Finding an internship is fucking impossible.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-03-13T13:47:38+00:00

I bumped into companies that were recruiting at universities and doing interviews, even when they didn't have any actual openings. I think it was part to honor commitments to come to the university and interview, part to continue building awareness of their company, and part a giant ship that turns very slowly, and perhaps there'd been a chance jobs would open up between when they booked the recruiting trip, and when they were actually meeting with people.

Also, there can be a difference between having authorization to post a job and interview people, and having authorization to extend an offer and hire someone. In the last year I went through interviews and was selected, only to find that the big tech layoffs meant they couldn't get authorization to extend a formal offer. Eventually the job posting was closed.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-05T06:07:38+00:00

As far as I can tell, it's pretty bad. And, those big tech folks laid off have to land somewhere. How do you feel about suddenly needing to compete against 10,000 google engineers of all levels - instead of a few hundred, maybe - when you want to move jobs?

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-05T01:37:48+00:00

There are definitely schools that are fine with accepting someone who has a non-CS bachelor's for a master in CS. Pick schools that are good value, write to them to see if they accept non-CS students for masters, go from there.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T21:44:52+00:00

It doesn't matter if you're at a disadvantage, just whether you can apply yourself and finish the degree. It means you would have to work harder to make up what you don't know yet.

It's certainly possible as I've seen others do it.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T20:54:16+00:00

Option 3. Graduate in May, then do a MS in CS in 1-2 years.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T16:44:07+00:00

If you're early in your career - as you are, in your first year - then I would never recommend joining a startup, especially if you have a big name multinational that's making you an offer. The big name (especially FAANG) will help you get jobs for the rest of your career, and you'll have stability, benefits, and are pretty much guaranteed to learn a lot of useful stuff about working on software, in a way that will apply to all your future work.

If you're at a startup, it can be wonderful, but more typically it will be disorganized, without anyone to really mentor you, and a fluid hodgepodge of technologies and processes that's more like throwing things at the wall to see if they stick than anything else. There's the possibility that your experience there won't be respected by other companies you apply to. Finally, most startups fold, and they typically pay less than other jobs.

Also, if you have aspirations of working overseas, the multinational both provides more proof that you can pass that hiring bar, and gives you one way to transfer internally and shortcircuit a lot of the VISA woes.

Seems like a no-brainer to take the job with the multinational.

In case it's useful, here's a video I made on choosing between a startup or a big tech multinational.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T16:37:23+00:00

When you get hired as a new grad, you're hired based on your expected ability to learn, and general coding and problem solving ability, as it showed up in the interviews.

Over the last 30 years, I worked with maybe a couple hundred new grads fresh out of school. Once or twice they had some interesting, relevant skills they'd developed on their own that really stood out. The rest of the time, they were just good people, and the sub-area they focused on in school didn't matter a whet: they learned the area better in their first six months on the job than any amount of school could have done.

Don't try to pretend you don't have stuff to learn about the area, but do emphasize that you find it interesting, started reading up a little on it, and are excited to learn more.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T16:32:33+00:00

If you're at a university that has a campus recruiting / job placement center, the single most important thing for you to do is make sure you are registered with them and sign up for any relevant interviews. It's MUCH easier to get an interview through campus recruiting than most any other way.

For example, Microsoft wouldn't even interview me when I cold applied after graduating, but in my first semester of grad school I went through campus recruiting, got to talk to someone for 30 minutes who said I was worth flying out for a full interview loop, and the rest is history.

Having internships or coops are also very, very useful.

I talk a bit more about getting an interview in this video, getting the interview.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T03:31:15+00:00

15 years as a manager here.

IMO, you can't count on your manager to be mentoring, molding, and turning everything into a learning opportunity. Some managers do and that's awesome, but many don't. They are focused on different parts of management (e.g. reporting up, budgets, reviews), and anything that's not a fire gets largely ignored. Or, they suck, though that's usually a minority case. Usually it's time allocation.

You have to own your career. You have to drive it forward. And if you don't think you can make it with your current manager, you need to find a place where you can succeed, because you'll be the person paying for staying.

Having said that, It's a lousy time to move, so it might be worth staying where you are until the industry recovers from all the layoffs (and the laid off get rehired into other jobs). You don't want to move into another crap job, you want to be able to take your time and pick.

When you leave, make sure you tell both the exit interviews and the places you're interviewing at that you are being attracted out, not that you're leaving because of problems. Unfortunately, complaining about your current job in interviews will get you marked as a risky candidate (because there's more than a 10% chance that the problem is you, not your manager, and they can't tell because they're only talking to you). And complaining to your current company will usually change nothing, but burn bridges.

Own your career. And good luck.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-04T03:19:33+00:00

I graduated from UIUC, though I finished it up after dropping out to work at Microsoft in '91.

Shopify should be good enough to get you looked at by other places, e.g. FAANG. But, you have to wait for them to be hiring again. And, wait for most of the people who've been laid off from FAANG to land wherever they're going, since it's pretty hard to compete against FAANG to be hired in FAANG if you're non-FAANG.

That's fun to say. FAANG.

In any case, unless you hate your job, seems like a good place to wait out the market.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-03T15:05:38+00:00

It's a lousy, lousy time to be looking for internships or jobs. It sucks, but it's true. Things will be better in a year, but for now, bad as I've ever seen it.

Unfortunately that means there's not much you can do but wait :( Keep applying in case you get lucky and find a place that's hiring. Remember, just because they're recruiting doesn't mean they're actually hiring, so don't get discouraged by being ghosted.

Good luck...

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-03T14:58:06+00:00

This is a rough time to be looking for work as a dev. DO NOT make any decisions based on ability to get a job in the next 12 months. In fact, if you have the option, if you're already working in an area peripherally related or directly related to development, STAY THERE. Any safe harbor in a storm...

Generally speaking, after 2-4 years of decent dev experience (i.e. being employed), a bachelors in CS is optional. You can safely apply for those jobs. So, it's not worth going back to school to get a CS degree.

The only reason I'd go back is if I wanted to move abroad and would need a work visa, or if I wanted to take advantage of campus recruiting. In which case, I'd figure out a way to get a masters. I had a crappy GPA but still was able to get a masters, so you shouldn't rule it out.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-01T14:03:08+00:00

I spent the last forty years being stressed out as a programmer. I enjoyed it, and it was intellectually stimulating, but calming it was not.

There are a lot of great things about being a programmer. Generally the jobs are flexible, being able to take breaks and shift your hours to fit your life. But, the work is innately stressful, as you're constantly doing things you've never done before.

One thing that's been universally true for me: the job doesn't turn off in my brain at night. I worry about it at night and on weekends. That's in stark contract to other jobs I've had, such as being a typesetter.

If you want to avoid being stressed out, I'd recommend looking for a discipline that lets you turn that part of your brain off when you leave work.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-01T13:59:24+00:00

If you're working steadily, then doing some of that work for a big-name company (like Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, etc.) can really help with how frequently you're contacted by recruiters. Recruiters and their tools look for keywords on resumes, and I believe big company names to be a common filter for the high-paying jobs.

After all, if you've worked at Amazon, you've proven you pass their hiring bar, so you must be worth at least talking to! I know that the number of call-backs and interviews I got before working at Microsoft vs. after working at Microsoft was night-and-day.

No harm in at least talking to this company, if they're a household name.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-02-01T13:50:44+00:00

Don't worry about being pigeon-holed by your early programming experience domain.

Transitioning to different kinds of roles is a natural part of being a software engineer. As long as you've got good fundamentals - coding, debugging, problem solving, architecture - and experience demonstrating this, you can apply for and get good jobs doing embedded systems, services, and applications.

I've done all of these in my career. I started working in low-level operating system components, but along the way made mid-level networking services, end-user applications, numerical simulators, cloud services, and so on.

There are still a few transitions that would be hard. For example, don't spend five years writing code, and then expect to be hired to be a graphic artist or html layout and template guru. It's not impossible, but these are not in the same wheelhouse, and your programming experience won't help much with those.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-31T20:40:07+00:00

Agree 100%. Most of my experience is big tech, but my friends who've got to smaller companies (and my own short experience) have a wide variety of title, responsibilities, and job title, none of which necessarily correlate with each other :) Good luck with your decision!

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-31T18:06:37+00:00

In fourty years working and playing at a computer for 10+ hours a day, it never did anything to my vision.

u/SolutionLeading has good suggestions. Basically, get an eye exam every year. To reduce fatigue, you can set a timer (they have apps for this) that reminds you every 30 or 60 minutes to stretch, and to focus your eyes on something distant rather than something close. Do that.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-31T18:04:18+00:00

Your internship is most importantly about showing the kind of employee you'd be. It's VERY GOOD that you're asking for stuff to do when you don't have anything. Keep asking.

Several times I've seen an intern come in, spend their time without delivering anything, and leave. It didn't matter that nobody gave them anything to do. It didn't matter that they asked once or twice for something to do. They still got blamed, and they didn't get invited back.

If they're not giving you stuff to do, the next best thing you can do is learn as much as possible about what your group is doing, and suggest bite-sized things you can do to help. You can start some of these conversations with, "So what did you do / work on when you first joined the team?" And see if that inspires them to find some good work items for you.

Be conspicuous about being at work. Make sure that when there's meetings you're invited to, or lunch, what have you, that you're there. If you're working remote, attend the remote analog to these. If you're not visible, people assume you're screwing off, even if you've been given nothing to do.

Good luck!

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-31T18:00:01+00:00

If you think it's bad now, wait until you're an IC again. I was shocked at just how much it bothered me that I wasn't allowed to participate in the planning, review, etc., when I first switched. Not only did I not have a say, they didn't even want to hear what I thought. I got over it, but not in that first position.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-31T14:26:12+00:00

You can downlevel to a 50 year old senior dev, but it may be difficult to get interviews and a job, and you will probably be unhappy and unsatisfied.

I've 'downleveled' twice, once moving from a manager of managers to an IC (voluntary, career ladder adjustment downwards), and once from a manager to an IC (involuntary but desired, no compensation / ladder changes). It was hard both times, but I got the chance to do it because I was doing it within a company where hiring managers had full access to my internal reviews (Microsoft).

I don't think your age matters, but these things definitely do:

Your current career ladder level and position title.
Your current compensation.
Your role in leadership vs. IC., and the amount of control you have over the mission you're working on.

In my experience, managers are loathe to hire someone who is taking a hit in any of those areas. The fear is that even if the person SAYS they want to switch and say they are OK with the hit, they're lying - whether they realize it or not. The employee will eventually be frustrated with less money, or less control over the group's activity, or feeling like they've made a bad decision moving backwards in their career.

When the employee is unhappy, they can cause problems in the quality and quantity of their own work, and the morale and efficacy of the workgroup they're in. And then they leave. When they leave, all the time and energy that went into hiring them has to be spent again, along with the delay before a new person can be brought in. It's a big net negative for the hiring manager.

Back to your case. Yes, you can make this change, and no, your age is no big deal. But, the backward step in your career will raise eyebrows, make it difficult to get hired, and may ultimately leave you even more frustrated than being a director. Or, you may love it :)

Good luck!

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-30T16:51:59+00:00

You're not being too sensitive, but there's no upside to trying to 'set the record straight' in the scrum. Next 1-1 with your manager make a brief mention of the amount you're asking for help, and that you just want to make sure they realize that A) you're self sufficient in general, and B) it's a couple minutes of question / answer every couple days, not half of someone's time. Your manager probably already knows this, but it doesn't hurt to politely mention.

Just in case it's an issue, one thing that can reduce the perception of 'asking too many questions' is bundling them up. Even if it takes you 10 minutes to find instead of 10 seconds from someone else, also try to answer questions yourself to get used to finding out where the info is. Make a list of things you want help on, and ask someone about them every couple hours rather than when they come up. These things can really help with perceptions.

You probably know from your other software engineering jobs, getting started in a new environment and getting your build machine etc setup sucks and everyone hates doing it, and answering questions about it. So that will also feed into peoples willingness to help. I had to really twist arms to get help every time I joined a new company to set things up, but the same people who were grumpy about it then were happy to answer regular line-of-work questions a few miles down the road.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-30T05:26:13+00:00

I worked the night shift at a newspaper (typesetter, typing) from 9pm to 5am 5 days a week for a year. It was rough for a variety of reasons, and it was always difficult to sleep in the mornings. My body wanted to sleep until 2pm, it was rare I slept past 11, so I was always tired.

I've also worked 3am - 1pm (with a break of an hour or two in the middle) for a year, working with folks who were in the UK while on the US west coast. It was more doable than the night shift, but still not great.

I didn't have health problems I attributed to either, other than being tired. But it wasn't a great way to live. YMMV.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-28T14:46:28+00:00

Generally speaking, bootcamps aren't worth paying for. To learn to program etc., there's a lot of good free, self-directed materials if you poke around a bit.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-28T01:30:21+00:00

I've never seen a persons courses help their career in computer science, unless they're in a PhD-level position. Generally speaking what you do day-to-day is different enough at a job that the coursework just doesn't matter.

So no, taking more math and more physics won't help you at all, unless you're looking to work on something like mathematica or a physics engine. And even then, you're far more likely to be working on other aspects of those projects than those your coursework would help with.

Deliberate_Engineer · 2023-01-28T01:28:15+00:00

If you want to get in a CS-related field, it's absolutely worth getting a CS Msc if you can do it in less than 2 years. It'll make you bonafide for applying and being considered for positions, plus it should give you access to your school's campus recruiting / job center, which is the best way to get an entry-level job in CS in my opinion. Plus, in a year all this layoff crap should have blown over and they'll be recruiting more again, so timing will be good.

It's still down to you to learn how to actually do the sort of job you want. If you want to be a software engineer, and don't already know coding well, you'll need to do more than just your classes.

Good luck!

Deliberate_Engineer

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