Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#61

Post by ryguytilidie » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 7:24 PM UTC

hkarthik wrote: post #13

I did this back in 2009. Here's how to do it. Pick a technology stack that you want to get a job in and build a side project in your spare time. Attend meetups with experts in your local community and learn how to make it awesome. Build relationships with them along the way. Use those relationships to get some part-time contract work in said technology stack with someone local. Document this experience and build up a…

I do recruiting and I have an awesome story like this. Back in 2010 I worked at a mobile reading company. I was trying to hire iOS developers. I found an awesome github from a dude who was doing backend C# stuff at MSFT, but was building AWESOME iOS apps at night.

I emailed him and asked if he wanted to do the thing he was clearly passionate about full time.

He aced the interviews, came out and built our app. About a year later one of our founders left to start a new company. The founder recruited this guy. Within 18 months, their company sold for a few hundred million and now instead of writing the C# code he hated, he has now helped build an awesome company, build a whole new skillset and built his leadership skills. Not to mention the fact that his wife and child are basically taken care of for life because of this decision.

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#62

Post by bane » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 7:31 PM UTC

pcsanwald wrote: post #24

As someone who does a lot of hiring for a startup, I will say I'm agnostic with regards to languages and frameworks. We've hired folks with all sorts of disparate backgrounds including embedded C (we mostly use Java and JavaScript). I think you should sell yourself as an experienced technologist who's looking to learn. You should also demonstrate a willingness and ability to learn new things; maybe by making somethin…

I just thought I'd echo this. Many people who are general technologists can hit the ground running, or be up to speed in a given language/framework in a matter of a couple weeks (or less).

I like to talk to people with a variety of skillsets and interests in their background and try to figure out how to leverage those towards the work we do.

Bonus: having a huge diversity of skills is kind of like having a deep bench to work with

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#63

Post by digitalboss » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 7:52 PM UTC

I'v really enjoyed seeing what companies such as tradecraft have doing around this sort tactic http://tradecrafted.com/ - check them out.

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#64

Post by grayclhn » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 7:55 PM UTC

vonmoltke wrote: post #53

VLM wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least some of those are H1B posts to prove there's no one in the locality with seven years experience with Windows10. Some are also pencil whipping a HR checklist before hiring the bosses kid or the hand picked internal candidate. You want a CCIE and are offering $50K? No one applying is not necessarily seen as a bug. At megacorps the relationship between the people writing reqs and the actual job are often rather…

See, this is a major dysfunction when combined with the unwillingness to give rejection reasons. How is one supposed to know when they get a form letter rejection if it was because this particular company is actually serious about their asinine "requirements"?

At the risk of sounding snarky: why do you need to know?

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#65

Post by nilkn » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 7:57 PM UTC

vonmoltke wrote: post #55

nilkn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, my company doesn't, nor have other companies I've interviewed with and received offers from. I'd be very hesitant to join such a company. I've interviewed with "top" companies like Google as well and they've never seemed to care about this stuff. This sounds more like a way to hire a contractor, not an engineer you will invest in who will be a full member of the team for potentially a very long time.

> Well, my company doesn't, nor have other companies I've interviewed with and received offers from. I'd be very hesitant to join such a company. I've interviewed with "top" companies like Google as well and they've never seemed to care about this stuff. My experience has been that the vast majority of non-software tech companies care quite a bit about these specifics. They are also much more likely to pigeonhole you…

Maybe I haven't witnessed this so much because I've always made it a point to only consider companies where software is the core product and profit center and developers are the main employees.

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#66

Post by grayclhn » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 8:01 PM UTC

nemmonszz wrote: post #10

deedubaya wrote: post #7

If you have an employer, this is usually a pretty easy sell. Approach your boss about transitioning Aging Product X to a new technology stack because the current one is becoming defunct. Of course this will require some training for you, but it is easier to teach you a new skill set than to hire someone with that skill set and get them to learn about Aging Product X. If you aren't employed and are contracting/freelan…

Is convincing employers to transition technology stacks really something that is generally considered easy (or even doable)? I'm stuck maintaining 'enterprise' software running on VB6 and ColdFusion 9 and the idea of getting my employers to sanction a migration to something newer is laughable.

Not necessarily, but convincing your boss to be mindful of your medium-term career goals definitely is and at largish companies there should be opportunities for you to spend time working on something else. Career-wise, I'd be more concerned about working for someone that wants you to stagnate than about the specific software you're maintaining. (Not saying that that's necessarily the case, BTW.)

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#67

Post by ngneer » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 8:03 PM UTC

READING THE THREAD IS DEPRESSING AND ENCOURAGING BUT THE SHORT ANSWER TO YOUR QUESTION SEEMS TO BE NO

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#68

Post by ngneer » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 8:05 PM UTC

I am in the exact same position. Summarizing the responses, the short answer to your question is no, there is no escape.

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#69

Post by martin-adams » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 8:27 PM UTC

>> I think if I applied for a job I'd get rejected

Only one way to know for sure.

Re: Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?

#70

Post by vijayr » Mon, Jun 08, 2015, 8:42 PM UTC

BadassFractal wrote: post #57

hkarthik wrote: post #13

I did this back in 2009. Here's how to do it. Pick a technology stack that you want to get a job in and build a side project in your spare time. Attend meetups with experts in your local community and learn how to make it awesome. Build relationships with them along the way. Use those relationships to get some part-time contract work in said technology stack with someone local. Document this experience and build up a…

This! I've had the opportunity to hire for our company for the past year or so. We use a somewhat uncommon paradigm in our tech stack that is very attractive to a lot of developers. Many of our applicants have exactly what you said: plenty of side projects in that paradigm / stack and participation to meetups / communities etc. Occasionally however I run into people who have absolutely no side projects and have been…

I agree that someone who doesn't have side projects isn't as attractive as someone who does, in general. But there are lots of people who don't do any programming once they leave the office (8-9 hours of computer time is more than enough for them). That doesn't mean that they aren't dedicated or that they are a risk.

I think it should be a case by case basis.