Ask HN: Have you tried changing careers lately?

3 points by renegade-otter 2y ago ↗ HN

The job market for software engineers is bad right now, like REALLY bad. I have 20 years of experience and a very eclectic background, a GitHub portfolio, a working SaaS product that I built myself (as full stack as you can get), and I have a tech blog.

Not only do I not get any interviews, I do not even get any initial HR phone screens, just "thanks but no thanks" emails weeks later.

There are so many developers sloshing around in the system that I feel like most of the hiring is happening through internal networks - a lot of folks know other folks who are very good and happen to be unemployed.

This will blow over, as it always does, but for now - has anyone tried changing their career? To which degree of success? What other jobs would a software engineer be good at? I have never done anything else since the early 2000s...

2 comments

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keiferski 2y ago ↗

Every job that I've gotten from applying to an open job posting has been worse than the jobs I've gotten from a referral, knowing someone at the company, etc.

If you're been a dev for 20 years, do you have any sort of network? You will have much better chances of getting work through them.

okokwhatever 2y ago ↗

In my experience the cycle now favors consulting companies (lower seniority profiles and lower wages). In my honest opinion the startup cult exploded till a future new hype requiring engineers appears (who knows if this happens again with our new friend in town called AI) and its sweeping the industry. This already happened 10 years ago and also 10 years before that. Again and again...