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Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

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Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#51

Post by joezydeco »

donretag wrote: post #39

"So many recruiters are looking for senior developers like me to join their early stage team and to do development and assist junior devs via knowledge sharing." What I have encountered is that everyone wants to hire senior developers, but no junior developers, so your "senior" role is the same as that of a junior developer. I always ask what the team structure is during the phone screen. If it is all senior develope…

Well, let’s be clear about the term “senior”.

These days “senior” means “3-5 years experience” and a salary to match.

When you have 20+ years experience, they don’t know what to do with you.

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#52

Post by liftbigweights »

Why not retire and contribute to open source? You can set your own schedule and speak to whomever you want or no one at all.

It amazes me that people in their 40s are working as software developers. Did everyone gamble their money away?

20 years in software developement is easily a few million in the bank + retirement account + home. Why not retire?

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#53

Post by [deleted] »

WalterSear wrote: post #20
platz wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does a rut look like, like what is the last recent tech rut folks use. And what is an example of tech that non-rut folks have that rut folks don't have?

At a large, well known software company, I worked with senior engineers, with a decade's more development experience than I, who couldn't use React properly, or even understand Redux. These are not difficult tools. They had been working on the specific codebase for over a year, fwiw.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#54

Post by platz »

WalterSear wrote: post #20
platz wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does a rut look like, like what is the last recent tech rut folks use. And what is an example of tech that non-rut folks have that rut folks don't have?

At a large, well known software company, I worked with senior engineers, with a decade's more development experience than I, who couldn't use React properly, or even understand Redux. These are not difficult tools. They had been working on the specific codebase for over a year, fwiw.

They should learn to use React & understand Redux

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#55

Post by mwfunk »

platz wrote: post #3
matt_the_bass wrote: post #2

I think these jobs exist. Mine does. We’re a small company that makes high value physical items with a large software component. We encourage remote working but not remote only. I know this is not a popular view on HN, but I think there is huge value with regular irl interaction. It doesn’t need to be every day, but it does need to be regular. We also offer mostly single person offices (interns are currently 2 per ro…

What does a rut look like, like what is the last recent tech rut folks use. And what is an example of tech that non-rut folks have that rut folks don't have?

I think the rut being referred to is an inability (rooted in complacency and habit, not actual inability) to learn, change, or adapt. Nothing to do with specific technologies, or even new vs old technologies. Just a far too strong inclination to stay in one’s comfort zone, and for that comfort zone to never expand.

I’m pushing 50 and know many older engineers. An occupational hazard is getting complacent and ceasing to evolve and learn as an ongoing part of one’s career. This is a hazard with life in general as people get older, but if we’re not wary of it, it can have professional consequences too.

As far as what does it look like- they go to a new team or employer, which naturally has different tools and practices and technical domains, and they expend titanic amounts of effort to continue working just like they used to in the new surroundings, rather than simply making an effort to adapt and learn new skills.

I’m not saying this is a common problem when hiring older engineers, just something we all have to grapple with as we age. I think that’s all that was meant by a rut. Resistance to all change, regardless of whether that change is good or bad.

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#56

Post by Yenderman »

When I was 30, people just looked at me and assumed I was a competent software engineer because I looked exactly like a very senior software engineer, and I presented myself in that way. But I was very junior, having made a recent career change. Yet they paid me like a prince, and I rose so rapidly through the ranks that I became an executive.

Now I'm 50, and my company folded and I went to the curb, and am looking for a new job. Now I don't look like that bright young engineer. I look like an old has-been who is stuck in a rut and stuck in my ways. Except I'm not. I'm highly experienced, an innovator, get along great with many kinds of people and can contribute at all levels of an org, from production support to development to architecture to the boardroom.

But the first question I get asked on interviews is "Are you technical?"

My over-40 career advice for you is to remember what they do to engineers that are over 40.

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#57

Post by jonstewart »

ethagnawl wrote: post #46
gallerdude wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always noticed this as a weird development. In an ideal capitalist scenario, people will wind up with the job that suits their preferences to the degree that they have enough career capital to be picky. But in reality, people just kind of fall into whatever job they can get and stay longer than seems rational. As a soon-to-graduate student, I hope I can hold onto the idea that the path of least resistance has a…

> stay longer than seems rational People wind up _staying longer than seems rational_ because they develop habits (schedule, commute, favorite lunch spot, etc.), develop relationships with their colleagues, feel a sense of loyalty to the company/their superiors/their team/etc. (this is often misplaced, but irrationality rears its head yet again), don't want to go through the hassle of interviewing, don't want to have…

Precisely. Rational? It's a multivariate problem. Get married, buy a house, have kids. Now you're juggling daycare and school schedules and dependent benefits. At the same time, you have to balance developing enough technical expertise to increase your value, learning new tech to say current (while likely having less time for learning), and paying close attention to your work projects to be sure you can reduce your accomplishments to a cold, hard ROI so the angel of death passes by when the economy slows and the RIF times come.

And while more junior engineers can be forgiven 3 jobs in 5 years as they ratchet themselves up, seniors need to demonstrate they can stay somewhere for long enough to amortize their hiring, while avoiding getting stuck in a rut.

Good luck!

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#58

Post by matt_the_bass »

gcb0 wrote: post #14
matt_the_bass wrote: post #2

I think these jobs exist. Mine does. We’re a small company that makes high value physical items with a large software component. We encourage remote working but not remote only. I know this is not a popular view on HN, but I think there is huge value with regular irl interaction. It doesn’t need to be every day, but it does need to be regular. We also offer mostly single person offices (interns are currently 2 per ro…

have you considered you are in a rut, and it might not be a very good one, so people with seniority call you out, while the freshman/woman you keep hiring and doctronating just reinforce your own bias?

Yes. I often spend time self reflecting my current solutions and chosen paths to consider if I’m in a rut. This is a common topic of discuss at my office especially when evaluating the cost of technical debt: should we continue editing the old tooling in the old technology or should we invest in a larger project to migrate to a newer solution.

We use a mix of older and newer technologies. We try to identify the “best” solution where best is a function of: implementation cost (time and dollars), technical debt, learning curve, future extensibility, performance, simplicity, and personal intellectual interest.

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#60

Post by stephen82 »

illumin8 wrote: post #44
jvagner wrote: post #19

The bigger companies I worked for in the Bay Area were more like this than the smaller. As a late 40-something who started his own marketing & technology agency to get out of the "working for others and their bad boss habits" conundrum, the one thing I can strongly recommend is that you have to interview companies as carefully as they interview you. I've directly hired more than 100 people in my career, and it was al…

I'm a 44 year old senior engineer, and the one thing I've noticed is that bad managers are almost universal in technology. I've had about 20 managers in my career and I can count only 2-3 that I would consider great managers, the rest ranged from mediocre to incredibly incompetent. This, to me, is the #1 reason I gain much more satisfaction from doing consulting work on the side: I'm my own manager, and I can make de…

"Why good employees leave" - I know that myself first hand!

https://imgur.com/gallery/Eh4krvj

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