Anyone else work in the software industry?

[fortnightlily]

I'm mid-career, front end developer team lead of two teams, and having a midlife crisis, as it were . Trying to figure out if I want to stay in engineering or pivot to UX Designer or Product Manager, and also whether to stay in management or not. I wish I had someone to talk to but my company went through layoffs recently and I just got a new team (I'm managing two small teams) and I don't know that I want to broach the subject with my own leaders, at least not yet.

I'd be open to a career coach but I don't know how to find a reputable one who knows my industry. I'm on the East Coast in a minor tech hub.

[Deleted]

I work for a global SaaS org. I'd be happy to talk through it with you but I'm in marketing so not sure if it's helpful.

[fortnightlily]

Feb 17, 2023 10:37:28 GMT -5 @rebeccawelton said:

I work for a global SaaS org. I'd be happy to talk through it with you but I'm in marketing so not sure if it's helpful.

Probably not the role-nitty gritty, but I appreciate the response! Do you like working for a large company? Do you feel like they're a well-oiled machine?

I spent most of my career working for small companies, but then we were acquired and there have been a *lot* of growing pains so I definitely also wonder if I prefer sticking to smaller companies or if I'd be fine at a bigger place as long as it had it's s*it together

[Deleted]

Feb 17, 2023 11:03:42 GMT -5 fortnightlily said:

Feb 17, 2023 10:37:28 GMT -5 @rebeccawelton said:

I work for a global SaaS org. I'd be happy to talk through it with you but I'm in marketing so not sure if it's helpful.

Probably not the role-nitty gritty, but I appreciate the response! Do you like working for a large company? Do you feel like they're a well-oiled machine?

I spent most of my career working for small companies, but then we were acquired and there have been a *lot* of growing pains so I definitely also wonder if I prefer sticking to smaller companies or if I'd be fine at a bigger place as long as it had it's s*it together

I think at last count we have about 125,000 employees worldwide.

Well-oiled machine? Eh - sometimes yes. Other times the layers of bureaucracy are slow to turn. I also think it could be very division dependent. I can't speak to what happens in the other areas of the company but our group was a start up that was acquired and our culture is still very much startup like but with very rich parents holding the strings, if that makes sense.

[CrazyLucky]

I'm in engineering, but chemical. I've been in management for about 5 years now. I miss the technical aspects of it. I manager the production team, and it's a lot more dealing with HR issues than I wish it was. I don't know your industry, but it sounds like you'd be staying technical either way. I do like management. I feel like I am more directly able to help improve things for the production team. What parts of your job do you like and what parts don't you like? Do you think you'd miss engineering? It seems like your industry evolves quickly, would you have to worry about your skills being outdated?

[fortnightlily]

Feb 17, 2023 11:56:48 GMT -5 CrazyLucky said:

It seems like your industry evolves quickly, would you have to worry about your skills being outdated?

Yeah, this is a huge part of it. Front-end and back-end engineering used to be more separated and over time there's more pressure for people to be 'full-stack', but it's rare to find a developer who is actually really skilled at the end-to-end. And front-end frameworks change more quickly than back-end frameworks so you have to learn some new paradigm every couple of years and it's just hard to keep up. Especially because the technical aspect of coding is not what interests me, I just like that it's a means to an end -- building a usable product. I have a project right now to upgrade the version numbers of a bunch of dependencies and fix whatever broke in getting the code to compile....and I'd rather gouge my eyes out. The larger a company is, or the older the codebase, there's just a lot more technical overhead, too.

At a smaller company I've been able to sort of straddle engineering, design, and product. Come up with the UI of screens myself and build them out. And I like that. Now that we're bigger I feel like I need to pick more of a lane, and I'm not sure if engineering is the right lane because of that technical minutiae and fighting to keep up with ever-changing programming skills. But if I went full designer and was just stuck doing things in Figma and never touching code again I'm not sure how I'd feel. And if I went full Product I think I'd miss the design aspect more than the engineering aspect. And if I went full manager -- I'm not even sure what that entails and what the day-to-day would look like. Like, is it expected that an engineering team lead/manager doesn't know the tech as well as the juniors, and is just facilitating and delegating? That feels weird to me. Triggers my imposter syndrome

 

[bee20]

fortnightlily, My current role is the first one where I changed companies entirely within management and the imposter syndrome is real. I can no longer do the work I'm managing and it's tough, but I've learned that means I need to ask questions and keep in mind the larger company vision versus trying to solve the problems.

For example, part of my responsibility is a coding team and I had no idea wtf one of the junior engineers was talking about. But then I asked him some questions and realized neither did the rest of his team. This guy was just out there deciding things so it was my job to push him into creating documentation, communicating with his team, incorporating feedback from another department, etc. It's not my job to turn the crank anymore but to set the vision. I like that more than working for an entire week on one detailed project, but everyone is different.

[origami]

Im in UX on the research side but work in tech on a product team. I think it’s natural to consider switching disciplines after working in 1 for a long time. I almost switched to product last year and regularly tell DH I should have been a coder lol. But that’s just “grass is greener” fantasy thinking. There are major cons to working in UX or product (and dev, as you know!) so I’m happy to DM more if you want to discuss.

[origami]

Feb 17, 2023 12:30:36 GMT -5 fortnightlily said:

Feb 17, 2023 11:56:48 GMT -5 CrazyLucky said:

It seems like your industry evolves quickly, would you have to worry about your skills being outdated?

Yeah, this is a huge part of it. Front-end and back-end engineering used to be more separated and over time there's more pressure for people to be 'full-stack', but it's rare to find a developer who is actually really skilled at the end-to-end. And front-end frameworks change more quickly than back-end frameworks so you have to learn some new paradigm every couple of years and it's just hard to keep up. Especially because the technical aspect of coding is not what interests me, I just like that it's a means to an end -- building a usable product. I have a project right now to upgrade the version numbers of a bunch of dependencies and fix whatever broke in getting the code to compile....and I'd rather gouge my eyes out. The larger a company is, or the older the codebase, there's just a lot more technical overhead, too.

At a smaller company I've been able to sort of straddle engineering, design, and product. Come up with the UI of screens myself and build them out. And I like that. Now that we're bigger I feel like I need to pick more of a lane, and I'm not sure if engineering is the right lane because of that technical minutiae and fighting to keep up with ever-changing programming skills. But if I went full designer and was just stuck doing things in Figma and never touching code again I'm not sure how I'd feel. And if I went full Product I think I'd miss the design aspect more than the engineering aspect. And if I went full manager -- I'm not even sure what that entails and what the day-to-day would look like. Like, is it expected that an engineering team lead/manager doesn't know the tech as well as the juniors, and is just facilitating and delegating? That feels weird to me. Triggers my imposter syndrome

 

I haaaaaaate the full stack trend. I could rant about that for hours but I digress. The same role varies a lot depending on the company, unfortunately. I worked at a place where (some) POs made wireframes and were in the field doing research. Now I work at a place where POs do nothing except manage Jira and have endless meetings. For design, there are definitely companies who would love a UXD + FED. That’s their version of a full stack designer. But not everywhere is like that and a lot of designers push back on needing to code (for good reason IMO). I dont work with any UXDs who code bc I’ve always worked on teams with both roles. but the design system teams had a lot more overlap than product teams, so that might be something to look into. Our design system devs had a lot of input on the design of components/patterns and made coded prototypes.

[deadwing]

I can relate to this. I've spent my career at a small SaaS company. We were acquired by a much larger (although still not huge) company a couple of years ago. Integrating the companies is a very long process, so in alot of ways it feels like I'm still working for a small company. I prefer back end development, but wear many hats in my role. I'm not super interested in where I believe our software is going. I don't have the people skills to manage. I don't know what else I would do if I wasn't developing though. I truly love writing code.

[Poppy]

I was software adjacent (technically hardware though I did a lot of coding) but I do want to comment on the small vs large company thing. I started at large companies and then went to a very small company (<20 employees). I personally loved the small company. I loved being able to be part of the full process from architecture design to production, and I loved the variety and challenge (could be stressful - there's nowhere to hide when something goes wrong). There was not a lot of opportunity to change paths, though, or room for growth in terms of title or pay. That all was fine for me and the trade off was worth it. Just things to consider.

[fortnightlily]

Feb 18, 2023 10:29:21 GMT -5 origami said:

Feb 17, 2023 12:30:36 GMT -5 fortnightlily said:

Yeah, this is a huge part of it. Front-end and back-end engineering used to be more separated and over time there's more pressure for people to be 'full-stack', but it's rare to find a developer who is actually really skilled at the end-to-end. And front-end frameworks change more quickly than back-end frameworks so you have to learn some new paradigm every couple of years and it's just hard to keep up. Especially because the technical aspect of coding is not what interests me, I just like that it's a means to an end -- building a usable product. I have a project right now to upgrade the version numbers of a bunch of dependencies and fix whatever broke in getting the code to compile....and I'd rather gouge my eyes out. The larger a company is, or the older the codebase, there's just a lot more technical overhead, too.

At a smaller company I've been able to sort of straddle engineering, design, and product. Come up with the UI of screens myself and build them out. And I like that. Now that we're bigger I feel like I need to pick more of a lane, and I'm not sure if engineering is the right lane because of that technical minutiae and fighting to keep up with ever-changing programming skills. But if I went full designer and was just stuck doing things in Figma and never touching code again I'm not sure how I'd feel. And if I went full Product I think I'd miss the design aspect more than the engineering aspect. And if I went full manager -- I'm not even sure what that entails and what the day-to-day would look like. Like, is it expected that an engineering team lead/manager doesn't know the tech as well as the juniors, and is just facilitating and delegating? That feels weird to me. Triggers my imposter syndrome

 

I haaaaaaate the full stack trend. I could rant about that for hours but I digress. The same role varies a lot depending on the company, unfortunately. I worked at a place where (some) POs made wireframes and were in the field doing research. Now I work at a place where POs do nothing except manage Jira and have endless meetings. For design, there are definitely companies who would love a UXD + FED. That’s their version of a full stack designer. But not everywhere is like that and a lot of designers push back on needing to code (for good reason IMO). I dont work with any UXDs who code bc I’ve always worked on teams with both roles. but the design system teams had a lot more overlap than product teams, so that might be something to look into. Our design system devs had a lot of input on the design of components/patterns and made coded prototypes.

Thanks, yeah, maintaning the design system is one of the main responsibilities of my new team -- but there are only two of us plus the designer. But the codebase is a mess and there is only a portion of it using the Redux components (and I know Angular) and the rest using a cobble of different legacy style guides. So there is a lot of wrangling to do but not a lot of other UI design problem solving at the moment.

[fortnightlily]

deadwing your username isn't a Porcupine Tree reference, by chance, is it?

[deadwing]

Feb 18, 2023 14:20:15 GMT -5 fortnightlily said:

deadwing your username isn't a Porcupine Tree reference, by chance, is it?

Yes it is! My favorite album. I'm bummed I missed their 2022 tour.

[fortnightlily]

Feb 18, 2023 17:58:34 GMT -5 deadwing said:

Feb 18, 2023 14:20:15 GMT -5 fortnightlily said:

deadwing your username isn't a Porcupine Tree reference, by chance, is it?

Yes it is! My favorite album. I'm bummed I missed their 2022 tour.

Nice. I am finding my people in this thread, lol. It is a great album. I keep forgetting to check out the new one, partly out of fear I won't like it.

[deadwing]

Feb 18, 2023 22:06:00 GMT -5 fortnightlily said:

Feb 18, 2023 17:58:34 GMT -5 deadwing said:

Yes it is! My favorite album. I'm bummed I missed their 2022 tour.

Nice. I am finding my people in this thread, lol. It is a great album. I keep forgetting to check out the new one, partly out of fear I won't like it.

It's different from their older stuff, but I really like it.

[Wallflower]

I've been in the software industry for about 25 years, first as a tech writer, then a business analyst/product manager, to a crazy ~2 years doing all kinds of stuff with a start-up, and now back to writing/training. I'm more than happy to talk about the pros and cons of Product Management with you.

Another path you might consider ... my company has a client services team that includes developers, who work on implementations, upgrades, and customizations. You get more direct interactions with clients (like you would probably get with Product Management), while leveraging your development skills.

I'd say your first steps should be to identify what you're not satisfied with now or what you want to do and aren't doing now.

Good luck!