[HN Gopher] Ask HN: Anyone else disillusioned from working in tech
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Ask HN: Anyone else disillusioned from working in tech
I'm technically a new grad, I finished my CS BSc in 2020 but didn't
start working then, and instead started another BSc. This year I
was close to starting my masters and go into academia but likely
won't because I just don't have the energy for it after going
through a big breakup and a sort of "identity crisis". Currently I
live in a big European capital (with a lot of tech jobs) that I
love from the bottom of my heart, and I would like to stay here.
But all the computer science jobs just seem so dull and pointless.
It seems like you either work for a startup that will eventually be
bought by a competitor and all the work that went into it is moot,
for a big bank or corporate, or some small company building CRUD
apps for other faceless corporations. What am I missing? I get
work is first and foremost an exchange of labour for money, and not
supposed to be fun. But aren't there more options I missed so far?
I enjoy web scraping a lot and have used it to solve a bunch of
real world problems my (ex) girlfriend or I had. I could
conceivably work as a freelancer and have done so in the past as a
psychology student but I really want to work on something as part
of a team. I recently came across the "developer relations" role,
i.e. representing the company at conferences and online, recording
demos, writing technical blog posts etc.. it seems perfect for me
(I prefer working with people), but I would assume they are looking
for people who have a few years of experience already so they know
what they're talking about? EDIT: plus some of the most
insufferable people I've met in my life were in undergrad CS
classes or colleagues in SWE gigs
Author : mahathu
Score : 28 points
Date : 2022-08-11 19:41 UTC (3 hours ago)
| keepquestioning wrote:
| Check oout Vow Foods.
| IceMetalPunk wrote:
| My response to the post title: abso-fucking-lutely. I just passed
| my 4th year in the fintech industry, and am incredibly burned out
| and, yes, disillusioned. I'm currently about to take my first
| steps towards switching careers into game dev in the hope that
| (a) I can actually find a job in that field and (b) it'll be more
| fulfilling and less soul-crushing, as a result of being both
| creative _and_ more aligned with why I got into programming in
| the first place. I don 't know if it will, but I need to try some
| change or collapse internally.
|
| All I can say is, if you go into a field you don't like, it will
| take a mental toll. My suggestion is to try applying to developer
| relations roles; they may _want_ someone with more experience,
| but that doesn 't mean that's all they'll accept. It's worth at
| least putting in applications to make yourself an option, and if
| they say no, then you're no worse off than you started.
|
| In my journey, I'm currently trying to learn Unity as my "foot in
| the door" skill for applications (all my previous game dev
| experience has been with pure JS and Game Maker Studio, which no
| game dev company seems to be looking for), but I'll be applying
| before I really have experience with Unity anyway just to put my
| name on hiring managers' lists.
|
| Good luck, friend; may we both find a fulfilling way to pay for
| the food we need to survive! :)
| dont__panic wrote:
| If you're burned out from fintech, what's drawing you to game
| dev -- one of the other famous meatgrinder industries for
| software developers?
|
| I'm probably biased by my own experience, but if you've only
| worked in fintech... please give tech a second chance! I worked
| at one of the most famous fintech companies in the world for my
| first few years in industry, and I absolutely understand how it
| can burn you out and disillusion you. But I assure you that
| switching to a medium-size tech company that builds open source
| products for _developers_ really refreshed my perspective on
| tech.
| IceMetalPunk wrote:
| I'm currently at one of the biggest fintech companies in the
| world. I understand that game dev is at least as much
| work/grind, but the key difference is that it's _creative._
| Even if I 'm not making the top decisions, you can't develop
| a game with zero creative input; whereas I've spent the last
| 4 years implementing other people's function-first designs
| for a webapp, and the most creative things I've done here was
| implement a search filter and add an unrequested multiselect
| input to a form. And I'm not even exaggerating that.
|
| I've been coding for 20 years now, since I was 12. I first
| got into programming for creative reasons, and _every_ bit of
| coding I 've done for myself in those 20 years has been game
| development or game related. It's _why_ I got into
| programming, it 's _why_ I continued programming, it 's _why_
| I got my degree in computer science. The only reason I didn
| 't go for a game dev degree was because I'm not great at
| visual art and I assumed I'd fail the degree requirements
| over that. I just happened to choose the wrong game engine
| and language to learn all those years ago.
|
| So I understand there will be crunch in game dev, but I'm
| fine with crunch as long as I can be creative during it.
| Coding to other people's uncreative specs is not worth the
| stress; coding to something I have creative input on would
| be.
| barrysteve wrote:
| A lot big game dev firms and even some mid-level indies
| will saddle you with work where most of the creative
| decisions have been made already and you are tasked with
| making it happen.
| IceMetalPunk wrote:
| And that, my friend, is why these are the questions I
| will ask prospective employers during interviews.
| bogomipz wrote:
| I'm curious since both you and the OP seem to have a similar
| experience working in Fintech. Might you or someone else say
| what is it about Fintech that is so bad? Is it cultural?
| suprjami wrote:
| > I get work is first and foremost an exchange of labour for
| money, and not supposed to be fun.
|
| I have always picked jobs doing something I've enjoyed. I've had
| times where I got a bit sick of it, but most of my 20+ years of
| work have been getting paid to tinker with things I enjoy
| tinkering with.
|
| Work doesn't have to suck. Keep looking. Find a job that
| interests you and find the fun in it. Keep your eyes open and
| switch when something better comes along.
|
| Never switch jobs solely for more money. As long as you can pay
| the bills, work conditions and happiness are more important.
| samuelstros wrote:
| In case the big European capital (with a lot of tech jobs) is
| Berlin, I might have an interesting opportunity for you. Take a
| look at my profile and feel free to contact me if you are
| interested.
| mr90210 wrote:
| I have a friend who likely live in your city (there aren't many
| EU big capitals that fit your description), who managed to get a
| job as a Research Data Scientist on a Uber-like company. His
| focus is Self-Driving.
|
| Such positions for people like you exist out there, but you've
| got be patient because there aren't many.
| dahdum wrote:
| > But all the computer science jobs just seem so dull and
| pointless
|
| There's a difference in the work being dull and the work
| environment being dull. I've had some of the best working times
| of my life building simple apps with a small team.
|
| > I enjoy web scraping a lot and have used it to solve a bunch of
| real world problems
|
| Web scraping is an extremely dull topic for me, but I would
| readily work on it again if I needed to. Good chance I'd end up
| enjoying it, since no doubt there are new techniques and
| challenges to overcome since last time.
|
| What I think you're missing is how dynamic and interesting even
| those entry level positions can be, and how quickly you may move
| up in position and salary. It sounds as if you like working with
| people, technical writing, leadership, and coding. That's a very
| robust starting point.
| badpun wrote:
| What you described is mostly not tech jobs. Tech is building
| Starlink, or maybe even Chat application No 17 at Google, or
| doing some other technical product. Coding work at banks or other
| non-tech corporations you mentioned rarely have any technical
| challenges - they merely use technology, they don't develop it
| themselves.
| evilos wrote:
| This just feels like arbitrary gate keeping. The vast majority
| of people would consider any kind of coding work a "tech" job.
|
| Maybe there's not much innovation happening in these jobs, but
| that's a different topic.
| badpun wrote:
| > The vast majority of people would consider any kind of
| coding work a "tech" job.
|
| I'm not so sure. Even on Wall Street (which is pretty
| mainstream), "Tech" means FAANGs and similar, not a yogurt
| factory releasing its iOS calorie counting app.
| nchase wrote:
| if web scraping excites you, let's talk!
| kradeelav wrote:
| Design manager, not a coder, but been in the workforce for quite
| a while at this point ...
|
| The specifics vary from person to person, but the first 5-10
| years of your career tends to be the "find what you _don 't_ want
| to do for the rest of your life" phase. It's actually a good
| thing to realize that you don't want to do X; you have a strong
| data point (or several) of what you know to avoid for future
| jobs.
|
| You know you like working with people (so you can tailor the job
| search towards in-office jobs). You like solving real-world
| problems (sometimes companies where tech is a single department
| vs the whole shebang are better for this -- tech-only companies
| tend to be a little navel-gazey about their own use but that's
| from an outsider, take with a massive grain of salt :>).
|
| Apply to many different places. See if you can get contracting
| gigs if your life circumstances allow for it to "taste" different
| companies and get more data points. I wish you the best of luck.
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