For a decade at Amazon, nearly everyone I worked with was following the linear, expected path. High school, university, degree, FAANG job. Amazon basically didn't interview SDE1s unless they were new grads. For a number of years that policy was explicit from our Director because "we find that works out best".<p>Now I'm at Shopify, where it feels like a complete 180. More than half my team took non-traditional paths- former dietician, government clerk, logger (like with a chainsaw). My team doesn't even seem like an outlier.<p>One thing I've noticed: the women I work with now are far more likely to have taken a non-linear path to get here. They weren't encouraged to go into that career when they were in high school, but later in life realized it was a good choice. One really great staff dev I've worked with told me how she was encouraged to be a tech recruiter (and did), then slowly realized she could be the one making the huge salaries she was offering people.<p>Amazon would never have given them a chance. And funny enough, Amazon struggles to hire women in dev roles.
High School Dropout -> GED -> Redneck Tech School -> RF Tech -> OJT -> Electronic Test Engineer -> Extracurricular Learning -> Big Iron Programmer -> Extracurricular Learning -> Mac Programmer -> Major Corporation -> Major Engineering Company for 27 Years (as Engineer and Manager) -> Declared Persona Non Grata in the Tech Industry (for Being Old) -> Extracurricular Learning -> Working for Free on Stuff That I Find Interesting<p>Also, I have been an artist and a musician, in that time (neither professionally).<p>We'll see what the future holds. It's been an interesting ride, so far...
Polymath was always an idea that appealed, mainly due to Leonardo da Vinci (check out his drawings of turbulent water).<p>I think the problem is career paths, as though a working life must optimise for linearity to achieve success, when instead those individuals who explore breadth and depth and fun are both most productive and creative.<p>Anyone who can see a problem and potential solution through more than one prism of learning is nearly always better able to communicate their insight and share their joy of thought. They tend to be more patient of failure, happier to be corrected, and fresher when returning to the problem again.<p>Also, more money demonstrating multi-disciplinary competence when moving jobs is definitely a thing. Good managers are rare
Women and marginalized people who change jobs: Flakey and incapable. Unable to handle a job. Something must be wrong. Clearly a sign of caution to be taken as a reason not to work with them.<p>Men who change jobs: literally articles inventing new vernacular stemming from the mental gymnastics required to justify the hypocrisy — men aren’t incapable because they change jobs — they are prodigy — men aren’t untrustworthy for changing jobs — they are taking nonlinear career paths because of the uncertainty in the market
The problem with non-linear career paths are that they're less predictable and work for people who have a higher career focus.<p>I think job (er, company) hopping is a perfectly good career strategy. It's just better suited for a different set of folks. Both options being available are great.
Sounds like survivorship bias to me.<p>Seen plenty of people drop out of things and never make a return to some magical FAANG or whatever employment/founding/etc after. Those folks don't make the headlines though and you don't remember them because - well - why would you.
Mine is: engineering -> pHD dropout -> advertising -> market research -> analytics -> software dev + ML. Different industries all united by data.
Seems pretty normal at least at my age. Leaving aside degree periods, four careers--three reasonably adjacent, the other not.<p>A couple engineering degrees -> offshore drilling engineering work -> business degree -> PM at computer hardware -> IT industry analyst -> primarily external software marketing. But the latter 3 were all ~ten years.
high school genius -> A Level failure -> record store stock clerk -> biochemistry & biophysics -> computational molecular biology PhD (abandoned) -> bike messenger -> systems support engineer -> software engineer -> UWashington CS&E staff -> amzn -> stay at home parent -> FLOSS hacker -> guest professor TU Berlin -> seemingly world-level expert on DAWs<p>I always wonder how rare this sort of pathway is.
I learned to program at 12 and with 16 i founded my first startup (which failed of course) and there i learned that coding is only half the game and added a bachelor in economical psychology instead of Comp-Sci.<p>My resume has over 20 years of experience: backend, frontend, platform, k8s, cto roles and much more.<p>Still Companies automatic filter sort me out because I don't have "the correct" degree unless i tell them that i have been freelancing forever.<p>Therefore sure, go for it, but no its not the future.<p>This is the "zuck was a college dropout" all over again.
for people who are tired of ads<p><a href="https://archive.is/zR9vF" rel="nofollow">https://archive.is/zR9vF</a><p>Specializers seem to be at a huge advantage in this economy. Switching careers to find your specialty may be a good idea. What can yo be among the best in the world at.
I really couldn't think of what other careers for me to pursue other than writing code. Simply transitioning to other domains/specializations in software engineering is already challenging enough for me, could really use some advice from someone who had a successful transition. (Im a mobile dev now but looking to potentially transition to computer graphics)
Non-linear career paths are the present. You’ve been able to get a job in software without formal credentials my entire software career, which started roughly in 2008. Who is this written for?
It's nice to see that this has become more of the norm/average. For one, non-linear career paths have existed for a long time, to use the phrase "standing on the shoulders of giants", innovation would be less if it weren't so. Good article and exposure of thinking for everyone
Is this a rebranding of the career jungle gym promoted on Forbes in 2013?<p><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/deborahljacobs/2013/03/14/why-a-career-jungle-gym-is-better-than-a-career-ladder/?sh=25b7ab041248" rel="nofollow">https://www.forbes.com/sites/deborahljacobs/2013/03/14/why-a...</a>
I gave a short talk and wrote about this to developers way back in 2016. To me this always seemed obvious. <a href="https://www.lostbookofsales.com/careers-of-the-past-versus-careers-of-the-future/" rel="nofollow">https://www.lostbookofsales.com/careers-of-the-past-versus-c...</a>
Local 600 Loader/2nd AC in film industry > high school English teacher > tech industry consultant.<p>I feel really fortunate to have made these transitions without much turmoil (though I would argue the costs of doing so are quite high relative to people I know who have had a more linear path).
Translation. Our wonderful capitalism can no longer support normal salary so that people can retire at reasonable age. So prepare to work till you drop dead so that those few that own half of the Earth can own a little more of it.