Professional Pathways

Notes on work and career — engineering, the business side, and what I’ve learned building (and abandoning) more side projects than I’d like to admit.

Former Developers and what are they doing now

Ski Mountaineering Shop jcborro on HN opened a ski mountaineering shop after 20 years in software development. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23952057 Realtor Some developer pivoted to real estate. For example, poulsbohemian on HN, switched to selling real estate after 20 years in software development. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23952181 Product Management Product management seems an easy pivot for many software developers. Ref: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23959642 Leadership Roles Some developers switched to leadership roles and started to climb corporate ladder. These roles represent different challenges & skill set and opportunity to keep learning and avoid boredom. ...

How to Advance in Your Career as an IC

Interesting post and discussion at Hacker News about advancing as an Individual Contributor. Still debating which way to go. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34662394

Ask HN: Those making $500/month on side projects in 2021 – Show and tell

I love these kind of posts. Here are some interesting ideas for side-gig: Books. There are quite a few books there, books for babies, books about iOS dev etc. Mining Cryptocurrency. This comment got a lot of attention. Apps. Too many but was glad to see Mac apps generating decent income. Music. Decent income from YouTube content ID payments according to this comment. DIY biologist. Seems fun. A lot of SaaS or content sites. Flipping items from thrift stores on eBay.

Real Estate vs Startup

For years, I was working towards my own startup. I always had various side-projects and learned a lot from these side-projects. But at the same time, all these projects were failures. I never paid much attention to real estate investing. I had some friends who bought rental properties or got into flipping houses. It seemed so much more work and riskier. I can create a new startup for just a few dollars and a few weeks of my time, so why pay attention to real estate. ...

Working Remotely

As a developer, I am lucky that I get to work from home as needed. But I have never been 100% remote; lately, I have been reading a lot about working remotely, remote first companies, digital nomad lifestyle etc. These are some resources that I have found useful so far: The Ultimate Guide to Working Remotely - I haven’t gone through the whole guide yet but so far it has been very informative. ...