Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#351

Post by emodendroket » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:44 PM UTC

southphillyman wrote: post #157

swah wrote: post #31

This is depressing. I'm 33 and still haven't really find a niche inside software dev that I'm willing to stay... On the other hand, nobody asks doctors and lawyers if their are planning to retire at 35.

Yea I'm getting depressed reading the advice in here. I'm around your age and not an expert in any domain. I pick work based not on a particular domain or industry but more so tech stack and perceived work environment. As a result my domain expertise is the equivalent of "10 years of 1 year experience" .

I mean, are you distressed by "only" making a salary in the low six figures? It's still pretty good.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#352

Post by ben_w » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:49 PM UTC

rplst8 wrote: post #311

kelnos wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but those are the trade-offs. You don't get the reward without taking on a bit of risk. It's a little ironic to hear talk like this, since around here I hear a lot of "sorry your coal mining job is going away, but you need to get with the times and train for something relevant". Same thing applies here. If you pick a programming specialization that eventually falls out of favor, buck up and learn a new one. May…

I don't think it's unreasonable for people to expect that they should be able to work in a field for the majority of their careers. Retraining is not an efficient use of ones productive years.

I think it is unreasonable to expect that, especially in a field where even a decade ago people were saying “50% of the skills on your CV become obsolete every 18 months”.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#353

Post by herbst » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:53 PM UTC

tlogan wrote: post #273

tptacek wrote: post #71

I was going to add this as a reply to a comment downthread but I think it's too important to bury. The fundamental rule of career progression in the technology industry is to position yourself as a domain expert in something more specific than "programming" . It's very difficult to "own" "programming" in a way where you can use scarcity to drive integer multiple increases of the median salary. It is not as difficult…

I wish this is true. The problem in software development that current way how company financing is set up is that you do not need domain expert to make it. In other words, it is nearly impossible to be hired as domain expert because very small number of startups needs one: just do some "growth hacking", get to YC, and raise money. Maybe founders need to domain expert to get to YC but they you will kick him or her out…

I heavily assume that even in IT startups are still a very small proportion of the actual job market.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#354

Post by gvb » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:53 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #190

lliamander wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then let me ask: how do you make it past 40 in software? Specifically, how do you position yourself so that you are actively sought after (rather than merely employable)?

I started at 21 and somehow just kept getting older. More seriously, having had a look around my cohort, there aren't that many people who've left programming altogether, and those that have have done so for personal reasons. Generally people have moved "upwards" and acquired management track positions. Small companies are good for this - because it's so flat you can easily get a high-ranking job title which you can…

I started at 17 (Basic on a terminal via a dialup modem to a mainframe).

Physically, I age linearly n.

Mentally, I age logarithmically 17 + ln(n).

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#355

Post by emodendroket » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:54 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #352

rplst8 wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's unreasonable for people to expect that they should be able to work in a field for the majority of their careers. Retraining is not an efficient use of ones productive years.

I think it is unreasonable to expect that, especially in a field where even a decade ago people were saying “50% of the skills on your CV become obsolete every 18 months”.

If people were saying that a decade ago they were wrong.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#356

Post by emodendroket » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:57 PM UTC

tigershark wrote: post #344

rplst8 wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's unreasonable for people to expect that they should be able to work in a field for the majority of their careers. Retraining is not an efficient use of ones productive years.

I think that if someone chooses engineering then he must love to learn. For me it would be too boring to do the same thing for my whole life, I always try to learn more languages, more paradigms, architectures and whatever. I can jump in the code of a different team and be immediately productive. Usually I suggest and implement small changes that have a large impact on the maintanability of the system as soon as I st…

But you are doing the same thing. This is the frustration. I've worked in several languages with various tools and it's very common to just be learning slightly different syntax to approach a problem in the exact same way (and then eventually maybe you'll reach a higher plane where you approach it in a way somewhat characteristic of the tool, but still not fundamentally different). Technologies that really change the way you work or think about problems are few and far between, and most of the algorithms and data structures you'll use most of the time in typical applications were discovered in the 1970s. It's not a big deal to pick up a new tool on the job, but I have a hard time motivating myself to spend free time learning yet another MVC framework or whatever.

It's a different story, I guess, if you go into a completely different type of programming from what you're used to (say Web apps to embedded programming), but I don't think that's necessarily easy.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#357

Post by herbst » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 1:58 PM UTC

amyjess wrote: post #229

tptacek wrote: post #71

I was going to add this as a reply to a comment downthread but I think it's too important to bury. The fundamental rule of career progression in the technology industry is to position yourself as a domain expert in something more specific than "programming" . It's very difficult to "own" "programming" in a way where you can use scarcity to drive integer multiple increases of the median salary. It is not as difficult…

TBH, I really don't care about career advancement. I don't need "half-mil-a-year offers" to fund my lifestyle, so as long as I can continue to draw a steady paycheck, I'm good. Not everyone's a climber, and being in "a dead-end job" isn't really a bad thing if you're not ambitious. I'd just like to spread the message that it is absolutely OK to plateau. You don't need to be a renowned domain expert, you don't need to…

Honestly that just sounds sad to me. I don't see how finding a plateau in life is ever a good thing.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#358

Post by auxym » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 2:04 PM UTC

jordanb wrote: post #98

tptacek wrote: post #71

I was going to add this as a reply to a comment downthread but I think it's too important to bury. The fundamental rule of career progression in the technology industry is to position yourself as a domain expert in something more specific than "programming" . It's very difficult to "own" "programming" in a way where you can use scarcity to drive integer multiple increases of the median salary. It is not as difficult…

The big danger is "owning" some domain that falls out of fashion. You might "own" distributed systems and do great for a time, but then companies start transitioning from that architecture and nobody returns your calls anymore. Also I've noticed a lot of sub-fields like computer vision or self driving cars where there's a great deal of nerd interest but very little actual employment. In fact, I have a feeling that co…

>In fact, I have a feeling that computer programming is the stick that's holding the entire STEM tent up---if not for programming as a consolation prize you'd have a whole lot of physics and chemical engineers making lattes at starbucks---and further that web development is the stick that's holding the programming tent up.

I swear, I repeat this comment in almost every news article posted about how "We need more STEM graduates" and "The STEM job market is super hot right now".

Yeah, programming is. I know so many graduates of a BS in math, physics, chemistry, biology, ecology that just couldn't find satisfactory employment. They either got a second, mostly unrelated degree (in management or something more industrial) or are working at a mostly unrelated job.

Even in traditional engineering disciplines, while it's easier to get at least OK employment the demand just doesn't seem that strong compared to CS. I have many friends that graduated with civil, mechanical, or chemical engineering degrees (in at least one case, an MS) who are vastly overqualified for their lab tech or drafter positions.

I have a strong background in mech engineering and robotics. Yet, for the two years I worked in that domain, I never had a single recruiter contact me out of the blue. Now, my mostly amateur computer skills somehow landed me a "tech" (read: IT) job. In the 2 months since I've changed my current title on linkedin, I've had 3 recruiters contact me.

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#359

Post by ben_w » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 2:06 PM UTC

emodendroket wrote: post #355

ben_w wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is unreasonable to expect that, especially in a field where even a decade ago people were saying “50% of the skills on your CV become obsolete every 18 months”.

If people were saying that a decade ago they were wrong.

Looks like a lot of people, net, agreed with the claim: https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/4417...

Re: Is software development really a dead-end job after age 35-40?

#360

Post by emodendroket » Sat, Nov 18, 2017, 2:11 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #359

emodendroket wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people were saying that a decade ago they were wrong.

Looks like a lot of people, net, agreed with the claim: https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/4417...

This comment seems to be more about putting all your eggs into one basket than the idea that every technology is going to die in a few years. Most of the popular production languages today are 10+ years old, for instance.