My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs • Hacker News Board

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#191

Post by Cthulhu_ » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:38 PM UTC

sails wrote: post #170

say_it_as_it_is wrote: post #147

It's alarming that there's an idea among a people -- possibly bay area -- that mid-career is six years of experience. You are your own worst enemy with that kind of belief. People reinvent themselves and their careers many times over a lifetime. It's hard to return to certain types of technical work but never impossible, especially for those who are sufficiently motivated. You will reach the limit of a pay scale, but…

I like the framing of a career into thirds of 15 years. 20-35: Find and build your skills/industries/networks and start to align that into a career. Don't be afraid to make mistakes to enhance learning. 35-50: Double down on the skills you have in the industry you know, build your personal brand, achieve your career goals. 50-65++: Give back to those earlier in their career, pay it forward, pass the torch etc. With t…

I think in "our" line of work you tend to see at most 30-some year olds actually talk about the job; I don't know what happens to people in the tech industry beyond that, they seem to have a lot less "presence".

Mind you, maybe there's just less of them because access to education and work in tech has improved so much over time?

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#192

Post by jonahbenton » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:41 PM UTC

sails wrote: post #170

say_it_as_it_is wrote: post #147

It's alarming that there's an idea among a people -- possibly bay area -- that mid-career is six years of experience. You are your own worst enemy with that kind of belief. People reinvent themselves and their careers many times over a lifetime. It's hard to return to certain types of technical work but never impossible, especially for those who are sufficiently motivated. You will reach the limit of a pay scale, but…

I like the framing of a career into thirds of 15 years. 20-35: Find and build your skills/industries/networks and start to align that into a career. Don't be afraid to make mistakes to enhance learning. 35-50: Double down on the skills you have in the industry you know, build your personal brand, achieve your career goals. 50-65++: Give back to those earlier in their career, pay it forward, pass the torch etc. With t…

Obligatory- this framing of Learn/Earn/Return is a good one, but this application of the model to age cohorts is fantastically unrealistic and outdated. Especially if you have/plan to have kids.

Unless you are exceptionally, unpredictably right place/right time lucky- I cannot emphasize how exceptional and unpredictable this is, and how much it depends on right place/right time and not on any unique attributes you possess- you will need to Earn for all of your adult life.

In order to do so you will also need to Learn for all of your adult life, in cycles that are far, far tighter than 15 years.

And you will benefit from Returning as soon as you are able. Even tracing and documenting your Beginner Mindset journey will be helpful for others.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#193

Post by cantankerously » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:43 PM UTC

cletus wrote: post #66

So I'd say anyone looking for engineering work should aim to have at least one (and just one is fine) of the following: 1. A good (and well-known) school. MIT, Stanford, CMU, UW, Waterloo, you get the picture. 2. A good (and well-known) employer. FAANGs in particular. Ideally as an FTE but internships are good signals here too. 3. To be known for something you've done. Well-used open source project, well-known blog,…

"Simply go to MIT and work at Google"

I say this in jest, but that isn't the most replicable path. For someone who didn't go to MIT and is mid-career, should one just throw in the towel and give up on the industry?

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#194

Post by nickbauman » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:54 PM UTC

sails wrote: post #170

say_it_as_it_is wrote: post #147

It's alarming that there's an idea among a people -- possibly bay area -- that mid-career is six years of experience. You are your own worst enemy with that kind of belief. People reinvent themselves and their careers many times over a lifetime. It's hard to return to certain types of technical work but never impossible, especially for those who are sufficiently motivated. You will reach the limit of a pay scale, but…

I like the framing of a career into thirds of 15 years. 20-35: Find and build your skills/industries/networks and start to align that into a career. Don't be afraid to make mistakes to enhance learning. 35-50: Double down on the skills you have in the industry you know, build your personal brand, achieve your career goals. 50-65++: Give back to those earlier in their career, pay it forward, pass the torch etc. With t…

Can we agree this idea of a "personal brand" is both harmful and oxymoronic? You are a person, not a product. You have a reputation. This is like adding fuel to the idea that management should look upon the people who work for them as "resources".

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#195

Post by LargeWu » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:55 PM UTC

dehrmann wrote: post #60

marcinzm wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like something about how you come off in interviews throws off red flags to the person interviewing you. Maybe you're too arrogant, not arrogant enough, not driven enough, etc. Most top tier companies will give you a list of personality qualities they are looking for that they expect you to show in the initial interview. I'd recommend doing a mock interview with someone you trust who has hired people to see…

> Maybe you're too arrogant, not arrogant enough For all the criticism hacker news gives whiteboard algorithm interviews, those at least are testing performance under pressure for a skill related to the job. Arrogance is a bigger problem in interviews. What comes off as confidence in an interview might come off as asshole at work.

"testing performance under pressure"

What kind of companies are these that their engineers need to write perfect code under severe (i.e. on the order of minutes) time constraints? Are they constantly opening sockets for Jack Bauer?

The only whiteboard questions I find useful as an interviewer are the super-easy ones that weed out the bozos who have somehow slipped through the initial filter. Things like "can you write a SQL join".

What I find most predictive are conversations with candidates about how they evaluate tradeoffs, approach system design, what do you do when you get stuck? Typically if they can pass the bozo filters and talk cluefully about these things, they will likely be a productive coder on straightforward applications. Which is most applications; many companies vastly overestimate the inherent complexity of their products.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#196

Post by Consultant32452 » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:56 PM UTC

theonething wrote: post #67

Consultant32452 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I get a cold call i ask them to send an email with the job description and salary range and inform them I don't reply to job descriptions without a salary range. If they don't send it I block their phone number as spam. This filter has led to me having decent experience. Very rarely do they comply.

Most 3rd party recruiters I've worked with straight out lied about the salary range of the positions they were shilling. I don't work with 3rd party recruiters anymore.

You can fix that by having a contractually guaranteed maximum overhead they can charge for you. Make it a % and it incentives them to max out your pay. You can probably only demand those kinds of terms of you're highly sought after though.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#197

Post by ulisesrmzroche » Mon, May 11, 2020, 1:57 PM UTC

eru wrote: post #124

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How does one even jump from tech to humanities anyways??? when you're the type of person who likes to question everything and who wants to build things to make the world a "better place", then switching to humanities with a tech foundation is a good option. It can be very dangerous though. One is at risk of undoing all the previous conditioning (which costed a lot of time and money) and bring oneself to realize tha…

Making lots of money is how society tells you what contributions it realy values. A big part of the rest is empty talk. It's easy to say that we value eg teachers or nurses or janitors. Doesn't make us pay them more.

That’s not true. Getting laid is. The economy is for the benefit of your master, not you.

Artists have far more sex than programmers do. It’s called natural selection.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#198

Post by SketchySeaBeast » Mon, May 11, 2020, 2:08 PM UTC

lihaciudaniel wrote: post #107

ivalm wrote: post #99

I am curious what counts for “mid career”, he started coding ~6 years ago. Presumably he is in his 20s. Here him talking about leaving philosophy: https://www.philosophicalhacker.com/2014/04/22/why-im-glad-m... Edit: LinkedIn ~agrees with this estimate

>For the past 5 years, I hoped I was going to be a philosophy professor Assuming he goes to university or somewhere. Because most people find it boring he should have chosen history, latin, or simply other humanities subjects. How does one even jump from tech to humanities anyways???

I graduated with a History degree in 2008. Had zero job success, a couple of years later went to a tech school for 2 year Computer Engineering Technologist diploma, the rest is history.... no, wait, the rest is programming.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#199

Post by jonahbenton » Mon, May 11, 2020, 2:15 PM UTC

nickbauman wrote: post #194

sails wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the framing of a career into thirds of 15 years. 20-35: Find and build your skills/industries/networks and start to align that into a career. Don't be afraid to make mistakes to enhance learning. 35-50: Double down on the skills you have in the industry you know, build your personal brand, achieve your career goals. 50-65++: Give back to those earlier in their career, pay it forward, pass the torch etc. With t…

Can we agree this idea of a "personal brand" is both harmful and oxymoronic? You are a person, not a product. You have a reputation. This is like adding fuel to the idea that management should look upon the people who work for them as "resources".

Can't agree, sorry. Hear the critique of the abstraction but there is a reason it exists, and to deny is to deny reality.

"Personal brand" is just another way of saying "personality, but online."

It is the nature of intelligence itself to distill and compress complex, messy stimulus/data/phenomena into shorthand. One must recognize that this is what people do when interacting with oneself, both f2f and online.

This is especially important now, given that digitally intermediated interactions will dominate the landscape for the duration of the epidemic.

People have all kinds of built-in ways of modulating their personality for f2f interactions. It is essential that they translate these to digital space.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#200

Post by C1sc0cat » Mon, May 11, 2020, 2:15 PM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #74

theonething wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I only submit cover letters if they are required I use to think that a well crafted custom cover letter totally gives me a leg up on the competition. But recently, I've been gettin lazy and not sending cover letters and I still get responses. Go figure.

I used to have a 1.5 page resume covering boilerplate, keywords, and highlights with a longer cover letter giving more detailed background. In a post interview critique I was told that the resume was too sparse. I pointed out the cover letter has what he wanted to see but of course that never made it to his inbox. New tech job search can't reliably manage two digital documents so I just merged them into one as a safe…

I still do them for some desirable ones - eg if covid hadn't intervened id have done a custom cover letter and cv for the grade 6-7 Civil service job I got pitched (Colonel to brigadier Range)

(that's around the same level of Matt Cutts Current Job)