Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#11

Post by CodingPanda42 » Tue, Oct 19, 2021, 7:31 AM UTC

newcareerwanted wrote: post #3

CodingPanda42 wrote: post #2

Do you want a new career or a new job? If you want a career then I'd start backwards: Where do you want to be? What can you imagine yourself as? And then works from there what you need to get there. And likely what you have to do is upskilling somehow before you can even apply, you can probably take a lot of learnings from your past 10 years and apply them to your new role but there are likely a few things you have t…

Thanks for your answer. > Do you want a new career or a new job? Both. > Where do you want to be? What can you imagine yourself as? Hm, difficult questions I can only partially answer. One part is definitely to become an (part-time) investor again. > Can you not imagine yourself as a developer because of self-doubts or because you really don't like that path? It's a mix of both. I have doubts whether I can do it. And…

If you don't like the act of writing code then you def don't want to go down the developer route. I agree with some of the other comments that looking into product management might very well be worth it and your background in investment can help with that if you find a company in that field!

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#12

Post by newcareerwanted » Tue, Oct 19, 2021, 8:09 AM UTC

tmaly wrote: post #9

newcareerwanted wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your answer. > Do you want a new career or a new job? Both. > Where do you want to be? What can you imagine yourself as? Hm, difficult questions I can only partially answer. One part is definitely to become an (part-time) investor again. > Can you not imagine yourself as a developer because of self-doubts or because you really don't like that path? It's a mix of both. I have doubts whether I can do it. And…

Are you good at writing requirements or doing project management work? There are tons of opportunities in Fintech that need those type of skills. Having some tech background is a huge plus.

I don't know whether I'm good with those things as I have never done them.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#13

Post by austincheney » Tue, Oct 19, 2021, 10:06 AM UTC

You can start life over as an old military officer. You would be one old lieutenant but I have seen people do it, deploy, and enjoy it. This will pay less but the expectations are high.

As a developer in his early 40s myself I can say it’s hard to start over. Whether or not there is ageism explicitly it is certainly there implicitly. It does not matter your experience or skill set. If you want to be employable you have to learn to hang with the cool kids and play with the cool kid toys. You have to be willing to work with fresh junior developers fresh out of school on a level they understand and concede a certain level of immaturity regardless of the position claiming to want years of experience.

Immaturity in software is rampant. Immaturity suggests having your cake and eating it too, such as a phobia of writing anything and yet high expectations for written guidance. A better example is wanting simplicity in the code and doing the opposite out of convenience. As an older guy you might know better, but as someone restarting their career you must learn to expect this hypocrisy is the anticipated preference.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#14

Post by newcareerwanted » Tue, Oct 19, 2021, 1:24 PM UTC

austincheney wrote: post #13

You can start life over as an old military officer. You would be one old lieutenant but I have seen people do it, deploy, and enjoy it. This will pay less but the expectations are high. As a developer in his early 40s myself I can say it’s hard to start over. Whether or not there is ageism explicitly it is certainly there implicitly. It does not matter your experience or skill set. If you want to be employable you ha…

Becoming a military officer isn't an option for me (I live outside of the USA). My military "career" ended more than 20 years ago at the mandatory recruiting event when I was considered to be unfit for it.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#15

Post by nextos » Tue, Oct 19, 2021, 11:19 PM UTC

Finding a new career is easier if you can link your education with your new desired career, and pivot there in a step wise fashion.

I would suggest looking into CS niches that you enjoy and where age would be an asset. For example, formal methods (e.g. in finance or in aerospace), automation/robotics (e.g. in biotechnology), or data engineering and modeling (e.g. in banking).

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#16

Post by tmaly » Wed, Oct 20, 2021, 12:04 AM UTC

newcareerwanted wrote: post #12

tmaly wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you good at writing requirements or doing project management work? There are tons of opportunities in Fintech that need those type of skills. Having some tech background is a huge plus.

I don't know whether I'm good with those things as I have never done them.

If you have a good analytical mind, you can pick these skills up rather quickly.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find a new career in your early forties?

#17

Post by JesusRobotics » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 5:16 PM UTC

I’ve been wondering similar things myself. I abandoned front-end development and have been trying to relearn things I used to know as well as new things. I don’t even have a clue what kind of employment I could be worthy of and required steps to take to pursue it.