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Non-linear career paths are the future

forbes.com

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Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#81

Post by bradlys »

planetwraith wrote: post #68
bradlys wrote: post #22

Sounds like survivorship bias to me. Seen plenty of people drop out of things and never make a return to some magical FAANG or whatever employment/founding/etc after. Those folks don't make the headlines though and you don't remember them because - well - why would you.

whew, I just spent the last hour of my life reading your post history. I'm 28, I make 170k/yr, and I drive a 2008 Nissan. I'm a 5'6" straight male, 150lbs, not unattractive, and I haven't had sex in five years. Frankly, I've never had a relationship longer than a couple months in my life. In almost every quantifiable aspect, you've got me beat - but I don't envy you at all. You're very intelligent and driven. There i…

> You're very intelligent and driven. There is this common thread in all your posts - you want what you can't have.

Well, to some extent you’re right. There are things I want that I can’t have. I’d love for capitalism to die, mixed use development to prosper, and gender roles to become like dinosaurs but those are far reaching things that I don’t expect to change.

But for my daily life - I do focus a lot on what is achievable, just insanely hard. Like you said, I’m in the 99th percentile and I’m still focused on being even higher. To some, being where I am seems like success regardless of where you started (and it is to some extent) but I want to go further. It’s not like I couldn’t ever be satiated, it’s just that I wish to do more and be more because I know I’m capable of it.

People are different. Just because I’m miserable doesn’t mean I chose the wrong path. It’s just that some paths aren’t for others. In the same way that bdsm might not be for you - choosing an extremely punishing and grueling lifestyle to climb your way to the top might not be your cup of tea either.

To me, at this moment, success is worth more than happiness. Happiness is quite abstract anyway and goals can be quite concrete. I tend to feel happiest when I feel like I’m getting what I want - and that doesn’t have to mean that I have it already… it just means it’s clear I’m on the right path.

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#82

Post by 908B64B197 »

r-s wrote: post #30
mabbo wrote: post #14

For a decade at Amazon, nearly everyone I worked with was following the linear, expected path. High school, university, degree, FAANG job. Amazon basically didn't interview SDE1s unless they were new grads. For a number of years that policy was explicit from our Director because "we find that works out best". Now I'm at Shopify, where it feels like a complete 180. More than half my team took non-traditional paths- fo…

Did Shopify have a choice? Many Canadians who got computer science degrees left to work for American companies for 2x-3x more money.

> Did Shopify have a choice?

They most likely didn't.

Often, businesses don't realize how much they are missing until they bite the bullet and hire SV caliber engineers.

Seems every time I'm pitched something about "finding unconventional IT talent" it's about hiring cheaper programmers. There's a whole industry built around paying less for programmers. With questionable results. Hell, Canadian politicians pitched Vancouver as an ideal HQ2 location to Amazon since tech workers are worth ~50K less than in America[0]

[0] https://www.vancouvereconomic.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02...

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#83

Post by 908B64B197 »

mabbo wrote: post #39
r-s wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did Shopify have a choice? Many Canadians who got computer science degrees left to work for American companies for 2x-3x more money.

Shopify's salaries are pretty competitive. They aren't "Bay Area" levels, but you can also live wherever you want, so your after-housing take home pay works out better. Amazon Toronto doesn't pay much better than Shopify- I can say first hand.

> but you can also live wherever you want, so your after-housing take home pay works out better.

"After-housing" doesn't really mean anything: buying a house means you build equity into the house which you can later sell (and pocket the appreciation).

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#84

Post by barbazoo »

prawn wrote: post #51
barbazoo wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like a wild ride. I wish you all the best for the future. Have you considered woodworking? :)

Is woodworking the inevitable end-game for every 45+ year old?

There is a set of inevitable outcomes for software engineers, woodworking is one of them, yes :)

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#85

Post by elforce002 »

dougSF70 wrote: post #2

Mine is: engineering -> pHD dropout -> advertising -> market research -> analytics -> software dev + ML. Different industries all united by data.

Nice path. Mine went from Engineering -> TSPs -> Manufacturing -> MSc Telco -> TSPs -> MSc CS dropout -> DA(finance) -> software dev + ML. Even though I didn't finish my 2nd masters, It helped put my foot on the door.

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#86

Post by slt2021 »

908B64B197 wrote: post #83
mabbo wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shopify's salaries are pretty competitive. They aren't "Bay Area" levels, but you can also live wherever you want, so your after-housing take home pay works out better. Amazon Toronto doesn't pay much better than Shopify- I can say first hand.

> but you can also live wherever you want, so your after-housing take home pay works out better. "After-housing" doesn't really mean anything: buying a house means you build equity into the house which you can later sell (and pocket the appreciation).

this doesn't apply to most junior/mid level engineers who are just a couple years out of college and are still on their student loans / don't have a mortgage / prefer to rent in downtown to be close to local Tinder scene :p

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#87

Post by slt2021 »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #25
knightofmars wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know that your experience is but I've worked on many products that are 10+ years old. Additionally, I'd take 3 old time engineers over 6 new engineers in a heartbeat. The problem is that every business wants to cut labor cost because that's the MBA way to do things. Why pay USA wages to someone with 15+ years of experience when you can hire three new beginners in the USA or an entire team in another country (…

My experience, is that they are paying kids right out of college, more than I ever made in my career. They are willing to pay to avoid old.

It is not the case.

The underlying reason is that young fresh grads are running circles around old timers.

I hate to say this, but in quite a lot of circumstances, ageism is very well justified for these reasons:

1. IT/CompSci is constantly changing and high growth area, any engineer worth his/her salt will grow rapidly.

2. High performance old-timers have either retired (earning their $$$) or moved up the ladder to manager/director/VP/Founder levels.

3. Regular IC old-timers who have not progressed in their career - companies don't want them, because old-timer who has not grown in his level - is a red flag for companies.

4. There are some old-timers who prefer part-time/consulting type gigs, but I put them in Founder category, all of them have their own LLC/S-corp and run one man consulting/entrepreneurship shop

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#88

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

slt2021 wrote: post #87
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience, is that they are paying kids right out of college, more than I ever made in my career. They are willing to pay to avoid old.

It is not the case. The underlying reason is that young fresh grads are running circles around old timers. I hate to say this, but in quite a lot of circumstances, ageism is very well justified for these reasons: 1. IT/CompSci is constantly changing and high growth area, any engineer worth his/her salt will grow rapidly. 2. High performance old-timers have either retired (earning their $$$) or moved up the ladder to…

This is true.

Everyone knows that old dudes can’t code.

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#89

Post by knightofmars »

slt2021 wrote: post #87
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience, is that they are paying kids right out of college, more than I ever made in my career. They are willing to pay to avoid old.

It is not the case. The underlying reason is that young fresh grads are running circles around old timers. I hate to say this, but in quite a lot of circumstances, ageism is very well justified for these reasons: 1. IT/CompSci is constantly changing and high growth area, any engineer worth his/her salt will grow rapidly. 2. High performance old-timers have either retired (earning their $$$) or moved up the ladder to…

It's funny when people generalize this way. You cherry picked specific scenarios as if that suddenly supports your claim that ageism is well justified. Anecdotally, I've worked with engineers across age ranges. Sure, there are the "rest on their laurels" types who stagnate in their careers. But there are also battle hardened veterans who can debug issues that are mind bendingly difficult to unravel and are happy to stay as IC. I'm curious what metric you'd pick to validate the claim that "...young fresh grads are running circles around old timers." Because based on the quality of the code and other observable aspects this isn't the case. Google introduced a whole new programming language (Go) because fresh grads weren't running circles around anyone and it was easier to go that route than get them to parity with the industry veterans.

Re: Non-linear career paths are the future

#90

Post by ravagat »

It's nice to see that this has become more of the norm/average. For one, non-linear career paths have existed for a long time, to use the phrase "standing on the shoulders of giants", innovation would be less if it weren't so. Good article and exposure of thinking for everyone
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