I went back to school for an MBA, emphasis in Supply Chain. The math and software side of my tech skills are valued because I'm pretty good at numerical analysis and learning the various odd software the company uses. Pay can be pretty great, depending where you go.
Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
41–50 of 82 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#42Engineering manager is probably the easiest pivot. It's a very different skillset from software engineering (more people interaction, more organization, less creativity and logic) that some people will love and others will hate, but you get to use your previous experience and there's often a pay bump and additional job security. Also consider trades like carpenter or electrician. Many software engineers also like thi…
Serious question: in general, does being a manager make you more likely to get fired or less? Heuristically I think "more likely" because why fire the front line workers doing the work when you can fire middle managers. However; I'm sure this thinking is missing quite a few important details. Maybe having direct access to work politics provides an advantage? Maybe a manager is able to sacrifice others to avoid being…
I'm not the person you originally replied to, but just to give a bit of perspective as an EM myself: I think this depends a lot on the person and the team. One part of the gig is just being an effective project manager, and those skills are somewhat more objectively measured.
Much more subtle is the relationship you have with the team you're leading. If you have a culture/vibe of mutual trust and respect, and know when the manager helps ICs versus when ICs help the manager, then the line is blurred, and the team kind of sinks or swims together. You're all playing on the same team, and your role is to some extent a metaphor of the team/product as a whole. What is a lead singer without a band, or vise versa?
If you foster an adversarial relationship, or an overly top-down, bossy kind of vibe, that schism between you and your team can devolve into something that won't withstand the downturns. Bad managers and situations lead to finger pointing and nastiness. Who gets canned in that scenario? Depends on the company and the relationship each person has with the folks up the ladder. But before this kind of situation has come to pass, there should have been some red flags raised. As a manager, if you don't/can't get along with your team, you should find a different team to manage, because you can't ever be effective without their support.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#43Pilot or air traffic control. Anything where it’s expensive to get license is good alternative.
“What’s the difference between a regional pilot and a large pepperoni pizza?” “The pizza can feed a family of four.” It’s a very long road to get to a decent paying flying job and if your reference is “well-paying like software was”, it basically never happens.
Having been a pilot (though not for an airline) and now being a software engineer I feel somewhat qualified to speak to this. Doesn’t really matter since airline pay is public and I think levels.fyi does a good job.
Captain at a major airline is attainable, it just takes time. Looks like that’s capping out at $270k right now (I’m sure I’m missing some benefits or something). Pilot pay isn’t nearly as affected by geography and multiple days of work mean an otherwise insane commute (like multiple states) is possible. An airline captain in a small town in Iowa is doing better than a software engineer. But the software engineer in Silicon Valley is doing way better. This was all prepandemic and I imagine that’s shaken up remote work pay a lot. So who knows.
But if you want to get out software because it’s a grind, stay far far away from the airlines. Sure you don’t have a scrum master breathing down your neck. You have complete autonomy to do the exact same thing over and over the exact same way until you retire. Imagine building the same app for the tenth time but no, literally, it’s the exact same app and it’s not the tenth it’s the thousandth.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#44Sorry you're feeling burnt out! It's a struggle for all of us especially during this pandemic. My advice is to try some other kinds of software development. Software development is such a vast field. I've been an engineer for a decade as well and I only really know about my specific field which is web and devops. There may be another field of engineering or specialty where your skills carry over but it's more fun and less burnout. Game development and mobile app development, for example, are very different work from my day job.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#45This sounds a lot like where I was around year ten in my career... I made a move into a niche area of technology consulting. That led to a whole lot of variety - I did pre-sales engineering, sold services, did a whole lot of high-profile consulting work, etc. Point being - if you are still enjoying technology but not the specific work you are doing or the company in which you are doing it, find a horizontal move into some other area.
Eventually, I burned out on all of it and went into real estate. That's a major jump and I wouldn't recommend it unless it's a field that really calls to you. Someone below mentioned licensing - there are a whole lot of niche fields that make the world go around. Think escrow officer, home inspector, insurance salesperson, home appraisal... not all of these might pay much, but there's a certain stability to them because it does take effort to get a license.
Speaking of which... if financial upside is part of your goal and you can get through the licensing, and if you like working with the general public... there's a good lifestyle to be made as a financial advisor / planner.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
Serious question: in general, does being a manager make you more likely to get fired or less? Heuristically I think "more likely" because why fire the front line workers doing the work when you can fire middle managers. However; I'm sure this thinking is missing quite a few important details. Maybe having direct access to work politics provides an advantage? Maybe a manager is able to sacrifice others to avoid being…
I've survived many rounds of layoffs as long as I have (decades) by refusing all attempts to move me into management. It is always the middle managers that get the boot during layoffs. I have almost never seen developers get laid off (at least not as part of mass layoffs, usually they are laid off because they are plain bad).
Usually they are laid off because they are plain bad
Or because their managers are bad, or the company is rife with politics.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#47Engineering manager is probably the easiest pivot. It's a very different skillset from software engineering (more people interaction, more organization, less creativity and logic) that some people will love and others will hate, but you get to use your previous experience and there's often a pay bump and additional job security. Also consider trades like carpenter or electrician. Many software engineers also like thi…
Serious question: in general, does being a manager make you more likely to get fired or less? Heuristically I think "more likely" because why fire the front line workers doing the work when you can fire middle managers. However; I'm sure this thinking is missing quite a few important details. Maybe having direct access to work politics provides an advantage? Maybe a manager is able to sacrifice others to avoid being…
Firing (due poor economics) is usually the result of bad management. A healthy company won’t have any need to fire an IC or manager, at least not because of economical reasons. I‘ve been in extremely stable companies (+500 employees) where no one has been fired for decades. People usually just quit when they don’t see career advancement or better opportunities. No need for an Up-or-out or bottom-10% strategy you sometimes see in big consultancies to have a healthy workforce.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#48Pilot or air traffic control. Anything where it’s expensive to get license is good alternative.
“What’s the difference between a regional pilot and a large pepperoni pizza?” “The pizza can feed a family of four.” It’s a very long road to get to a decent paying flying job and if your reference is “well-paying like software was”, it basically never happens.
Yea, piloting is fun, but a long, loooong grind. It takes a while just to start making peanuts flying regional jets. By the time you are in the big bucks range, you could have done a bachelor’s in biology, med school, your residency and become a doctor.
And starting in air traffic control has an age limit of 30 years old[1], so it might be too late for you already. Talk about even worse ageism than software!
1: https://work.chron.com/many-years-college-need-air-traffic-c...
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#49I would recommend taking time off and then starting a software job at a new company. Find a company with different culture, new people, etc.
You might as well try this first before doing something more extreme. If it doesn't help then try switching careers.
Re: Ask HN: What are well-paying alternative jobs to being a software developer?
#50I don't have an answer but something of a follow-up question: my theory on how to do this is to find a field where my stuff skills are very useful, but are a complement to the job rather than the job itself. I'm thinking of things like scientific / engineering / research endeavors where the ability to think through how to structure and work with large amounts of data in a maintainable way is a useful skill but the so…
Would also be interested in this topic. I’ve been a dev for some years now but I have always wanted to lean more into the scientific/research side of things and no idea what that path looks like or how to get there. Ultimately I’d like to end up at a lab of some sort or in a “hybrid” area like space.
So far the only ideas I’ve come across are the standard “do some related project for resume purposes and then apply to anywhere/everywhere until it works” or “go back to school for a 2nd/more relevant degree and try again”
Neither of which is particularly practical for me, but perhaps this is the way.