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Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?

• matt_the_bass 8y ago
  I think these jobs exist. Mine does. We’re a small company that makes high value physical items with a large software component. We encourage remote working but not remote only. I know this is not a popular view on HN, but I think there is huge value with regular irl interaction. It doesn’t need to be every day, but it does need to be regular. We also offer mostly single person offices (interns are currently 2 per room). We also have a culture of opensuggestions and critique regardless of official positions. I’ve always worked this way so maybe it is survivor bias. I fully admit I could make more money elsewhere but that is not my primary success metric. I already make more money that most in my area (though it is easy to believe I don’t based on some of the material things I see around my general location). My only concern hiring older engineers is that they are stuck in a rut. But I’m my area most senior devs work for huge defense contractors. So maybe that is more an environmental factor.
  • platz 8y ago
    What does a rut look like, like what is the last recent tech rut folks use. And what is an example of tech that non-rut folks have that rut folks don't have?
    • WalterSear 8y ago
      At a large, well known software company, I worked with senior engineers, with a decade's more development experience than I, who couldn't use React properly, or even understand Redux. These are not difficult tools. They had been working on the specific codebase for over a year, fwiw.
      • deleted 8y ago
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      • platz 8y ago
        They should learn to use React & understand Redux
        • WalterSear 8y ago
          They should be reading the fucking source code. Redux isn't big. But they are stuck in a rut. IMHO, from the outside, senior developer rut looks like a fear/resistance to change or learning. I'm not sure if what is really going on inside, though. Probably career burnout. I am the around same age as the guys I'm referring to here, fwiw. So, it's more than just physiological aging.
          • firebones 8y ago
            Out of curiosity, what was their primary technology background before being expected to use/learn React?
            • WalterSear 8y ago
              Javascript :(
  • Myrmornis 8y ago
    > but I think there is huge value with regular irl interaction a) People vary hugely in the extent to which they find irl interaction helpful. You can’t make a single statement like this and claim that it applies equally to everyone. b) Huge value to whom?
  • wai1234 8y ago
    "My only concern hiring older engineers is that they are stuck in a rut." Wow, better check that bias.
    • tomc1985 8y ago
      Biased or not, experienced people fighting change is nothing new
      • wrs 8y ago
        Inexperienced people advocating change is not new either. They both have their pros and cons.
        • OldHand2018 8y ago
          Experienced people advocating against good changes is a bad thing. Experienced people advocating against bad changes is a good thing. Inexperienced people advocating for a good change is a good thing. Inexperienced people advocating for a bad change is a bad thing. It's almost like it would be great if we knew what changes were good and what changes were bad before we started arguing about them. Any ideas???
          • xyproto 8y ago
            Ideas just have to be tried out. The problem is when a company have absolutely no process for letting developers, young or experienced, try out a new idea. Many companies have a very random "process", where a few select people can get away with just implementing their ideas, without any testing. Small teams of 2-3 people spending a few days for testing out a new idea, or writing a prototype, may often work out.
          • wrs 8y ago
            One good filter I’ve found is whether the person arguing has a good understanding of both the old thing and the new thing. If an experienced person doesn’t seem to understand the new thing, or an inexperienced person doesn’t seem to understand the old thing, then they probably aren’t making a good argument. Both of those certainly happen —- the inexperienced will follow fads and the experienced will not want to devalue their knowledge.
  • gcb0 8y ago
    have you considered you are in a rut, and it might not be a very good one, so people with seniority call you out, while the freshman/woman you keep hiring and doctronating just reinforce your own bias?
    • tyrust 8y ago
      Calling out women separately and grouping them with "freshman" is pretty messed up. No one mentioned gender and women could be part of seniority.
      • demoray 8y ago
        Perhaps they meant "fresh men/women"? Instead of slamming, you could ask.
      • connoredel 8y ago
        Pretty sure he meant "freshman or freshwoman"
        • tyrust 8y ago
          Oh, didn't think of that. I hope that's the case. Avoiding a gendered word would avoid this confusion.
          • elteto 8y ago
            Not jumping to conclusions would have been equally acceptable.
      • richardwardza 8y ago
        I think you're misreading and the op was meaning freshman/freshwomen, shortening it to freshman/women
    • matt_the_bass 8y ago
      Yes. I often spend time self reflecting my current solutions and chosen paths to consider if I’m in a rut. This is a common topic of discuss at my office especially when evaluating the cost of technical debt: should we continue editing the old tooling in the old technology or should we invest in a larger project to migrate to a newer solution. We use a mix of older and newer technologies. We try to identify the “best” solution where best is a function of: implementation cost (time and dollars), technical debt, learning curve, future extensibility, performance, simplicity, and personal intellectual interest.
  • deleted 8y ago
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• maxxxxx 8y ago
  There are a lot of small, specialized, stable companies that fit your description. The challenge will be to find these companies and get hired. Usually their turnover is pretty low and they don't grow much so there is not much hiring going on.
  • nextstep40plus 8y ago
    This is so true and I will not jump ship until this kind of job shows up. I suffer from IBS which might be stress induced so a changed work lifestyle is not just a luxury request for me. I want to focus and work in a relaxed customer focused remote position.
    • dev1n 8y ago
      Related to IBS, IBD, etc., I've found this subreddit [1] to be super helpful (not for me but for someone I know) [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/CrohnsDisease/ https://www.reddit.com/r/CrohnsDisease/
• GlenTheMachine 8y ago
  Some government jobs fulfill many of your requirements. Not all, to be sure, but some. I am a roboticist at a government research lab. It's a good gig. The nice things about it are steady work hours (I'm not actually legally allowed to charge more than 40 hours a week, and none of my bosses over the years has ever pressured me to work unpaid overtime). No open offices, anyone with seniority has an actual office with a door. Everyone else gets a fairly decent cubicle. Many (not all) government jobs let you telecommute, at least part of the time. Colleagues tend to be competent and not stress-inducing. We admittedly do have more meetings than I'd prefer, but I'm currently working on a rather large program, 200+ engineers, and I'm sort of the scientific representative to program management so it's not surprising. There have been times when I had one meeting a week or fewer.
• davidxc 8y ago
  Consider the defense industry / government contractors. I'm not sure what kind of salary you're looking for, but the defense industry / gov contractors pay fairly well (I'd guess ~150k ish for someone with your background) and checks most of your requirements.
• alexashka 8y ago
  It may seem to you like you're asking for advice, but may come across to others like you're complaining. We'd all prefer a better work environment, with better people and less stress, so that we can thrive and have better balance in life. You haven't mentioned anything that you're doing to get there, besides asking somebody else (HN) to hand you some sort of 'insightful' answer. The insight may very well be that given your current skillset and level of ambition and willingness to sacrifice, you are right where you deserve to be. If you want something to change, the only variable you really have control over, is you. I'd give a 2pac quote, but it'd get flagged so I'll link it - the last line is for you. https://genius.com/2pac-starin-through-my-rear-view-lyrics https://genius.com/2pac-starin-through-my-rear-view-lyrics
  • nextstep40plus 8y ago
    Actually I've been actively searching and responding to recruiters and sent spontaneous applications etc. You have no idea.
    • deleted 8y ago
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• ydnaclementine 8y ago
  My first job out of school was with a consulting company (think SapientRazorfish, Accenture, Deloitte). What I found interesting is the vast majority of my colleagues were 'older' (35-40+), and these positions are primarily remote WFH. Consultancies love more experienced developers because they know they'll get the work done. The pay is definitely above average too. Consulting can sometimes lead to more hours depending on stage of project (so be strict on work/life balance) and there might be a lot of travel depending on the project/client. But the clients will be brands you know and the project will be technically interesting and worth millions of dollars. I figure if I ever get tired of the startup game when older, I'll move back into that space.
  • sailfast 8y ago
    Perhaps, but you are almost guaranteed a terrible manager and many, many meetings in this scenario.
• eranation 8y ago
  Did you consider pre-sales/professional services consulting. Most folks who do this that I know are in their forties. Good pay, interesting work, and relies a lot on soft skills
  • nextstep40plus 8y ago
    Yes I consider that but I'm an introvert so developer jobs are more suitable.
• meritt 8y ago
  > Do you suggest I go solo and take on development jobs myself Yes. You don't want to help juniors. You don't want to waste your time in meetings explaining things to "incompetent" managers. You only want to work in a private office on your own schedule. You don't want to be stressed or asked to put in extra hours. You only want to work on "hard technical problems" that you find interesting.
  • deleted 8y ago
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  • nextstep40plus 8y ago
    You're getting really close to what I want. I just don't find it easy to get this kind of job. Do you have experience working for your self helping small clients with fun work and your description?
    • ilaksh 8y ago
      I have experience with something like that. I'm 40 years old and been working remotely most of the time for maybe ten years. I mostly find good projects online. Building prototypes helps get contracts. However, the major problem I have had is finding those awesome low stress remote jobs or gigs that _also_ have "US market rate" pay and that can sustain it. I have certainly been successful in that to some degree but my current startup hasn't had funding. And rather than give up when he started running out of money, I cut my rate. So in order to save money I recently moved to a beach area in Mexico. It has an amazing view of the ocean and is affordable. However there are downsides. I have discovered new types of diarrhea that I did not know existed. The water was shut off for five days. And yesterday the ATM had an error and just decided it couldn't give me my $170 even though my account was debited. So today I am trying to find an inexpensive place to live in the US again.
• utopkara 8y ago
  Given your requirements, I would suggest a consultant/contract developer position for large/established companies building enterprise solutions. Large, because they will have challenging business problems that they cannot deliver through their normal project development process. Enterprise solutions, because the problems will be better defined and your experience will be better appreciated.
• HelloNurse 8y ago
  Most of your requirements depend on the quality of each particular workplace; the only aspect that is susceptible to advice is the alignment between somewhat relaxed environment, more or less Android and web for technology, and hard technical problems. For that, I suggest companies that are as small as possible (you would be more of a generalist and less of a cog), established (filtering out bad ideas and incompetent teams, and ensuring the time to reach a high competence level), product-oriented (to work on interesting improvements, customizations, support requests of something you can become an expert of, instead of random low quality consultancy projects). As specific examples: machines of all sorts (likely computer-controlled and with external management apps and other auxiliary software) or business software at the intermediate scale at which customers are many enough to ensure stability and variety, but large enough to need interesting kinds of individual attention.
• jvagner 8y ago
  The bigger companies I worked for in the Bay Area were more like this than the smaller. As a late 40-something who started his own marketing & technology agency to get out of the "working for others and their bad boss habits" conundrum, the one thing I can strongly recommend is that you have to interview companies as carefully as they interview you. I've directly hired more than 100 people in my career, and it was always notable to me how many people show up for an interview, answer questions, ask just a few, and then accept a position in a company without any qualifying process of their own. People take jobs that are offered to them, more or less.
  • samstave 8y ago
    Sure, but people also take jobs because they really need the money. I don't know if you have spent any meaningful amount of time without a job/money - but this world REALLY fucking sucks when you have no income.
    • ngngngng 8y ago
      A good strategy in this scenario is to take the first job you can when you need money, but keep interviewing. This way you can be more selective since your needs are already being met.
      • samstave 8y ago
        Yeah, I hear this - the problem can be in some cases that the job you get for money may have come from a contact that if you up-and-leave will negatively affect your relationship with them.
      • wheaties 8y ago
        Sorry but that's a very good way to hurt your career. The community is surprisingly small. As in, I swear it's less than 3 hops from me to most people who might cross my desk when recruiting. I can tell you we know who have done this and we shy away from them. They're a waste of time.
• mikestew 8y ago
  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 fact the work environment has changed. I’ll bet the fact that you don’t want an open office knocks out 60-70% of Seattle-area prospects right off the bat. Quiet colleagues? Tech bros are where it’s at...bro! You’ll have at least one in 50% of the remaining prospects. Managers are not getting any more competent, so whack off another 25%. The quiet, professional workplace with offices is largely gone, so prospects that fit your parameters are less common than in the past. That all said, my brief flirtinsg with embedded and the reports from others indicate that it is a field with higher instances of what you’re looking for.
  • Bekwnn 8y ago
    I work in an office with lots of dads and people in the 30-50 range. It's still not that quiet because people get along well and going over to someone's desk to discuss something happens often. The best thing to do is make your own quiet with headphones. If your headphones don't do enough, request different ones. "I would be more productive and focused with headphones that block out peripheral distractions better." With wording that makes it a potential gain rather than a failing on your part. Most (smart) places will readily jump at buying software or hardware that will increase an engineer's productivity. Your salary is high enough that it's a no-brainer. "I would get maybe 5% more work done with fewer distractions." So long as that's true, I'd imagine you'll get them.
  • teuobk 8y ago
    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.
• samstave 8y ago
  >I'm 40 years old without any children and would like to be able to not be stressed and work overtime and solve hard technical problems You have no kids... You can work overtime and do anything you want when you want with respect to working and focusing on work without kids. I'll assume those downvoting this comment dont have kids.
  • unit91 8y ago
    I have kids and down-voted your comment. Simply because a person has (or might have) the capacity for working overtime doesn't mean this should be a requirement. We're employees, not slaves.
    • samstave 8y ago
      Thats not what I meant - the OP stated "I dont have kids and I want to be able to work overtime and focus on a project" -- so, my comment was "well if you dont have kids, you should be better able to work overtime and focus on a project"
      • azangru 8y ago
        That’s really interesting. Reading the OP's post: > I <...> would like to be able to not be stressed and work overtime and solve hard technical problems and move towards a more rewarding job I cannot tell whether he is saying he would like to be able to work overtime, or whether he doesn't want to <be stressed and> work overtime. I would assume, "work overtime" has a tighter coupling with the preceding "not" than with the preceding "would like to", but can't tell for sure.
• wprapido 8y ago
  Contract work outside of the startup world (or for a well funded startup that delivers real value) fits the description. Large companies, too.
• donretag 8y ago
  "So many recruiters are looking for senior developers like me to join their early stage team and to do development and assist junior devs via knowledge sharing." What I have encountered is that everyone wants to hire senior developers, but no junior developers, so your "senior" role is the same as that of a junior developer. I always ask what the team structure is during the phone screen. If it is all senior developers, which is becoming the norm, then I stop the interview process. You will be the defacto junior developer as the newbie on the team.
  • joezydeco 8y ago
    Well, let’s be clear about the term “senior”. These days “senior” means “3-5 years experience” and a salary to match. When you have 20+ years experience, they don’t know what to do with you.
• vaibkv 8y ago
  Sure, we have a team just like you mentioned. Quiet, no stupid gossips, etc. Focused on work and individual contribution. Very less to almost no meetings for developers. We always for look for creatively solving the problems, rather than preferring manual labor intensive solutions. And the team is small. But it's not Android related. We are big data development and mostly use Scala. Email me at panghal.vaibhav@gmail.com if you want to apply. We are Austin, texas based and domain is healthcare.
• varjag 8y ago
  Working on hard problems is rarely stress free.
• jonathankoren 8y ago
  Not finding an open office plan is going to be tricky. That’s been the fashion for well over a decades now. Buy headphones. Complaining about colleagues and managers, is well... a bit sad. You’ve been around the block a few times. You know how people act. There’s no perfect place, you just decide what pile of problems you want to deal with.
• liftbigweights 8y ago
  Why not retire and contribute to open source? You can set your own schedule and speak to whomever you want or no one at all. It amazes me that people in their 40s are working as software developers. Did everyone gamble their money away? 20 years in software developement is easily a few million in the bank + retirement account + home. Why not retire?
  • deanmoriarty 8y ago
    This is harsh but true. I am an average 32 years old software engineer in the Bay Area, and in my average 8 years career I amassed roughly $1.2M by diligently saving, investing in index funds and living frugally. My real hope is that by the time I’m in my mid 40s this amount, including the new savings, will have at least doubled (if not 3X), and I’ll be able to retire or take some very light job in a cheaper area, not worrying about this nonsense software engineering bias against age.
    • liftbigweights 8y ago
      Yeah. I'm surprised that I'm downvoted. If you are clearing six figures ( most software devs should in this environment ), you could max out your 401k/ira/etc ( $40K ) to lower your tax basis and then save half the remaining income easily. Especially if you are single with no kids. My biggest problem was hitting the max and not being able to shelter more income from taxes. $40K per year in retirement + $20K or $30K in saving and interest + capital gains will easily make you a multimillionaire over 20 years. I don't think people understand how long 20 years really is and how consistent savings starts to add up. As long as you don't gamble away your money or do something stupid with it, a six figure salary as a software engineer should make you are multimillionare ( in assets ) by your 40s.
      • deanmoriarty 8y ago
        Fully agree. Just out of curiosity, is the $40k pre-tax including 401k contributions of a spouse too? Otherwise, how can I, as an single person, achieve retirement contributions of $40k? In general, working for startups with crappy retirement plans, retirement accounts have been a big pain point for me, a big portion of my assets are actually held in taxable accounts, which is not too bad if you invest in tax efficient funds which at most provide qualified dividends, and during a downturn you can do some valuable tax loss harvesting, but I would gladly take advantage of more tax deferred space.
• Yenderman 8y ago
  When I was 30, people just looked at me and assumed I was a competent software engineer because I looked exactly like a very senior software engineer, and I presented myself in that way. But I was very junior, having made a recent career change. Yet they paid me like a prince, and I rose so rapidly through the ranks that I became an executive. Now I'm 50, and my company folded and I went to the curb, and am looking for a new job. Now I don't look like that bright young engineer. I look like an old has-been who is stuck in a rut and stuck in my ways. Except I'm not. I'm highly experienced, an innovator, get along great with many kinds of people and can contribute at all levels of an org, from production support to development to architecture to the boardroom. But the first question I get asked on interviews is "Are you technical?" My over-40 career advice for you is to remember what they do to engineers that are over 40.
  • jensv 8y ago
    That's insanity. What is wrong with this industry????
    • toomuchtodo 8y ago
      Being ageist cost nothing and is hard to prove.
      • noname120 8y ago
        Of course it does cost something. If there is unjustified ageism, then the market value of older people is lower than it should be. In this case, hiring a younger person will cost you more if adjusted for output.
    • hinkley 8y ago
      I've been watching Uncle Bob videos lately and he's stated in a number of them that the population of developers has doubled every 5 years basically since the beginning. Which means that half of developers have less than 5 years experience. We are just outnumbered by the new kids. But there also usually aren't enough of them to fill all of the seats.
    • 8y ago
• Yenderman 8y ago
  One thing you might consider is expanding that "Spring Boot" to "Full Stack". It will give you some options when they decide they don't want a fussy gray on the team and cut you loose.
• Yenderman 8y ago
  It doesn't match all of your wants, but you should consider living in the inner city of a large metropolitan area and working for tech companies there. In Los Angeles, a talented dev/arch with devops can make $185,000/yr with benefits. Another possibility would be turning into a migrant fruit-picker, stick your stuff in a storage facility and follow the contracts around the country, looking for the $200/hr gigs. Do all of the above, then retire early and spend your time developing your own client list at your own pace at home, working 0 to 10 hours per week.
  • maxxxxx 8y ago
    "$200/hr gigs." do these really exist in sufficiently large numbers? When I was freelancer there seemed to be hard limit at $100.
    • paulgrant999 8y ago
      LOL. I quoted 120 an hour, and the response I got was "120 an hour?! thats what we bill at!" Yeah dumbass. 120 an hour, the bare minimum, for a small company, where I'm not gauranteed shit. The next comment was even worse "you don't have any overhead!" To which I replied, "Yes, but I'ld like to get some. So if I don't budget it out, I won't ever get it." Then I correct him, by telling him 120 was my minimum. Depending on the work, it could be higher. I dipped to 65, on a multi-month project ("discounted rate for large block of time"). But that was a one-off for that customer. Rule of thumb is 1:6; but its more like 1:8. So that 120 an hour, is more like earning 15 bucks an hour. And that assuming a full schedule. Sometimes I get clients who try to cheap out, and give x hours per week; to which I just raise my rates. If you can't afford to pay real wages; or more likely, treat all your employees like shit and skim their salaries to make mega bucks - fuck off.
• codingdave 8y ago
  Those types of jobs exist, but usually not with young companies. Look for older, established companies that either have high internal tech needs, or are a tech-based business. I had 2 jobs that matched your description, each of which lasted 5 years - one was internal software development for a large energy company. The other was working for a small SaaS shop that had been around for more than 10 years. On the flip side, the least satisfying jobs I've had were open-office startups with inexperienced managers and CEOs. I didn't last a year at the three of those I've done, and I think I've finally learned my lesson to never try again. To be clear, there is a place in this industry for young startups led by ambitious but inexperienced leadership teams. I think positively of the people from those places and wish them well... I just agree that those of us who have been around this block for more than a couple decades don't fit well in such places.
• rectang 8y ago
  There are many of us willing to leave money on the table in order to get quality of life, but there are basically zero companies whose job ads explicitly make that trade. Finding such companies is thus a frustrating and inefficient process.
  • xchaotic 8y ago
    Basecamp seems to be an exception, see their latest book - "it doesn't have to be crazy at work"
• deleted 8y ago
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• pjmlp 8y ago
  From another's mid-40 point of view, the only ways to avoid such management like positions is to either go consulting, e.g. Android + Spring Boot expert on your case, or accept a position at a company with lower pay but with those perks that you list. In either case it is an hard fight, as most HR departments and head hunters try to offer management positions, so it is up to you to make your point about what you really want, and accept it takes a bit longer to find such positions.
• trebligdivad 8y ago
  Yes they exist. I'm Mid 40's; been working from home for ~5 years for a large international software company as a dev. If you're doing remote, make sure it's in a team where there's a fairly large chunk of remotees - being the only remotee is a bit weird (fortunately at this job most of the team are remote).
• bergerjac 8y ago
  Nobody cares about your age as much as they care about what you can do for them. Sell the vision of what your experience can bring to the company.
• oppositelock 8y ago
  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 companies generally expect you to become productive before they're ok with fill time WFH. As a senior engineer, you are expected to mentor junior engineers and participate in broad design and architecture, that's much harder to do from home. Unlike you, I have kids, which puts severe constraints on my time, and I find myself WFH quite a bit, but my company is ok with it, since I'm productive. Open offices suck, I agree, but find a coping mechanism - for me it's a noise canceling headset, a pile of music on my phone, and a very careful arrangement of whiteboards to pretend I have some privacy. I'm not doing anything strange at work, just the activity around me is distracting. It's sad, but for the time being, private offices are extinct. As a senior engineer, you also spend more time in meetings - precisely because that's how you disseminate knowledge to other people in a corporate environment. If you've been working for a while, you probably have deep expertise in some area, find companies which need that and are willing to pay for it. No strange startups with low salary and high equity, etc. I don't know about you, but over my career, I've made hundreds of professional connections. It's difficult to walk in the front door with grey hair for a fair interview, since in our field, people view us older folks as has-beens. Call in those former connections. Anyhow, good luck! Try not to get stuck being too curmudgeonly.
  • kalecserk 8y ago
    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 - which I have immediately converted into a shared quiet space to work for whoever might need it. I actually prefer to be where things get done. I really think the problem lies in the engineering culture and maturity of the teams you had the chance to work with. Keep on looking! Best,
• somid3 8y ago
  If you can code in Java, optionally using the Play Framework, ebeans, etc. I can hire you at $100k per year as a contractor. Email me at omid at colibrin dot com —- I don’t care about your age.
• avip 8y ago
  I'd hesitate to "go solo" if what you'd like to do is Android + Spring Boot. Because it's a cold, cold world of a race to bottom out there. I have fiverrs doing apps for me for 5$/h and, contrary to what may be a common belief, they are not x10 worse than me. They are almost as good, and once they become fully on par they start asking 15-20$/h - which is insanely low. Only do that on top of some baseline employment that keeps you going.
• deleted 8y ago
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• throwaway172852 8y ago
  Speaking as someone who is a 40+ IC Eng at one of the FAANG companies (and previously worked for another) let me give you some advice: - First, at the risk of being blunt, you come across as someone who needs to get off their high horse with your list of "demands". Take the open office. This is the norm. IME this has always been manageable with headphones. YMMV. - The biggest issue is not wanting to exhaust yourself helping others. Helping others is about your best value add. What's more, helping people is a pretty good way of earning the gratitude of your colleagues. Some general thoughts on working as a 40+ IC in these companies. Again YMMV: - I don't tell people my age. Nor do I allow people to infer it by, say, mentioning when I graduated college or make references that would otherwise indicate my age. Now I don't look 25 but do people assume I'm old looking in my 30s or in my 40s? I have no idea. I think it's in my best interest not to find out. - Ageism is very real and it's subtle. I've had directors tell me "I like new grads so I can mold them" without realizing that's brazen ageism. - Culture fit is another common proxy for ageism. You can say that millennials will naturally gravitate to those of similar age or background. Grads from one college will tend to prefer grads from the same college. Common experience is one reason for this but another is people can overvalue the social proof of, say, being an MIT or Stanford alum as that by extension increases their own value. Culture fit is problematic on many fronts and tends to exclude those of nonstandard backgrounds for which age is but one factor. - With or without justification you will have to alleviate the concern that you aren't an old dog who can't learn new tricks. Some older workers will expect deference based on age (as a proxy for seniority/experience) but it's the nature of the beast that in FAANG companies you may end up reporting to some wunderkind who is 2-3 years out of college and may be 20+ years younger than you. If you get hung up on that you're going to have a bad time. - Likewise older workers will have to fight the stereotype that you'll be less committed because of other responsibilities (typically meaning family). The way you're wording things here does you no favors because it can come across as entitled and inflexible.
  • loco5niner 8y ago
    > Take the open office. This is the norm. IME this has always been manageable with headphones. YMMV. As someone who has developed tinnitus from this, I disagree.
• RickJWagner 8y ago
  I work in support. Many of my colleagues work remote, and you are increasingly rewarded for deep technical knowledge. It's not for everybody, but it's been great for me. Many of your 'wish list' items seem aligned. Good luck. (Edit: I am in my 50s. I feel it's possible to continue in a similar role 'till retirement age.)
• softawre 8y ago
  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.
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• danielvf 8y ago
  Other than a different tech stack, I've got all of these. This is totally doable as a freelancer. I can't offer any magical advice, other than that, I've made it my policy to never work with anyone who might be a jerk, and to stop working with anyone one who got past the first filter and turns out to be one. So yes, if you actually want control over your work environment and who you work with, your options are usually either freelancing or owning you company. Good luck, and you aren't asking for too much!
• rdiddly 8y ago
  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?
  • username3 8y ago
    Reading variables is hard.
    • SomewhatLikely 8y ago
      I think it's a learned skill. Reading academic papers is impossible without it. Perhaps a happy medium would be two or three letter acronyms.
      • qorrect 8y ago
        And so much of reading variables is about context.
    • rdiddly 8y ago
      Ironically if I were writing code I would've been much more verbose, like offersPrivateOffice, canWorkFromHome etc.
    • 8y ago
• raarts 8y ago
  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.
  • tayo42 8y ago
    > 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. Do you mean titles for levels in companies? Isn't staff, senior staff, principal, what gets used now for experienced levels?
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• fuzzieozzie 8y ago
  These kind of jobs DO exist. This is pretty much exactly our value proposition to our developers (we are a team of 9 in six countries!) Unfortunately for you we are focused on back-end Java developers. (search for CompilerWorks on who's hiring https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17902901 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17902901)
• liangzan 8y ago
  Well I'm the founder of a startup, funded, and actively hiring. I'm considered old myself(late thirties), so I see the value of experience. Going through the variables. A - no. B - no. I tried that in my previous company, it won't work unless everybody buys in. C - no. D - yes. E - toss up. The average age of the management is in the late 30s, the average age of the whole team is in the mid-late thirties. No twenty plus young kids(rarity in startups nowadays). We've seen shit, made many mistakes, so we're hopefully on the way to becoming better managers F - hell yes. Both founders have kids. Principle is "Work hard, and go home" G - Unavoidable I - Blockchain Please reach me(check my username)!
• mattdeboard 8y ago
  What you are looking for is a worker's co-op. https://github.com/hng/tech-coops https://github.com/hng/tech-coops
• m23khan 8y ago
  Have you thought about working for IT department at a University? Would like check off all the items on your wish list.
• lowlevel 8y ago
  I think you're going to be most happy running your own show.. I've seen a lot of this anyway. Open plan because the boss wants to see everyone in one spot the 3 hours he is in per year. Focus unattainable due to noise/talking. Resistance to WFH arrangements. Train young people so we can have redundancy...Old guy quits and now you have 4 people doing what 1 used to, 3 of which are looking to quit because face it, they don't want to work hard ;) Good luck my friend.
• mikekchar 8y ago
  I'm 50 and work remotely from rural Japan. I work with a good team and I genuinely like the people I work with. I'll try to respond to each of the points you make in relation to my job: - I work from home. My wife volunteers most days so I have the place to myself most of the time. However I work in Japan and my colleagues are in the UK, so this means I often work nights. In our small apartment, it's hard to separate myself from what my wife is doing. I try my best to do work where I need to concentrate during the day and then collaborate with people during the evening. It's hard to juggle, though. - These days lots of companies are doing office work with work at home a few days a week. We do that, but because the company is growing fast, we ran out of desks. This means that people mostly work at home and hot swap when then are in the office. The hot swapping is actually a real sore point with people as they like to have their own space at work, but you can imagine that it's hard for the company to justify having a floor 3/4 empty most of the time. Still, before I moved back to Japan, I did the WFH one or two days a week and IMHO, if you are close to your office this is really ideal -- lots of opportunity to collaborate and lots of opportunity to put your head down. In that kind of environment, personally I'm happy to have open office, hot swap setup. I differ from many people ;-) - Meetings are a function of company culture. Some companies value them, some do not. I once worked in a company and my manager asked me what I'd like from him (NB: managers, please do this!) I said, I don't ever want to go to a meeting. Can you go to all my meetings and send me a quick email with the result? He said, No problem! (Best manager ever) When you are shopping for jobs, make sure to ask about what kinds of meetings people have and why they have them. I like companies where meetings are for disseminating information to large groups of people. I dislike companies where meetings are for collaboratively coming up with a solution. Other people like the opposite. Know what you want and find a compatible group to work with. - Incompetent managers. Sorry, no panacea for this one. Most managers are terrible (sorry, but it's truly how I feel). It's a massively hard job, people are not trained for it and often people get into management because they want to bully people into doing what they say. I want a manager who feels their job is to remove obstacles from me so that I can concentrate on work (see point above). 90% of the time I don't get managers like that. It's hard for me to complain too much because I don't want to be a manager, even though I am very opinionated about what managers should do. Again, pre-screen your prospective employers. Specifically ask your potential manager what they think a manager should be doing. I've never met a manager who would lie about that. - Colleagues: Let me preface this by saying again, I like my current colleagues. As I get older, though, it gets pretty difficult. I'm the oldest person in the IT department at my company. I'm double the age of most of the people (we have a lot of junior people). I remember talking to a colleague about Tenerife because we had both vacationed there. It's an amazing place, but my colleague said that they didn't see any of it because they spent an entire week in night clubs. All of the other people listening to our conversation murmured with great appreciation. The industry is growing rapidly so as you get older you often become a minority. Even though you were there first, it's you that is the "foreigner" in the group (me, especially, LOL). You have to adapt to that culture rather than expecting people to adapt to your culture. For me, that's extremely difficult. Having said that, I have worked in a small startup where nobody was under the age of 35 (and we even had a guy in his 60's) -- I was the baby in that group! There are some founders who want only experienced people and are willing to pay extra money up front to get it. Reach out through your contacts because probably you can find them. Now, I really like working the way I work (and the day after tomorrow I'm actually going to the UK to meet and greet with the team, which I'm super excited about!) However there are tons of downsides. - Working remotely for a non-remote team means that there is a definite power differential. People who see each other in person regularly naturally have a better rapport. As a remote person, you're always a bit of an outsider. It's easy for people to forget about including you in discussions (especially if you are in a different time zone!) There are sometimes bad actors in companies too and if someone decides to intentionally lock you out of decisions, there is practically nothing you can do about it. You are at the mercy of others. I spend a lot of my energy trying to keep my relationships working well at work -- tons more than I would need to if I worked in the office. That's why 3 days in 2 days WFH is such a nice setup (and really, I think all companies should do something similar for programmers). Working remotely and solo is a huge risk. However, if you want to take on that risk, 40 is a really good time to do it. At 50, I've got 15 years left of my career. I need to save for retirement (and I admit to neglecting that in order to traipse around the world doing strange things). I've got savings, but if I was out of work for a year or two, it would be rather bad for me. At 40 (or earlier) you can take that risk a lot more easily because you can then put your head down and do less risky things when you are older if you need to (like me). Especially since you are relatively young (still 25 years left of work!) and you have no children, you are pretty flexible. Earlier I've been pointing out the need to keep thinking about the work environment when interviewing. If work environment is very important to you, make sure that you value that yourself. Don't take a job for more money that has a worse environment. Maybe there's a jerk that you have to work with, but you can still get your job done acceptably -- don't give up that job. No job is going to be perfect, so make sure you prioritise things appropriately. If I were you, the strategy I would probably employ (because I'm hugely risk averse) is to find a job with part time WFH that has the option to lead to full time remote. Get a couple of years of experience with working from home (and at least 6 months of full time remote). Then toy with the idea of doing solo consulting (ideally fully remote). As you are learning to work remotely, go to meet ups, etc to make contacts so that you have an avenue for solo consulting. This may mean moving to a fairly large city if you don't already live in one. Try out selling yourself and seeing if you have the character to do that (because not everyone can be successful in that regard, and being solo means you don't have anyone else to lean on). And finally, don't panic. You have lots of time to sort this out. Good for you thinking about it now -- take a few years trying different things and seeing how they work out. But don't procrastinate. This is your time for exploring -- if you wait until you are 50, it gets much scarier (believe me!)
• randycupertino 8y ago
  I think you absolutely can find a position that fulfills your requirements (mainly because I have one like that and love it!), however it's either going to take just getting lucky and striking gold randomly, or networking like crazy with your network and having them tell you about what the work atmosphere at their office is like and back channeling you with their HR. Great companies with great work cultures exist, but they're like exclusive rent control apartments... we tend to fill openings with internal referrals because the talent brings their best colleagues from their previous jobs. How I got into where I am was I dumb-lucked into it by connecting with a great recruiter and randomly having the hiring team like me a lot. I've been there two years and have recruited two of my best previous coworkers from other jobs to come join us. We are all loving life. Anyways... work your network! Good luck and don't give up!! I would say stay away from newbie startups and go to midsize profitable firms. edit: I don't have my own private office, but I have a really big high walled private cube with a door. big enough to leave my bike inside it and do yoga inside. I love it. I feel dorky in a cube but it is really nice!
• sytelus 8y ago
  If you are inclined to stay IC at 40+, get in to teams where someone needs to write “impossible programs”[1]. Accelerated ray tracing, robotics, computer vision, firmwares, deep learning/machine learning, orchestration stacks, OS kernels, debuggers etc. These are sort of areas which I think benefits tremendously from multi-decade expertise and complexity+stacks are usually pretty high. [1] https://www.deconstructconf.com/2018/julia-evans-build-impossible-programs https://www.deconstructconf.com/2018/julia-evans-build-impos...
• clubm8 8y ago
  Many government contractors give private offices due to the nature of the work. Sometimes they default to it even if working on non-classified work. There's good work/life balance since you fill out a timesheet. And the work can be very interesting. Maybe look into a contractor that deals with non military entities like NASA?
• bruhwiler_ycomb 8y ago
  RadiaSoft offers that sort of work environment, with a small world-class team and plenty of interesting work. David radiasoft.net
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• ttarabula 8y ago
  The sentiments in this thread are surely one of the major driving factors behind techies being some of the most enthusiastic in the FIRE movement (financial independence, retire early). I often wonder why true lifelong career planning isn't part of formal secondary education programs. I've noticed a trend where especially in the software dev world, the reality seems to hit people like a ton of bricks in their mid to late thirties, seemingly with very little reflection on the likely paths earlier on, and FIRE seems like it is sometimes as much about saving face as it is about career and financial planning. Is it part of our inward nature spending much of our time trying to get in to a flow state to solve difficult problems that causes us to push away the messy and more difficult, human cantered, and politically loaded long term career development stuff in those early career years until that avoidance bites back?
• kranzky 8y ago
  I suggest you read "Bullshit Jobs: A Theory", by David Graeber. He explains that apprentice -> journeyman -> master no longer holds; we all get stuck at journeyman, working in the service of others for our entire career. You, my friend, need to start your own company.
• aussieguy1234 8y ago
  The average age of a successful startup founder is 45: https://hbr.org/2018/07/research-the-average-age-of-a-successful-startup-founder-is-45 https://hbr.org/2018/07/research-the-average-age-of-a-succes...