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It is important to distinguish between job flexibility and what I call career flexibility. As a software developer, I can often work from home, and I can go ge
by geebee 11y ago
It is important to distinguish between job flexibility and what I call career flexibility. As a software developer, I can often work from home, and I can go get a cup of coffee more or less whenever I please. However, what happens if you want to scale back or leave the field for a few years? How does that affect your ability to get back into it?
Among my family and friends are a radiologist, emergency room physician, nurse anesthetist, and a (multiple) registered nurses. This is just my own observation, but they appear to have much greater options to scale back on work for a half decade while they have kids than the software developers I know, without severely compromising their career path when they re-enter full time at a later date. And all these career paths pay, at the median in San Francisco, more than the median for a software developer in San Francisco.
With the exception of radiology, telecommuting, which may people consider to be a critical element of a "flexible" job, is not a big part of most health care jobs. However, jobs like registered nurse, pharmacist, nurse anesthetist, and emergency room physician, may offer more flexibility where it counts most, especially to people who want to pursue meaningful careers but recognize that a period of life, probably when they have small children at home, will require scaling back for an extended period.
- Retric 11y agoI recently took over a year off with minimal issue. Taking a longer break and Scaling back to zero is an issue, but you can keep your skin in the game as a developer fairly easily. Fill the paperwork and start a company doing iOS apps for 5 hours a week and it's not obvious you where taking an extended break. Another option is to have some other project fill the break and then do some transition work to get back into the game. The important thing is to have recent experience not to have zero long term gaps.
- grecy 11y ago> As a software developer, I can often work from home, and I can go get a cup of coffee more or less whenever I please. However, what happens if you want to scale back or leave the field for a few years? How does that affect your ability to get back into it? I'm a Software Engineer and I've taken major breaks. After a year working at the DoD, I spent three years dong whatever I wanted / snowboard instructor / kayak guide, etc. Then I got a job as a Software Dev for 2 years, no problem at all, got the first job I interviewed for. Then I took two years off to drive Alaska->Argentina, and generally do whatever I wanted. After that I again got the first Software Dev job I applied for, and did that for 4 years. Now I'm off again to drive around Africa for at least 2 years. Granted, I have not "climbed the ladder" like my university friends who have been working all of those years, but I've had absolutely no problem dropping in and out when I please.
- xacaxulu 11y agoI second this. I took a year off doing absolutely no dev work and made wine in southern France and I'm still at 6 figures. Highly recommend the drive from Pretoria, SA to Lusaka, Zambia, it was one of my favorites. The added benefit of time off is that you can reexamine your career aspirations and set a new course if necessary.
- vicda 11y agoI would imagine this gets harder as you age, get more set in your ways, the higher on the career ladder you've climbed, and/or as your required salary increases.
- geebee 11y agoThis is what I had in mind when I described career flexibility. The experience for a middle aged person (say, late 30s or older) returning to the workforce full time after scaling back or leaving the workforce for 5+ years to take care of small children (and who still has those obligations for older children) will be very different form relatively young person who has gone back and forth between work and travel. I think the nature of the disruption to career progress is very different.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoI think its less about age and more about financial independence; the more monthly obligations you have, and total debt, the harder it is to be flexible in your career choices. Have a low personal burn rate, save at least 20-50% of your income, and don't live in places with exorbitant living costs (SF, London, NY), and you too can be the master of your destiny.
- strathmeyer 11y agoGraduated in '04. Didn't have a job upon graduation, haven't found one willing to hire an unemployed person since. Everyone in software development is blind to the problems.
- grecy 11y ago
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- learc83 11y agoYou can do contract work for a while and take as few jobs as you want. After you do a few big projects, you can pretty much work 10-20 hours a week on just maintenance pretty much indefinitely.