4 ms·

I agree with your first paragraph, not your second. A major downside to govt. tech is their overly conservative approach to adopting new technology, and general

I agree with your first paragraph, not your second. A major downside to govt. tech is their overly conservative approach to adopting new technology, and generally low standard to overall speed of execution and productivity. You'll probably be safe if you stay in the same agency or related cluster, but I have found that people trying to break into the private sector or jump to a different jurisdiction with a totally different tech stack were either woefully under developed in terms of their skill set outside of the 20 year old proprietary stuff they were used to using, or were 0.1x developers compared to their private sector colleagues. When you're young, you have the time and energy to toil hard for long hours and learn lots of new things. I would not waste that resource on a government job unless I were ready to make a career long commitment to it.

diggan 2y ago
> tech is their overly conservative approach to adopting new technology, and generally low standard to overall speed of execution and productivity Or, another reading would be that they're avoiding the hype cycle the private sector constantly falls into, and you won't be overworked/eventually stressed out because of the constant pressure from shareholders/executives/founders who want you to put 150% of your energy with no work/life balance into their "vision of supercharged spreadsheets" or something similar. I personally wouldn't waste my youth on just slaving away at companies for money, but also spend time exploring the world and yourself while you're young enough to have the energy (and hopefully time) to do so.
Retric 2y ago
My private sector jobs have largely used outdated or proprietary technologies. First job had me maintaining a ~30 year old Object Pascal project in the early 2000’s. They were still using AppleTalk instead of TCP/IP locally. IMO keeping up is more about what you do in your free time rather than trying to actually work with whatever the new hotness is. So having free time is critical not just whatever technology you’re using at work. However, work for NASA for 40 years and what the industry does is irrelevant.

diggan 2y ago

> tech is their overly conservative approach to adopting new technology, and generally low standard to overall speed of execution and productivity Or, another reading would be that they're avoiding the hype cycle the private sector constantly falls into, and you won't be overworked/eventually stressed out because of the constant pressure from shareholders/executives/founders who want you to put 150% of your energy with no work/life balance into their "vision of supercharged spreadsheets" or something similar. I personally wouldn't waste my youth on just slaving away at companies for money, but also spend time exploring the world and yourself while you're young enough to have the energy (and hopefully time) to do so.

Retric 2y ago

My private sector jobs have largely used outdated or proprietary technologies. First job had me maintaining a ~30 year old Object Pascal project in the early 2000’s. They were still using AppleTalk instead of TCP/IP locally. IMO keeping up is more about what you do in your free time rather than trying to actually work with whatever the new hotness is. So having free time is critical not just whatever technology you’re using at work. However, work for NASA for 40 years and what the industry does is irrelevant.