[iainctduncan]

This is so true. I now get paid over twice what I got as a coder because what I do involves a combination of code knowledge, writing, and interviewing people. My skills in the last two make me a star there, and I am way more appreciated than I was in pure coding roles. Finding your "superpower" is the best thing you can do for your career.

[dencodev]

What is your job title, or what is it commonly called elsewhere? I'm desperately trying to get out of coding roles but hate just leaving my senior dev titles to rot and not help me in my next step.

[iainctduncan]

see above thread

[spsphulse]

That’s great!

What is it that you do for a Living now? Did you stumble onto it or made a gradual transition away from coding?

[iainctduncan]

I totally stumbled on to it - I was very lucky, and do my best to never forget that. I work as a consultant for a company that does deep technical due diligence on mid-stage tech firms getting acquired, mostly by private equity firms. I worked with someone who was doing it part time for the same firm, and then following that I was the CTO of a small startup for a year, which got acquired, so I went through the process on the startup end. When I decided to move on, I was able to get hired based on deep architecture knowledge but also the ability to interview people delicately in high stakes environments, and then write that up in an executive report and present to the private equity clients. It's an unusual job, and I think the average programmer wouldn't like it, but for me it's worked out really well and I now have the mental energy to do more open source and hobby hacking again. It's great to be in a role that actually capitalizes on my arts education and people skills as well as tech. :-)

[dencodev]

Thanks for this. It sounds very cool but very niche. Seems like you'd need to know the right person to get into this sort of work. Congratulations on all your success.

[iainctduncan]

Thanks! I wouldn't say you need to know the right person really, but you do need to be the right fit - which is a pretty odd fit. I think it would be a bad job for example for someone who was not ok with the work uncertainty as it's pure consulting. But if you are someone with high level (VP, manager, or C-suite) tech experience, strong people skills, and can write, and you think it would fit you, feel free to find me on linked-in and get in touch. We need more folks right now! :-)