
Need Some Career Advice! - user-on1
Current Position : Senior Software Developer with 8 Years Exp.<p>Which track would you choose if you were in my position?<p>1. Get PMP Certified
2. Get Scrum Certified
3. Get PM Role<p>or<p>1. Get AWS Architect Certified.
2. Finish AI Nano Degree in Udacity.
3. Finish Machine Learning Engineer Nano Degree.
4. Get AI Engineer Role.
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rajeshp1986
I am in a similar situation and made a decision few weeks back. I am a senior
engineers with 8 years exp. I was getting frustrated thinking that in few
years I was looking at a dead end career. I didn't want to max out as engg.
manager or director. I was thinking about production management, primarily
because most of my ex-colleagues jumped into product management and they are
doing well in their career. I was looking for all possible ways to move to
product management but in the end I got an advice from someone:

1) As an engineer, your technical skills are more rewarded and valued. You can
quickly learn new skills like AI/Machine learning and will boost your career.

2) There is no guarantee that moving to PM role will boost your career. I feel
PM skills are overrated and your success doesn't necessarily depends on your
skills. Organizational dynamics & politics will also play a major role. In the
few years that you will spend as PM, you will loose your technical skills and
moving into a new domain will be a big challenge.

I personally choose to stay in engineering & learn AI/Machine learning and
moving up the engineering ladder.

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JSeymourATL
Recalling Career Advice from the creator of Dilbert:

Capitalism rewards things that are both rare and valuable. You make yourself
rare by combining two or more “pretty goods” until no one else has your mix. >
[http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/care...](http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-
advice.html)

There are lots of AWS guys, lots of generalist PMP's. Not many AI engineers
with PMP. *Reference Linkedin.

~~~
muzani
Scott Adams is a clever guy, but referring him as "the creator of Dilbert"
makes the advice sound like satire :p

Also Cal Newport, MIT computer scientist, says a similar thing - do things
that are rare and valuable, which he calls "career capital". I'd recommend the
book, So Good They Can't Ignore you.

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seeyes
I came to the same crossroads and agonized over my decision for a few months.
For context - I am an engineer with over 10 years of work experience currently
working in a well-known small company. I am currently working on our
Java/Scala services.

Every company I have worked at has been very appreciative of my communication
skills and my focus on operations. So I was evaluating product management as a
serious choice - as a PM who could also code reasonably well.

These were the questions I asked myself -

1\. Is the new career going to give more control over my time or less
(courtesy: Scott Adams's advice in his book)

With PM, I have noticed that your schedule is controlled by the customers you
talk to and the deluge of meetings either with engineering stakeholders or the
sales/marketing parts of the company

By continuing as an engineer, you get to dictate your hours to a large extent.
There are still those meetings that you don't like, standups where people
drone endlessly, but you _can_ control most of the time and how it gets spent.

I have also noticed that people tend to forgive you if you don't want to/ care
about socializing. They chalk it up to the engineer stereotype and let you be.

2\. Are my skills transferable?

As an engineer, if you care about honing your skills and learning all the
time, you'll do well. Mostly have transferable skills that you can take to
other jobs

As a PM, this is not entirely true. Say you specialize in medical devices, you
are unlikely to get hired by a ride sharing service. The vast domain knowledge
you might have built about the market for medical devices might not be useful
for ride sharing. Even though engineering problems tend to be similar
(scaling, availability), it is not a guarantee.

So I decided to stick to being an engineer while also trying to be someone
that is more _empathetic_ to the product org. I will make a genuine effort to
slip into the customer's shoes, think from the product perspective regardless
of how cliched it sounds when I say that :)

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djchung23
Do you want to get out of software engineering? I think it all depends on what
you want in the future.

~~~
user-on1
i want to understand which option will give me more advantages in terms of
career growth and job stability, working on technically advanced projects
etc,.

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id122015
The question is only about you. If you have money, you can do what you want
next. But if you dont, stick to a job that gets you closer to where you want
to go. I dont trust certifications.

