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by gaius 5796 days ago
I really question what you think "senior" means. A career for most people can be 40 years, and you're calling yourself "senior" after 5? What do you think guys with 20 years experience - who've led teams, managed budgets, seen the full SDLC, seen the same fads cycle every decade with different buzzwords, worked in multiple industries, multiple languages, multiple countries, been QA, developers, architects, project managers, business analysts at different points in their careers - see and hear when some kid (no offense) calls himself "senior"?

A revenue generating programmer in an investment bank is called a "quant". Maybe you could give that a whirl.
3 comments
hga 5796 days ago
The last time I checked 5 years of experience is enough to label someone as "senior" in software development.

I'm not saying that's not crazy, or disagreeing with your general point, but as the term is used in the field he's not out of line.

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dugmartin 5796 days ago
I think I'm getting to be a cranky old developer like you (I'm just shy of 20 years of professional programming). I thought the same when I saw five years = senior.

On the other hand, 6 years into my career I was promoted to Principal Engineer, over guys with 3 times my experience. Go figure.

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gaius 5796 days ago
Yeah, it's like kids who show up to their first interview and say "I have 15 years experience", meaning they have been playing with computers since they were little. Ermm, no, work you didn't get paid for doesn't count. You aren't being paid to program. You're being paid to solve business problems with code. Even for hardcore geeks this is true, the problem a compiler writer is working on is actually the problem of the CFD guys who want to optimize their simulations, and their problem is actually the problem of the auto guys who want to build better cars. Or if you're working on a filesystem your problem is actually the problem of the database guys who want to process transactions faster, and their problem is really the problem of traders. Experience of that is what matters.
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istari 5796 days ago
What do you think guys with 20 years experience blah blah blah blah blah...

That would be the "staff" engineers. I myself is a "senior" design engineer with 4 years of experience. You seem unfamiliar with the industry lingo.

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