As I've said, I'm not willing to give up my day job to pursue working in the Cannabis industry full time. During the day, I'm leading the effort to build our "number one priority". Despite a recent wave of coworker departures, crazy aggressive deadlines, ever shifting scope, and conflicting directives, it's an almost impossible goal I feel compelled to win. While it's extremely fulfilling work, it leaves me little time to write code for the Cannabis industry.
Recently, I spent some of that free time to participate in the Metrc API Advisory Group. The group will meet regularly with a goal of making recommendations regarding training, verification and support of API users. A separate group recommends improvements to the overall Metrc system, however the API users were not shy about sharing their desire for API changes. It was reassuring to hear how many others would like the ability to post transfer data, get response data instead of just a 200, access package history, and similar issues I've long said were missing from the API. It was also interesting to meet people who have taken the leap into full time Cannabis software work.
There's a bit of an internal struggle happening in my head. If others are able to write software full time for Marijuana related businesses, why can't I? Is it fear? Is it laziness?
I don't think so. It's that I want to write code. Sure, for my day job I still have to write documentation, design new features, architect systems, train/mentor junior developers, and more, but all of that is centered about building working software. I don't have to worry whether I'm building the right thing, only that I'm building it in the right way. The decisions of what to build, how to market, who to sell it to, and so on, is someone else's problem. They just pay me to deliver "the thing". That's freaking awesome!
Though I've really enjoyed working with Cannabis companies so far, I've come to realize I'm doing a lot more than just building software. I've had no trouble finding people who want solutions, so I haven't had to do any marketing or advertising. And since I don't charge anyone1, there's no accounting to do. So it would seems all that's left to do is build software.
But that's not the case. Very few businesses I've had contact with have a clear cut idea of what they want built. Those that do generally describe systems which may seem modest, but in reality are massive in scope and complexity. While these are the systems I want to build, the people who can envision these solutions have businesses to run, and can not "drive the bus". That means I'm left to figure out the actual problem they're trying to solve, and discover ways to alleviate the pain in the quickest, lowest effort approach possible. That's a lot of work to do in order to find software to build; especially because there can be non-software solutions which are better suited to solving the problem.
Does this mean I'm going to stop looking for software to write for the Cannabis industry? Heck no! I'm currently building a workflow solution that tracks and analyzes processing activities, both as an inventory control system, and a system to identify opportunities in increase efficiency and decrease waste. Now, instead of trying to design a marketable product, I'm going to build it because it's a fun project that could actually help people run their pot businesses. No promises and no pressure. And no more trying to figure out how I can turn this into something to replace work that I love.
Who knows. Maybe some day I'll run into a Marijuana entrepreneur who has been dreaming of building an ERP or Automation system for Cannabis Processors. Maybe one of the brave souls who have already taken the leap into the industry full time will one day have a position available that suits me. But until then, I'm going to stick with doing full time software development, and spending my free time building software because I like to build software, not because I want to build a business.
1 though I have accepted a couple of small donations to get a server up and running
