Ask HN: Non-programming, 'thinking' jobs?

The non-profit types have loads of people who are not-PhDs who do clever think-tank style work for the government. Lots of report writing mostly, but if you can get latched onto some IRAD type project and do internal R&D work, you can see some really cool stuff -- I'm pretty sure I've seen the first ever real-time fusion of geospatial data from six different imagery platforms in a 3d environment. But even the report writing can be interesting, things like open-source studies of countries, industries, facilities, etc. But they can also be a back door into the lab work if you work for one of the managing organizations (like Battelle). Look into them closely as they also tend to have fairly large internal R&D departments. It's possible to make a career working on IRAD projects and responding to SBIR grants. Both are pure research.

Other places do things like geospatial systems research, text mining, information visualization, network security research (which for lab purposes usually requires lots of high level systems understanding or solid math, not as much low level hacking as you might expect, lots of the work is in predictive theories and social network analysis), pattern detection, image analysis, image change detection -- lots of good places for applied math, acoustic triangulation, emergency response modeling and simulation, etc. Think DARPA style research, which the labs do lots of work for.

If you are into hardware, there's also plenty of that, communication systems, weapons testing (like naval guns), hardware encryption systems, phased array radars, biochem detection systems, rapid prototyping, radiation detectors etc.

Most of these don't require PhD backgrounds, and if you hit all the ones you are interested in, you might find something that sticks.

Honestly, given your background, you'd probably find a better home at the labs than the companies. But the hiring cycle is abysmally slow, don't take a non-response as evidence of a lack of desire to hire. 6-12 month wait times on call backs are not uncommon. Often followed by 5-20 years of happy employment.

I personally found both the lab and non-profit environments a bit too rarefied for my tastes. But I do miss being surrounded by brilliant people every day. Also, keep in mind that some of these are enormous organizations, Google-sized by way of comparison, their campuses can be measured in square-miles, not acres and they often have tens of thousands of employees. If you don't live in the States (or aren't a citizen), there are probably equivalent organizations in your home country. Often there is lots of cross-pollination as well, I worked on projects with the Brits, the Italians, Singapore and the Aussies.

The DoD may not have direct control but they do have some influence, even if only indirect.

In my opinion the wonderful thing about programming is that it is the job with the lowest barrier of entry, to which your thinking, your thoughts, have the most direct and lasting effect on your employer's business.

As it's been pointed out on this thread already, the jobs in which you have the most effect and the most amount of thinking have very high barriers to entry, i.e., the corporate executive, or aren't well paid, e.g. the artist or writer, or don't have any real effect in the world, e.g., the romance language professor (humanities academic)... that is to say, there are trade-offs.

In general the thing that bothers me the most about non-programming thinking jobs, being a professor, thinking about policy, business strategy, or whatever seems to be the way you qualify or train yourself for the job- most of the time it means thinking or doing things that don't relate to your interest- business school, law school, MFA, whatever- but what do you do to become a better programmer? Program.

FWIW, my suggestion was specifically to have art as a hobby, not a job. This way, it doesn't need to make you any money. Just to provide an escape and/or a stress relief. And in this case, who cares what others think of your work? You do it because you want to.