
Serious About Your Software Career? Leave your job  - jpro
http://www.dzone.com/articles/serious-about-your-software
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hkarthik
This post really resonates with me. I've felt the same way about a career as
an engineer and have left many jobs in the past because of hitting a ceiling
in terms of technical growth and ability to learn new things. I really started
gravitating towards startups and consulting instead of big companies because
of this desire.

But today, I have two small children and simply can't put in the same amount
of time towards work as I was able to before. That makes the corporate
environments more attractive, but I find it really comes at odds with my
hacker mentality of wanting to learn and grow.

Recently I've come across a few roles within certain large companies where you
can continue to learn and grow, but maintain a more sustainable pace than in
startups or consulting. These types of roles seem to help strike that balance
between getting a sustainable pace for someone with a family while not
stagnating technically in a typical corporate job. There aren't a ton of these
roles and they can be pretty competitive to get into, but I think they're a
good choice to explore.

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Rickasaurus
If you can't leave your job (like for instance, you live in an area with
difficult employment prospects) you can always keep side projects.

It's not a real replacement with changing up how you work though.

