
Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income? - xchaotic
I am making a good living with a niche skillset. It&#x27;s a fairly old technology and there&#x27;s less and less work in that area.
I&#x27;d like to move to another technology stack - it&#x27;s not too hard for me - different keywords etc and I&#x27;ve actually done some hobby projects already.
I think if I applied for a job I&#x27;d get rejected as there is no track record of being able to work with that tech.
Best get case I could probably apply for a junior job which would pay well below my current. It will probably take years to get to the same level of pay, assuming that particualr tech stack takes off.
Is there any eascape from this?
Are there any companies that would be willing to hire a grumpy 30-something and recognise his&#x2F;her experience as something reusable?
======
hkarthik
I did this back in 2009. Here's how to do it.

Pick a technology stack that you want to get a job in and build a side project
in your spare time. Attend meetups with experts in your local community and
learn how to make it awesome. Build relationships with them along the way.

Use those relationships to get some part-time contract work in said technology
stack with someone local. Document this experience and build up a portfolio.

Eventually, use the knowledge you've obtained from your side project and part
time contract work to apply for full time jobs. You'll then be very
marketable, and you will have enough knowledge to do well in interviews.

Good luck!

~~~
BadassFractal
This! I've had the opportunity to hire for our company for the past year or
so. We use a somewhat uncommon paradigm in our tech stack that is very
attractive to a lot of developers. Many of our applicants have exactly what
you said: plenty of side projects in that paradigm / stack and participation
to meetups / communities etc.

Occasionally however I run into people who have absolutely no side projects
and have been doing the same stuff for 10+ years. I'm a Java expert (or .NET
or C etc.), they claim. When I ask them if they've tried anything else besides
that one thing they've been doing over and over for a decade, perhaps a side
project, a toy product, some contribution to OSS in the new paradigm they
apparently really want to work in, I get responses along the lines of "I'd
never work on something I'm not being paid for, I'm a serious professional
that's irresponsible".

Er.. ok. So I'm supposed to hire you, take a huge risk not knowing if you can
pull this off or not, train you for a year to do something you have 0
familiarity with, and then you might peace out right about the time when I'm
starting to recoup the onboarding costs? I'll pass. Candidates who already
demonstrate a lot of interest, side projects, and desire to learn outside of
their 9-5 will win any day of the week with me.

~~~
vijayr
I agree that someone who doesn't have side projects isn't as attractive as
someone who does, in general. But there are lots of people who don't do any
programming once they leave the office (8-9 hours of computer time is more
than enough for them). That doesn't mean that they aren't dedicated or that
they are a risk.

I think it should be a case by case basis.

~~~
phaus
As someone who struggles to find enough time for side projects, I agree that
it isn't necessarily a sign that someone isn't passionate about the job.
However, if someone says stuff like "I'd never work on something I'm not being
paid for, I'm a serious professional that's irresponsible", its pretty obvious
that they don't actually like what they are doing.

~~~
dagw
_its pretty obvious that they don 't actually like what they are doing._

My dad has been a mechanical engineer for almost 40 years and I struggle to
think of anyone who enjoys their job as much as he does. Yet I have never once
seen him do any personal "side projects" that are in any way related to his
day job.

~~~
vijayr
Many people truly believe in _not_ doing anything related to their career/job
outside of their workplace. They do something totally different instead. One
might train for a marathon in her spare time, instead of learning the newest
JS framework for example.

The side project concept is fairly unique to digital workers, especially
software engineers simple because _we can_. Noone asks an accountant or a
secretary for side projects.

------
pcsanwald
As someone who does a lot of hiring for a startup, I will say I'm agnostic
with regards to languages and frameworks. We've hired folks with all sorts of
disparate backgrounds including embedded C (we mostly use Java and
JavaScript).

I think you should sell yourself as an experienced technologist who's looking
to learn. You should also demonstrate a willingness and ability to learn new
things; maybe by making something and putting it up on github.

~~~
brianfryer
This is an excellent point. We hired an engineer at the startup I work at who
had a lot of Java experience but very little Ruby experience—our stack's
primary language.

He was a fast learner and had no issues getting up to speed in a reasonable
amount of time.

~~~
pcsanwald
that's been my experience, too; both for myself personally, as well as people
I've hired.

------
lastofus
> I think if I applied for a job I'd get rejected as there is no track record
> of being able to work with that tech.

This is a big assumption, that is simply not true for a lot of opportunities
out there. If you are able to show proficiency in what they are looking for,
many companies will take you seriously as a candidate, even without 5+ years
on the resume in said technology.

Worst thing you can do for yourself is to not try and apply. Worse case is you
get a "no thanks" and you move on to the next application.

~~~
mooreds
If this is the case, why do people put tech under the 'requirements' section,
rather than the 'desired'?

Hiring managers, you are going to get what you ask for.

~~~
VLM
At least some of those are H1B posts to prove there's no one in the locality
with seven years experience with Windows10. Some are also pencil whipping a HR
checklist before hiring the bosses kid or the hand picked internal candidate.
You want a CCIE and are offering $50K? No one applying is not necessarily seen
as a bug.

At megacorps the relationship between the people writing reqs and the actual
job are often rather strained.

I could never qualify for my own job req, and I work there. I got in via
networking and portfolio. Seriously, HR lists specific versions of AS/400
software and the department doesn't even work that closely with the AS/400
group, ya know. In fact I think my AS/400 password expired, aged out so I need
to regain access, although I really don't need it. People in my department
"need" windows 8 experience but our desktops are win7? A+ certification
preferred because everyone in my great-grand department requires it on paper?
You listed the exact model number and firmware version of a specific spectrum
analyzer from a company that is no longer in business under that name?
Seriously?

~~~
vonmoltke
See, this is a major dysfunction when combined with the unwillingness to give
rejection reasons. How is one supposed to know when they get a form letter
rejection if it was because this particular company is actually serious about
their asinine "requirements"?

~~~
grayclhn
At the risk of sounding snarky: why do you need to know?

------
sjcrank
I have found it is much easier to switch to a new stack within your existing
employer than it is to get hired for a stack for which you have no
professional experience.

Here are the steps:

a. find employment at a company that requires your niche skillset but also has
projects in your desired tech stack (hopefully this is your current employer)

b. learn enough of the desired tech stack on your own to be a useful
contributor

c. ask to switch over to a project using your new stack, or volunteer to write
tests or help in some other way to get your foot in the door (this may require
some persistence and relationship-building)

d. once you have some experience you are ready to add it to your resume and
seek your dream job

~~~
fecak
This is advice that many seem to overlook. Leverage the current skills to get
exposure to the ones that you want. It is not always easy to find companies
that both use your dated skill and the skill you want. Devs at those companies
probably aren't that interested in using the old technologies, so you should
be welcomed for your willingness to do the job they don't want to do in
exchange for learning something new.

------
nasalgoat
When I interview people, I am less interested in their specific experience
than I am in their ability to think and troubleshoot problems. Google solves
the knowledge problem but doesn't solve the problem of intelligently using
that info.

I imagine other employers are similar, and given the high demand for tech
workers, you might be surprised at the reactions.

~~~
HeyLaughingBoy
I do the same, but from reading a lot of comments in similar threads here, it
seems that we're a minority. Many (most?) employers want to hire people with
only the exact skills & technologies they're currently using.

I was hired into my original position here knowing absolutely nothing about
the language or the technology. Like you, my manager just wanted raw talent
that could be retrained and it worked out for him. That's probably colored my
interviewing practices over the years, but an awful lot of people don't want
to take that kind of a risk.

~~~
VLM
"but an awful lot of people don't want to take that kind of a risk"

I would agree with and extend your remarks in that its a window into how the
company handles risk. There have been companies that have blamestorming
meetings to punish the people who selected employees that didn't work out. I
had an experience with that leveraging an inside contact for info, and I was
pretty pissed off at that time, but now that I'm older and wiser I am so
unimaginably happy I didn't get a job at a company mismanaged like that.

------
mrj
My advice: thinking it is just "different keywords" is exactly why you may
lose income. The syntax may be easy to change but you're changing an entire
stack that will have it's own conventions, history and culture.

If you want to be paid well, it's an awful lot more than just keywords.

------
nilkn
Do companies really try to pigeonhole developers into "tech stacks" so much
that you'll be forced to revert to junior status to change?

Unless we're talking about COBOL -> Haskell here, I think any decent company
would be wary of overvaluing skills with a particular language or framework
and undervaluing fundamentals.

~~~
barrkel
It depends. It's more about developers pigeonholing themselves. Some CVs come
along and are e.g. all Java, EJB, Spring, Hibernate etc. - they present
themselves as completely unidimensional and more or less rule themselves out
of something broader.

There are different things you learn when you've coded in a mix of C/C++,
Java/C#, Ruby/Python, and perhaps something functional. But having all your
experience in one of these buckets is more a sign of a junior developer, or
the old "one year's experience ten times".

~~~
vonmoltke
What are they supposed to do when the people employing them demand they get
ever deeper into a specific stack in order to advance?

------
vkjv
> Are there any companies that would be willing to hire a grumpy 30-something
> and recognise his/her experience as something reusable?

Yes. I work for a large company that does recognize this and does _not_ hire
for specific stack experience. We have a hard enough time finding enough good
people, regardless of specific experience, to use that as a critical factor.

------
colinbartlett
Maybe start by attending user groups or meet-ups on the tech you're interested
in. That might lead to some potential freelancing gigs or even just some open
source work in that field.

But, in general, I think many, many companies are willing to hire
30-somethings with experience. Perhaps seed-funded startups aim for cheap low
end labor, but enterprises and well-funded startups consistently value
experience over skills with a specific stack or language.

------
jsamos
Sounds like you're confident in you ability to pick up any stack. I wouldn't
wait. Good companies hire smart people.

I just switched to a great company with a stack I had zero experience with.
Hasn't been a problem at all.

------
vinceguidry
You would not get rejected if you applied for a job without a track record, at
least, not out of hand. I've been hired to work on .NET having never had
worked on it before.

You do not need side projects or to train yourself. Just the ability to
project confidence.

------
deedubaya
If you have an employer, this is usually a pretty easy sell. Approach your
boss about transitioning Aging Product X to a new technology stack because the
current one is becoming defunct. Of course this will require some training for
you, but it is easier to teach you a new skill set than to hire someone with
that skill set and get them to learn about Aging Product X.

If you aren't employed and are contracting/freelance, it is just as easy.
Since your skill set is niche, not everyone has it, and you can charge more
for that niche. Up your rates enough that you can cut 10 hours a week out to
study something new.

~~~
nemmonszz
Is convincing employers to transition technology stacks really something that
is generally considered easy (or even doable)? I'm stuck maintaining
'enterprise' software running on VB6 and ColdFusion 9 and the idea of getting
my employers to sanction a migration to something newer is laughable.

~~~
grayclhn
Not necessarily, but convincing your boss to be mindful of your medium-term
career goals definitely is and at largish companies there should be
opportunities for you to spend time working on something else. Career-wise,
I'd be more concerned about working for someone that wants you to stagnate
than about the specific software you're maintaining. (Not saying that that's
necessarily the case, BTW.)

------
wyclif
I also went through this a few years ago. I was a land surveyor and although I
loved the combination of technical, mathematical, and analytic skill with
working in the great outdoors, the subprime mortgage crisis resulted in big
commercial land development contracts drying up.

You have to be single-minded and goal-oriented. Another HN user above says to
"pick a technology stack" and focus down on it. That's great advice. I already
had some experience on the LAMP stack and I built up from there. Don't let
yourself get distracted after you've decided the direction you see yourself
moving in.

Work on side projects. Go to meetups. Find people you can collaborate with and
work well with you. See if you can get some PT work that is being parceled out
by companies because their own FT devs are too busy. If you're allowed to
expose your code, build up your Github. Don't forget to visualise where you
see yourself going, and don't be afraid to tell people where you're headed.

Also, make productivity apps work for you. Have a Dropbox file where you keep
all your technical books, and have that file open all the time. Subscribe to
Pinboard or some other bookmarking service to save technical blog posts and
documentation you want to read. Use Trello to manage your projects. Etc. Good
luck to you.

------
newobj
I've worked for 20 years and never targeted myself towards a tech stack. In
fact, I think spreading yourself over lots of different tech is a better bet
for longevity, even if not optimal in some short-term capacity. Being able to
adapt quickly to new paradigms is the quality necessary for long-run
viability. And when you have a track record of successfully doing that, no one
will question your ability to do it in a new setting.

------
GFischer
Doing consulting work? If you can solve companies' problems, they won't mind
if you don't have a track record with that particular stack.

------
Robert_Webonise
If you're a senior level developer (ie: if you've been doing development more
than 7+ years), then you're in luck. Companies usually recognize senior level
developers can migrate to a related technology stack without too much of a
loss, and the skills of being a senior developer are more soft-skills than
particular technical areas. Recruiters generally won't know how to sell you in
this regard, but with a bit of networking, you should be able to find you a
bridge position into your new technology stack. You are going to be expected
to hit the ground running, which will make the first few months of that job
really exciting, but it should be entirely possible.

A good place to look is in consulting companies, like my own Webonise Lab.
Consulting companies will often hire experienced people to become generalists
with broad skill sets, and will often take a specialist and give them an
opportunity to train up through the company's open source projects and the
like.

------
serve_yay
I switched from doing back-end C# work to front-end JS by switching jobs at my
employer. I basically reskilled on their dime. If you're a talented engineer
and your company doesn't suck, they should be relatively accommodating to this
idea. Engineers get bored and want to switch it up, smart companies and smart
managers get this.

------
darklajid
Thanks a lot for asking this - I'm in a similar boat¹ and will follow this
thread with interest.

Good luck from another 30-something.

① For me 'niche tech' is one thing, and 'investing a lot of time in the bowels
of the corporate product over 10 years' the other one - the latter just WILL
go away if I switch and is absolutely not useful elsewhere

~~~
GrinningFool
Don't underestimate the value of the lessons you've learned in the bowels of
that corporate product. Consider:

1) You have experience in a corporate environment. You know the kinds of
things that terrify them, and you know the kind of experience they expect from
the companies they interact with. This knowledge and perspective is incredibly
valuable to any startup in the b2b space.

2) The problems you solved - while maybe specific to the corporate product -
generalize well. There's a better-than-even chance you had to deal with
managing data from multiple inputs, scaling and performance, build management,
testing issues (even if experience in pain of not having it), product
delivery, and/or user experience. These things are not as different as you
might expect.

Reference: I spent many years working for a Large Bank developing in-house
software before transitioning into the startup world. THe biggest problem I
had faced was my complacency - somewhere along the way I gave up on pushing to
do things better, and it took me a while to get that back. In that way I was
fortunate that I came to work for a company that gave me the time I needed to
do that.

~~~
darklajid
Thanks for the words of encouragement.

I'm not totally pessimistic, I was really referring to the knowledge that
doesn't translate to a new job. After 10 years and working deeply with a lot
of stuff I am among the 'Do you know..?' types for questions about the inner
workings of the product. That is really just baggage.

Processes, experiences probably can be reapplied elsewhere. But having read
some C files from 1996 (I .. didn't work at that company at that time),
reciting the product's API every evening after dinner and being intimately
familiar with the current .Net code base is time invested in this job and this
job only.

~~~
marktangotango
>> But having read some C files from 1996 (I .. didn't work at that company at
that time), reciting the product's API every evening after dinner and being
intimately familiar with the current .Net code base is time invested in this
job and this job only.

I disagree with this, you gain something working closely with a legacy code
base. After you've done it once, it becomes easier when you have to it again,
although if you do it more than a few times, it gets REALLY old. I
distinguished myself at my last two jobs by jumping into and becoming
proficient with the legacy code in short order.

------
personlurking
My issue is similar, though not so tech-related. I do VA work for some
startups but would like to get into a growing interest of mine (journalism),
though my time is limited. I have experience as a writer, but not a background
in journalism. I could make the complete jump to being a journo and self-
publish, shop stories and find my way, but that'd mean giving up what pays the
bills (pay & responsibilities of which are currently on the rise). Doing what
I want to do means way more work and, very likely, less pay.

Does anyone else here juggle two different jobs? Is there a secret to doing
so?

------
cpitkin
As someone who is trying to move into the development space from a more sys
admin role this is great to hear. I have a similar idea about learning new
things. I just dive in with both feet and start building, watching tutorials,
and reading the docs. I have been working on Nodejs/Meteorjs apps in my spare
time. I am just going to keep building little side projects to get better and
learning all I can along the way.

Glad to see I am on the right track and that others have had success managing
their career path. Thanks for all the great advice!

Moral of the thread: Never stop learning!

------
ofcapl_
It is a good question! Personally, I've got my first full-time job thanks
mostly to own side projects in my portfolio - I was hired even without code
challenge during recruit process - so listen to 75% of comments here - do some
side projects, built a solid portfolio and apply.

You can also try some contract work/start own business and do some simply
projects that one-man-band can handle - I was trying that too and after every
project I've felt that my skills got a boost.

Best,

ł.

------
xchaotic
Thank you soo much for all the comments so far. I didn't expect such positive
respone. It definitely encourages me to try new things over the summer.

------
brudgers
Career changes also allow for switching roles. There's no reason to keep
playing grumpy at a new job. First because good workplaces are often good
because they don't place a premium on grumpy, and second because at companies
that value grumpy that slot is likely to be filled. I'd throw in that thirty-
something is a bit young to be the go-to-get-off-my-lawn person.

Good luck.

------
swalsh
I just switched from C# to Ruby. Honestly the switch has not been that big of
deal. The company is giving me some time to learn, and the switch has been
pretty painless.

I think if you want to switch, I think its more important to demonstrate
skills in the base skill set (in my case software architecture), and then
there are plenty of people willing to give you some room to grow.

------
vkjv
I'm curious about something similar, but perhaps more drastic. I went to
college for EE, but after graduating got a job in software. I enjoy computer
engineering much more than software, but at this point I'm 5 years into my
career and I don't see a way that I could ever switch paths without taking a
critical hit in income.

------
testingonprod
[https://nextdoor.com/jobs/?gh_jid=424](https://nextdoor.com/jobs/?gh_jid=424)

We don't care about what tech stack you know, we're willing to teach you ours.
We just need you to be extremely motivated and ready to go!

------
digitalboss
I'v really enjoyed seeing what companies such as tradecraft have doing around
this sort tactic [http://tradecrafted.com/](http://tradecrafted.com/) \- check
them out.

------
martin-adams
>> I think if I applied for a job I'd get rejected

Only one way to know for sure.

------
ngneer
I am in the exact same position. Summarizing the responses, the short answer
to your question is no, there is no escape.

------
ngneer
READING THE THREAD IS DEPRESSING AND ENCOURAGING BUT THE SHORT ANSWER TO YOUR
QUESTION SEEMS TO BE NO

------
adnam
PHP programmer, right?

------
derptron
You're going to have to do it on your own time. Make it a pet project, make it
visible on github, and make sure to link it on your resume so potential
employers can see what you're capable. of.

------
a3voices
You could do work at night on side projects to learn new skills.

~~~
druml
Better if you could do it together with others. Join a study group of the tech
you want to learn or even try going to relevant hackathons.

~~~
mooreds
> a study group of the tech you want to learn

Aka an open source project that is written in the stack you want to learn.

