Like the article, not fan of the title. I understand it's supposed to be catchy, but it is just not accurate. Planning for the next phase of your career would be better. Planning of the end of the career is a very valid topic, but it's a different one (planning for retirement).
A career-ending mistake
191–200 of 211 posts
Re: A career-ending mistake
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO, there's no such thing as a career in tech, outside of maybe FAANGs (or whatever they're called now). It's just a series of jobs until accumulated wealth, ageism, or disability ends it.
The public sector is probably a decent place for a well defined career.
This is a good point. There have a bunch of excellent HN posts about the UK gov technical service. It looks like a good place to work, and, since it is civil service, then likely a good career. I think a lot of HN overlooks working in light & heavy industry. Like: Who is writing software that runs power plants and turbines and ABS breaking systems? There are lots and lots of devs in light and heavy industry. And those companies are old and stable.
Re: A career-ending mistake
#193This article assumes a lot more self-determinism than is available in practice to most people. Beyond that many of us have been running on fumes for years, I can't lose ten extra hours every week away from seeing my family, so I can up-skill for a new variation on the same career with ultimately the same bull.
This is the point I was going to make as well. I think the article is written for high-agency people, which are rare in my experience, even in tech. Also related: The Peter Principle: people get promoted to their level of incompetence. We think we want something but then realize the job is actually harder than we thought, so we do a bad job (or burn out). So to the excellent points in the article I would add an intro…
> I think the article is written for high-agency people, which are rare in my experience, even in tech.
Re: A career-ending mistake
#194It's not true that in all companies you have to chose between tech and management. It's true in some companies. But at many companies lead and director roles are very hands on. At Stream a lead is 80% technical, a director roughly 50% sometimes more. And even VPs and up are still somewhat technical. I think the idea of management without technical excellence track is just misguided. Small teams, technical excellence,…
> It's not true that in all companies you have to chose between tech and management. It's true in some companies. But at many companies lead and director roles are very hands on. I‘ve seen bad companies where it is true, but in good companies typically not true. Look for example Peter Norvig, 100% hands on technical type, but in a high management position.
> Look for example Peter Norvig, 100% hands on technical type, but in a high management position.
Re: A career-ending mistake
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
But why isn’t there a code review process for management decisions? What if code was how decisions were recorded ? What if companies were programmable ?
The most obvious reason, in my mind, is that merely proposing a decision is enough to be a problem. Suggesting we're killing a project a dev has spent months on, or moving someone to another team, or saying we'll miss a major KPI, or not promoting someone aren't things you can have a public full-team review on. Just knowing the manager was considering it is enough to upset people. If someone writes code that has an e…
But thats politics. Look at every railway, roadway, power station - always supported or opposed by various factions. We think it’s actually healthy for our society, so why is it bad on the scale of companies - some of whom have larger GDP than some countries
Having political discussions out in the open is - I hold as an axiom - a positive on balance.
This who are “upset” about things - well they are adults in a political society - they can understand the issues. Do they feel exposed / vulnerable ? Maybe there is a political solution to thinking you have two weeks notice and that’s all the protection
I think it’s worth having decisions openly debated - otherwise we are blessing an elite and frankly hoping they will get it right.
The survival rate of companies suggests they might not be
Re: A career-ending mistake
#196Here's the thing about the average career in big tech: five years after you leave, almost no one will remember you were there . Most of your old team mates will leave for other other jobs. Your code will get refactored or rewritten. Docs will be superseded, then lost in some CMS migration. Before long, it will be as if you have never worked there. I know it sounds preposterous, but ask anyone over the age of 55 or 60…
> the most useful goal is to make money fast in a way that doesn't drain your life energy
There's a couple issues with your assertion. Even if you go the VP route, people rarely make VP in under, say, seven years, and usually more like twenty years, without exceptional luck like getting in on the ground floor of a rocket ship. If you don't like the managerial path then you'll burn out long before you get to VP. The second issue is that learning to control your expenses is far more powerful than earning more money. I promise you, no matter how big the salary is, there are people drowning in debt despite of it.
Hobbies, friends, family - none of these should require outsize financial outlay. Doing what you love, building your community, and living below your means is a much more powerful strategy for lifelong happiness and fulfillment, and also much more likely to succeed than some years-long "sprint" to a job you can barely tolerate.
Re: A career-ending mistake
#197Earlier quoted context omitted.
But why isn’t there a code review process for management decisions? What if code was how decisions were recorded ? What if companies were programmable ?
What if there were no hypothetical questions? That is, you can ask hypothetical what ifs all you like, but unless you have a concrete plan for getting there, you're just writing fantasies. And, management decisions get reviewed before implementation all the time. It's just not a code review, precisely because management decisions are not code. Why aren't they code? Because people aren't computers. If you're going to…
Look with a historical lens - democracy in USA. From the point of view of say Chartists in 1776 it is a good start, 80 years till slave males can vote, 80 years till women can vote and another forty till civil rights. In 1776 can we call that a “concrete plan”?
Or is the fantasy “votes for all” actually a plan?
Yeah we can have plans - get Zuckerberg to give up power and place it in the hands of employees? Maybe convert Meta to a co-operative?
But on the literacy point - at some point we ran everything with illiterate “managers” - but slowly developed organisations that use literacy. My, yes ok fantasy, is not only democracy but that everyone inna company is software literate and has access to (maybe not write access) the code base of the company.
So there is a concrete plan - a whole org test rig, a company that every IRL action has a virtual shadow, a codebase that directs this IRL actions day-to-day and everyone having access to the codebase and able to suggest / comment or even vote on pull requests.
Run the company through code - change the company through democratic politics
Re: A career-ending mistake
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
If your goal is to get a cushy high paying job you will need to make sacrifices, otherwise that job would no longer be cushy and high paying. Some sacrifice their 20s and grind an education, career, and have no kids or spouse. Others put a large burden on their spouse to retrain, you have to weigh the short term toil versus the amortized improvements over your career. And it is important to remember that luck plays a…
I have sacrificed my relationships with my friends and family for two decades and it hasn't helped advance my career beyond a normal, lowly IC. I don't want to manage people. I would be the exact kind of manager that destroys my own will to live. A senior role would be nice, but because I don't have any social skills (all that time I spent learning all of the technical knowledge I have now had unforeseen consequences…
Well that’s just assuming alternative paths would have been much better than current situation. Looking at how life played out for many of my classmates even my lowly IC job looks quite good.
Re: A career-ending mistake
#199This approach to careers fails to take into account that we inherently change as people. In periods of ones life other things matters - maybe it is taking an education, starting a family, etc. Other periods work matter. It should be entirely fine to switch it on and off and change tracks throughout life - and in my view it seems like it is! To reach a peak it takes roughly 10 years, but these 10 years can be started…
> This approach to careers fails to take into account that we inherently change as people. OP very much talks about this in the last few paragraphs, both in that you can't plan exactly and that you need to course correct as things change. Also, just because it's okay or may happen that you change tracks within your career, it's still a good idea to optimize the track you are currently on and have an idea of where you…
You make it sound like I implied that one should life their life nihilistically or with indifference - I definitely do not think one should do that.
I thnk there is most satisfaction in putting yourself 100% into whatever you do. But what you do is not strictly limited to your work.
Sometimes you put yourself 100% into your family, sometimes it is education, and sometimes it is work.
Re: A career-ending mistake
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
>you don't have to wait until your 60s to live the life you want But, at least at some point in your life, doing work within a company may provide that life. At some point, you're done. And that point may vary. But many people wouldn't really love (or at least benefit from) a bunch of money dropped in their lap when they graduated from college.
I can 100% tell you it will not provide that life to a lot of people. I'm happy for you if it does but others like myself would rather kill themselves than work a 9-5 until they're 60.
"others like myself would rather kill themselves than work a 9-5 until they're 60". If its in a corporate hell-hole, I might at times feel like that too. However, not all 9-5s are equal :) Public sector such as govt or academia, or other non-profit, can be fulfilling and not soul-sucking. Or, at some point switch to something only slightly related to tech, such as teaching. People talk about "full fat" FIRE, but thats unrealistic and/or requires some years of miserable sacrifice for most people (being rich before you start, or getting randomly lucky with stocks, doesn't count IMHO). They also talk of "Barista FIRE" - i:e you can't totally retire but can work a supposedly low-stress job (personally, not convinced by it, baristas can still feel "oppressed" at work) . What about the middle road... which is, live frugally (which helps the planet too), over-pay mortgage and avoid other debts, with such an attitude hopefully most techies would by their 40s be able to work in a job with a moderate professional salary, perhaps arguably underpaid for what they do, but, if that's what necessary to be fulfilled at work and not feel like killing oneself, then so be it? ;)