
HN: Help. Talented engineer lost his way - throwawayeeie
I consider myself a young talented programmer. I'm not sure if I'm a 10x rockstar, but I’m definitely not a 0.1x slacker. My career so far was pretty successful: I worked at a startup, small consultancy and a big-co. Six months ago I resigned from a well paid job at the big-co. I'm emotionally struggling since then. I was interviewed by three companies for what I'd consider my dream jobs, and got three rejections. That hurt.<p>In the meantime I did some opensource work. I have two aspiring github projects with growing communities. But I don't know how to capitalize on that. Friends suggest to do consulting around those projects, but I don't want that. I'm good at programming, not running a business. Additionally, I like being emotionally attached to the things I do and that rarely happens while doing consulting.<p>I'm not really sure what to do next. I tried asking about opportunities, but here's a problem - I don’t want to work for typical internet businesses like a web framework, analytics startup, or a newspaper publisher. I don’t feel enthusiastic about selling advertisements or stuff that’s purely virtual. I want to write good software, be productive and eventually save the world. I’d like the job to be meaningful. I guess I want to care about it.<p>The time's passing and I'm not making much progress in the job search. I'm getting depressed, which doesn't help with being enthusiastic about potential employers. I fear that my morale will deteriorate and I'll be stuck with neither a job nor an energy.<p>Dear HN. What should I do?<p>- Should I reduce my ambitions and take a first not-completely-stupid job and hope it’ll lead somewhere?<p>- How to be enthusiastic about companies I don’t know?<p>- How can I meet people who have the opposite problem: have passion and vision, but lack a decent engineer?<p>- What’s your experience? How did you find your dream job once you got rejected from places that you thought were the best?
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lacker
Stop moping about the three jobs you didn't get, and keep applying to jobs.

A lot of jobs are meaningful, but might not be obvious from a job ad. When you
interview, you'll also meet people and learn more about what it's like to work
there. So, don't worry if a job seems like it might be boring, just interview
there anyway.

At least if you're in the SF area, you should easily be able to line up 2 or 3
interviews a week indefinitely. If you are really out of ideas for companies
to apply to, just read through Techcrunch and look for a jobs page for every
company mentioned. That should give you at least 10 leads a day.

Good luck!

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mkoble11
^^ This.

You just gotta think 3 simple words everyday:

Keep moving forward.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hbi__sQ7F5Q&feature=youtu...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hbi__sQ7F5Q&feature=youtu.be&t=1m52s)

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santu11
Please check out this months job thread on HN and apply to all the options you
like : <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5472746> .

You can also post an email to me if you are feeling low.

Not for the sake of argumentation but I have a slightly different take on what
you have written. So some points IMHO :

.."I have two aspiring github projects with growing communities."

Great, you are a better programmer than me. Please mentor me.

You can train fresh young programmers anywhere in the world. Teaching is a
great morale booster and you will be changing lives of your students.

.."But I don't know how to capitalize on that."

Gotta learn it the hard way.

Building a business is a different skill set than programming. Try something,
fail and try something else. You will learn it and get better at it. The more
skilled you get, the better you will be.

.."I don’t want to work for typical internet businesses like a web framework,
analytics startup, or a newspaper publisher. I don’t feel enthusiastic about
selling advertisements or stuff that’s purely virtual."

I agree with you on finding a more meaningful job. But selling advertisements
is great if you are advertising a good cause. Making a web framework like
Wordpress powering millions of blogs is just awesome.

Again it is your personal choice but making someones life better is better
than doing something. And doing something is better than doing nothing.

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webdisrupt
You made quite a few statements which made me think quite a bit but my first
advice is:

Do what you enjoy doing most...so if consulting does not tickle your fancy
then just don't do it. Doing stuff that you really enjoy whilst making cash is
definitely the best of both worlds.

Also you mentioned that "I'm not really sure what to do next"...I suggest you
travel around the world for a while and experience the world as you could
really discover new things about yourself whilst along the way figure out what
you really want to do. This has worked for myself and a lot of people I have
met. More importantly do not stress or hassle about finding what you want to
do as the more you pressure yourself, the more you end up not coming up with a
solution.

"I’d like the job to be meaningful. I guess I want to care about it."...that
shows passion and having passion in a product is a good start. So why not
build your own SAAS (software as a service) product? You are your own boss and
you also get to create your own dream job. Sounds surreal or maybe unrealistc
at first but with great determination comes great rewards.

Best of luck and enjoy life!

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_chrismccreadie
The thing that stuck out the most for me was your state of mind. You mentioned
how you have struggled emotionally and felt the hit of three rejections. You
then go on to say you like being emotionally attached to things that you do.

It seems to me you are an emotional person. I consider myself the same, when
my state of mind is gone, I'm worse than useless.

My advice: Get to the core of what is making you unhappy and fix it.

Please don't think that I am passing you're struggles off as a "shit happens,
get on with it", quite the opposite in fact. A healthy body and a healthy
mind. Well, I find that I can deal with parts of my body failing (I am getting
older after all) but please don't underestimate the power of your mind. If you
are unhappy with aspects of your life no "dream job" will fix it. Sure, people
do get down when they are looking for work, it's a stress and a hassle but I
suspect most people's unhappiness runs deeper than that.

Good luck with the job hunting. It would have been nice to see which GitHub
projects you are working on (the feedback from the HN community alone would
have been valuable).

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mojoe
It's difficult to provide advice without knowing a little bit more about your
motivations. For instance, why did you leave the bigCo? Was the work
unfulfilling, or were there other issues?

Without knowing more about your situation, I have two comments to offer:

1\. Make sure you're exercising regularly. When you get out of shape,
neurotransmitter ratios can make your problems feel a lot worse than they are.
I've seen big boosts in mental acuity and feelings of well-being in my own
life every time I've gotten back into shape after a hiatus.

2\. Make sure to keep things in perspective. You're clearly ambitious, which
can be a good thing, but we have to remember that even in our field's less-
exciting jobs we get to solve problems and work on puzzles all day and
generally receive 99th percentile pay (globally speaking). It sounds trite,
but the phrase "first world problems" has helped me see my situation in a more
objective light in the past.

Good luck!

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lifeisstillgood
In my career I have stacked shelves at a supermarket and worked at the UK
equivalent of circuit city. Oh that was recovering from a nasty bankruptcy in
the middle of the dot com crash.

So my advice is yes, take a job - but take a part time job - three or four
days a week. They exist, honestly. Worst case scenario see if someone on HN
will jobsharer with you and if a employer will take on two talented hackers
who are going places.

Take the communities growing around your projects (let us know which ones!)
and do not be afraid to try and turn it into consultancy - running a business
is not the end of the world.

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PeterisP
If you prioritize making a difference and choice of work topic over money,
then a valid option is to go to academia, pick a compsci topic that you care
about, and spend some time working on that - as a postgrad or postdoc you
won't be paid nearly as much as in industry but you can usually can pick the
direction yourself and make some satisfying and fun progress there.

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leashless
Money is what they give you for doing what you don't want to do. Most of the
really fun jobs pay poorly as a result. Talk to people who work IT for NGOs
for examples.

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Cardeck1
Put an email in your profile or email me.Maybe I can help you with that
depending on the situation.Thanks.

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OnyeaboAduba
Ditto my email is in my profile if you would like to contact me

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Cardeck1
Are you in the same situation as the OP?

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OnyeaboAduba
Opposite im looking to pair with someone who has the OP skill set

