[HN Gopher] Ask HN: How does an old timer find contract work
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Ask HN: How does an old timer find contract work
I'm 72 years old and have been programming professionally since I
was 27. I've kept up with the times reasonably well, considering
that no one can now keep up with more than a few branches of
software's evolution. Sparing you the history: over the past 8
years I've worked extensively with javascript, full stack, taught
full stack at a bootcamp for a year, written a couple very large
applications, and worked a bit on other projects. I would like to
find more opportunities to continue doing what I love the most. At
this stage contract work ranging from ~20 hours per week up to > 40
hours per week occasionally is probably the best value. Yes, there
is a question. How should I go about finding such jobs? (Also,
I'm unclear about how to briefly fit my 45 years experience into a
resume format)
Author : zanethomas
Score : 28 points
Date : 2022-12-07 18:08 UTC (4 hours ago)
| iancmceachern wrote:
| The best method I've found for contractors to find work is to
| mine linkedin.
|
| Although it's against the linkedin terms of service (and I do not
| currently use it), octopus crm is a good place to look for thr
| framework, octopus automates it, but you can just do what octopus
| does, follow the same playback, manually.
|
| Every day like a few people's posts, write a glowing
| reference/reccomendation for someone you've worked with or for on
| their page, endorse a few people for skills, and send out 10
| personal messages to people in your field. To find those people
| search . Like if your into semiconductor robotics just search for
| that with those keywords, then filter it by people in management,
| then further by anything else you want to filter by (location,
| etc) and then connect with those people (send a friend request)
| and in the note just say hi, I'm X, I do X, I noticed you do to,
| just wanted to connect.
|
| Do that for a few weeks and someone will reply back asking for
| your help.
|
| I hope this helps, if it doesn't ignore it and do something
| better.
| gregjor wrote:
| I signed up for LinkedIn when it started, stayed on until last
| year because I believed it offered some value to me. I never
| got a single lead from that site. I would call it useless
| unless you need to fill a recruiter's candidate database, or if
| you have the patience to spend a lot of time building a fake
| network of people who don't know you through "likes" and posts.
| Your mileage may vary. I ditched LinkedIn along with all other
| social media except HN and that has not affected my freelancing
| prospects at all.
| iancmceachern wrote:
| What is your advice for OP in how to find those prospects?
| This is a thread with that goal in mind, do you have any
| advice for him on how to find prospective clients?
| gregjor wrote:
| Yes I answered in other comments in this thread. I have a
| couple of long articles about finding freelance work, how
| to work with freelancers, and maintenance programming as a
| career on my web site typicalprogrammer.com, which I
| mentioned in my reply to OP.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| YMMV. I got my current position after a recruiter saw my
| LinkedIn profile (that was about 5 years old!) and contacted
| me last summer. I wasn't looking at the time, but it didn't
| take much to convince me to leave :-)
|
| [edit] That said, for a freelancer, LinkedIn has less value
| unless you are active in the same communities that your
| customers are.
| gregjor wrote:
| If I was looking for a f/t job I might use LinkedIn, mainly
| because so many recruiters use it. In my own career, both
| with f/t jobs and freelancing, referrals and word-of-mouth
| always work best. A good recruiter can put you in front of
| hiring managers, but I would prefer finding a good
| recruiter face-to-face rather than on LinkedIn.
|
| I think the worst way to find a job is filling out
| applications online and blindly sending in hundreds of
| resumes. LinkedIn at least sits a notch or two above that.
| satvikpendem wrote:
| All my jobs have been from recruiters on LinkedIn. I keep it
| open and get at least 10 messages a day talking about this or
| that position. I guess people don't optimize their profile
| like LinkedIn tells you to, after you do that, it's very easy
| to get inbound leads.
| gregjor wrote:
| Are you getting freelance work on LinkedIn, or job leads
| from recruiters? When I had a LinkedIn profile I got lots
| of contact from recruiters (both internal and external).
| Since I'm not looking for f/t jobs I just replied "Thanks
| but not interested."
|
| I'm sure LinkedIn has value for some people, probably even
| some freelancers. It never did for me, I always found
| referrals and word-of-mouth work better.
| satvikpendem wrote:
| Both, if I wanted freelance work I asked them, usually
| they say no, but sometimes they say yes. It's much easier
| if you're talking to the founders of a startup, rather
| than a recruiter, since the former are much more
| flexible.
|
| I'm not sure how people find freelance work for big
| companies like Google though, unless they go through an
| agency that has prior connections.
| gregjor wrote:
| Agencies like the one that represents me (10X Management)
| place people at Google, Facebook, etc. Another route is
| knowing someone inside the big company -- I know
| freelancers who got gigs at FAANG (or whatever it is now)
| companies through contacts.
|
| That's not a good match for me because I prefer smaller
| companies with well-defined discrete business problems
| and shorter timelines, and because I usually live
| overseas and travel a lot -- full-time remote in other
| words, and not available for daily stand-ups or lots of
| meetings.
|
| I generally don't work for startups. I have, but they too
| often lack the focus to get good requirements from, need
| a lot of interpersonal interaction with the team, and
| want to pay in equity. Great gigs sometimes but not for
| me. For me the best customers are small/medium businesses
| not in the tech industry, profitable and established, who
| can't attract/hire/keep software/system admin talent. For
| every job opening at a startup you can find 100 small
| companies who can't get anyone.
| iancmceachern wrote:
| You were clearly doing it wrong. I've done the opposite. I've
| built a robust network of real people that have real mutual
| interest in being acquainted with me professionally. You have
| to put good will into it. It's not a site, it's not linkedin,
| it's a tool to meet cool people who share your professional
| interests and to facilitate making real connections with
| them. If you used it to create fake friends and superficial
| relationships that's on you.
| gregjor wrote:
| Not sure how you got the idea I created "fake friends and
| superficial relationships," I think you misread my comment.
| I intended to dismiss that plan because it seems the norm
| on LinkedIn -- "connecting" with people you don't know,
| haven't worked with, for the sole purpose of creating a
| fake network. My LinkedIn network consisted entirely of
| former colleagues, customers, and a couple of recruiters I
| have worked with. Turns out I can stay in contact with them
| in person, by phone, or with email.
|
| Maybe it comes from my age, but "connecting" or "liking"
| someone on social media doesn't equal "meeting" people,
| cool or otherwise. A referral is a referral, perhaps, but I
| think one from someone I worked with or for who can vouch
| for me counts for a lot more than one from someone I
| "connected with" on LinkedIn.
|
| My personal address book keeps my "network" safe from
| anyone harvesting them from my LinkedIn profile, another
| bonus.
| brudgers wrote:
| Talk to all the people you worked beside, below and above.
|
| If they won't turn you on to work, there's probably a reasonable
| reason.
|
| Working with peeps who know you and your work doesn't require a
| resume.
|
| And the first step for finding work is always seeking rejection -
| because that's the typical outcome of a phone call - on the phone
| not writing a resume.
|
| A resume is only needed when someone asks for one.
|
| Good luck.
| _tom_ wrote:
| Write and speak.
|
| Have an online presence in some area. Open source something
| related to what you want to work on.
|
| Help them find you.
| kleer001 wrote:
| > I would like to find more opportunities to continue doing what
| I love the most.
|
| Lean on face to face networking? Programming Conventions? I got
| my last couple jobs based on who I know, not from applying in a
| big 'o cattle call.
|
| > briefly fit my 45 years experience into a resume format
|
| Chop it to just the last 10 years? That's what I did (as a green
| 45 yo with 20+ years experience). Then, during the interview I
| talked a bit more about my full experience.
|
| Best of luck!
| gregjor wrote:
| I have never formally interviewed for freelancer roles. I don't
| interview car mechanics or plumbers -- I pay them to fix a
| problem and expect (sometimes wrongly) that they know their
| business. When I get a freelancing lead the customer doesn't
| usually care about my experience, education, age. They want to
| know if I can fix their business problems. Either I can or I
| can't. If the customer does try to start an interview with me I
| change the subject to focus on what problems they need to
| solve. My job as a freelancer/consultant amounts to quickly
| understanding the problems, setting priorities, and fixing
| things. I'm not auditioning for a f/t job.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| Create a LinkedIn account and contact recruiters. Many of them
| specialize in placing contract jobs. I also notice that they have
| been getting really aggressive these days.
| brynb wrote:
| Any old timers here in the thread, please email me at
| strep_makers.0p@icloud.com -- I'm building a new company doing
| both consulting and internal product development and have always
| loved working with older, more experienced folks. We're looking
| for tech leads, technical project managers, and anyone who has
| the ability to take strong ownership.
|
| (FYI, that's a burner email-- I'll reply from a different one)
| readonthegoapp wrote:
| what's your email? you can put it in your profile. i'll ping you
| about a potential part-time contract. thanks. psmithsf@gmail.com
| zanethomas wrote:
| I'd like to thank everyone for the input received thus far and
| the future feeback to be received. It is very much appreciated
| and will be given very careful consideration!
| dv35z wrote:
| You ought to check out UpWork (https://www.upwork.com/) and
| Fiverr (https://www.fiverr.com/). Treat it as a "buffet" of
| interesting work, projects, and skills. Likewise, you can hire
| other workers to help you with tasks, and then form your own
| virtual team. For example, If you'd like to build a mobile app,
| you could use those apps to find a graphic designer (someone
| skilled at Figma, in order to do design & prototyping), a back-
| end engineer (in order to build APIs), and a product manager
| (manage requirements, backlog, development cadence), and a
| skilled mobile app developer to build it. Depending on where your
| interest and skill level is, you can always pair-collaborate with
| these people - you'll learn a ton, feel the team vibe, and feel
| less "behind the times", since you have now augmented yourself
| with experts. Most importantly, treat the team well, prioritize
| quality, and have fun.
| ilaksh wrote:
| I think it's similar to what works for a lot of people regardless
| of age. Focus on a particular niche, learn how it works to the
| degree that you would be able to participate in that business,
| build tooling that would help you do that, let the people in that
| community know. The people who use you tools will ask you to make
| more tools.
|
| To avoid ageism, focus on online communities on Twitter and
| Discord. They don't even need to see your face. 99% of the time
| they are happy to do a text or voice chat.
| gregjor wrote:
| Freelancer at 62 here, 40+ years programming and system admin
| experience. My opinions/advice:
|
| Word of mouth and professional connections work best. With your
| long career you must know a lot of people who run companies, or
| still work in the field. And they know people. Word of mouth and
| referrals remain the best way to get leads.
|
| Freelancers should focus on _solving problems_. Employees get
| hired to _fill roles_. Freelancers don 't need a resume. They
| need demonstrated expertise that they can apply immediately to
| solving business problems. My approach comes down to getting the
| (potential) customer to list and describe their top five or ten
| pain points or needs, in priority order, then knocking those out
| for them. If you can deliver no one cares about your age or what
| you did before or where you went to school 50 years ago. Working
| remotely also helps, because you won't get the "not a good fit
| with our culture" excuse (i.e. "too old").
|
| If you mean contracting like a temp employee that usually works
| more like an employee arrangement -- resume, interviews, etc.
|
| You can work through an agency (disclaimer: 10X Management
| represents me). A good agency does the marketing, contracts,
| legal, invoicing, payment for you (for a cut). They can expose
| you to opportunities you would not otherwise know about.
|
| Focus on your strongest skills, don't try to do everything. For
| example I concentrate on relational databases/SQL (core ideas and
| techniques almost unchanged since the 1980s), Linux system admin
| and cloud infrastructure (old hat to anyone who grew up with
| Unix), and web application development. I started freelancing by
| finding customers who had abandoned or broken projects (plenty of
| those, like 60% - 90% of all software projects) and offering to
| fix the problems. Debugging and maintenance pay just as well or
| more as green-fields development.
|
| I have several articles about freelancing on my web site
| typicalprogrammer.com. No ads, sign-ups, pop-ups, or affiliate
| links. Good luck.
| akhmatova wrote:
| Know that the odds are stacked against you - but be persistent
| and press on anyway.
|
| The minority who are willing to look past your age (who will also
| be the better ones to work for) will pick up on your persistence
| and see it as a positive trait and hire signal.
|
| As to the resume - there's lots of advice out there on resume
| advice for older workers. Truncating / condensing lists of older
| gigs is one of the standard techniques.
|
| The rest of what you do is a variation of the same advice as
| applies to younger candidates - just that in your case it will
| have even more protective benefit,
|
| For example - even though it may bore you a bit, be sure to both
| read (or carefully skim) as many modern books as you can that are
| relative to your field, as well as to stay up on the "shiny"
| stuff (cloud, containers, CI/CD) even though your gut instinct
| will (rightly) tell you they may be overhyped or less important
| than knowing the core principles.
|
| That is - at least know what they are, what problems they attempt
| to solve and what they are basically made of. This will make is
| substantially less easy to dismiss you as a dinosaur (inflexible
| / crusty / less nimble than younger candidates).
|
| Finally: wear your age with pride. You've lived through times,
| and have seen things these people can only read about (for those
| who even read these days). You have a rare perspective to offer,
| and the better folks out there will see that and dig that aspect
| of you. And will be proud to have you in their corner and on
| their team.
| gregjor wrote:
| The "shiny stuff" is almost all retreads and new clothes on old
| ideas. Containers and VMs? Around for decades in various forms.
| Cloud? That was mainframe computing years ago. CI/CD? Had it
| back in the '70s. Same with TDD. A hallmark of the software
| industry: almost nothing truly new gets introduced, but old
| ideas and technologies get a new coat of paint, a buzzword, and
| make more sense today because the hardware and networking have
| improved by orders of magnitude.
|
| Anyone who learned C back in the '70s or '80s can pick up most
| newer languages quickly. Relational databases, the core of
| every non-trivial business application, date from the '80s.
|
| My advice: don't worry about or focus on your age, don't make
| excuses, don't try to persuade people you haven't turned into a
| dinosaur. Focus on business needs and how you can solve
| problems and add value. Ageism in tech certainly exists but you
| mainly run into it when a team of younger people interview
| someone their dad's age and don't see a good fit with the team.
| And they're right about that -- I won't work 18 hrs/day for
| free pizza and beer anymore, and I don't play foosball or need
| a nap room.
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