
Ask HN: Acceptability of Public Sector Experience for Job Hiring - orware
I’ve had a public sector day job in IT for ~12 years now and had been happy working to make things better for the org. and continue my journey as a software craftsman.<p>However, the environment just isn’t conducive to allow the focus to be on development.<p>This really hit home for me earlier this year when I was relegated back to focusing on simple “webmaster” stuff with a website redesign project even though lots of our custom web apps need to be updated or rewritten.<p>Finally coming to that realization, and not having the option to simply quit (I’m not that wealthy nor am I in a locale that has lots of software development jobs to begin with)...I decided to buy a house and see if that might help (my small family was outgrowing our rental). And it sort of did for the past 5 months or so since most evenings&#x2F;weekends were all focused on new house stuff.<p>Yet, as things have started to quiet down those feelings have all resurfaced again and I don’t feel like I have any real ways to fix them directly in my current workplace.<p>I peruse the monthly HN Who’s Hiring threads and used to imagine in past years of going back to the Bay Area but I’ve let that option go and definitely would prefer a fully remote company now and have even applied to a few over this past year.<p>Which brings me to my question...are there any companies out here on HN that can first off provide an excellent technical environment and mentorship, a good Bay Area like salary, a retirement plan, and paid medical benefits and be willing to take on somebody that wants to learn and grow as a software developer every single day?<p>When applying to companies it always seems (this is only my perception) that what’s being looked for is expertise in specific tech stacks rather than focusing on the potential of the individual and hiring based on that.<p>I’m hoping my next decade of life can be made a little more interesting by finding this type of company out there that can that potential in me.
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KingMachiavelli
I work in the public sector (higer ed) as a SysAdmin but I'm very young w/o my
own family or anything tieing me down but I can relate to the sentiment.

> are there any companies out here on HN [...]

I think it really comes down to what your credentials and experience are; the
private sector is much more competative (I'm shocked how many non-technical or
only semi-technical people work in IT in the public sector) and you're kind of
asking for the holy grail of jobs - remote, good compensation, and engaging.

Personally, I feel this is the biggest risk/negative to public sector jobs.
They typically aren't breaking new ground so gaining the experience that the
private sectors values is difficult. This compounds the longer you work in the
public sector.

If I was in your position this is how I would approach it.

1\. Update your resume and try to see how competative you can make it; you can
pick & choose the projects and skills from those 12 years that you think
companies would value. 2\. Identify gaps in your resume, most likely these
gaps are the very thing you believe you are missing out on such as
large/interesting software development projects, modern development & team
paradigms (DevOps, newer languages, etc.) 3\. Find open source projects that
match these gaps and spend ~1 year learning the ropes and contributing. This
will show that you're serious about your goals and have the talent to achieve
them. And, most importantly, it sepertes you from the majority of people
wearing your shoes. 4\. Along this time and after, reach out to any place that
is looking to grow. It may even still be public sector but not all public
sector is equal just like a lot of private sector IT isn't going anywhere if
it's not their core business.

Even though this may sound long winded and pessimistic, I think that
experience + catching on on some modern technologies is enough to be
competative for junior dev. position that recent, but highly talented college
grads are able to obtain.

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bubba1236
leetcode and no one really cares

