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> If you’re still a student or open to attending grad school, do everything you can to gain admission into a top-5 Master’s program I think you are over-estima
by jb3689 5y ago
> If you’re still a student or open to attending grad school, do everything you can to gain admission into a top-5 Master’s program
I think you are over-estimating the impact of a "top 5" master's program vs an average master's program. I had a very similar trajectory to you and went to an average master's program.
The major difference between you and me is that I never wanted to work for a Google, Amazon, or Hedge Fund and wanted to work at smaller companies. Salary suffered because of my reluctance to even compete for those jobs.
> The biggest boost in my career earnings came when I transitioned from a Computer Hardware engineer to a Software Engineer
I also disagree with this. The biggest boost in your career earnings came from working at (1) financial companies and (2) working at FAANG. I don't think you have enough data to say that your area of focus is what to lead to this, and I personally think it is wrong. Maybe it opened doors for you however
- thegypsyking 5y agoThe masters ranking does matter if you’re international
- andreilys 5y agoSalary suffered because of my reluctance to even compete for those jobs. The article talks about how to gain Financial Independence as a software engineer. Choosing to not work at FANG or unicorn co's, will severely limit your ability to achieve FI. Whether you like it or not, people do make judgements off of where you went to school. I've had several managers at FANG talk about how they have a bias towards top 10 schools, one even admitted that the candidates don't seem that different but he still has this bias. The biggest boost in your career earnings came from working at (1) financial companies and (2) working at FAANG. I don't think you have enough data to say that your area of focus is what to lead to this, and I personally think it is wrong. You're welcome to look at the data on levels.fyi It's pretty clear that at this point SWE's on average far-out earn HWE's. Not to mention the fact that there are a lot more open headcount for SWE's than for HWE's at the top-paying companies.
- spacemadness 5y agoThis is what I found frustrating about embedded and computer architecture jobs. Your knowledge base is difficult to attain and many jobs require you to disrupt your life by jumping on a plane and fly to $country_of_manufacture to diagnose issues while fighting jet lag. For that you’re rewarded less pay than your software engineering peers. It’s not worth it unless you greatly prefer to work closer to the metal.
- giantg2 5y agoMy masters did nothing for me. I still make under $100k. What a waste of time.
- uyt 5y agoBeware that many masters programs from top schools are degree mills and the undergrads who went there know this and actively loathe them (based on their experience sharing classes with them). At least for my particular school. I remember helping out with resume screening at a job fair and we would sort everyone who went to that masters program to the bottom of the pile. A handful of them turned out to be good candidates on second pass, but it sucks that they probably would've had a better chance just leaving off their masters.
- csa 5y ago> Beware that many masters programs from top schools are degree mills and the undergrads who went there know this and actively loathe them (based on their experience sharing classes with them). Thank you for mentioning this. So many people don’t realize that masters programs can be fairly worthless even from elite schools.