<story><title>Ask HN: Software Engineer hitting 40: what&apos;s next?</title><text>I&amp;#x27;ve been working in software engineering for 18 years. I worked mostly as individual contributor  (now as a Senior Staff Engineer), also I was an Engineering Manager for couple years. Now I am interviewing after a few years at the company, and I am hit by harsh reality. For the context, I am in Europe, not in the US.&lt;p&gt;I like technologies and programming, I want to further improve my skills in designing and developing reliable and maintainable distributed system, make better technical decisions. Also, I want to keep learning and playing with new techs. I am now interviewing for the roles like Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal Engineer, My expectations for the roles like  Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal Engineer are that while staying hands-on, say for 30%, I will primarily use more my skills in architecture, engineering, and communications to focus on large, important pieces of functionality, technical decisions with big impact, etc. I expect that I would report to a Director or VP level manager, so that I could be exposed to a big picture, collaborate with and learn from a professional who operated on strategic level.&lt;p&gt;In reality, I am now interviewing for Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal roles and see a few problems that make me rethink my carrier plans. First, the definion for the most of those positions looks Senior Engineers with a few more years of experience: so you are limited to the scope of a single team scope, report to an Engineering manager, just be a worker at a feature conveyor, just be faster, mentor young workers, maybe get some devops skill. I feel limited in impact in such roles, my borders and carrier are defined by Engineer Managers, who are usually less experienced in engineering and leadership topics than I am. The work is also very repetitive, there is not much meaningful progression, next level. I think those titles are created to cover problems caused by diluted Senior titles: an illusional career progression candy for ICs with some salary increase.&lt;p&gt;I saw a few Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal roles that put a very high bar on technical expertise, when only 3-4 percent of all the engineers have such levels, and again usually limited to a lot of coding and a single team scope. They usually have long exhaustive interview process.&lt;p&gt;An important problem with Staff+ IC roles is that there is a low salary limit as well, and you will face much more competition for top roles. Mostly salaries top at the level of a director of engineering. It is typical for a company to have 10 directors, but only 1-2 IC with a similar compensation.&lt;p&gt;I want to work hard, and see meaningful progression: in salary, in impact, in respect.&lt;p&gt;I would like to ask for advice. I believe there are qute a lot 35+ engineers here that faced similar problems and made some decisions for their careers. Now I think to plan switching to a EM track or to Technical Product management. Thank you!</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>askonomm</author><text>I feel like as a software engineer, in most of the western world, if you actually save money (and invest!), and don&amp;#x27;t make stupid financial decisions, you can probably retire by 50.</text></item><item><author>bjornsing</author><text>Sounds great, if you can retire at 50. In the EU you can’t (or at least not in Sweden where I am), so you have to think about how sustainable this approach is past 50… and to me it doesn’t really feel sustainable.</text></item><item><author>leet_thow</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m 42 and have stopped paying attention to titles and all the traditional organizational paradigms that are losing relevance.&lt;p&gt;I feel like the ability to work from home in my sweats on simple problems as a senior engineer and receive a 75th percentile income relative to my neighbors in one of the best neighborhoods in my new home state is the most societal progress I will ever experience in my lifetime. I&amp;#x27;m a lifelong bachelor by choice. Why bother striving for anything career wise when I am on track to retire comfortably to focus on my mostly free hobbies no later than the age of 50? For a house with a 3rd bedroom I don&amp;#x27;t need?&lt;p&gt;No, best to appreciate what I have and leave the striving for the next generation of engineers.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>nly</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s definitely not feasible for most Software Engineers in Europe without extreme sacrifice, and fairly low expectations wrt to standard of living in retirement.&lt;p&gt;Retiring at 50 is extremely risky in terms of sequence risk[0], so you&amp;#x27;d want a low withdrawal rate on your pot. You&amp;#x27;re also likely to want a higher income initially while you&amp;#x27;re still young enough to enjoy it.&lt;p&gt;So let&amp;#x27;s say your target is €2M for a €60K&amp;#x2F;yr income until you die, after a 25 year career. That gives you a couple years of fucking around after college &amp;#x2F; some bad years &amp;#x2F; gaps.&lt;p&gt;To achieve that over a 25 year, investing in to a smooth 7%&amp;#x2F;yr bull market, you&amp;#x27;re going to need to invest €2,500&amp;#x2F;mo. That&amp;#x27;s something along the lines of €50K&amp;#x2F;yr of gross income (assuming 40% tax).&lt;p&gt;Most software engineers in Europe probably don&amp;#x27;t even make €50K&amp;#x2F;yr... and we haven&amp;#x27;t even taken in to account taxes on  gains, raising kids, buying property, or just enjoying life throughout your career!&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.investopedia.com&amp;#x2F;terms&amp;#x2F;s&amp;#x2F;sequence-risk.asp&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.investopedia.com&amp;#x2F;terms&amp;#x2F;s&amp;#x2F;sequence-risk.asp&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Ask HN: Software Engineer hitting 40: what&apos;s next?</title><text>I&amp;#x27;ve been working in software engineering for 18 years. I worked mostly as individual contributor  (now as a Senior Staff Engineer), also I was an Engineering Manager for couple years. Now I am interviewing after a few years at the company, and I am hit by harsh reality. For the context, I am in Europe, not in the US.&lt;p&gt;I like technologies and programming, I want to further improve my skills in designing and developing reliable and maintainable distributed system, make better technical decisions. Also, I want to keep learning and playing with new techs. I am now interviewing for the roles like Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal Engineer, My expectations for the roles like  Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal Engineer are that while staying hands-on, say for 30%, I will primarily use more my skills in architecture, engineering, and communications to focus on large, important pieces of functionality, technical decisions with big impact, etc. I expect that I would report to a Director or VP level manager, so that I could be exposed to a big picture, collaborate with and learn from a professional who operated on strategic level.&lt;p&gt;In reality, I am now interviewing for Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal roles and see a few problems that make me rethink my carrier plans. First, the definion for the most of those positions looks Senior Engineers with a few more years of experience: so you are limited to the scope of a single team scope, report to an Engineering manager, just be a worker at a feature conveyor, just be faster, mentor young workers, maybe get some devops skill. I feel limited in impact in such roles, my borders and carrier are defined by Engineer Managers, who are usually less experienced in engineering and leadership topics than I am. The work is also very repetitive, there is not much meaningful progression, next level. I think those titles are created to cover problems caused by diluted Senior titles: an illusional career progression candy for ICs with some salary increase.&lt;p&gt;I saw a few Staff &amp;#x2F; Principal roles that put a very high bar on technical expertise, when only 3-4 percent of all the engineers have such levels, and again usually limited to a lot of coding and a single team scope. They usually have long exhaustive interview process.&lt;p&gt;An important problem with Staff+ IC roles is that there is a low salary limit as well, and you will face much more competition for top roles. Mostly salaries top at the level of a director of engineering. It is typical for a company to have 10 directors, but only 1-2 IC with a similar compensation.&lt;p&gt;I want to work hard, and see meaningful progression: in salary, in impact, in respect.&lt;p&gt;I would like to ask for advice. I believe there are qute a lot 35+ engineers here that faced similar problems and made some decisions for their careers. Now I think to plan switching to a EM track or to Technical Product management. Thank you!</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>askonomm</author><text>I feel like as a software engineer, in most of the western world, if you actually save money (and invest!), and don&amp;#x27;t make stupid financial decisions, you can probably retire by 50.</text></item><item><author>bjornsing</author><text>Sounds great, if you can retire at 50. In the EU you can’t (or at least not in Sweden where I am), so you have to think about how sustainable this approach is past 50… and to me it doesn’t really feel sustainable.</text></item><item><author>leet_thow</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m 42 and have stopped paying attention to titles and all the traditional organizational paradigms that are losing relevance.&lt;p&gt;I feel like the ability to work from home in my sweats on simple problems as a senior engineer and receive a 75th percentile income relative to my neighbors in one of the best neighborhoods in my new home state is the most societal progress I will ever experience in my lifetime. I&amp;#x27;m a lifelong bachelor by choice. Why bother striving for anything career wise when I am on track to retire comfortably to focus on my mostly free hobbies no later than the age of 50? For a house with a 3rd bedroom I don&amp;#x27;t need?&lt;p&gt;No, best to appreciate what I have and leave the striving for the next generation of engineers.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>iso1210</author><text>If you&amp;#x27;re pulling a 6 figure salary then sure.&lt;p&gt;If you&amp;#x27;ve been earning on a typical career - say £25k&amp;#x2F;yr starting in your mid 20s, £35k-£45k through your 30s, perhaps getting upto £60k by the time you&amp;#x27;re into your 40s, you won&amp;#x27;t have saved enough to pull even £20k a year for a few decades.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;uk.indeed.com&amp;#x2F;company&amp;#x2F;Precision-Microdrives&amp;#x2F;jobs&amp;#x2F;Software-Engineer-01b57b2204ac4840?fccid=ac2e4d8cef116119&amp;amp;vjs=3&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;uk.indeed.com&amp;#x2F;company&amp;#x2F;Precision-Microdrives&amp;#x2F;jobs&amp;#x2F;Sof...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;uk.indeed.com&amp;#x2F;rc&amp;#x2F;clk?jk=62dc4988a0e4f36b&amp;amp;fccid=0de01f2ba89cfd39&amp;amp;vjs=3&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;uk.indeed.com&amp;#x2F;rc&amp;#x2F;clk?jk=62dc4988a0e4f36b&amp;amp;fccid=0de01...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>