GoogleX Chief Scientist On Imposter Syndrome, Career Growth, Project Taste

Carey Nachenberg was a Chief Scientist at a GoogleX moonshot, a Fellow (senior most eng at Symantec) and a professor at UCLA. I interviewed him about his career story and we discussed:

• Story behind his growth to IC10 (VP equivalent)

• How high-level IC recruiting works

• How imposter syndrome held him back

• How to develop “project taste”

• How AI is affecting his students

Timestamps:

(00:00) Intro

(00:54) Growth to Fellow at Symantec 

(13:13) The most complex malware

(16:13) Why C was faster than assembly

(17:17) Imposter syndrome

(21:28) What matters more than intelligence

(28:03) Experience at GoogleX

(34:24) Leaving GoogleX

(37:43) Experience at Lyft

(43:40) Getting credit on collaborative projects

(46:53) Becoming a professor at UCLA

(49:13) How to speak well

(53:23) How AI affected his students

(1:03:53) Career regrets

(1:07:16) Finding work you enjoy

(1:09:03) Advice for younger self

(1:11:04) Outro

Where to find Carey:

•  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carey-nachenberg-14bbb03/

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