Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Career Advice in 2025

lethain.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 185 posts

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#31

Post by yolovoe »

scarface_74 wrote: post #19
tibbar wrote: post #7

Some more free advice, in no particular order: * Try to get at least one job offer every year, even if you don't accept it. * Look at the requirements for your dream job and figure out what you need to learn to qualify. * Pick one skill and get very good at it. Spend an hour a day on it for a year. * Steer away from skills like web development that are clearly getting eaten by LLMs. * Look for work in major U.S. tech…

Amazingly enough, I and millions of other developers have managed to find jobs outside of the Bay Area. Personally, I’ve been finding jobs quite easily 10x since 1996 - the last 2 in 2023 and last year. > Look at the requirements for your dream job and figure out what you need to learn to qualify. Those jobs in the Bay Area mostly require you to “grind leetCode” and system design. They really don’t require you to kno…

> They really don’t require you to know the latest frameworks, databases, Kubernetes, etc

The latest "framework, databases" are constantly changing. Being good at leetcode and system design is a better signal (ofcourse, not perfect) than knowing specific tools.

Being good at system design implies you are aware of tradeoffs across various systems, and that coupled with willingness to grind means you can at pick up new tools and probably deliver on projects. I have used 13 languages and an equally absurd amount of tools across 4 orgs in my 5 YOE at FAANG. It's constant learning, or you're out basically. Doesn't make sense to quiz on anything specific. The interview process is quite fair actually.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#32

Post by kristiandupont »

tibbar wrote: post #18
DeathArrow wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Steer away from skills like web development that are clearly getting eaten by LLMs. What do you mean by web development? Would backend qualify? Would microservices qualify? A complex application is much more than coding.

I'm mostly thinking of frontend dev work, but also some types of light backend work that you might see in a CRUD app. And listen, I've done that work, I've done a lot of it, and I saw that it's mostly a career dead-end, becoming more and more automated/copiloted away. It's not a career moat to be a mid-level React developer. By contrast, some things I think are worth pivoting into include infrastructure, databases, d…

>infrastructure, databases, data engineering, stats

Why would those areas be less exposed to the "LLM threat"?

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#33

Post by scarface_74 »

tibbar wrote: post #24
scarface_74 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazingly enough, I and millions of other developers have managed to find jobs outside of the Bay Area. Personally, I’ve been finding jobs quite easily 10x since 1996 - the last 2 in 2023 and last year. > Look at the requirements for your dream job and figure out what you need to learn to qualify. Those jobs in the Bay Area mostly require you to “grind leetCode” and system design. They really don’t require you to kno…

Hey, as I said in another thread, I did not start out working in the Bay, and ended up here somewhat by accident. It shocked me how much easier it was to find good jobs here, and I'll stand by that. With that said, of course I say this with no judgment to anyone not in the Bay or other tech hubs, it's friendly advice from personal experience. > Those jobs in the Bay Area mostly require you to “grind leetCode” and sys…

I’ve worked for BigTech. If you look at how to pass any of the interview processes, it’s basically all about generic coding interviews.

That’s it, those are the only “skills” you have to have to get into the BigTech - pass coding and system design interviews.

And there are thousands of developers looking for jobs - even those who are coming out of well known tech companies.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#34

Post by noisy_boy »

luxuryballs wrote: post #17
DeathArrow wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Steer away from skills like web development that are clearly getting eaten by LLMs. What do you mean by web development? Would backend qualify? Would microservices qualify? A complex application is much more than coding.

this and why not use LLMs and become an even more productive web developer

I see the evolution, atleast until things get drastic, to be where the interviewer will allow LLM use and observe how fast you can deliver the objective while dealing with hallucinations etc.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#35

Post by tibbar »

kristiandupont wrote: post #32
tibbar wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm mostly thinking of frontend dev work, but also some types of light backend work that you might see in a CRUD app. And listen, I've done that work, I've done a lot of it, and I saw that it's mostly a career dead-end, becoming more and more automated/copiloted away. It's not a career moat to be a mid-level React developer. By contrast, some things I think are worth pivoting into include infrastructure, databases, d…

>infrastructure, databases, data engineering, stats Why would those areas be less exposed to the "LLM threat"?

To be brutally honest, LLMs aren't very good at solving novel problems, they aren't very good at integrating business context, and they make many small mistakes. That's why they are a good fit for frontend development! Frontend features are

1. often quite deterministic (well-defined specs and mockups from product managers) and

2. repetitive (95% of all frontend features have already been built many times in the training set) and

3. small mistakes often don't really matter much, the page will just be slightly degraded. Speed of development usually beats perfection.

So you can often say "hey, Claude, here is the exact feature I want, this has been done many times before, can you update the codebase to mostly do that?" And Claude can do that in a lot of cases now, and will probably continue to get better at it over time.

By contrast, infrastructure work tends to be more complex and higher stakes (a small mistake can cost you a lot of money or downtime). Also you usually aren't optimizing as much for a large number of small features. So there's just not as much value, and much more danger, in turning an LLM agent loose on this stuff.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#36

Post by margalabargala »

yolovoe wrote: post #31
scarface_74 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazingly enough, I and millions of other developers have managed to find jobs outside of the Bay Area. Personally, I’ve been finding jobs quite easily 10x since 1996 - the last 2 in 2023 and last year. > Look at the requirements for your dream job and figure out what you need to learn to qualify. Those jobs in the Bay Area mostly require you to “grind leetCode” and system design. They really don’t require you to kno…

> They really don’t require you to know the latest frameworks, databases, Kubernetes, etc The latest "framework, databases" are constantly changing. Being good at leetcode and system design is a better signal (ofcourse, not perfect) than knowing specific tools. Being good at system design implies you are aware of tradeoffs across various systems, and that coupled with willingness to grind means you can at pick up new…

System design yes, leetcode no.

Leetcode is only a useful problem to ask if the candidate has not encountered that problem before and has not practiced leetcode. Otherwise it is exactly as good a signal as knowing some arbitrary framework or database.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#37

Post by enraged_camel »

__loam wrote: post #27
bayarearefugee wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The next time I am angrily typing to claude 3.7 in all caps because he overengineered a bunch of code I didn't even ask him to write in the first place, I'll be sure to let him know his continued failures are risking the entire world economy.

You can be as snarky as you want but the reality is we're years deep into a market cycle that has seen a tremendous amount of capex with very little visible return. How much more productive do you think claude makes you as compared to Google or Stack Overflow? 15%? 50%? 200? Do you think that's enough to satisfy the market or are we all trading on unrealistic expectations? Do you think shareholders are going to like…

It will be incredible when the bubble pops. Especially if it coincides with the upcoming downturn in the economy.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#38

Post by coffeefirst »

__loam wrote: post #11
Zee2 wrote: post #6

The statement >The current market doesn’t value those skills particularly highly, but instead prioritizes a different set of skills: working in the details, pushing pace, and navigating the technology transition to foundational models / LLMs. depends on the assumption that technology must "transition" to "foundational models / LLMs". The author doesn't seem to interrogate this assumption. In fact, most of the career…

Think about what you're asking when you tell these people to interrogate the assumption that LLM based AIs are going to be the dominant technology going forward. Hundreds of billions, the growth of the technology industry, the entire US stock market, and the global economy has been wagered on this technology. Imagine the turmoil when those in power realize the reality of what they're betting the farm on.

Yeah... unfortunately that might be where we are.

I have no analogy for this except the railroads of the Gilded Age. Did railroads become a pretty big deal? Yeah. They were also a giant vortex that slurped up endless investment, far more than the real demand could possibly justify. And it ends, well, we know how it ends.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#39

Post by tibbar »

scarface_74 wrote: post #33
tibbar wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey, as I said in another thread, I did not start out working in the Bay, and ended up here somewhat by accident. It shocked me how much easier it was to find good jobs here, and I'll stand by that. With that said, of course I say this with no judgment to anyone not in the Bay or other tech hubs, it's friendly advice from personal experience. > Those jobs in the Bay Area mostly require you to “grind leetCode” and sys…

I’ve worked for BigTech. If you look at how to pass any of the interview processes, it’s basically all about generic coding interviews. That’s it, those are the only “skills” you have to have to get into the BigTech - pass coding and system design interviews. And there are thousands of developers looking for jobs - even those who are coming out of well known tech companies.

I agree, that is how many big tech interviews look. I've done 'em too. If one's dream job is a generic, mid-level role at BigTech, then the path is clear - get very good at Leetcode and system design, and flag down a recruiter.

My dream jobs tend to be more eclectic, and not necessarily at giant companies. I'm more interested in getting really skilled at a particular type of technology and being hired to work on that. And this kind of targeted recruitment still exists at big companies, too.

But also Leetcode doesn't scare me too much, so maybe I'm dismissing it too easily. I've done a lot of those problems over the years, and I'm FAR from great at them but it's never been the blocker to a particular role in practice.

Re: Career Advice in 2025

#40

Post by shmerl »

__loam wrote: post #11
Zee2 wrote: post #6

The statement >The current market doesn’t value those skills particularly highly, but instead prioritizes a different set of skills: working in the details, pushing pace, and navigating the technology transition to foundational models / LLMs. depends on the assumption that technology must "transition" to "foundational models / LLMs". The author doesn't seem to interrogate this assumption. In fact, most of the career…

Think about what you're asking when you tell these people to interrogate the assumption that LLM based AIs are going to be the dominant technology going forward. Hundreds of billions, the growth of the technology industry, the entire US stock market, and the global economy has been wagered on this technology. Imagine the turmoil when those in power realize the reality of what they're betting the farm on.

It wouldn't be the first bubble. That doesn't make the above point about questioning it incorrect.
Post reply on HN