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Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

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Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#101

Post by richardknop »

Yes, you should get involved in technologies you want to pivot to and be part of the open source. And it doesn't mean just creating a quick hello world app and sticking it to your Github profile.

Side projects which are basically a "hello world" in framework X are not impressive so don't waste time with polluting your Github with N hello world examples.

Instead create something more substantial, either contribute directly to the library/framework which is core of the new tech or build some useful new addition to the ecosystem.

Write some blog posts along the way as you learn and become more and more familiar with the technology and different edge cases.

This, from my experience will get you a lot of interviews.

Also, during the interviews, don't say things like you are pivoting, instead tell them that you are expanding your expertise in a new direction or making a next step in your career. Or that you want to work with this new tech on a daily basis and this job would allow you to do that.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#102

Post by scarface74 »

learc83 wrote: post #40
scarface74 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hire contractors. I don't have time for people to ramp up on the job. I need them to come in knowing the stack we are working in. If I were hiring full time devs, I would take a chance but I would expect them to meet deadlines as if they were fluent in the stack - meaning if they have to work weekends or more than 40 hours a week to be just as efficient as someone who knows the stack, they should do it. I put mysel…

Hiring contractors is a different, but if you skip over an experienced JavaScript developer for a W-2 position because they aren't familiar with React, you're going to miss out on a lot of great employees. You'll miss out on people like me who refuse to play that game. I don't expect to be fully productive for the first few weeks on the job and I'm not working through the weekends to try to be. I also don't expect an…

It's completely absurd to put the burden of training completely on the employee. Culturally we need to stop accepting this.

Why is that so absurd? Part of the culture in tech is that there is no loyalty on the side of the company or the employee -- I'm okay with that. The company can lay me off at anytime but I can also change jobs and take the skills I learned with me and probably earn a higher pay anytime. What incentive does a company have to train employees in that environment?

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#103

Post by scarface74 »

lsc wrote: post #50
scarface74 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hire contractors. I don't have time for people to ramp up on the job. I need them to come in knowing the stack we are working in. If I were hiring full time devs, I would take a chance but I would expect them to meet deadlines as if they were fluent in the stack - meaning if they have to work weekends or more than 40 hours a week to be just as efficient as someone who knows the stack, they should do it. I put mysel…

> I hire contractors. I don't have time for people to ramp up on the job. I need them to come in knowing the stack we are working in. Employers can bluster all they want; in the end, either they need to be happy hiring someone willing to work for the wages offered, increasing the wages offered and spending a lot more time looking (better wages gets you access to a larger pool, but it in no way chases away the incompe…

As far as I can tell, the facts on the ground for contract work (which is to say, lower total comp than working as a FTE at one of the local big companies, lower job security, less respect, and generally slightly worse working conditions) means that when you are hiring contractors for a big company, you are hiring from a pool of people who are unable to get the same job at the same sort of company as a FTE.

Contractors making less and being less qualified aren't the facts on the ground at all in my neck of the woods. If you're making less as a contractor than the similarly skilled FTE, you're doing it wrong.

When I'm W2 contracting, I take what I think my yearly salary should be, divide by 1800 to allow for unpaid holidays, vacations, and 3 weeks to find a new gig and make that my hourly rate. I also add in a premium for the crap I know I'm going to put up with and the lack of benefits.

When you're contracting you get paid for every hour you work, if anything, being an FTE is more exploitive.

EDIT:

I guess I should add for context that I get benefits through my wife's very stable government job. That allows me to be more flexible with jumping back and forth between full time and contracting.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#104

Post by scarface74 »

scarmig wrote: post #47
scarface74 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hire contractors. I don't have time for people to ramp up on the job. I need them to come in knowing the stack we are working in. If I were hiring full time devs, I would take a chance but I would expect them to meet deadlines as if they were fluent in the stack - meaning if they have to work weekends or more than 40 hours a week to be just as efficient as someone who knows the stack, they should do it. I put mysel…

That's entirely your prerogative. If 100% productivity is expected first week, though, I'm going to make lots of assumptions about what management is like at your company, and not apply. But if you're not having trouble finding the engineers you want/need, all the more power to you.

"Being 100% productive" and knowing the stack aren't the same thing. If I'm willing to pay a premium for expertise and all of the uncertainty that comes with being a contractor, I don't expect them to have to ramp up on the stack and the environment - just the environment.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#105

Post by scarface74 »

franciscop wrote: post #31
scarface74 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hire contractors. I don't have time for people to ramp up on the job. I need them to come in knowing the stack we are working in. If I were hiring full time devs, I would take a chance but I would expect them to meet deadlines as if they were fluent in the stack - meaning if they have to work weekends or more than 40 hours a week to be just as efficient as someone who knows the stack, they should do it. I put mysel…

I work as a contractor and that is kind of similar to what I do. If I have to use a new tech (an important one in the stack but not the main one) I will normally invest 5~10h of my time pre-anything in learning the basics of the stack. Then if I get stuck at something I'll try to fix it first, then learn more about the stack to see if I'm missing something basic and finally ask for help. These go normally for free if…

PS, your comment sounded quite negative/exploiting, probably that's why the downvotes.

How is that "exploitive"? When I'm contracting I always get paid 10 -30% more than I could get as an FTE all in - even if I include the cost of benefits, paid time off, the gap between employment, etc.

When they want me to work more than 40 hours a week, they pay me for more than 40 hours a week.

Companies don't hire contractors over FTEs as software developers to save money per hour worked. They hire them because they need to ramp up development fast and need the flexibility of reducing head count fast. The only difference between an FTE and a contractor in today's economy is that the company is honest about your expendability. As a contractor, you should charge a premium.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#106

Post by thisisit »

tristram_shandy wrote: post #7

Don't write anything on your resume that would indicate "number of years experience" -- list your jobs, explain key achievements, don't distill anything down to a number. Your resume should NOT explain who you are, or go into real specifics -- it's an advertisement for you, as simple as that. If they want details, they'll have to schedule an interview. Once you have the interview, you can talk about your experiences,…

Good advice but as many are pointing out, many a times the job description will have some kid of "number of years experience" requirement. Even if it means asking for X number of years when the technology has existed for X-N years.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#107

Post by moron4hire »

bdcravens wrote: post #76
hasenj wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always hear this, but I've never been hired through networking, nor have I ever seen someone hired through networking. I suspect that to be more the case in very large companies. Luckily I have never worked in one.

Depends on what you call networking. Being involved (speaking), mentoring, reaching out to people in your social circle who have contacts in professional circles you're interested in, etc. Networking isn't showing up to a something posted on Meetup.com, grabbing a slice of pizza and a drink, and making small talk.

No, eating meetup pizza is not the whole of networking, but it's a very easy path that can certainly lead to the rest.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#108

Post by [deleted] »

TurboHaskal wrote: post #85
tristram_shandy wrote: post #7

Don't write anything on your resume that would indicate "number of years experience" -- list your jobs, explain key achievements, don't distill anything down to a number. Your resume should NOT explain who you are, or go into real specifics -- it's an advertisement for you, as simple as that. If they want details, they'll have to schedule an interview. Once you have the interview, you can talk about your experiences,…

> they will not tally up years of experience or record your answers directly > into an Excel spreadsheet. About half of my interviews started with an HR phone call where they spew their laundry list of technologies and ask me to disclose the years of experience and how do I rate my skills from 0 to 10 for each element in the list.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#109

Post by brians »

scarface74 wrote: post #23
Vendan wrote: post #2

I treat the "we want people who know stack X" kind of thing as a "Here's what stack we are using" and nothing more. I don't lie and say that I know the stack, but I don't want to work for a company that doesn't understand that a good programmer can switch to a new stack in a very short time frame. On the other hand, you need the ability to pick up a new stack easily.

I hire contractors. I don't have time for people to ramp up on the job. I need them to come in knowing the stack we are working in. If I were hiring full time devs, I would take a chance but I would expect them to meet deadlines as if they were fluent in the stack - meaning if they have to work weekends or more than 40 hours a week to be just as efficient as someone who knows the stack, they should do it. I put mysel…

It's very big of you to be willing to pay overtime for new staff that way.

I invest in my staffs' intellectual equity too, but usually ask them to do their reading and learning on the clock.

Re: Ask HN: How do you pivot your career when jobs want years of exp in a stack

#110

Post by moretai »

TurboHaskal wrote: post #85
tristram_shandy wrote: post #7

Don't write anything on your resume that would indicate "number of years experience" -- list your jobs, explain key achievements, don't distill anything down to a number. Your resume should NOT explain who you are, or go into real specifics -- it's an advertisement for you, as simple as that. If they want details, they'll have to schedule an interview. Once you have the interview, you can talk about your experiences,…

> they will not tally up years of experience or record your answers directly > into an Excel spreadsheet. About half of my interviews started with an HR phone call where they spew their laundry list of technologies and ask me to disclose the years of experience and how do I rate my skills from 0 to 10 for each element in the list.

How do you typically rate yourself on these scales?

You can't call yourself anything lower than a 9 lest they move on.

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