Ask HN: Has anyone successfully started their career over in their 30s?

Our stories sound familiar. I dropped out of grad school, delivered pizzas, dropped out of law school, worked a menial job for awhile. Before I knew it I was approaching 30 and I could barely pay my bills.

If you've got no idea where to start, consider taking a job as a recruiter. I doubt you're interested in that as a career path, but in that role you'll gain a HUGE amount of insight as to how the whole hiring process actually works, as well as a ton of information about what jobs are out there, what the day-to-day looks like for someone with a given job title, and what your resume would need to look like to get that job.

That's the path I took, anyway. I recruited for a year, plotted out a career path, and five years and three (progressively better) jobs later I had the exact job title that I'd set out for. Now I'm on to the next one :)

Getting a recruiting job should be pretty easy. Just make a list of all of the third party recruiting shops in your area and hound the absolute hell out of the hiring managers. Most recruiting managers I've met are "Always Be Closing" types who love high energy and tenacity. Call them once a week and pitch yourself. If you find one who says they're hiring, be friendly but don't take no for an answer. Tell them they're making a mistake. Tell them to give you a chance. Push through "no" until they hang up on you. One will take this as a sign that they can't live without you.

Good luck!

You can absolutely remake your career in your thirties. You can even do it in your forties, and I suspect we'll see people in their fifties doing it too.

We just don't live in a world where everyone gets a job at 22, stays in that field and job for thirty years, then retires with a pension. Tech moves too fast, and macro economic forces basically necessitate that workers become flexible. Gig work, or 2-3 year duration contract work, is going to be the future of most employment.

If we accept that, then the idea of changing your career at basically any age makes sense. The anxiety you're feeling comes from unrealistic expectations - that you'll have a stable career, chosen at 22, from which you won't depart. Not only is that untrue in today's world, it's also profoundly boring. I can't imagine doing the same thing for more than a couple of years; I'd get so incredibly bored

Frankly, that reads like a recruitment poster. If you are asking yourself such questions, have you considered the military? There are all sorts of tech-related jobs in the military that are way more interesting than the civilian equivalent. Whatever you do, the military would give you a clear path for advancement and improvement. Even if you don't stick with it, a few years of military experience doesn't hurt a resume.