
Ask HN: How do non tech (business) folks get rich these days? - coldheartd
I am wondering about this question lately. I have been in the tech for a decade now. I like writing code, designing solutions. But,slowly I am losing interest in coding. 
There is also tremendous increase in CS graduates, bootcamp grads, data science grads etc. You have to compete with 30 to 50 people everytime you look for a new job. Competition is good but I feel like it&#x27;s too much hassle when compared to getting rewards<p>I am wondering what kind of business skills a person should achieve? Sales, product management, Finance, marketing?<p>Would a MBA degree help in acquiring these skills? What about MBA from top schools if are early 30s? Does evening MBA from Wharton&#x2F;UCLA count?<p>Any suggestions?
======
GuiA
Not sure how to say this without sounding harsh, but if you've been in tech
for over a decade and you're still competing with bootcamp grads, you're doing
something pretty wrong.

Bootcamp grads can cobble together a basic project, usually having seen only a
very high level view of 2-3 programming languages (javascript, python, ruby,
etc). The bootcamp doesn't give meaningful experience on software
architecture, fundamental topics in CS, deep knowledge of languages and
techniques, or even softer things like project management.

I would expect a 10 year professional, on the other hand, to have a very solid
understanding of a few languages and technologies, knowledge of advanced
technical topics, experience shipping real world projects, managing junior
developers, etc.

So you are either severely underselling yourself, or you don't have 10 years
of experience but rather 10x 1 year of experience.

~~~
rabidrat
I agree with you on this, but let's not forget that companies are still hiring
from this diluted larger pool, and most companies (apparently) don't know why
they would benefit from more senior people. So in effect, senior people _are_
competing directly with bootcamp grads, who may be very well able to
accomplish the first-order tasks that are set before them. You and I may know
how grotesque this can turn out after a couple years, but it's hard to
convince a hiring manager of your longer-term value when they're asking you to
whiteboard FizzBuzz.

~~~
taway_1212
> most companies (apparently) don't know why they would benefit from more
> senior people

Citation needed? At most of my jobs, it was preferred to hire an experienced
dev over a junior one. Time is money, competition does not sleep - if you
waste time training juniors, your competition will be adding features (or
whatever) faster than you.

------
bkohlmann
I'm at a top-2 business school right now. The wealthiest guest speakers we
have are private equity partners and others in the investment professions. My
classmates leaving school joining or resuming those professions stand to make
a lot of money in base salary. Then top it off with bonus and "carry" in the
next 5-10 years, and you're talking big bucks. Even those going into
consulting for a top-3 firm, if you make partner in 7 years, will have an
incredible salary.

But financial wealth isn't about your salary - I.e. Via your nonscalable
labor. It's about putting the money to work once you get it. Finance excels at
this for two reasons: leverage and equity. Similar to startups actually...buy
one could argue without all the risk.

There is survivorship bias in the stories we hear to be sure. But if you truly
only care about wealth, your best bet is to somehow make your way into
finance.

~~~
cauterized
What does "carry" mean in this context?

~~~
stagbeetle
Basically a percentage of the profits from sales.

~~~
bkohlmann
More exactly, "carry" is the negotiated profit from a deal above a certain
"hurdle." For instance, in the traditional 2 and 20 Model in Private equity,
general partners get an annual fee of 2% of assets under management. But the
20 is the real moneymaker...they get 20 percent of any profits from the
overall gain in the fund. If the fund makes, say, an annualized 15 percent,
and the min return to investors I. 8%, the investor gets 20% of the 7% (15-8)
profit. And over a 5-7 year fund life, that's a compound number. It leads to
immense upside.

~~~
cauterized
That is insane!

------
amorphid
This about all of the tech recruiters that contact you for employment. Now
imagine yourself being one of them. That's what entry level sales is like. You
are dialing for dollars all day, every day. You might get a better sales gig
if you stick with sales long enough to kind of get it. If you don't like
competition and hassle, sales is probably not for you.

If you can afford to pay for an MBA out of pocket, maybe it'd be a good
investment. If you need to borrow a ton of money, your going to have a bad
time after graduation. Trying to pay back a lot of money after graduation
sucks, especially at a time where you're trying to experiment and take risk.

You might fair better if you can get into a top 10 MBA program, but you should
think about exactly what you're going to get out of an MBA program. Think
about this. Don't focus on what you're going to learn in an MBA program. Focus
on the employers that actively recruit from a school you're considering. If
that list of employers and the positions the recruit for looks appealing to
you, only apply to schools that have an impressive number of companies who
recruit for jobs you'd want. Then work your butt off to get into one of those
schools, and develop the profile needed to be one of the people those
companies recruit. Any other path is far too unpredictable to make any solid
bets around.

Source: I was a tech recruiter, and got an MBA (not in that order).

------
bsvalley
do you want to get rich or do you want to switch jobs? What's your question
exactly?

~~~
coldheartd
I want to get rich. But, my point was being in a tech role does not seem the
way as everyone else is also doing the same thing.

~~~
nkkollaw
Software jobs are probably the best in terms of employment, second only to a
handful of other professions.

I don't really feel like there are a lot of software developers (not too many,
anyway), but even if they were it takes a long time to get experienced, so new
entries shouldn't really be competitors of yours if you've been doing it for
10 years.

There are better programmers than me around, but after having worked in the
field for 10 years I'm about 1000 times more likely to complete a project
successfully compared to a less-experienced developer, and most important give
good advice to the client.

Maybe you weren't able to be successful, but I wouldn't blame it on too much
competition. It might be that you aren't really passionate and should just try
to explore something else.

------
canterburry
I do fine in tech in sv but all the sales people I know make about 3 to 4
times my salary with commissions.

~~~
toomuchtodo
This is exactly why I plan on moving into a sales engineering role (or some
other biz dev role that requires engineering experience) in the next few
years. Ridiculous compensation multiplier with soft skills instead of the tech
skills treadmill for a traditional engineering position.

You don't have to be an incredible developer to extract value.

~~~
taway_1212
From what I've observed, sales engineer is a support role for the salesman and
it's the salesman who's getting most of the commission.

------
forkLding
What is your definition of rich?

~~~
coldheartd
About 10 million in assets with 2 million liquid cash.

~~~
nkkollaw
Assuming you aren't trolling, you're talking about a millionaire, then.

I don't know if a lot of programmers become millionaires from freelancing (or
worse yet, employed by somebody).

~~~
coldheartd
No, I am not. I also consider myself successful for my age. Are there hundreds
of outliers, probably yes. But, my question is - how business folks become
successful and wealthy?

~~~
sjg007
They solve other people's problems. They make something people want. They have
leveraged value. Get an MBA, make friends, expand your network. Be the best
and help others.

