Ask HN: Is it time to quit tech industry?

With you 100%. Things have gotten... weird... in the past 8yrs or so. 13 yrs as a SWE here. Self taught in tech, programming since I was a freshmen in highschool, majored in business in my undergrad but stuck with tech for a career. What's next is the big question. I enjoyed my last gig, 4 years at a startup, massively more than I do now at at an 'elite' tech company where I'm 5 yrs in. It's just so fucking annoying and tedious. The only problem is I need to stick it out for 5 more years or so to be financially independent and work for myself. What kills me is the knowledge that if I played the game properly, I could already be there. Now, I have to decide on if I throw away 5 years, or eject and take the risk to do my own thing now. I'm giving it one more year to make that decision. At this point, I feel like it will come down to a coin flip, where I will pray for whatever side is the eject button while the coin is mid air.

What's your plan if you quit tech?

>Is it time to quit tech?

>I have taken some time off work recently to travel and unwind.

No. Go fully remote, travel and see out the rest of your career.

Software dev has about 10 years left as a viable career until it's as common as, and remunerated in line with, store cashier positions. You may as well ride out the crest of the wave.

I'm with you.

Exact same feelings.

What makes it worse I'm currently in a country where the things that interest me have completely dried up work wise. My partner is a resident since birth and want's to stay, I've been here a few years, don't mind it but see it as a tech backwater.

Searching LinkedIn I get no jobs, searching overseas I'm getting hundreds. Local being Sydney Australia and overseas being London. Things that interest me being Scala, functional programing, work that isn't big data with large corporations trying to fuck over their customers and doing bad things collecting/using data and not crypto currency.

The only options I have is go in to management. Not my skill set at all and I'd be / am a terrible manager as dislike the politics being a blunt straight talking person. My partner also jokes saying I show autistic tendencies with my bluntness not being able to read the situation.

I can change careers then I'd be taking a 4x paycut at the least and that's after 3-4 years of re-training. I'd be struggling to live even though I have a modest life style driving a 10year old toyota corolla in a cheap rented house. I love manual labor I find it more re-warding than sat in endless meetings with people talking gibberish avoiding giving a straight answer or avoiding just getting the work done but i'd be silly to make the switch.

So right now I am stuck in a job I'm bored with, dealing with stuff I don't want to deal with for a company who staff are great and some of the best people i've worked with but owner is a text book psychopath, and the contracts dull all for the pay check.

Nope, not time to quit if you still need to earn a living. You've invested 13+ years into a career and if you aren't financially independent and don't have a backup job then you do still need to pay bills, right?

For an interesting perspective on another career - there is a YT channel called the handyman. He talks a lot about how he isn't choosing the light fixture to install and has opinions on it but is just getting paid, decently, to install it.

Maybe contracting is more for you at this time. Get paid to come in and code stuff, solve problems and go home. Move onto the next job. Maybe you'll discover some idea along the way that could be kindle into your own project.

Maybe, but don't give up your day job. Financial health and personal health are both important.

I've been programming for 43 years (since I was kid) and worked as a programmer for about 20 years. In the last 17 years, I've seen the switch from exploration, creativity, open-ended thinking to this new thing called "tech." I am not a "tech." I guess I've quit tech, and won't become a "tech." I miss working as a programmer - I had pretty good jobs. Beware as workplaces in other industries can be much more toxic.

From what I gather, no one is hiring programmers: "the programming part is easy", "solo programmers need not apply", "scrum", buzzwords, horrible marketing, bad management, and worse. I have a day job not in "tech", and not as a programmer. On the side, I program for me. I read and post what's interesting to me on Hacker News and other programming sites.

I think that there's some extent to which the mere fact that something is your job drains the motivation from it. In my day job, I work on some world-changing technology that will massively improve the state of security; I see applications for it everywhere. I have nearly complete control over the technical aspects of the project, from language (Rust) to framework to code style, etc. I enjoy working with my colleagues, and we all feel strong loyalty to each other. It's the best work situation I could hope for, and I plan to stay there for the foreseeable future.

And yet, I somehow find continuing to work on it to be a bit of a slog. At the end of the day, I breathe a sigh of relief and crack open my personal project, which is a point of sale system written in COBOL on an AS/400. This, somehow, sparks joy.

Yes, there are aspects that can make a day job more or less pleasant. Keeping up with the churn in faddish sectors is exhausting, and I'm glad that I've been able to avoid touching the web in my career. Unrealistic deadlines are a sure-fire trip to burnout for me. Constantly putting out fires gets demoralizing.

So, you can control how much your day job bothers you, and even like it, but it's never going to have the same joy that you feel when you're working for yourself, with nobody to answer to. I still think it's a better career track for me than any of the alternatives though.

The reasons you give around "keeping up with new developments, new technologies, ...lack of creativity", lead me to believe it isn't the job that you dislike, it's the environment you're in.

I have a friend who was in a very similar situation to you and he just kept sticking with it year after year. He talked about going back to school and finding a new career, but it was always just easier to keep doing dev work, and it was well paid. He hated the tech stack he was working on (particularly everything javascript/typescript), didn't see how his contribution was meaningful, etc etc.

He was ready to cash it all in again when he found a start-up that he really loved the product. He had a big say in the initial tech stack, and had wanted to dive into Rust. He was enjoying learning about hardware, etc etc. After a few months, he realized that Rust was a great language, but he was getting into more of the "new technologies" and it was a bit of a shiny thing, so he went back to C++. He doesn't care about the "technologies" so much as he cares about the problem he's solving for customers, and how that is implemented.

You mention you "don't see the value...beyond the paycheck.", well, that's the value. Can you find something where you love the problem that you're solving for the customer, and hopefully love the product as well. Something where you can see the impact your having on the customers (and maybe even the world).

I know it may seem all "we're changing the world" start-upy, but some people really are, and it isn't only about the money. From my experience, SF is full of the "we're changing the world" people with no real reason behind it. The less startup focused hubs I think have more to offer because they're not so caught up in the bubble.

Just my two cents, hope it helps.

If you reframed your perception to "It is literally just for a paycheck", do you think your perception of your job would improve?

If you have enough savings to quit tech and do other stuff for a while, why not? Or, if you have enough savings/confidence to just take a year off and fuck around, why not? I might suggest riding out your current job/role until you have the ability to travel without the concern of covid, but also recognize that might be quite a while.

My #1 rule is, if you're so miserable that you're struggling to get out of bed in the morning, quit pretty much instantly. Your wellbeing is worth more. If you're not at that point, though, it might be worthwhile to play around with your way of thinking and finding any cognitive traps you have lying around.

Yes, I'd recommend building something of your own.

It feels to me like you just don't enjoy big companies. The bigger the company, the more crap you'll be required to pass through. It's not just tech related, any office job has the same.

Politics, indoctrination, favouritism, corruption, boring tasks.

Don't get me wrong, some small companies can be hell as well, if the founders / first hires are not great. But the bigger the company the higher the chance of finding some of those people who will create a bad environment.

It's often done in good faith, sometimes for personal gain.

Starting your own company will give you the freedom to either run solo or hire people you like, giving you the creative freedom you long for. I wouldn't recommend going the startup-raise-millions-burn-millions route, chances of success are low and it's a stressful ride. Check out the video Bootstrapping Side Projects To Profit by Pieter Levels.

Go to the fundamentals, they are limitless and do not change very often.

Mathematics, science, comp sci hard problems, music, logic and philosophy. Classical drawing, writing, ect.

Look back to untapped projects from the 80s and early 2000s.

13 years is a good stint. I don't know where in the industry you worked, but you could try a different segment.

If you did adtech, work in web consulting.

If you worked at a consulting shop, apply at product companies.

If you worked at a bigco, work at a startup.

If you worked in gaming, work at an ecommerce company.

Also, realize that there are a lot of related occupations: tech trainer, product manager, devops consultant, etc. These all may be worth looking at to refresh your joy around the work. (I wrote about this here: https://letterstoanewdeveloper.com/2020/10/05/how-to-make-a-... )

I took a sabbatical myself early in my career and found myself pulled back into tech (reading tech articles for fun, for example). That was my clue that I enjoyed it enough to return--if I'm reading about it for fun, must like it.

So, what are you reading for fun?

You sound burned out. I had a familiar experience a few years ago. I was extremely tired of my job. It wasn't a hard job, but I didn't connect with my coworkers. Also, I didn't find interest in what I was doing. So, it was soul crushingly exhausting. Btw, I'm not putting all the blame on my environment. It was as much me, as it was them.

Anyways, I took some time off to travel and unwind like you. I remember the day I came back to work-- all the stress and horrible feelings I had immediately came back like I never took a break. So, I left.

I didn't quit the tech industry, but I took a year break from working. I was lucky, because I had a SO that could support me. So, I didn't have to worry about money too much. I still missed the stability of a job though. The break did a couple of things for me. It gave me time to develop new habits and it renewed my curiosity. I started tinkering again. It's really hard to care about new developments or technologies when you're drowning. However, if you're able to take care of yourself, I believe you'll find the curiosity that led you down to being a developer in the first place.

If you're a developer or if you're in tech. You're constantly learning. If you don't naturally like learning, it's going to be tough.

I think one problem we have is that every year there is some new shiny language that is hot. And companies and recruiters expect you to learn that language or stack which is ridiculous. Back when I was in college in the CS program I made a decision to focus on one language and only learn that and try to become good at using that language. I know my way around a few other languages but rarely use them. Like a carpenter who uses a few tools but has one favourite tool. I think that is OK, and nobody needs to learn more tools or stacks or languages. If people expect you to do that, just move on and find a company where you can do what you want with the tools you want. There is a lot of "you should be learning X or doing Y" and this just creates a lot of unnecessary stress and it's ridiculous to expect that. Lawyers only need to know a few tools, and nobody expects them to learn new tools every year. They just have to do the bare minimum to keep up. Same for a lot of other professions. I also think that recruiters and companies just use the "you need to know X" excuse to simply pay you less. So don't fall for it.

This post resonated with me. I hope someone else has good advice around this. I'm in a similar situation. I used to love this field so much but I'm finding myself disenchanted with it this year.

Last year I started a company that crashed and burned. That was a pretty painful process but one that was ultimately worth it I think. I'm still kind of recovering from it but I'll try it again and don't feel too burned out in that respect.

When I came back to the field after the failure of the company I found that I had an even easier time finding jobs. Higher paying jobs even. But I've also found that I don't enjoy the work. It's more "senior" and just so many more meetings and so much less doing anything that feels useful or interesting.

I've thought about trying to step back down to more technical and fun roles. That might wind up being a money hit but might actually be worth it at this point if I can go back to writing code.

I've also thought about trying to move into a different field. VR is one that is really compelling to me. It's still part of "tech" but feels new and untamed in the way that tech used to. This field used to feel like blazing a trail and lately it has felt more like an arbitrary part of business, like accounting or something. Even if my perspective is warped and it hasn't happened yet - it's bound to happen someday. It's not even a bad thing. But what I loved about this field in the early days was the sense of adventure and rebellion. Nobody knew what was going on and it felt like there was a lot of opportunity for creativity. Now it feels more like implementing a bunch of boring standards made up by other people.

I feel jaded about it and I've considered that might be the issue too. I came off the biggest failure of my life into covid when I thought I was going to be taking 2020 to get back to normal and regroup. It could be that this year just kind of sucks and I'll go back to loving tech when the world gets back to normal a bit.

Hard to say. In any case I'll be keeping my eye on this thread for anybody that has advice or has been through a similar experience.

I am in a similar position. Turned 41 years old. New "tech" that goes away in a few years is getting tiresome. I moved from Dev to DevOps for a change of pace, but it made things worse in a way.

I've debated management, but being in meetings all day sounds worse...

Try quitting and applying your knowledge to a separate field with significant growth trajectory and a lot of interesting subjects to learn about, such as industrial automation. Sometimes you just need to get back in touch with the curiosity and sense of challenge and wonder that goes with being a complete newbie in a new discipline. We are lucky that having a systems perspective and algorithmic analytical capacity means we transfer well to numerous complex disciplines. Many established fabrication operations are now seeking people from a computing background to assist with systems integration, operations planning and business-level investment trajectories. Get in there, learn and be valued. Feel free to email me for some pointers.

I've moved inside a business as the solo internal Dev. It has it challenges but I'm much happier. I'm no longer building software for hire I'm solving business problems with software. The management layer of having to fill out time sheets to every quarter hour is gone. Spending hours coming up with requirements docs no one reads is gone. Unrealistic deadlines still exists but they are more realistic. It's so much better. Maybe a change in roles would help

The question is never quit. If the decision is 'switch', it is a lot easier. You can be open-minded about opportunities. 'quit' does not mean anything. You don't quit your current job and then start search for a new one. When you are not happy with what you currently have, you will see anything not current job a help rope (see current election). It is going to lead to some bad decisions. It is important to see what you are doing from a different perspective, and seek values. Then be open minded to explore other things now. Once you find something you really love, you will switch without asking anyone here. Wish you the best.

What if you just stay as IC and not managing? I think you'll be happier.

Also pursue hobbies that produce. Not just travels or media binging. Travels are still consumption in a way. True fulfillment comes from creation. Maybe learn to paint, cook, or make music.

Why not use your skills to help a budding startup? The ground floor is almost all dirt and plants, no fancy infrastructure or elevators yet, but it is also the best time to join in on the fun.

Perhaps we need to put tech back to the ultimate goal: to keep us busy creating stuff just like art. In the end, progress is an illusion. An idea we put there to ignore what comes... death.

This is a personal question so you have to provide more context here. If you quit tech industry, what would you like to do after that ? Are you financially stable/independent to take a risk and leave you "faang" money ?

Why not start your own thing on the side then? From any digital business, to a website /app /micro-saas whatever you like?

Being your own boss is a pretty awesome motivator.

Have you thought of being a startup ceo?