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: linkedin.com/in/carey-nachenberg-14bbb03

Where to find Ryan:
• Newsletter: developing.dev
• X/Twitter: x.com/ryanlpeterman
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ryanlpeterman
• Threads: threads.com/@ryanlpeterman
• Instagram: instagram.com/ryanlpeterman