Every Career Has Jumps. These Were Mine.

Mar 10, 2025

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Steve Polacek

Your career isn’t a straight line. It’s a series of jumps. Here are the shifts that have defined my career:

Print → Web

Ink became pixels. Static turned interactive. Content moved online. New disciplines emerged overnight. Social media exploded. Startups went mainstream.

Web → App

The iPhone put apps for everything in our pockets. Mobile went from obsession to addiction. Disciplines took root. Waterfall was the status quo.

App → Product

Understanding the business, the user, and the product became non-negotiable. Disciplines grew up. Agile rewrote the playbook. Data became precious. Measure everything. Iterate often.

Product → AI

And now? We’re in uncharted territory. AI will reshape everything. Let’s see where this goes.

* * *

Every shift felt like a new frontier. But the common thread? Curiosity. Adaptability. A relentless drive to experiment and build.