| Disclaimer: My perspective is obviously shaped by the places I've worked; I don't know the people I don't know. Here's my LinkedIn profile in you want that context(note - I'm not looking for a job): https://www.linkedin.com/in/lyndsysimon/ Healthcare. There were lots of changes brought about by Obamacare, and while of course many of the political aspects have either been changed or are at risk of being changed with little or no notice, the implementation also created great changes in the industry that aren't going away regardless of the political climate. There are all kinds of niches where something not much more complicated than a simple CRUD app on an iPad can significantly reduce costs and/or improve outcomes. The industry has realized this, and it's going to be a hot place to work for the foreseeable future - and one that can make a real difference in people's lives. Government. The last I looked was ~2016, but 18F was doing some great things at the time. They had far more latitude in hiring and compensation than is typical for the public sector, but I'm not sure if this is still the case. Dev community outreach. In my experience, there are at least two kinds of "developer evangelists" - those that are skilled socially (and have to gain the respect of developers) and those that are skilled technically (and may have to learn how to do the social side). Those who are technically-skilled and have proven themselves before taking on the role tend to be both very effective and well compensated. There are a couple of people I know in those roles, but they are people I very much respect. Devops. Especially at a junior level, I've encountered far more people I would consider to be exceptionally talented on the ops side of things than purely development. I don't know where their careers will end up taking them from there, but I've seen those people rise quickly through the junior > mid-level > senior progression. If a team has someone who is exceptionally smart, motivated, and productive, devops is easily the role I'd want them to be in. Their work there can make the entire team substantially more productive. I think (good) managers see this as well, which is why devops seems to have a higher proportion of very talented people. Finally, there is something of a revolution happening in academic publishing. It's yet to be seen if the lessons learned by the F/OSS software world can compete and win the cultural war between established academic publishers (e.g. Elsevier), but the people I know who are working in that space definitely qualify as the smartest people I know. |