The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Suppose you are a 40 year old software engineer making 120k/year, and you somehow magically get banned for life from practicing the profession. You have decent savings to live off of for a bit and to supplement a smaller income for a while. What would you do? If you're so inclined, be specific and like narrate out a life plan.
Silly question, but why are you only making 120k/year? How long have you been in the industry? That's like entry-level for software engineers these days.
Has your time in the industry taught you anything about management at all? If I were you, I'd try to leverage your experience to become a tech lead. But maybe you could tell us more about why you don't want to be in the software industry anymore?
Where do you go, and what do you study, to make more?
I learned programming for a year, and since then have been working as a software developer (in crypto) for two years, and that's what I make. No degree or anything but I still think I can do better.
Well, I may not know too much about those answers, since I've had a relatively sheltered career. But I'll tell you what I think I know.
I did my undergrad at a school that has a pretty well-known CS department. And even though I wasn't too serious about pursuing a software career at the time, I had to choose some major, so I chose CS. And that ended up being a good decision. I don't think this makes me a better coder than most others in the industry, but the fact that I have the degree from a big name, it probably did well for me. It got me in the door of big tech, where I was able to work my way up to a nice salary. In big tech, you get your bosses to invest in your career, not just see you as a tool for getting work done. It's a growth-oriented culture, and managers are first and foremost judged by their managers on how well they grow their reports.
Other than making me look good, I mean, maybe also the universities taught me more about algorithms and theory, too. In your year-long programming learning, how much did you learn about how to analyze programs, think about algorithms, runtimes, space usage, different types of languages, etc? It's possible that that sort of in-depth thought about the theoretical nature of programming may be something else that's desirable about people who studied CS in college. Computer Science really is a separate thing from software engineering, and it's possible that you learn to think about code on a slightly different level. I'm not sure, because I don't really know what it's like to not have learned CS first.
The degree totally helped me, but you don't need it in big tech. They're not elitist, if you can show that you have the skills. If you don't have the degree, then you'll need like 3 to 5 years of industry experience, during which time you've amassed many stories where you've shown that you're hard working, methodical, you understand software, you care about the team you're on, and you're capable of making tradeoffs and decisions. Think about all of the times that you've personally done something that helped change the course of a project, or helped someone out, or made some sort of decision, and write them down and rehearse them for your interviews. If you have that, then you must also study Cracking the Coding Interview, and can absolutely get a high-paying job in big tech.
Also, you don't have to work in big tech to get a high paying job (though I know less about how to do this). But I think a lot of it comes down to, once again, you showing that you're methodical, smart, and hard-working, in much a similar way as above. And you can be hired as a tech lead for a smaller company. But once you're in a smaller company, there's usually less room for growth in salary (without simply leaving and going to another company), because the smaller companies are usually more focused on the bottom line instead of focusing on the growth of their employees.
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I have no idea where these insane SWE salaries reported by everybody are, outside of a few specific cities. Never seen it anywhere near me, if it's here there must be some secret to finding it that I'm not aware of.
Hah, I feel the same way, people online with half my YOE who are ostensibly near me are reporting that they getting my salary! But still, from all my experience, your salary seems really low for someone who's not entry level. Location could have to do with it, how big your tech company is could have to do with it, whether or not you're pushing for higher salaries could have to do with it, and also sub-field and specialization could have to do with it.
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No, your experience is typical. Only the top 10-20% of companies offer these insane salaries. Not everyone gets into FANG companies and if you aren't in a place like San Francisco, New York, Boston etc then you shouldn't expect 100k+ as entry software engineer even today. Depending on where you live 120k a year as a software engineer is very impressive. If you want those high salaries you have to be willing to change companies every 1-2 years, move, and get very good at doing interviews.
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move to a cheap area?
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Personally, I'd move into management.
What exactly don't you like about your job? Is it the actual work, the company culture, the commute, the lack of "meaning", or something else? Each of these has a different solution.
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If you have money, become an entrepreneur. Buy a laundromat, or buy housing and rent it. Get multiple, independent streams of income. Landlording or laundromat (or whatever) stuff doesn't have to be full time; you can work while getting your footing.
It seems like there are a lot of people doing this right now, but I would advise being very cautious. There are a lot of declining "mom and pop" businesses with massive hidden costs that sellers want to avoid disclosing, and newbies are falling into the trap. Water systems that need a complete rebuild, leaking gas tanks that touching in any way will cause a decade of EPA paperwork and fees/fines, and oh god the air conditioning. Not to mention lost suppliers and big clients that are making a lot of rural businesses impossible to run, but which the seller's carefully truncated records will show no sign of.
Someone in my town got conned into taking over a grocery store, and ended up paying multiple times the purchase price just to have the 60 year old gas tanks dug up and the soil sanitized to the EPA's satisfaction. He died, and now his aging boyfriend sells stationary and knick-knacks while serially renting out other parts of the building to restaurants and hobby stores that rarely survive a year (and never pay their rent that long).
Overall not a great investment.
You have to do your due diligence, but I've met people who got started like that. What you said is more or less true of buying any business
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If by 'banned' do you mean 'unable to work as an independent contractor in any country'? If not, consider working remotely for an overseas company, or even relocating overseas. A lifetime of professional experience and the opportunity cost of wasting that experience is no small thing.
There are careers that are aligned with skills and traits that software engineers have. If I was only on 120k/year I would look at taking some Linkedin learning courses training in Agile and potentially becoming a Technical Business Analyst or even Product Owner. Courses would probably only take a few months if you hammered them full time. Once working again I'm sure your career could progress through commercial tracks rather than IT.
Side hustles might be independent software development making your own game (early access on Steam to finance/Patreon) or other software applications.
I'm not in IT at all, so I'm sure others might be able to find something more creative.
'banned' as in I kinda wish something would coerce me in this way because the thought of this being my vocation for the rest of my life is starting to feel pretty bleak. Really my post could have been reworded as something like "What are some options for a middle aged IT person who wants to change careers?" and just have people throw out ideas of "what I can be when I grow up" that aren't too ridiculous to choose as a middle aged man.
Like I know what I don't want but I don't know what I do.
40's isn't too late for a full career change. I met a guy at a meditation retreat once who went from being a tier one lawyer to a school teacher (and ended up fast tracking to principal). He was very happy with his decision even though he lost a chunk of his income, as he felt his old job was soulless.
Consider going to a proper career psychologist to help you figure out what you have an interest and aptitude in. You've probably got 20+ years of working left so its worth paying a few thousand if necessary for the happiness of working in a role that best suits you.
Also check if you have an Employee Assistance Program at your current workplace for free counseling along those lines (they're confidential).
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