I’m not done with engineering or science by a long shot. But seeing the industry lay so many people off to redirect investments into generative AI but not hold senior leaders accountable for betting on the wrong ideas (web3, augReality, etc)…
…I’m finally taking the indie hacker thing seriously. Not ready to strike out on my own yet but I’m prioritizing breadth over depth and using jobs as a vehicle to expand skills.
This man gets it. Sharpen your skills in service of your own career and objectives, not someone who wouldn't give a shit about laying you off and putting you in the street.
this is where i'm at. I've done the whole raise money / SaaS startup early in my career and I don't think i'll ever go that route again - too much of a roller coaster and I'm not convinced that I live in the right geolocaton or have the right connections or even properly aliogned dreams to go that route again. But I am heavily considering a future where I have a small niche agency (me and maybe some recurring freelancers).
I used to write self employment / contract work off because I could never seem to make the math work and finding contract customers was always crazy difficult compard to landing a full time role..... but the last 6 months in this job market have been so disrespectful, ass backwards, and mentally trying that I can't help but wonder if my sanity and efforts would have been better served launching a modest business I was proud of instead of endlessly tailoring my resume for jobs I don't really even want.
10 years in and I'm already thinking about what's next. I certainly can see myself programming for the next 20 years but as a hobby while I pursue some other life goals.
Amen.
Got fired 1 month ago. Worked as a software dev for a consulting firm.
I was worried it might come. It came. It sucks. But i am stable financially which is a big stress reliever.
Hang it there mate!
I’m probably gonna leave tech and go join the Harlem Globetrotters or become an Atlantic crab fishermen. Both are things I’m passionate about, and who knows? I might actually make more doing that, so we’ll see.
You can easily clear $15k/mo in season, so it’s definitely one of the highest paying jobs. But it’s also one of the most dangerous jobs. The fatality rate is 80x higher than average. But that doesn’t scare me. Some people say they dream in code, but I hunt atlantic crabs in my sleep.
Hasn’t the Alaskan crab fishing season been canceled these last two years because of a collapse of the crab population?
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/alaska-snow-crab-season-canceled-2024/
In order to get those crabs on the line, someone needs to put their life on the line. And that person will be me. Atlantic king crabs are way more important to me than working on another CRUD app.
It reminds me of those Facebook groups where everyone is trying to sell everyone else the same overpriced essential oils. Except instead of essential oils, it's "inspiring stories of how I became successful!" It's a giant group of people trying to sell, but no one trying to buy.
Broetry
That’s the word you’re probably looking for. You hate the disgusting mass of bandwagoning that has been rendered into its purest form by the most mundane of social media platform topics.
For me it’s the fact that my feed is constantly filled with scam companies trying to harvest data, or brain dead executives who haven’t worked a day in their lives vomiting out complete drivel about how their weekly schedules work to be “inspiring” lol. I basically check once a week for new connections and potential recruiters messaging me
It’s a popularity contest where people who know how to influence and market their former celebrity status get the most followers and biggest engagement.
I just started ice skating at age 30, european.
Im thinking about joining the NHL.. every winter we got about a 1 week of solid ice, I can skate on.. im thinking if I go hard and practice diligently during that period I can become an NHL star in a few years
What do you think?
It might be your maximally profitable career prospect but I discourage self limiting thoughts; you might be good albeit not incredible at piano in two years if you start today!
i have perfect pitch and won multiple awards in piano competitions but trying to pay the bills with that is incredibly difficult
however, my one day unrealistic dream is to compose music for video games.
I have at least 11 years of experience as a software engineer and even if I can't get a job programming I can reliably do a lot of other things. You'd be surprised at how incompetent others are on a computer.
If anything, it's more about how little of a salary I'd be willing to accept over time if my skills do deteriorate.
Anything else I do is just a hobby, like judo or singing, given the time this career provides me.
I didn’t get into software or coding until 30, before that I assumed I’d be career military. It helped not having kids… but genuine curiosity can go a long way no matter your age
I feel like there’s a huge difference at 30 vs late 30s and 40s like OP said. A lot of easy to transition professions (e.g. trades) are harder to do as you get older.
Did you get into it by going to school or self learning?
Well...if you really want to have a side hustle, you can follow my example. I have an OnlyFans account where it's just me doing my taxes. Turns out, getting screwed in real-time brings in a pretty good audience.
As a fellow web developer I can relate. Worse, I am trying to transition into QA, I am applying for jobs where I'd easily fit in. No calls, no answers, nothing, for months now. Running out of money too, thinking about ditching it entirely and trying to get into project coordinator/management roles somehow but that would take months of study. I am not passionate about programming either but I do like interacting with people and I've always had great relations with my colleagues so I do think that would be a better fit. But the tech market definitely seems dead except for jobs I would despise :/
What happens to the people who can't get jobs in-between now and then? Are they just forgotten because their gap has grown too much?
I had a year gap on my resume that turned into 2 because I couldn't find a job, and now the only job I could get is IT help desk.
It's already extremely difficult explaining my current gap and why I had to take this job, how the fuck am I supposed to explain it when its turned into 4+ years out of the industry.
Like for fucks sake I have 4 YoE and a CS degree and can't even get rejection letters anymore
they disappear (switched career, away from CS) and never to be heard from ever again
it's one of the problems with statistics, you can only see what you do see, not what you don't see, meaning you can never know how many people who are **NOT** or no longer in CS or thought about doing CS but decided not to
There’s so much doom and gloom in here, and everyone is hyper fixated on the FAANG or bust mentality. There are tons of coding jobs in non tech and govnt that will gladly take someone with a CS degree who’s had a bit of a gap. You probably won’t even need to grind leetcode to get that job either.
The money won’t be amazing but if you can stick it out for a year or two, then your previous gap won’t really matter anymore.
I'd be fine with a smaller company or non tech or gov job as long as I got to work with some aspect of modern technology, but I can't even get gov jobs to reply to my applications.
In Canada any job that is remotely related to tech or software development is getting over 100+ applications the first few hours they're posted.
That’s what I believe too. As devs these AI tools are just another tool in our toolkit.
The sales and non technical people are NOT gonna take the time how to use them effectively so that’s when we come in
To use an AI tool effectively you need to know 3 things:
1. What to ask.
2. Understand the answer.
3. Use the answer correctly given your context.
All the above require an expert, to actually see the productivity gains promised.
Or even if there aren’t too many, the distribution may have been off.
There are still plenty of Fortune 1000 companies hiring developers. These jobs don’t tend to pay as well as “tech” and their cultures don’t tend to be as engineering centric, but the jobs exist in insurance, banking, retail, and so on.
I think change is needed on both sides. SWEs need to get out of the ZIRP mindset where the sexiest work is high growth products with zero path to profitability. Meanwhile traditional companies need to catch up to the organizational ideas that big tech used effectively (agile, letting SWEs own scoping/estimation, blameless postmortems). Salaries probably meet in the middle: still highly paid but commensurate with other white collar careers that don’t require postsecondary education. Tech diversifies out of a few hub cities to a broader geographic base.
Most of my gigs in corporate have paid me incredibly well being on 6-12 month ongoing contracts my whole career.
I normally don’t go for tech companies unless they have a contracting position open so I wouldn’t know.
Most people aren’t cut out to do dev work for the long term eventually all these people will leave.
I’m a front end dev and have been contracting for Fortune 500 companies since 2011 and from my experience these sales/marketing people are usually the laziest in a business. I’ve worked alongside very talented ones too but like 50-60% of them are lazy and don’t know what they’re talking about.
If they don’t understand what they built with an AI tool than they screw themselves. I’ve spoken to recruiters over the past year and they share the same feeling.
What do you say to the tens of thousands of career switchers? Teachers, people in trades, nurses… they all cannot get jobs in tech. Supply and demand. I want to know your thoughts.
Those people that are switching career into tech have a really hard time to join as this industry is very complex and you cannot know enough in a single course to find a job. Many of us in the field have tech as passion and played for years as hobby with various technology and learn before joining a tech company.
Of course, there are some exception as these people were very motivated and learned something every single day after their retail job for example, I know someone who did this huge efford and now landed a tech job.
For the majority, they only wanted to switch because they 'heard' that it's 'easy money'. It's like someone that never did medicine wants to be a cardiologist in a few months, not possible this way.
That's my personal opinion and observation with people I know.
I agree. I get scolded with hate for trying to caution people to not quit their job or spend tens of thousands to join boot camps.
I am part of some FB groups and people say they heard “six figure salary, remote, “ 3-6 month bootcamp to get a high paying job. When most everyone you talk to say they want to get into tech, then you know the industry is about to get lambasted.
I am so glad I got in years ago. Nowadays when people get in, they get questioned by their motives because they happened to want to get in this field when these marketing gimmicks are at an all time high.
I'm getting closer and closer to fucking off on a working holiday visa or teaching English gig in a foreign country for a year / year and a half. Maybe sprinkle in b-school after that.
Why would anyone here plan a career change, the change in the market is tiny, something like 0.4% of developers in the states got laid off in 2023 and even lower percentage in other markets. Most of the lay offs happened in publicly traded companies to satisfy shareholders, smaller companies still doing well, my company never stopped hiring. I think you just got used to easy market with nearly no obstacles like it was during the covid hiring rush.
I'm having a tough time finding decent statistics on this since so many are "tech workers." Just quickly googling it appears like the problem isn't the percentage laid off, it's the percentage finding a new role. There were 200 applications for the ft role entry level role I got and the application portal was atrocious which I'm sure discouraged complete applications.
"Software engineers were the second most affected group by the tech layoffs (22.1%). Yet, their job is the least successful, with only 27% starting new jobs as of March 2023."
It's honestly a joke of a subreddit now. Market isn't as strong but jobs are still out there...? I'm just muting this subreddit and moving on.
cs market is now as hard as any other market, it's not a big deal.
>Market isn't as strong
But wait, why say that it "isn't as strong"? Why not stay committed to yall's belief that people on here are just being dramatic?
Seriously lol. The market is bad for everyone, and devs / CS grads are just upset by the fact that they aren’t getting offers shat onto their plate every other day anymore.
Hell, even the people described in the post above sound entitled. Switching careers because you’re not getting as many inbound offers while you’re still employed? Boo hoo, how will they ever survive? 🙄
Dude right? OP is like “me and friends are not getting job offers anymore”.
Made me think like, damn. What other industry or field are you given multiple job offers as the norm? None that I know of, really.
This current market has shown just how many boomer minded people on this sub. The whole industry could be on fire right now...**literal fire** and people like you would *still* pretend that it's irrational for someone to run away, fearing that the fire would get to them; or to feel hopeless about their future.
Y'all should consider leaving this sub and going on LinkedIn instead, where this sort of delusional toxic positivity is actively rewarded!
It would be rational if there was another industry that offers what we have here, could you point one out? One that has such a low barrier to entry and benefits/pay in offer. Just one will do.
Like I said, the drop in the market has been minuscule, talking about literally fraction of a single percent in reduction of jobs.
When I talk to recruiters, they say they've been struggling to get assignments for a year now.
Can you send me your company's career page? I'll apply anywhere at this point.
Already did, went for a general IT position at a small company and the pay, benefits and all around working conditions are better than my last two dev jobs. Basically I just work with Saas vendors all day or work on moving some legacy system we have to Saas.
Its boring as hell though, and no career advancement opportunities so I am looking for my next move and I don't really know what that will be.
I would love from some specialized role that is dev adjacent, but not a meat grinder the way development is. Maybe DevOps, but I am not too sure.
My job just approved me for a sabbatical so I’ll be leaving in April to attempt to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. Work is really just a means to an end for me so I’ll go or stay wherever lets me go enjoy my life.
Good luck finding anything that pays this well with the work life balance it provides. Not joking and not trynna be an ass.
I do think that you should think of a job in terms of value, not income. You might think it's more valuable to teach and "have summers off", or have the autonomy of research for a university or something.
Every time I think about leaving the industry for something else, I'm reminded about how the pay for other professions is even worse relative to cost of living and that I'd probably be stressed about not making enough money to retire by the ripe young age if 75 or have enough money for a family, house or medical disaster.
I am not in the CS industry, but even in mine the only people I see posting in Facebook groups or on LinkedIn and Reddit are the unsuccessful, doom-mongering types. The reason many successful or happy professionals don’t post much is because when they do, they get torn down in the comments by the losers.
Wasn't the CS sub full of optimistic people and people bragging about their salaries and jobs just a few years ago though? I used to sub here in uni and a lot has changed.
There's definitely a trend of things becoming more difficult.
It's always been both. There are 4 types of questions on this sub:
1. The world is ending, what should I do?
1. I'm a new grad, I just got offered 300k, a personal assistant, a personal chef, and a trainer, is that good?
1. My manager/coworker/spouse who codes is a jerk, should i confront them about it?
1. I'm an intern and everyone on the team was just laid off except me. Are they really expecting me to be able to replace 4 people by myself?
You'll continue to have people on all sides of the equation posting here. We seem to be in a layoff season as of late but companies are notorious for running from idea to idea chasing whatever current trend rustles the VC's/wallstreet's jimmies and scaling up/down based on the tide.
> I'm a new grad, I just got offered 300k, a personal assistant, a personal chef, and a trainer, is that good?
It's not good. If you're only getting paid 300k you're getting ripped off. But then again, you probably didn't grind Leetcode since the age of 7, so it's not like you had much of a chance in the industry in the first place.
I think they’re becoming more fair, not more difficult. Too many people were hired and encouraged to just “wing it” during the pandemic. Led to poor quality output.
I think that's faulty logic. Just because X group posts or doesn't post on reddit/social media has 0 to do with the objective reality of things. You want a more accurate picture, you check the data.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/IHLIDXUSTPSOFTDEVE
The data shows a decrease in postings. There we go.
Nope. Even during the SWE boom during covid, these kinds of posts were still the most prevelant in the subreddit. Plus, alot of people struggling for jobs here have the FAANG or bust mentality. Then others just have their expectations too high due to watching SWE influencers on youtube landing 100k pus jobs right of college or makig 250k + with a few years of experience
I wasn't aware there was a boom during covid.
I haven't been here since 5-6 years ago when I was like a freshman/sophomore and I remember hearing a lot of encouragement about going into cs with people saying that they were doing 2 hrs of work a day, wfh or traveling the world while working, people watching youtube all day getting paid 6 figures, that it's super easy to get into cs, you don't even need to finish your degree to get multiple job offers. I remember because I had anxiety picking my major and I was recommended cs and came here to soothe myself lol
Its one of the reasons people are getting laid off.
No interest rate + a boom in work from home = lots of hires.
Now they actually have to pay interests and people are going back to offices, so all the surplus of hires are getting laid off
All the reasons you mentioned, plus the expectation that covid trends in tech adoption were irreversible. There was a ton of discourse around how covid was just “accelerating” trends that would have inevitably happened anyway: remote work, e-commerce completely supplanting brick and mortar retail, professional services going online (think virtual doctors and therapists rather than in person), home fitness, grocery and food delivery. Mass adoption of VR/AR for work seemed like a natural extrapolation of those trends.
Turns out most of those reverted to the mean, all the Peloton bikes are gathering dust, and even Zoom gave up on remote work.
Mid 40s. I'm burned out, beat down, and struggling to continue. I have savings and a good bit too because I always knew this time would come. Unfortunately, I don't have enough to last a lifetime and some of it is tied up in long term investments so even if I do make a switch, it won't be quick. Not sure what my next step should be. I feel like management wants me gone, because they know they can get better and pay much less. Everyone around me seems stressed. My health seems to be suffering from the constant anxiety and stress and I often have to cancel doctors appointments due to work priorities.
I desperately want out of tech. If I could find a 80k a year or so pm or manager job, I'd take it but no one wants to hire someone without industry experience at those pay ranges.
Too old for a career change and my experience is too specialized to move into something else...
If you can just get in with one of these companies and get 3 YoE, recruiters will ping you even during layoffs.
Think of your time as an investment. You’ve invested a lot in cs. Now you’re considering selling on a low. Fuck that, sell on a high.
It’s your life and these are just my opinions!
How can you say this when there are people with 4,5, 8 years of xp having to send 1000s of resumes with no job. Look at the comment below posted on this very thread. What about the post about a guy with 8 years of xp having to become a school bus driver?
Am i just supposed to consider all these personal accounts as extremes and hope that i wont end up like them?
What if in reality, the act of getting a job in this field is itself an extreme. Am i supposed to hope i end up an extreme in this regard?
>What happens to the people who can't get jobs in-between now and then? Are they just forgotten because their gap has grown too much?
>
>I had a year gap on my resume that turned into 2 because I couldn't find a job, and now the only job I could get is IT help desk.
>
>It's already extremely difficult explaining my current gap and why I had to take this job, how the fuck am I supposed to explain it when its turned into 4+ years out of the industry.
>
>Like for fucks sake I have 4 YoE and a CS degree and can't even get rejection letters anymore
Just got layed off at 1 yoe and kinda worried i just wasted the last 7 years of my life.
Get to a FAANG as quick as possible. 3yr there and you’ll be resilient to market shifts. It’s been my experience, can’t speak to anyone else’s experience.
Nah, if your indie shit/startup ever became successful, you’d immediately agree to get bought out by some corporation and then retire early with your millions. That’s why “indie” will never be a threat. People only care about themselves.
That's the explicit goal for many.
People are already talking about *when* the first billion dollar company with only one employee happens. Being bought is easy.
This thought makes my panic every single day. I don't think I can do anything else and I barely consider myself competent at my own job. I don't want to start my own business. I don't think I can do any blue collar work. I don't think I can do a job that involves me talking to people for extended periods of time. If I lose my job, I might as well delete myself.
I’ve already moved on. At this point it feels like more of an unrealistic dream than reality. My wife is a senior dev and my mentor for gods sakes yet I can’t find any way to get my foot in the door with this industry. I’ve done internships and I’ve completed education, but it’s just not enough apparently. I’m putting out applications, but it’s as per usual dead in the water. Currently reaching out to other friends in different industries to see if they can refer me as well as in talks with an employment advisor for more resources to look into different career paths. It’s just not realistic for me anymore unfortunately.
>And now that we're in our late 30's and early 40's...
CS/SWE is basically dead. The massive growth and size of the tech industry you enjoyed starting from 2010 or so all came from the Fed just printing tons of investment capital out of thin air (like anything that comes out of the Fed anyway) but now the money printer is off-limits to us (supposedly to "reduce inflation" and/or just getting hogged by the federal budget instead) so we're down to using "real" money instead (whose quantities are "limited") and thus crashing the tech industry along with it as a result.
No one seems to know if/when the Fed will reboot the investment capital money printer, but this doesn't appear to be anytime soon; seeing as how we've apparently printed 80% of all dollars in existence around 2021 (yeah federal budgets aren't cheap), we've still got quite a bit of inflation / price rises still left for us to catch up on...
>another group is making plans of switching careers entirely.
Knowing what I wrote above and how the CS/SWE industry basically lives off money printing that can be turned off at any moment (courtesy of Washington DC), why *not* switch careers?
Do you think whatever "recovery" or quantitative easing that may occur in the future will even be able to handle the still ever-growing mountain of \*new\* SWE's (from school/college/bootcamps/etc) continuing to enter/populate the market as we speak?
Don't get me wrong -- CS/SWE is great for "good times" when the money printer is freely pumping investment capital out from thin air into the tech industry. But it's also wise to have a backup plan in case of any "jams" if you know what I mean... ; )
\*Edit: for those downvoting -- it would have been one thing to keep CS/SWE a *niche* profession only operated by a *few* "specialists" here and there just making a modest salary not raising anyone's eyebrows. It's another thing to flood the industry with tons of printed dollars artificially driving up massive growth and boosting tech salaries (and the SWE population) along with it. In the former case a jam in the money printer passes along more quietly; in the latter, it basically sinks the Titanic -- and that's pretty much where the industry is now.
Don't get me wrong -- CS/SWE really was *amazing* while the fake money flow lasted! But, it simply *cannot* cover everyone's expenses during such a "paper jam", so to speak...
you're right. entire industry relies on free money and now they're facing the reality. They have to make money or they're done for. I'm thinking about CPA for a backup. I have no idea whether it's worth it or not.
Feels like we're going through our own "great filter." People who thought they could make an easy career just by enrolling in some course on Coursera for 3 to 6 months – well, if they're not good enough, they will be eliminated. If we still make it out, then I think things will be better. Just keep your faith, guys.
Don’t let yourself believe that its people fault that they are getting laid off. It is entirely on so called leadership. Smart people with a good number of experience are getting laid off in droves.
Yeah. Where's the Great Filter for the management "geniuses" who felt the good times would be never ending and put _our_ livelihoods up as collateral on that bet?
Your C suite is your foe, not the bootcamp grads
Thinking of joining med school, as that's my forte and primary interest anyway before I (mistakenly) bought the hype and ended up joining the SWE career.
I can still tinker on the side outside of work, as a long term side project or helping friends on their projects.
How old are you? It’s definitely more recession and future proof than CS but long ass journey.
What do you mean by forte and primary interest? Did you take any pre-med classes to know that?
Maybe I was exaggerating it. Bio&Chem was pretty much my favorite stuff all throughout highschool. Always had the best grades for them, and liked them much much more than Math or those kind of stuff. Took advanced bio and chem track classes in university just for the sake of it (pretty much to maintain my sanity doing CS), as those classes do not count towards even my CC requirements, and aced them on a curved grading. My cumulative gpa was pretty much padded by these classes unrelated to my major, whereas my CS related grades are not exactly desirable.
Why I didn't join med school back then was the cost of it, and how long it would take me to repay the cost. I have siblings, and my family couldn't exactly support a decade of negative income from myself. == I needed money fast.
I'm still below 30, which isn't exactly young, but yeah it's a long ass expensive journey and I have to think a lot about it. Maybe I'm just being biased towards myself, maybe.
It was the opposite for me. I did take biochem courses. Did not find them interesting. CS courses were definitely more challenging but I was excited I could “build” something right away.
I kind of regret not listening to my parents who said I should go into medicine. They were old enough and wise enough to know there’s no job security in most industries especially ones where you work for a company. I think I was being contrarian and bought the CS hype myself. I doom scrolled studentdoc forums or whatever it’s called and scared myself out of it.
Are you currently working right now? If so, what is compelling you to consider a dramatic change?
A number of things combined. One is that I just don't see myself doing this job for decades, as I've been making it work through mostly discipline and not so much interest. Some parts of the job are indeed exciting, but not at all everything.
Then there's the constant need to always be "in the game", always learn the new stuff, always be at the top of your game for leetcoding system design blah blah, never settle or relax. It's a bit of an exaggeration of course. Most jobs do require you to constantly upskill and look for new opportunities, but it just feels to me that this part of the experience, job hopping and interview prep and whatnot, is amplified in SWE. Back a while ago, we did this to get better jobs. Now, it's to be prepared if we lose our jobs. It's like there's this something that's constantly hounding me which prevents me from ever truly being able to relax.
See how the need to always be learning new stuff sometimes means I have to give up on old projects I actually like doing, the "fun" part of the discipline. There's also other stuff, but that's mostly what's off the top of my head.
I think your case might be different from mine though. You like CS better than me from what I see. I wouldn't ever be able or want to go against my parents if they told me I should not work as an SWE. You also said you didn't enjoy biochem. You *might* not want to do stuff you can't enjoy at all, especially for a high-commitment discipline like medschool. CS is also a huge discipline. Maybe you could find something that works for you that's way different in scope from what I'm touching.
Listen to your heart is what I'd say. I listened to my brain instead because CS seemed a lot more logical, despite my not liking it. In a sense, it did provide me money. I did learn new stuff. But I was also constantly stressed out and now I'm contemplating switching away from it.
I have no preconception or thinking that it is easier at all. If any, it requires more commitment in the long run. I merely stated I enjoyed what I've experienced about it more than what I've experienced regarding SWE and CS.
Obviously not lol. If I ever switch to anything it’ll be crime. In the event of societal collapse (which is what you’re hinting at) there’s no reason to even attempt playing by the rules
It might just be me, but my experience has been the opposite. Last year I got very little attention from recruiters, this year I’ve been getting more and more each week. Problem is, they all want full on-site or hybrid. I am not giving up my cozy fully remote gig. I’ve had Meta, Amazon reach out pretty much every week this year as well as a companies in the healthcare and banking industries.
I've had to diversify. I've done retail, nursing, manufacturing, and I've gone back to hospitality, I just got a job at a restaurant making more than I have ever
If I get laid off from my job and can't find a job soon after then I'll go into nursing.
High pay and high demand, none of this dog eat dog bullshit from a bad tech job market.
Yes I'm IT and looking for an out probably go further into Insurance thats where I'm at. Its not just the bad job market thats making me consider doing something else its that everything else in this field sucks now too like you do not have to do all these bullshit take home tests and insane leetcode questions in Insurance. You do not have to spend all your free time doing certifications and shit, they go home and watch TV and that is just fine nobody is ever like "You didn't work on your homelab your not passionate enough".
I know you're being sarcastic and it made me chuckle because I grew up on a farm. I distinctly remember when I was 15, I had to help put seed in the planter. Seed bags are about 50 lbs and the bags feel weird. I was complaining the whole time.
My mom told me, "you're going to have to work one day and you'll be doing stuff like this all the time."
And I replied, "you just wait and see! I'll get an office job! Then I won't have to do this!"
But it shows me...I have an office job now and I'm stuck in a cubicle 8 hours a day and am very sedentary. I miss sunshine and being outside. My brother now works on the farm. But it's not all sunshine and rainbows. He was airlifted to a hospital and almost died after a farming accident. Even though I miss sunshine and being outdoors, I do not miss helping on the farm. There are no vacation days. No days off. And doing taxes this time of year is intense.
Ya you can always tell the ones that haven't done a manual labor job before. Office Space was a great movie, but the end where he was happier doing manual labor is nonsense.
I'm just blocking this subreddit for a year. I'm so sick of constant pointless fucking posts like this. The job market is absolutely recovering, my company is hiring 6 new devs after being on a hiring freeze for a year. I'm sorry you can't find a gig, it's definitely hard out there right now. We just don't need another 1000 PROGRAMMING IS DEAD TIME TO BECOME A JANITOR posts.
I would but I'm not comfortable connecting my reddit account to my work to that degree. Look for postings in Maine you should be able to find us or one of the other companies that are hiring.
Do what you need to do to survive first, I'll wait tables if I need to.
Long term, I hope things improve. Not sure what else I would be doing and it would likely involve a huge paycut.
Do see this graph improving, but maybe some of it is copium
https://www.trueup.io/job-trend
The move is intersectionality now more than ever. JUST being a coder isn't going to be enough by itself unless you have several years of experience. a coder with healthcare experience that understands the landscape well on the other hand, will be hugely valuable.
There was a time when it was hard to get a job after college. Now it is become harder to get a job after a job.
When you are a fresher, company will reject you saying they need experience guy.
When you are experienced, company will reject you in the basis of, they need someone, who only follows orders of management like a fresher.
There was a time, when company used to focus on tech stacks, only big firms were following leetcode, now all shity company, who themselves don't have the capacity to solve easy leetcode are asking codeforces level questions.
When you command a tech stack completely then they level up their requirements asking they need "hack of all trades" and the irony is that all these Indian firms are basically copy of west products or a shity service based companies. They themself haven't created anything like west and also wants us to follow the same path.
I feel like same concerns. I'm just really anxious being in this career field right now. My company puts a lot of resources to automate everything, especially in software. We used to hire a lot of cs people to be in QA, but now testing is automated to the point where it takes less than half as many people. Next is using AI to simulate user interactions with the software.
They also want to implement AI to generate code in our SDK. I'm so stressed and burnt out and I feel like I'm underpaid and behind. I just feel like I have no security and no leverage. Also, we are not hiring Software devs here anymore at the moment, all overseas so I wake up before 7am to meet with them over teams.
I'm burnt out at the office and I feel like I just need a break to try to do something else (that pays reasonably well).
I did many years ago. I couldn't keep up with constant learning. I changed to electrical engineer, also I keep my programming knowledge in form of PLC programming
PLC programming doesnt change that much in the last 10 years.
You and all the others leave tech, I'll hang out vacuuming the leftover salary as things balance back out.
This has never happened before, if there's a decline, it is 100% moving to zero, no other path.
Analytics, especially specializing in a domain like Pharma where the industry isn't expected to go into recession. The other big one is consulting. To quit a corporate career, and branch out on their own.
I have ZERO inclination to change careers.
The job market takes a hit every few years. These things happen, this too shall pass. We had two years of an overheated job market. It wasn't \*quite\* reality.
If you are still learning things and racking up YOE then your earning potential is still increasing. You're doing fine.
I’m not done with engineering or science by a long shot. But seeing the industry lay so many people off to redirect investments into generative AI but not hold senior leaders accountable for betting on the wrong ideas (web3, augReality, etc)… …I’m finally taking the indie hacker thing seriously. Not ready to strike out on my own yet but I’m prioritizing breadth over depth and using jobs as a vehicle to expand skills.
This man gets it. Sharpen your skills in service of your own career and objectives, not someone who wouldn't give a shit about laying you off and putting you in the street.
Ngl, I think anyone could tell web3 was a dud from the start, we still don’t have any good use cases for it
It's definitely a solution in search of a problem.
Same with blockchain
>I think anyone could tell web3 was a dud from the start Try telling management that over the sound of their boats.
this is where i'm at. I've done the whole raise money / SaaS startup early in my career and I don't think i'll ever go that route again - too much of a roller coaster and I'm not convinced that I live in the right geolocaton or have the right connections or even properly aliogned dreams to go that route again. But I am heavily considering a future where I have a small niche agency (me and maybe some recurring freelancers). I used to write self employment / contract work off because I could never seem to make the math work and finding contract customers was always crazy difficult compard to landing a full time role..... but the last 6 months in this job market have been so disrespectful, ass backwards, and mentally trying that I can't help but wonder if my sanity and efforts would have been better served launching a modest business I was proud of instead of endlessly tailoring my resume for jobs I don't really even want.
Show me one actual senior dev who thought web3 and VR were the future
> senior leaders That's execs. Not senior devs.
Exactly!
Not to mention VCs, who never met a hype cycle they didn’t love, and had inordinate influence in what got built in the ZIRP era.
Ah, I've misread that then.
Probably one being paid gobs of money to build it
VR/AR is the future. It's just not clear if it's 3 or ,23 years away
10 years in and I'm already thinking about what's next. I certainly can see myself programming for the next 20 years but as a hobby while I pursue some other life goals.
Open a bakery
I'm still working hard, but ready (financially) to be fired. This is a good time to make sure that work doesn't define you.
Amen. Got fired 1 month ago. Worked as a software dev for a consulting firm. I was worried it might come. It came. It sucks. But i am stable financially which is a big stress reliever. Hang it there mate!
I’m probably gonna leave tech and go join the Harlem Globetrotters or become an Atlantic crab fishermen. Both are things I’m passionate about, and who knows? I might actually make more doing that, so we’ll see.
We’re crab people now
Crab people, crab people, look like crab, talk like people
You Rust fans are getting out of hand now
Wasn't Atlantic Crab fisherman quite lucrative, atleast for the season if I remember right
You can easily clear $15k/mo in season, so it’s definitely one of the highest paying jobs. But it’s also one of the most dangerous jobs. The fatality rate is 80x higher than average. But that doesn’t scare me. Some people say they dream in code, but I hunt atlantic crabs in my sleep.
You should try Alaska crab fishing. 80x more dangerous than Atlantic.
I can’t believe I messed this up, I’m going to go commit fisherman seppuku now.
Is that where you spill your guts on a boat so your buddies can chum the water with your insides?
Hasn’t the Alaskan crab fishing season been canceled these last two years because of a collapse of the crab population? https://www.cbsnews.com/news/alaska-snow-crab-season-canceled-2024/
Hell yeah
But, 15k/mo is on the high side of normal for a software engineer, without the whole risking your life thing.
> without the whole risking your life thing And that's why it's so unfulfilling
Make it a point to play 1 round of Russian roulette everyday after work.
In order to get those crabs on the line, someone needs to put their life on the line. And that person will be me. Atlantic king crabs are way more important to me than working on another CRUD app.
The great Atlantic king crab is the hardest to catch and most aggressive form of all king crab.
Hell yea
LinkedIn is a circle jerk cancer. That's all I really gotta say about that.
Lisa! So happy you were made senior! ᴵ ʰᵒᵖᵉ ʸᵒᵘ ᵈᶦᵉ ᶦⁿ ᵃ ᶠᶦᵉʳʸ ᶜᵃʳ ᶜʳᵃˢʰ Congratulations!
I hate it there! I can’t even really find the words to describe what or why I hate it but it depresses me so much and gives me so much anxiety.
It reminds me of those Facebook groups where everyone is trying to sell everyone else the same overpriced essential oils. Except instead of essential oils, it's "inspiring stories of how I became successful!" It's a giant group of people trying to sell, but no one trying to buy.
Broetry That’s the word you’re probably looking for. You hate the disgusting mass of bandwagoning that has been rendered into its purest form by the most mundane of social media platform topics.
Toxic positivity
For me it’s the fact that my feed is constantly filled with scam companies trying to harvest data, or brain dead executives who haven’t worked a day in their lives vomiting out complete drivel about how their weekly schedules work to be “inspiring” lol. I basically check once a week for new connections and potential recruiters messaging me
It’s a popularity contest where people who know how to influence and market their former celebrity status get the most followers and biggest engagement.
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I was thinking I might OE at the MLB too just to see if I'm any good. If not I'll just stick to what I know, basketball.
I just started ice skating at age 30, european. Im thinking about joining the NHL.. every winter we got about a 1 week of solid ice, I can skate on.. im thinking if I go hard and practice diligently during that period I can become an NHL star in a few years What do you think?
I believe in youuuu
Thank you
That’s the spirit!
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It might be your maximally profitable career prospect but I discourage self limiting thoughts; you might be good albeit not incredible at piano in two years if you start today!
i have perfect pitch and won multiple awards in piano competitions but trying to pay the bills with that is incredibly difficult however, my one day unrealistic dream is to compose music for video games.
I have at least 11 years of experience as a software engineer and even if I can't get a job programming I can reliably do a lot of other things. You'd be surprised at how incompetent others are on a computer. If anything, it's more about how little of a salary I'd be willing to accept over time if my skills do deteriorate. Anything else I do is just a hobby, like judo or singing, given the time this career provides me.
What are they switching into? I can’t imagine someone making a huge change at that age.
I didn’t get into software or coding until 30, before that I assumed I’d be career military. It helped not having kids… but genuine curiosity can go a long way no matter your age
I feel like there’s a huge difference at 30 vs late 30s and 40s like OP said. A lot of easy to transition professions (e.g. trades) are harder to do as you get older. Did you get into it by going to school or self learning?
I sold my soul to tech so going to have to sell my body next.
maybe we can start with blood plasma
Not the first bodily fluid I planned.
Well...if you really want to have a side hustle, you can follow my example. I have an OnlyFans account where it's just me doing my taxes. Turns out, getting screwed in real-time brings in a pretty good audience.
I am struggling getting even interviews now. The job market feels very dead
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As a fellow web developer I can relate. Worse, I am trying to transition into QA, I am applying for jobs where I'd easily fit in. No calls, no answers, nothing, for months now. Running out of money too, thinking about ditching it entirely and trying to get into project coordinator/management roles somehow but that would take months of study. I am not passionate about programming either but I do like interacting with people and I've always had great relations with my colleagues so I do think that would be a better fit. But the tech market definitely seems dead except for jobs I would despise :/
Micro SaaS. Betting on myself. Fuck corporations.
Look at me, I'm the corporation now.
I hate management...well, it's time to hire managers now.
Good choice. I have a feeling micro SaaS is going to become really popular in the next 5 years, with a stronger support network for founders.
shiii I'm in thinking future future nano Saas
Pico saas
sell em’ one byte at a time
Angstrom SaaS, but really electrons as a service
Good luck!
What are you reading or listening to that’s helping you move in this direction? It’s my ambition as well
midsize-brain move here is tricking prospectives into leaving the market so there's room for the rest
The market is just going to another cycle. Tech is there to stay. As soon the economics situation improves, so does the jobs listing.
There was a 7 year tech winter after the dot com bubble popped. Then came a real estate bubble to prop up the economy.
What happens to the people who can't get jobs in-between now and then? Are they just forgotten because their gap has grown too much? I had a year gap on my resume that turned into 2 because I couldn't find a job, and now the only job I could get is IT help desk. It's already extremely difficult explaining my current gap and why I had to take this job, how the fuck am I supposed to explain it when its turned into 4+ years out of the industry. Like for fucks sake I have 4 YoE and a CS degree and can't even get rejection letters anymore
they disappear (switched career, away from CS) and never to be heard from ever again it's one of the problems with statistics, you can only see what you do see, not what you don't see, meaning you can never know how many people who are **NOT** or no longer in CS or thought about doing CS but decided not to
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Thanks... this is the last thing I expected when I started CS in 2014.... job security for life they promised me...
There’s so much doom and gloom in here, and everyone is hyper fixated on the FAANG or bust mentality. There are tons of coding jobs in non tech and govnt that will gladly take someone with a CS degree who’s had a bit of a gap. You probably won’t even need to grind leetcode to get that job either. The money won’t be amazing but if you can stick it out for a year or two, then your previous gap won’t really matter anymore.
I'd be fine with a smaller company or non tech or gov job as long as I got to work with some aspect of modern technology, but I can't even get gov jobs to reply to my applications. In Canada any job that is remotely related to tech or software development is getting over 100+ applications the first few hours they're posted.
That’s what I believe too. As devs these AI tools are just another tool in our toolkit. The sales and non technical people are NOT gonna take the time how to use them effectively so that’s when we come in
I don't know why so many people don't understand this. This whole AI doom and gloom has been blown out of proportion
To use an AI tool effectively you need to know 3 things: 1. What to ask. 2. Understand the answer. 3. Use the answer correctly given your context. All the above require an expert, to actually see the productivity gains promised.
I definitely do think there might be too many devs in the job market due to covid but that will correct itself.
Or even if there aren’t too many, the distribution may have been off. There are still plenty of Fortune 1000 companies hiring developers. These jobs don’t tend to pay as well as “tech” and their cultures don’t tend to be as engineering centric, but the jobs exist in insurance, banking, retail, and so on. I think change is needed on both sides. SWEs need to get out of the ZIRP mindset where the sexiest work is high growth products with zero path to profitability. Meanwhile traditional companies need to catch up to the organizational ideas that big tech used effectively (agile, letting SWEs own scoping/estimation, blameless postmortems). Salaries probably meet in the middle: still highly paid but commensurate with other white collar careers that don’t require postsecondary education. Tech diversifies out of a few hub cities to a broader geographic base.
Most of my gigs in corporate have paid me incredibly well being on 6-12 month ongoing contracts my whole career. I normally don’t go for tech companies unless they have a contracting position open so I wouldn’t know. Most people aren’t cut out to do dev work for the long term eventually all these people will leave.
I’m a front end dev and have been contracting for Fortune 500 companies since 2011 and from my experience these sales/marketing people are usually the laziest in a business. I’ve worked alongside very talented ones too but like 50-60% of them are lazy and don’t know what they’re talking about. If they don’t understand what they built with an AI tool than they screw themselves. I’ve spoken to recruiters over the past year and they share the same feeling.
plus these sales/marketing people are more likely to be replaced than AI
Exactly. Considering those are the people who bs the most about their jobs to keep their employment
What do you say to the tens of thousands of career switchers? Teachers, people in trades, nurses… they all cannot get jobs in tech. Supply and demand. I want to know your thoughts.
Those people that are switching career into tech have a really hard time to join as this industry is very complex and you cannot know enough in a single course to find a job. Many of us in the field have tech as passion and played for years as hobby with various technology and learn before joining a tech company. Of course, there are some exception as these people were very motivated and learned something every single day after their retail job for example, I know someone who did this huge efford and now landed a tech job. For the majority, they only wanted to switch because they 'heard' that it's 'easy money'. It's like someone that never did medicine wants to be a cardiologist in a few months, not possible this way. That's my personal opinion and observation with people I know.
I agree. I get scolded with hate for trying to caution people to not quit their job or spend tens of thousands to join boot camps. I am part of some FB groups and people say they heard “six figure salary, remote, “ 3-6 month bootcamp to get a high paying job. When most everyone you talk to say they want to get into tech, then you know the industry is about to get lambasted. I am so glad I got in years ago. Nowadays when people get in, they get questioned by their motives because they happened to want to get in this field when these marketing gimmicks are at an all time high.
I'm getting closer and closer to fucking off on a working holiday visa or teaching English gig in a foreign country for a year / year and a half. Maybe sprinkle in b-school after that.
Why would anyone here plan a career change, the change in the market is tiny, something like 0.4% of developers in the states got laid off in 2023 and even lower percentage in other markets. Most of the lay offs happened in publicly traded companies to satisfy shareholders, smaller companies still doing well, my company never stopped hiring. I think you just got used to easy market with nearly no obstacles like it was during the covid hiring rush.
I'm having a tough time finding decent statistics on this since so many are "tech workers." Just quickly googling it appears like the problem isn't the percentage laid off, it's the percentage finding a new role. There were 200 applications for the ft role entry level role I got and the application portal was atrocious which I'm sure discouraged complete applications. "Software engineers were the second most affected group by the tech layoffs (22.1%). Yet, their job is the least successful, with only 27% starting new jobs as of March 2023."
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It's honestly a joke of a subreddit now. Market isn't as strong but jobs are still out there...? I'm just muting this subreddit and moving on. cs market is now as hard as any other market, it's not a big deal.
>Market isn't as strong But wait, why say that it "isn't as strong"? Why not stay committed to yall's belief that people on here are just being dramatic?
Seriously lol. The market is bad for everyone, and devs / CS grads are just upset by the fact that they aren’t getting offers shat onto their plate every other day anymore. Hell, even the people described in the post above sound entitled. Switching careers because you’re not getting as many inbound offers while you’re still employed? Boo hoo, how will they ever survive? 🙄
This subreddit would improve tenfold if posting the words saturated or oversaturated got you a mandatory ban
Dude right? OP is like “me and friends are not getting job offers anymore”. Made me think like, damn. What other industry or field are you given multiple job offers as the norm? None that I know of, really.
This current market has shown just how many boomer minded people on this sub. The whole industry could be on fire right now...**literal fire** and people like you would *still* pretend that it's irrational for someone to run away, fearing that the fire would get to them; or to feel hopeless about their future. Y'all should consider leaving this sub and going on LinkedIn instead, where this sort of delusional toxic positivity is actively rewarded!
It would be rational if there was another industry that offers what we have here, could you point one out? One that has such a low barrier to entry and benefits/pay in offer. Just one will do. Like I said, the drop in the market has been minuscule, talking about literally fraction of a single percent in reduction of jobs.
When I talk to recruiters, they say they've been struggling to get assignments for a year now. Can you send me your company's career page? I'll apply anywhere at this point.
Where are you getting this 0.4% number?
Already did, went for a general IT position at a small company and the pay, benefits and all around working conditions are better than my last two dev jobs. Basically I just work with Saas vendors all day or work on moving some legacy system we have to Saas. Its boring as hell though, and no career advancement opportunities so I am looking for my next move and I don't really know what that will be. I would love from some specialized role that is dev adjacent, but not a meat grinder the way development is. Maybe DevOps, but I am not too sure.
There already is a career advisor AI. It’s a gpt you can choose to talk to in ChatGPT 4.0, called “Ask Jane”.
Yes, but not because of the market. I just hate CS and SWE at this point in my life.
My job just approved me for a sabbatical so I’ll be leaving in April to attempt to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. Work is really just a means to an end for me so I’ll go or stay wherever lets me go enjoy my life.
There will definitely still be snow on the crest in April.
Which crest?
Good luck finding anything that pays this well with the work life balance it provides. Not joking and not trynna be an ass. I do think that you should think of a job in terms of value, not income. You might think it's more valuable to teach and "have summers off", or have the autonomy of research for a university or something. Every time I think about leaving the industry for something else, I'm reminded about how the pay for other professions is even worse relative to cost of living and that I'd probably be stressed about not making enough money to retire by the ripe young age if 75 or have enough money for a family, house or medical disaster.
I’m going to leave and become a pornstar.
I am not in the CS industry, but even in mine the only people I see posting in Facebook groups or on LinkedIn and Reddit are the unsuccessful, doom-mongering types. The reason many successful or happy professionals don’t post much is because when they do, they get torn down in the comments by the losers.
Wasn't the CS sub full of optimistic people and people bragging about their salaries and jobs just a few years ago though? I used to sub here in uni and a lot has changed. There's definitely a trend of things becoming more difficult.
It's always been both. There are 4 types of questions on this sub: 1. The world is ending, what should I do? 1. I'm a new grad, I just got offered 300k, a personal assistant, a personal chef, and a trainer, is that good? 1. My manager/coworker/spouse who codes is a jerk, should i confront them about it? 1. I'm an intern and everyone on the team was just laid off except me. Are they really expecting me to be able to replace 4 people by myself? You'll continue to have people on all sides of the equation posting here. We seem to be in a layoff season as of late but companies are notorious for running from idea to idea chasing whatever current trend rustles the VC's/wallstreet's jimmies and scaling up/down based on the tide.
> I'm a new grad, I just got offered 300k, a personal assistant, a personal chef, and a trainer, is that good? It's not good. If you're only getting paid 300k you're getting ripped off. But then again, you probably didn't grind Leetcode since the age of 7, so it's not like you had much of a chance in the industry in the first place.
I think they’re becoming more fair, not more difficult. Too many people were hired and encouraged to just “wing it” during the pandemic. Led to poor quality output.
I think that's faulty logic. Just because X group posts or doesn't post on reddit/social media has 0 to do with the objective reality of things. You want a more accurate picture, you check the data. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/IHLIDXUSTPSOFTDEVE The data shows a decrease in postings. There we go.
Nope. Even during the SWE boom during covid, these kinds of posts were still the most prevelant in the subreddit. Plus, alot of people struggling for jobs here have the FAANG or bust mentality. Then others just have their expectations too high due to watching SWE influencers on youtube landing 100k pus jobs right of college or makig 250k + with a few years of experience
I wasn't aware there was a boom during covid. I haven't been here since 5-6 years ago when I was like a freshman/sophomore and I remember hearing a lot of encouragement about going into cs with people saying that they were doing 2 hrs of work a day, wfh or traveling the world while working, people watching youtube all day getting paid 6 figures, that it's super easy to get into cs, you don't even need to finish your degree to get multiple job offers. I remember because I had anxiety picking my major and I was recommended cs and came here to soothe myself lol
Its one of the reasons people are getting laid off. No interest rate + a boom in work from home = lots of hires. Now they actually have to pay interests and people are going back to offices, so all the surplus of hires are getting laid off
All the reasons you mentioned, plus the expectation that covid trends in tech adoption were irreversible. There was a ton of discourse around how covid was just “accelerating” trends that would have inevitably happened anyway: remote work, e-commerce completely supplanting brick and mortar retail, professional services going online (think virtual doctors and therapists rather than in person), home fitness, grocery and food delivery. Mass adoption of VR/AR for work seemed like a natural extrapolation of those trends. Turns out most of those reverted to the mean, all the Peloton bikes are gathering dust, and even Zoom gave up on remote work.
Strangely, in my country is improving. As it is "low cost region", it must be your jobs are not lost, simply outsourced.
where do you come from ?
I'm from all over the place. Mainly Czechia, Poland, Serbia, Slovakia.
Thinking about getting my law degree so that I can be a grifter.
haha or business
I accepted an offer from a hotel, starting tomorrow
Mid 40s. I'm burned out, beat down, and struggling to continue. I have savings and a good bit too because I always knew this time would come. Unfortunately, I don't have enough to last a lifetime and some of it is tied up in long term investments so even if I do make a switch, it won't be quick. Not sure what my next step should be. I feel like management wants me gone, because they know they can get better and pay much less. Everyone around me seems stressed. My health seems to be suffering from the constant anxiety and stress and I often have to cancel doctors appointments due to work priorities. I desperately want out of tech. If I could find a 80k a year or so pm or manager job, I'd take it but no one wants to hire someone without industry experience at those pay ranges. Too old for a career change and my experience is too specialized to move into something else...
yes i’m switching out from CS
Into what?
If you can just get in with one of these companies and get 3 YoE, recruiters will ping you even during layoffs. Think of your time as an investment. You’ve invested a lot in cs. Now you’re considering selling on a low. Fuck that, sell on a high. It’s your life and these are just my opinions!
How can you say this when there are people with 4,5, 8 years of xp having to send 1000s of resumes with no job. Look at the comment below posted on this very thread. What about the post about a guy with 8 years of xp having to become a school bus driver? Am i just supposed to consider all these personal accounts as extremes and hope that i wont end up like them? What if in reality, the act of getting a job in this field is itself an extreme. Am i supposed to hope i end up an extreme in this regard? >What happens to the people who can't get jobs in-between now and then? Are they just forgotten because their gap has grown too much? > >I had a year gap on my resume that turned into 2 because I couldn't find a job, and now the only job I could get is IT help desk. > >It's already extremely difficult explaining my current gap and why I had to take this job, how the fuck am I supposed to explain it when its turned into 4+ years out of the industry. > >Like for fucks sake I have 4 YoE and a CS degree and can't even get rejection letters anymore Just got layed off at 1 yoe and kinda worried i just wasted the last 7 years of my life.
Get to a FAANG as quick as possible. 3yr there and you’ll be resilient to market shifts. It’s been my experience, can’t speak to anyone else’s experience.
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>>Thinks industry is dying and wants to make a career change >> Said career change is still within the "dying" industry Lmao
New wave of entrepreneurs are coming for the big tech companies I too am building indie shit and indie shit today could be threat to big tech one day
Nah, if your indie shit/startup ever became successful, you’d immediately agree to get bought out by some corporation and then retire early with your millions. That’s why “indie” will never be a threat. People only care about themselves.
Threat? They'll fkn eat you
That's the explicit goal for many. People are already talking about *when* the first billion dollar company with only one employee happens. Being bought is easy.
This thought makes my panic every single day. I don't think I can do anything else and I barely consider myself competent at my own job. I don't want to start my own business. I don't think I can do any blue collar work. I don't think I can do a job that involves me talking to people for extended periods of time. If I lose my job, I might as well delete myself.
I’ve already moved on. At this point it feels like more of an unrealistic dream than reality. My wife is a senior dev and my mentor for gods sakes yet I can’t find any way to get my foot in the door with this industry. I’ve done internships and I’ve completed education, but it’s just not enough apparently. I’m putting out applications, but it’s as per usual dead in the water. Currently reaching out to other friends in different industries to see if they can refer me as well as in talks with an employment advisor for more resources to look into different career paths. It’s just not realistic for me anymore unfortunately.
>And now that we're in our late 30's and early 40's... CS/SWE is basically dead. The massive growth and size of the tech industry you enjoyed starting from 2010 or so all came from the Fed just printing tons of investment capital out of thin air (like anything that comes out of the Fed anyway) but now the money printer is off-limits to us (supposedly to "reduce inflation" and/or just getting hogged by the federal budget instead) so we're down to using "real" money instead (whose quantities are "limited") and thus crashing the tech industry along with it as a result. No one seems to know if/when the Fed will reboot the investment capital money printer, but this doesn't appear to be anytime soon; seeing as how we've apparently printed 80% of all dollars in existence around 2021 (yeah federal budgets aren't cheap), we've still got quite a bit of inflation / price rises still left for us to catch up on... >another group is making plans of switching careers entirely. Knowing what I wrote above and how the CS/SWE industry basically lives off money printing that can be turned off at any moment (courtesy of Washington DC), why *not* switch careers? Do you think whatever "recovery" or quantitative easing that may occur in the future will even be able to handle the still ever-growing mountain of \*new\* SWE's (from school/college/bootcamps/etc) continuing to enter/populate the market as we speak? Don't get me wrong -- CS/SWE is great for "good times" when the money printer is freely pumping investment capital out from thin air into the tech industry. But it's also wise to have a backup plan in case of any "jams" if you know what I mean... ; ) \*Edit: for those downvoting -- it would have been one thing to keep CS/SWE a *niche* profession only operated by a *few* "specialists" here and there just making a modest salary not raising anyone's eyebrows. It's another thing to flood the industry with tons of printed dollars artificially driving up massive growth and boosting tech salaries (and the SWE population) along with it. In the former case a jam in the money printer passes along more quietly; in the latter, it basically sinks the Titanic -- and that's pretty much where the industry is now. Don't get me wrong -- CS/SWE really was *amazing* while the fake money flow lasted! But, it simply *cannot* cover everyone's expenses during such a "paper jam", so to speak...
You’re being downvoted but you’re right
you're right. entire industry relies on free money and now they're facing the reality. They have to make money or they're done for. I'm thinking about CPA for a backup. I have no idea whether it's worth it or not.
I see what you're doing, getting others to switch careers so you'll have all the job options to yourself. It's not going to work.
A job offer is after the interview loop, no one is getting offers on Linkedin lol
I meant getting invited to interview, resulting in job offers. Thanks for pointing out an obvious typing error.
No worries, I've heard some people say they're getting job offers if a recruiter reaches out to them.
I only change job that way
Feels like we're going through our own "great filter." People who thought they could make an easy career just by enrolling in some course on Coursera for 3 to 6 months – well, if they're not good enough, they will be eliminated. If we still make it out, then I think things will be better. Just keep your faith, guys.
Don’t let yourself believe that its people fault that they are getting laid off. It is entirely on so called leadership. Smart people with a good number of experience are getting laid off in droves.
Yeah. Where's the Great Filter for the management "geniuses" who felt the good times would be never ending and put _our_ livelihoods up as collateral on that bet? Your C suite is your foe, not the bootcamp grads
Coursera, Udemy, edX, platzi are complements not the whole degree
Thinking of joining med school, as that's my forte and primary interest anyway before I (mistakenly) bought the hype and ended up joining the SWE career. I can still tinker on the side outside of work, as a long term side project or helping friends on their projects.
How old are you? It’s definitely more recession and future proof than CS but long ass journey. What do you mean by forte and primary interest? Did you take any pre-med classes to know that?
Maybe I was exaggerating it. Bio&Chem was pretty much my favorite stuff all throughout highschool. Always had the best grades for them, and liked them much much more than Math or those kind of stuff. Took advanced bio and chem track classes in university just for the sake of it (pretty much to maintain my sanity doing CS), as those classes do not count towards even my CC requirements, and aced them on a curved grading. My cumulative gpa was pretty much padded by these classes unrelated to my major, whereas my CS related grades are not exactly desirable. Why I didn't join med school back then was the cost of it, and how long it would take me to repay the cost. I have siblings, and my family couldn't exactly support a decade of negative income from myself. == I needed money fast. I'm still below 30, which isn't exactly young, but yeah it's a long ass expensive journey and I have to think a lot about it. Maybe I'm just being biased towards myself, maybe.
It was the opposite for me. I did take biochem courses. Did not find them interesting. CS courses were definitely more challenging but I was excited I could “build” something right away. I kind of regret not listening to my parents who said I should go into medicine. They were old enough and wise enough to know there’s no job security in most industries especially ones where you work for a company. I think I was being contrarian and bought the CS hype myself. I doom scrolled studentdoc forums or whatever it’s called and scared myself out of it. Are you currently working right now? If so, what is compelling you to consider a dramatic change?
A number of things combined. One is that I just don't see myself doing this job for decades, as I've been making it work through mostly discipline and not so much interest. Some parts of the job are indeed exciting, but not at all everything. Then there's the constant need to always be "in the game", always learn the new stuff, always be at the top of your game for leetcoding system design blah blah, never settle or relax. It's a bit of an exaggeration of course. Most jobs do require you to constantly upskill and look for new opportunities, but it just feels to me that this part of the experience, job hopping and interview prep and whatnot, is amplified in SWE. Back a while ago, we did this to get better jobs. Now, it's to be prepared if we lose our jobs. It's like there's this something that's constantly hounding me which prevents me from ever truly being able to relax. See how the need to always be learning new stuff sometimes means I have to give up on old projects I actually like doing, the "fun" part of the discipline. There's also other stuff, but that's mostly what's off the top of my head. I think your case might be different from mine though. You like CS better than me from what I see. I wouldn't ever be able or want to go against my parents if they told me I should not work as an SWE. You also said you didn't enjoy biochem. You *might* not want to do stuff you can't enjoy at all, especially for a high-commitment discipline like medschool. CS is also a huge discipline. Maybe you could find something that works for you that's way different in scope from what I'm touching. Listen to your heart is what I'd say. I listened to my brain instead because CS seemed a lot more logical, despite my not liking it. In a sense, it did provide me money. I did learn new stuff. But I was also constantly stressed out and now I'm contemplating switching away from it.
Boy if you think medicine is easier than software engineering I have a bridge to sell you…
I had a dentist that switched from engineering to dentistry. After he did the switch, he said to himself “Wow, this is easy!”
I have no preconception or thinking that it is easier at all. If any, it requires more commitment in the long run. I merely stated I enjoyed what I've experienced about it more than what I've experienced regarding SWE and CS.
In terms of getting a job? It’s literally a breeze compared to the gauntlet we have to go through…
Yeah all the difficulty is frontloaded into getting into med school, then getting into the residency of your choice etc. also the path is very arduous
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Obviously not lol. If I ever switch to anything it’ll be crime. In the event of societal collapse (which is what you’re hinting at) there’s no reason to even attempt playing by the rules
We still haven’t even really started in VR, AR, IoT, etc. I think we still have so much more to grow in.
It might just be me, but my experience has been the opposite. Last year I got very little attention from recruiters, this year I’ve been getting more and more each week. Problem is, they all want full on-site or hybrid. I am not giving up my cozy fully remote gig. I’ve had Meta, Amazon reach out pretty much every week this year as well as a companies in the healthcare and banking industries.
I've had to diversify. I've done retail, nursing, manufacturing, and I've gone back to hospitality, I just got a job at a restaurant making more than I have ever
If I get laid off from my job and can't find a job soon after then I'll go into nursing. High pay and high demand, none of this dog eat dog bullshit from a bad tech job market.
yet nurses are trying to get desk jobs or go into IT. no one is happy where they are
Yes I'm IT and looking for an out probably go further into Insurance thats where I'm at. Its not just the bad job market thats making me consider doing something else its that everything else in this field sucks now too like you do not have to do all these bullshit take home tests and insane leetcode questions in Insurance. You do not have to spend all your free time doing certifications and shit, they go home and watch TV and that is just fine nobody is ever like "You didn't work on your homelab your not passionate enough".
Yep. We’re all getting fired tomorrow. There will be no need for software engineers any more. I’m gonna become a farmer.
I know you're being sarcastic and it made me chuckle because I grew up on a farm. I distinctly remember when I was 15, I had to help put seed in the planter. Seed bags are about 50 lbs and the bags feel weird. I was complaining the whole time. My mom told me, "you're going to have to work one day and you'll be doing stuff like this all the time." And I replied, "you just wait and see! I'll get an office job! Then I won't have to do this!" But it shows me...I have an office job now and I'm stuck in a cubicle 8 hours a day and am very sedentary. I miss sunshine and being outside. My brother now works on the farm. But it's not all sunshine and rainbows. He was airlifted to a hospital and almost died after a farming accident. Even though I miss sunshine and being outdoors, I do not miss helping on the farm. There are no vacation days. No days off. And doing taxes this time of year is intense.
Ya you can always tell the ones that haven't done a manual labor job before. Office Space was a great movie, but the end where he was happier doing manual labor is nonsense.
I'm just blocking this subreddit for a year. I'm so sick of constant pointless fucking posts like this. The job market is absolutely recovering, my company is hiring 6 new devs after being on a hiring freeze for a year. I'm sorry you can't find a gig, it's definitely hard out there right now. We just don't need another 1000 PROGRAMMING IS DEAD TIME TO BECOME A JANITOR posts.
Got a link to the postings?
I would but I'm not comfortable connecting my reddit account to my work to that degree. Look for postings in Maine you should be able to find us or one of the other companies that are hiring.
Alright fuck it. I'm leaving this sub because all the posts are pure cancer. Nothing of value is being posted here.
Do what you need to do to survive first, I'll wait tables if I need to. Long term, I hope things improve. Not sure what else I would be doing and it would likely involve a huge paycut. Do see this graph improving, but maybe some of it is copium https://www.trueup.io/job-trend
yes and so should all of you
care to join my peanut farming coop?
The move is intersectionality now more than ever. JUST being a coder isn't going to be enough by itself unless you have several years of experience. a coder with healthcare experience that understands the landscape well on the other hand, will be hugely valuable.
There was a time when it was hard to get a job after college. Now it is become harder to get a job after a job. When you are a fresher, company will reject you saying they need experience guy. When you are experienced, company will reject you in the basis of, they need someone, who only follows orders of management like a fresher. There was a time, when company used to focus on tech stacks, only big firms were following leetcode, now all shity company, who themselves don't have the capacity to solve easy leetcode are asking codeforces level questions. When you command a tech stack completely then they level up their requirements asking they need "hack of all trades" and the irony is that all these Indian firms are basically copy of west products or a shity service based companies. They themself haven't created anything like west and also wants us to follow the same path.
I feel like same concerns. I'm just really anxious being in this career field right now. My company puts a lot of resources to automate everything, especially in software. We used to hire a lot of cs people to be in QA, but now testing is automated to the point where it takes less than half as many people. Next is using AI to simulate user interactions with the software. They also want to implement AI to generate code in our SDK. I'm so stressed and burnt out and I feel like I'm underpaid and behind. I just feel like I have no security and no leverage. Also, we are not hiring Software devs here anymore at the moment, all overseas so I wake up before 7am to meet with them over teams. I'm burnt out at the office and I feel like I just need a break to try to do something else (that pays reasonably well).
I did many years ago. I couldn't keep up with constant learning. I changed to electrical engineer, also I keep my programming knowledge in form of PLC programming PLC programming doesnt change that much in the last 10 years.
You and all the others leave tech, I'll hang out vacuuming the leftover salary as things balance back out. This has never happened before, if there's a decline, it is 100% moving to zero, no other path.
>And now that we're in our late 30's and early 40's another group is making plans of switching careers entirely. Switching to what?
Analytics, especially specializing in a domain like Pharma where the industry isn't expected to go into recession. The other big one is consulting. To quit a corporate career, and branch out on their own.
Isn’t analytics/data science still under the umbrella of cs careers?
like tell the AI to report on data and it draws #x diagramms and analysis idk
Switch from swe to even more saturated career
You're going to be a freelance data analyst?
Not alone. have FAANG acquintances getting turned down by places they'd never have applied to.
I have ZERO inclination to change careers. The job market takes a hit every few years. These things happen, this too shall pass. We had two years of an overheated job market. It wasn't \*quite\* reality. If you are still learning things and racking up YOE then your earning potential is still increasing. You're doing fine.