3 Strategies That Helped Me Turn a 40-Hour Side Hustle Into $18K

Matt Stine Headshot
By: Matt Stine
Published:
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In 2015, I made $18,000 from a 56-page O’Reilly book titled Migrating to Cloud-Native Application Architectures.

Time clocked from the first word typed to publication? 40 Hours.

I’m not here to sell you a magic formula. A surface-level analysis might suggest this was nothing but dumb luck. But it would be wrong.

Honestly, I never sought out the opportunity to write the book. I did, however, engage in three strategic “luck creating” behaviors that I still continue.

Anyone can be strategic!

These behaviors don’t produce results. But they do produce opportunities!

1. Practice Creating in Public

I loved attending conferences from the start. By 2007, I wanted to start speaking. I did two things:

  • I joined a Toastmasters Club so that I could create a fast feedback loop.
  • I started a Java User Group so I could practice and meet other speakers.

This practice produced a 2010 invitation to join the No Fluff Just Stuff (NFJS) tour, which produced countless opportunities to practice speaking and writing.

In 2014, the industry was trying to figure out the cloud. I was working on Cloud Foundry at Pivotal, and I quickly found myself at the center of this conversation.

The big question? What does an app targeting the cloud look like?

After doing some research, I believed the ideal cloud app intersected directly with a new architectural style people were calling microservices. I told my boss we needed to be the microservices platform, and I wrote the first book with “cloud-native” in its title.

3. Cultivate a Network of Like-Minded Professionals

I haven’t told you how any of this turned into my opportunity to write the book.
Every significant opportunity that has come my way has been delivered by someone I cultivated a relationship with years ago.

  • Instead of hiding in my room after a long day of NFJS sessions, I joined the other speakers for dinner. That’s where I met Neal Ford, who years later recommended me to O’Reilly Media, the book’s publisher.

  • Instead of simply consuming Spring, I built relationships with its creators. Years later they offered me a job that eventually transformed into becoming the microservices expert at Pivotal.

I started cultivating both of these relationships years before they produced opportunities. A strong professional network is like a well-tended garden. Cultivate it well, and it will eventually produce a bounty.