AI is rewriting the rules of work in real time. The skills rising to the top are exactly the ones first-gen professionals have had to figure out alone. You're more ready than you think though. Let's prove it together.
Who this is for
AI didn't create the gap. It just made it more expensive to ignore. If you're in tech (or breaking in) and you're first-gen, you've been navigating blind. Smart, capable, and still second-guessing every move. That's not just a you problem.
You're doing the work. The promotions aren't coming. And nobody's told you what's actually holding you back.
You know how to do the job. Selling yourself, managing up, working the room? That's a different playbook. Nobody handed you that one.
Career pivot, new role, breaking into tech for the first time. You've got one shot to do this right. Vibes won't cut it.
Competence isn't the problem. Clarity, confidence, and a real direction forward: that's what's missing.
The Framework
Most career coaching starts with your resume. This starts with you. Your values, your needs, your strengths. Every goal we set is gated on knowing exactly who you are and what you're trying to become.
We map your values, needs, and strengths before we touch your career. No clarity on those, no credible goals.
We name what success actually looks like for you. Not the version your LinkedIn feed told you to want.
We develop the frameworks, language, and skills to move with intention. No more second-guessing.
We track outcomes, not effort. Every engagement is goal-gated.
About Derrick
I'm a first-gen professional with over a decade of experience in enterprise tech, across companies like IBM, Datadog, and LinkedIn. For the past 4 years I've worked in Learning and Career Development, and alongside my career I've mentored underserved undergraduates navigating the exact same questions you're probably sitting with right now. I know what it's like to walk into those rooms without a roadmap. Because I've been there.
This coaching practice started as a passion project, and that's still what it is. I built it because I care, and because I've watched the tech landscape shift in ways that disproportionately affect first-gen professionals who already have to work twice as hard to decode a system that was never designed for them. My background, my experience seeing where this industry is heading, and what I understand from living it myself: that combination is what makes this different. I'm not just credible. I genuinely give a damn.
Derrick Kwan, Career Coach
Work With Me
Personalized coaching for first-gen professionals in tech who are ready to stop second-guessing and start moving with intention. If that sounds like you, fill out the form below.
I work with a small number of people at a time, intentionally. Not to be exclusive, but because real coaching requires a real relationship. Every person I work with gets my full attention.
