A Bit About Who I Am and What I Do
Hello there strangers (or do I know you?)! I'm Serdar Salim.
I spent 9 years at Twitter training global teams and managing crisis response systems across three continents. But here's what I'm really proud of: I built my life so systematically that when corporate life ended, I had the freedom to travel 25 countries with my wife and figure out what I actually wanted to create. Now I build tools that help people get that same freedom and clarity.
Let me tell you how I got here: I was born in Ordu, in northern Turkey - the region that produces 75% of the world's hazelnuts. When I was 8, my family moved to Austria, to Tyrol of all places. Talk about culture shock - going from remote Turkish countryside to somewhere that's been famously called "far away from Europe." Tyrol is one of the most beautiful places in the world and pretty underrated for some reason.
Most people outside of Europe don't even know where Austria is, constantly confusing this small country with Australia. Folks, Austria used to be part of a major empire (the Habsburgs) and even infamously started a World War! No joke, one time I went to the Austrian Embassy in Malaysia and there were signs showing they're not affiliated with Australia. Yet there were still people that day who came to the embassy thinking it was the Australian one.
I studied Transcultural Communication at the University of Graz because of my fascination with languages, culture, and how people connect. I've always had an affinity with technology, history, finances, and global affairs. I guess you'll see that a lot in my content.
After Austria, I moved to Ireland to work in tech. My dream was to work at Google or some big tech company where they work on cool things and lots of smart people roam around. Google kept shooting my applications down for some reason - I was once close to landing a job at YouTube. My first major role was as a community manager at a video game company in Dublin, and from there I landed what I thought was my dream job: working at Twitter in 2013.
I spent 9 incredible years there as a Program Manager. My primary role was onboarding and training global teams, especially content moderation agents across East Asia. That role took me around the world. Since much of our work was centered in the Philippines, I relocated there for two years to be closer to operations. Eventually I returned to Ireland briefly, before giving in to the magnetic pull of Southeast Asia. This time I moved to Singapore, where life took an unexpected and beautiful turn: I met and married my wife.
Shortly after our wedding came the 2023 layoffs. Honestly, I'd been contemplating leaving corporate life for years, but Twitter was so good it didn't even feel like a job - that's what kept me hooked. The layoffs were exactly the push I needed to finally do something new. Thanks to my financial planning obsessions, I had enough runway to keep going without corporate jobs for a few years. So we traveled. For 2 years. 25 countries. Learned and told countless stories. Had lots of fun!
And now? I'm building. I'm working with AI to create useful tools - things that solve real problems and help others. Personal finance trackers, planning systems, tools that make life easier. I believe that living with purpose and helping people level up their lives is what I'm here for. That's what gives me the most joy and keeps me going.
- Serdar Salim