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Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

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Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#131

Post by teuobk »

mikestew wrote: post #21

Well, Goldilocks, you’re going to have to pick which of your list you’re willing to give up to have the other. Do such jobs exist? You bet they do, I’m working a job that fits your list to the letter. I’m also making considerably less than I could. That’s fine, it was a compromise I was willing to make. But I’m not working on mobile, either. In a macro sense, though, you’re going to have to come to grips with the fac…

Embedded is definitely a place where this sort of Goldilocks environment can be found. I suspect it's because embedded -- and I mean really low-level stuff, not "We run embedded Linux!" level -- requires a lot of EE knowledge in addition to software engineering skill to do it well. That, in turn, requires test instruments and such, which lends itself to an office or at least a dedicated section of lab bench rather than an open office. In addition, embedded often seems to be sort of voodoo for managers, so I've found they tend to keep their hands off more than on, say, front-end web dev projects. Lots of guys doing it remotely, too. There are guys (and gals) in their mid 20s who are doing it and good at it, but I'd say overall it skews towards late 30s or older.

Or maybe I've just been lucky.

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#132

Post by person_of_color »

kalecserk wrote: post #129
oppositelock wrote: post #94

I'm in my mid forties and I've been working for pay in tech since '96, so this puts me in a similar demographic like yours. I think you're being too picky and greatly limiting your job choices. I miss the days of private offices, but those days are over in any moderately cutting edge companies. You'll find offices in Cisco, Juniper and Oracle, you'll find open seating at Google, Facebook, and startups. WFH friendly c…

Hello! I am currently 36, working for pay as a software developer since 1999, father of three -- and I would like to reiterate oppositelock's comment: "you're being too picky" I totally understand your frustration with all this "helping other people" buzz but... Ultimately this is the job to be done by you right now :) About the entire open-office culture, since I am a manager I have been granted a private office - w…

You didnt go to college?

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#133

Post by [deleted] »

icedchai wrote: post #125
deanmoriarty wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would really love to know why this was downvoted? This is what I don’t like about HN, one spends time to come up with a reasonable, realistic and thorough comment, and just gets downvoted. Makes me lose motivation for writing my future next comment.

Probably because coming up with 150K/spare year to invest, right out of the gate, is unrealistic. 50K, maybe, if you live in low-COL area on a good salary...

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#134

Post by [deleted] »

softawre wrote: post #128

Where are you located? I might have a job that would interest you. You might be able to be remote part time , at least until we get to know you. We hit all of your marks (devs have offices, laid back, we all WAH 3 days a week). We are near Indianapolis.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#135

Post by yhoneycomb »

person_of_color wrote: post #132
kalecserk wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hello! I am currently 36, working for pay as a software developer since 1999, father of three -- and I would like to reiterate oppositelock's comment: "you're being too picky" I totally understand your frustration with all this "helping other people" buzz but... Ultimately this is the job to be done by you right now :) About the entire open-office culture, since I am a manager I have been granted a private office - w…

You didnt go to college?

You can work during college

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#136

Post by tomp »

Joeri wrote: post #119
wisam wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do think is the reason that most managers in technology are bad? I tend to think of management as abstraction. A mid-level manager provides an abstraction of the work for high-level management and at the same time is provided an abstraction of the work by the low-level managers or engineers. Assuming that my understanding is right, are these abstractions leaky? is the lack of technical knowledge the reason why ma…

The thing with managers is that they have to understand the work being done well enough to make decisions about direction and resource allocation, while also having tons of people skills. In tech you either get a manager who doesn't have a technical background and just doesn't understand the thing they're managing, or you get someone with a technical background who stereotypically doesn't have the necessary people sk…

AFAIK many hospitals have a "MBA manager" and a "doctor manager" - I don't know exactly how they relate to one another (who's the "boss boss"), but the idea is that they each bring their part of superior skills to the table.

Would the same idea work for IT? Or, another idea would be, to take a look at how traditional (non-IT) engineering companies work (although the main difference between both medicine and engineering, and IT is that the former are both very high-risk industries that move much slower than IT).

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#137

Post by rdiddly »

A - private office

B - WFH

C - Android

D - few meetings

E - good management

F - mellow, friendly (probably older) colleagues

G - no training of underlings

H - low stress

I - interesting work

Independent contracting/consulting satisfies A and B; some subset satisfies C; D it likely fails; E is orthogonal or maybe slightly negatively correlated (some portion of those who hire consultants, have to do so because they're bad managers); F doubtful; G yes (just don't sign a scope-of-work that includes it); H probably not, unless you're itching to wear more hats including, especially, sales; I yes

Working at any of the big trendy companies: A no way; B maybe; C sure; D no; E orthogonal/tossup; F no; G probably unavoidable; H doubtful; I maybe

Working at a startup: A no way; B maybe; C sure; D likely; E tossup; F no; G no; H no; I maybe

Working at a boring, big, established company that surfs on a river of money: A possible but receding; B possible; C sure, for some subset; D you're out of luck; E, as always, a tossup (picking up a pattern?); F more likely; G possible but it depends; H yes; I probably not, but it depends more on you and what you find interesting.

Anybody else think of any work paradigms that satisfy more of these conditions?

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#138

Post by illumin8 »

Joeri wrote: post #119
wisam wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do think is the reason that most managers in technology are bad? I tend to think of management as abstraction. A mid-level manager provides an abstraction of the work for high-level management and at the same time is provided an abstraction of the work by the low-level managers or engineers. Assuming that my understanding is right, are these abstractions leaky? is the lack of technical knowledge the reason why ma…

The thing with managers is that they have to understand the work being done well enough to make decisions about direction and resource allocation, while also having tons of people skills. In tech you either get a manager who doesn't have a technical background and just doesn't understand the thing they're managing, or you get someone with a technical background who stereotypically doesn't have the necessary people sk…

Great points, and I see the same thing in myself, which is why I don't want to be a manager - I'm great with technology, but I don't have the people skills to be a successful leader.

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#139

Post by lastofus »

deanmoriarty wrote: post #122
deanmoriarty wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is that laughable? 150k spare a year, diligently invested 20 years with an overall real return rate of 5% (which should be relatively achievable with index funds, otherwise our capitalist machine is in serious trouble and it won't matter too much what my portfolio does) compound to $5.2M. And that's a real return rate so it should be protected against inflation (add a ~3% if you want to do pre-inflation calculati…

I would really love to know why this was downvoted? This is what I don’t like about HN, one spends time to come up with a reasonable, realistic and thorough comment, and just gets downvoted. Makes me lose motivation for writing my future next comment.

> I would really love to know why this was downvoted?

Some bar napkin math:

$150k (savings) + $40k (living expenses) = $190k post tax.

Assuming 30% goes to taxes (making liberal use of a 401k), that would be $272k salary. @ 35% it would be $292k.

I think the reason everyone is annoyed/down voting is the assumption that every developer in the bay area is pulling top end salaries like that. The reality is the median dev salary is a lot closer to $140k/yr. It's also quite difficult to live on $40k/yr for most people in the bay area ($3.3k/mo). It's definitely possible but compromises will be made (e.g. no children, live with partner/roommates, have no expensive hobbies, no travel, etc).

Assuming everyone is as fortunate as you, and is willing to make the same compromises as you can come off as condescending, as if everyone is is screwing up and they just need to do this simple easy thing you are doing. It's akin to "why don't you poor people just earn more money??"

With that said, congrats on kicking ass at the savings game, and I hope you enjoy your early retirement :)

Re: Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

#140

Post by raarts »

I can not advise you I can only offer my own experience.

The older you get the harder it will become to get a programming job. I am pushing 60, and lucky enough to end up with a lot of experience as CTO/CEO in multiple companies and now doing technical due diligence for investors, and coaching young CTOs.

But although I'm very up to date on everything new and shiny I would not want to be searching for a programming job right now. The word 'senior' used to mean someone with grey hair, but now means people around thirty and there just are no words available for 40+. Which doesn't make things easier for recruiters by the way.

Even though middle aged people are very experienced, the IT field changes fast and it's very hard to have a family life AND keep your skills current. I only know of a few people being successful with that. On the other hand those people are extremely valuable and few companies know it.

Face it, the future for programmers is bleak, ageism is rampant and it's also true that many aren't current and stuck in their ways.

So maybe it's best to move into management and at least don't be a PHB, or start your own company, it seems older people have a better succes rate than young ones with that at least.

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