4 ms·

A start would be to ignore a lot of things said about tech on HN. It is a solid source of pain, suffering and time wasting (I like it, but that's another story)

A start would be to ignore a lot of things said about tech on HN. It is a solid source of pain, suffering and time wasting (I like it, but that's another story). Forget about all this modern tech stuff no-one is asking for. You can work for companies / clients who need stuff automated; they don't care about k8s, jamstack, react, docker, service mesh, etc etc. You can hack shit together with php + mysql, put in on a vps and you'll be treated like a sorcerer. Find small companies (I know a bunch in the EU, which is a good region anyway as you have a safety net if you lose your job and many places have 36 hour or less weeks) that are not IT companies but factories or something non-software with a small team that are working on internal software for the last 10 years. You will get tasks to fix/add on stuff, no-one will be in a hurry (factory runs fine without it, it just makes things better or gears up for a tax rule change or whatever). I would be careful to not get depressed by this kind of work (I nearly did), but it's not hard to find (not here anyway) if you are at least a bit social and can write code so you can get through the interview. These companies don't give you whiteboard interviews or actually any more than just a friendly chat.

yowlingcat 6y ago
Nice to know this stuff is out there. I really do wonder how long I'll be able to handle the exhausting pace of US tech before I want to settle down and have kids in a society with a better social safety net and maybe a more sustainable approach to living.
paul_f 6y ago
>You can hack shit together with php + mysql, put in on a vps and you'll be treated like a sorcerer. This times 1,000,000
- colecut 6y ago
  Yes this is one of the most true things I have ever read based on my own experience.. In 2009 I was hired to do mostly helpdesk / IT support for a printer/copier sales company, making $36k By 2012 I was making over $80k, being taken on the annual company trips with the high sales earners (cabo, hawaii), etc.. All basically because I set up a web based dashboard that aggregated numbers that their Sales CRM stored in a SQL database, which saved the Sales Managers tons of time every week.. I continued building this out / milking it for a few years, adding new reports and features. It was the worst spaghetti code you have ever seen, SQL statements placed inside of HTML tables, wow it makes me kind of sick thinking about it now, I did not know what I was doing. None of that mattered though.
  - ascendantlogic 6y ago
    > None of that mattered though. After doing this professionally for 20 years I've found that clients don't care what language, framework, hosting provider, etc you use to solve their problems. They don't care about your code quality, they don't care about your CI pipeline or any of that shit. They care if you have solved their problem for them, and that's it.
    - groaner 6y ago
      They also don't care about security, until one day it bites them in the ass.
      - mxschumacher 6y ago
        I continue to be surprised by how little impact gigantic hacks seem to have on large companies. Countless media reports of deep intrusions, stock market valuations not dented in the long term.
        ascendantlogic 6y ago
        Until giant hacks result in actual pain being experienced by the leaders of these companies in the form of jail time and/or fines that aren't rounding errors on the balance sheet, no one will care.
  - dsego 6y ago
    >SQL statements placed inside of HTML tables You're good. The principle of proximity applies, or was it locality of behavior?
    - colecut 6y ago
      There was nothing good about my code organization
xela321 6y ago
Medium sized law firms (25+ attorneys) are a good place to look. They have a lot of internal business processes that can be wrangled with some fairly simple apps. Not a single person in the whole firm knows anything about computers. Profit margins are fat. If you automate a couple things the managing partner thinks are a PITA, you'll be treated like a god. Also law firms seems especially fearful of tech talent leaving, so I don't even really think you have to worry about a paycut.
- xtracto 6y ago
  This is great advice. I have several friends who are lawyers, and they are just utter and completely non-technical. If you can find a place like this that allows you to work from home, it would be a great job for someone like OP's profile.
- cutler 6y ago
  Which processes? Could you give some examples?
- endymi0n 6y ago
  More generally still, look at established, unsexy industries flush with (old) money, such as finance, law, oil&gas, government services, infrastructure, real estate... If you can find a space in there where you can accelerate things just by 5% mostly on your own, you'll find yourself in a highly paid, irreplaceable position soon enough.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  Worst thing is: Nobody likes doing these manual tasks. They get the junior/paralegals/interns to do them but they all could be doing more valuable stuff.
uhtred 6y ago
Just make sure it is only internal software you'll be working on. Otherwise those small companies will have you doing customer support on the phone too.
- stagger87 6y ago
  That might not be a big deal if the goal is low effort work.
  - uhtred 6y ago
    I personally found it very stressful but maybe not everyone would. Customers can be a PITA. There's always the guy who wants to question you on the finer details of the technology being used because he knows he could do better, and he's a passive aggressive asshole.

yowlingcat 6y ago

Nice to know this stuff is out there. I really do wonder how long I'll be able to handle the exhausting pace of US tech before I want to settle down and have kids in a society with a better social safety net and maybe a more sustainable approach to living.

paul_f 6y ago

>You can hack shit together with php + mysql, put in on a vps and you'll be treated like a sorcerer. This times 1,000,000

colecut 6y ago
Yes this is one of the most true things I have ever read based on my own experience.. In 2009 I was hired to do mostly helpdesk / IT support for a printer/copier sales company, making $36k By 2012 I was making over $80k, being taken on the annual company trips with the high sales earners (cabo, hawaii), etc.. All basically because I set up a web based dashboard that aggregated numbers that their Sales CRM stored in a SQL database, which saved the Sales Managers tons of time every week.. I continued building this out / milking it for a few years, adding new reports and features. It was the worst spaghetti code you have ever seen, SQL statements placed inside of HTML tables, wow it makes me kind of sick thinking about it now, I did not know what I was doing. None of that mattered though.
- ascendantlogic 6y ago
  > None of that mattered though. After doing this professionally for 20 years I've found that clients don't care what language, framework, hosting provider, etc you use to solve their problems. They don't care about your code quality, they don't care about your CI pipeline or any of that shit. They care if you have solved their problem for them, and that's it.
  - groaner 6y ago
    They also don't care about security, until one day it bites them in the ass.
    - mxschumacher 6y ago
      I continue to be surprised by how little impact gigantic hacks seem to have on large companies. Countless media reports of deep intrusions, stock market valuations not dented in the long term.
      - ascendantlogic 6y ago
        Until giant hacks result in actual pain being experienced by the leaders of these companies in the form of jail time and/or fines that aren't rounding errors on the balance sheet, no one will care.
- dsego 6y ago
  >SQL statements placed inside of HTML tables You're good. The principle of proximity applies, or was it locality of behavior?
  - colecut 6y ago
    There was nothing good about my code organization

xela321 6y ago

Medium sized law firms (25+ attorneys) are a good place to look. They have a lot of internal business processes that can be wrangled with some fairly simple apps. Not a single person in the whole firm knows anything about computers. Profit margins are fat. If you automate a couple things the managing partner thinks are a PITA, you'll be treated like a god. Also law firms seems especially fearful of tech talent leaving, so I don't even really think you have to worry about a paycut.

xtracto 6y ago
This is great advice. I have several friends who are lawyers, and they are just utter and completely non-technical. If you can find a place like this that allows you to work from home, it would be a great job for someone like OP's profile.
cutler 6y ago
Which processes? Could you give some examples?
endymi0n 6y ago
More generally still, look at established, unsexy industries flush with (old) money, such as finance, law, oil&gas, government services, infrastructure, real estate... If you can find a space in there where you can accelerate things just by 5% mostly on your own, you'll find yourself in a highly paid, irreplaceable position soon enough.
908B64B197 6y ago
Worst thing is: Nobody likes doing these manual tasks. They get the junior/paralegals/interns to do them but they all could be doing more valuable stuff.

uhtred 6y ago

Just make sure it is only internal software you'll be working on. Otherwise those small companies will have you doing customer support on the phone too.

stagger87 6y ago
That might not be a big deal if the goal is low effort work.
- uhtred 6y ago
  I personally found it very stressful but maybe not everyone would. Customers can be a PITA. There's always the guy who wants to question you on the finer details of the technology being used because he knows he could do better, and he's a passive aggressive asshole.