For an essay in English class, I’m supposed to research my chosen career path and talk about what someone might expect when pursuing it. Obviously, my major is Computer Science, with an as-of-yet undeclared focus, so I’m going to be discussing careers in software development.

One of the required elements of this essay project is to contact a professional in your chosen field and interview them about their work, both in their current job, and their career as a whole. I’ve been given a long list of interview questions to choose from. I won’t include the whole list for the sake of brevity but here are some examples:

What is your job like? ○ –A typical day? ○ – What do you do? What are the duties/functions/responsibilities of your job? ○ – What kinds of problems do you deal with? ○ – What kinds of decisions do you make? ○ – What percentage of your time is spent doing what?

● How did you get your job? What jobs and experiences have led you to your present position?

● What are the most important personal satisfactions and dissatisfactions connected with your occupation? What part of this job do you personally find most satisfying? Most challenging? What do you like and not like about working in this industry?

● What were the keys to your career advancement? How did you get where you are and what are your long­range goals?

● If your job progresses as you like, what would be the next step in your career?

● What obligations does your employer place have on you outside of the ordinary work week? What social obligations go along with a job in your occupation?

● – Are there other things you are expected to do outside work hours? Are there organizations you are expected to join?

● If you could do things all over again, would you choose the same path for yourself? Why? What would you change?

And things of that nature. It gets a little personal but the focus seems to be on giving the student an idea on what their job might be like if they decided to pursue that career path.

I’m asking the Rust community specifically because I would love to get into the kinds of engineering that Rust is good for: fast and low-level. I think a Rustacean could provide unique perspective on this choice, because if you’re into Rust then you’re obviously interested in systems programming but you’re unhappy with the status quo.

I would probably prefer speaking to someone who is currently using Rust at work or is seriously looking to incorporate Rust into their work, because that’s the kind of perspective I want: what kind of future do you think Rust has in the industry? Obviously you see a bright one because otherwise you wouldn’t be here.

It probably goes without saying that the assignment requires that the interviewee currently be employed in some sort of software development capacity, but I figure I should say it anyways. All disciplines are welcome but I’d really like to talk to someone who works in operating systems, graphics, game, or simulation development, because those are my primary areas of interest.

Addendum: though the assignment doesn’t dictate it, the interviewee should probably have a relevant degree like Comp Sci, since we’re ostensibly discussing my choice of major. However, if you got a job working on this kinda stuff based on merit alone, I’d love to hear about your experience!

Of course, Rust and Servo team members are welcome, but I know you guys have a lot on your plates and I would hate interrupt your awesome work.

We can conduct the interview in your medium of choice. The assignment recommends a phone conversation but email or IRC or Skype are fine too. The interview itself probably won’t take more than an hour but we could talk all day if you have the time.

I will need some identifying information to complete the assignment, mainly your real name, job title and contact info, and the name and contact info of the company or organization with which you are currently employed. We can cover that during the interview, I don’t need it up front. If you’ve seen me around on here, Reddit or GitHub, you know I’m legit, so I don’t want anyone to think I’m phishing or anything like that.

I wish I could interview you all but unfortunately I’m only supposed to interview one person, so if more than one person responds I’m going to have to choose. So if you’re interested, please reply (or PM/email) with just a little bit about yourself, where you work and what you do, as well as some way to contact you. I’ll let everyone know when I’ve made my decision (probably in a week or so, or when responses seem to be dying down) and contact the person I chose.

Thank you for your time!

Volunteers not in this thread: