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Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

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Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#211

Post by jdmichal »

m0nty wrote: post #132
erikb wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not necessarily a bad thing to hear something that sounds bad. Even after years on this planet people can rediscover themselves and start a kind of life they didn't even know it exists. Not telling people who are bad that they are bad is a concept I have a hard time to understand. Instead of worrying about feelings why not worry about really being this better person people can't complain (as much) about?

> Not telling people who are bad that they are bad is a concept I have a hard time to understand. You might be wrong, and you should factor that in. Perhaps you're not helping people towards a bright new future of self-realization, just condemning them out-of-hand based on your own limited experience or misconceptions? (Not using "you" to imply you do this, btw.)

I really wish English would develop a pronoun similar to the German man. I guess we used to use "one" in a similar sense, but it sounds really stilted now.

> Perhaps one isn't helping people towards a bright new future...

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#212

Post by khyryk »

evilduck wrote: post #51
31reasons wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>75% - one year's experience 30 times, not 30 years experience. You don't want these people. You are basically saying 75% of the developers after certain age are useless. I don't agree or disagree with your statement . Just startled. What does it say about software development as a career ? Would you say the same thing for lawyers or doctors with 30 years experience? This is depressing.

Not after a certain age. They're equally useless young too. These are the people who fail at FizzBuzz.

I think this failing at FizzBuzz thing is becoming a meme.

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#213

Post by vonmoltke »

shanemhansen wrote: post #197
vonmoltke wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Right now there is a [firehose] of job offers from recruiters on linkedin Interview offers, and they only come to the people who have the right combination of keywords and location. Miss on one or both of those counts, and you are invisible. The second seems to be much more important than the first, too.

I'd agree with that. I'd add that I live in Salt Lake City, Utah and still get a fair amount of offers. I realize it might be quite different in other countries.

I know Texas likes to claim is is "a whole other country", but sometimes living in Dallas it feels like that. It seems like nobody comes looking in Dallas from outside the area.

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#214

Post by eru »

warfangle wrote: post #158
eru wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you let them treat you like that? There are other options.

> LA

I don't get it. shams93 clearly has the right to work in the US, and is already on the west coast, one of the hottest markets for any warm body capable of writing a few lines of code..

Anyway, move away from LA, and up to SF or NYC?

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#215

Post by mark-r »

shams93 wrote: post #124
31reasons wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>75% - one year's experience 30 times, not 30 years experience. You don't want these people. You are basically saying 75% of the developers after certain age are useless. I don't agree or disagree with your statement . Just startled. What does it say about software development as a career ? Would you say the same thing for lawyers or doctors with 30 years experience? This is depressing.

Down here in Los Angeles the talent pool is very shallow, now we are starting to see the first companies offering equity down here that is meaningful since 1998, seriously. If I hadn't had to go the last 14 years without equity I wouldn't still be coding pushing 43, I'd be an angel investor, basically making a living helping to fund companies. With no equity life is a kind of living hell, no ability to have the norma…

Don't overplay the importance of equity. It's like a lottery ticket - you can't win if you don't have it, but the chances of winning big are still remote.

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#216

Post by mrgriscom »

MCRed wrote: post #134

Either you become CTO or you stay a Senior Software Developer forever. I have noticed a lot of age discrimination the "bay area startup scene". Not so much outside the bay area. I do wonder how long it is until someone gets sued for age discrimination when the way they knew the person's age was a video call. I see a lot of startups (including some YC ones) wanting to do a video call with a recruiter before even sendi…

If you wanted to be ageist, though, can't you deduce someone's approximate age from their resume just as easily, and thus eliminate them even quicker?

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#217

Post by vonmoltke »

MrDom wrote: post #201
shanemhansen wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now there is a firehouse of job offers from recruiters on linkedin, and all a good developer has to do to find work is take a drink from that firehose. While I enjoy the current situation, it's unlikely to last. Sometimes we forget that there's plenty of people who have simply built up a clientele and a repuation through plain old networking. These jobs tend to be more lucrative and probably don't require you t…

Having tried to drink from the firehose in the past, I can say that I have never once had a recruiter lead actually result in a job offer. It's one gigantic catch-22. The companies themselves aren't great at hiring, or they wouldn't need to use recruiters doing semi-random searches on linkedin. If you yourself were any good at interviewing, you wouldn't need to rely on the recruiters either. You're an unqualified lea…

> But, if you were any good an shining in an interview, you wouldn't need the recruiter in the first place.

If you need the recruiter in order to get the interview in the first place, it doesn't matter how well you shine in the interview.

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#218

Post by Iftheshoefits »

chton wrote: post #35
edw519 wrote: post #23

59, programming for 42 years, the last 35 professionally. Here on HN for 7.5 years. I've always been very busy (one of the main reasons I don't post on HN as much any more). I don't have a resume. I'm not on LinkedIn. If I ever ran low on work, it would probably take me a day or two and a few phone calls to find something. I don't work on anything unless I find it incredibly compelling. I write applications. I've see…

"one year's experience 30 times, not 30 years experience." is a fantastic sentence and I'm stealing it. I've seen too many developers to whom it applies, and it's a great way to express that.

Are you one of the people who use it to describe serial contractors or "job hoppers", or are you one of the people who use it to describe people who've been iterating on the same project/technology system for X years in a single place?

That's the problem with the generalization: it's too general, can be applied to almost any normal career, and isn't really a good heuristic to use when analyzing somebody's work experience in most contexts.

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#219

Post by khyryk »

FD3SA wrote: post #209
mattmanser wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this comment getting upvoted? It's pretty insulting and arrogant to paint a massive swathe of our community as stupid, unambitious people who never progressed past hello world. Let's remember that in those 42 years the number of BASIC, FORTRAN, or COBOL jobs has diminished through to almost nothing. The last person I met who described themselves as a COBOL programmer was about 10 years ago, and even they said…

I felt the same, but I've come to realize that the comment you take issue with perfectly encapsulates the tech industry. A no holds barred race to the bottom. That's why work conditions, salary, stability and prestige are nowhere near comparable industries such as finance, heavy engineering, medicine, law, etc. Something about programmers makes them think they are all the destined one true hero, and as a result, prog…

> That's why work conditions, salary, stability and prestige are nowhere near comparable industries such as finance, heavy engineering, medicine, law, etc.

As a combination or individually? Medicine is about the only one in the list that's strong in all of the listed characteristics. "Heavy engineering", to my knowledge, doesn't pay much more, finance doesn't seem that much more stable, and law certainly has good work conditions for those at the very top, but not for the newbies.

Re: Career planning: Where do old devs go to?

#220

Post by JoeAltmaier »

zeratul wrote: post #45
edw519 wrote: post #23

59, programming for 42 years, the last 35 professionally. Here on HN for 7.5 years. I've always been very busy (one of the main reasons I don't post on HN as much any more). I don't have a resume. I'm not on LinkedIn. If I ever ran low on work, it would probably take me a day or two and a few phone calls to find something. I don't work on anything unless I find it incredibly compelling. I write applications. I've see…

I think no one is like Ed. There maybe be 25% of programmers that have a long standing experience, even with the new tools, but they don't share wisdom like Ed does. Ed why can't you have your own company? Why can't you be the one who is hiring or at least teach others how to hire. I bet you can smell a talent from 1000 miles away - even if someone did not finish a good school; the world of software engineering would…

I'm like Ed! Except I do engines, libraries, network and backend code, including embedded stuff. But I don't have a resume; don't apply for jobs; don't need to look for work because it looks for me.

I've owned a company but its lonely, so now I earn less but work as a peer in somebody else's company.

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