<story><title>Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?</title><text>I am making a good living with a niche skillset. It&amp;#x27;s a fairly old technology and there&amp;#x27;s less and less work in that area.
I&amp;#x27;d like to move to another technology stack - it&amp;#x27;s not too hard for me - different keywords etc and I&amp;#x27;ve actually done some hobby projects already.
I think if I applied for a job I&amp;#x27;d get rejected as there is no track record of being able to work with that tech.
Best get case I could probably apply for a junior job which would pay well below my current. It will probably take years to get to the same level of pay, assuming that particualr tech stack takes off.
Is there any eascape from this?
Are there any companies that would be willing to hire a grumpy 30-something and recognise his&amp;#x2F;her experience as something reusable?</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>hkarthik</author><text>I did this back in 2009. Here&amp;#x27;s how to do it.&lt;p&gt;Pick a technology stack that you want to get a job in and build a side project in your spare time. Attend meetups with experts in your local community and learn how to make it awesome. Build relationships with them along the way.&lt;p&gt;Use those relationships to get some part-time contract work in said technology stack with someone local. Document this experience and build up a portfolio.&lt;p&gt;Eventually, use the knowledge you&amp;#x27;ve obtained from your side project and part time contract work to apply for full time jobs. You&amp;#x27;ll then be very marketable, and you will have enough knowledge to do well in interviews.&lt;p&gt;Good luck!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ryguytilidie</author><text>I do recruiting and I have an awesome story like this. Back in 2010 I worked at a mobile reading company. I was trying to hire iOS developers. I found an awesome github from a dude who was doing backend C# stuff at MSFT, but was building AWESOME iOS apps at night.&lt;p&gt;I emailed him and asked if he wanted to do the thing he was clearly passionate about full time.&lt;p&gt;He aced the interviews, came out and built our app. About a year later one of our founders left to start a new company. The founder recruited this guy. Within 18 months, their company sold for a few hundred million and now instead of writing the C# code he hated, he has now helped build an awesome company, build a whole new skillset and built his leadership skills. Not to mention the fact that his wife and child are basically taken care of for life because of this decision.</text></comment>
<story><title>Ask HN: How to reskill without losing income?</title><text>I am making a good living with a niche skillset. It&amp;#x27;s a fairly old technology and there&amp;#x27;s less and less work in that area.
I&amp;#x27;d like to move to another technology stack - it&amp;#x27;s not too hard for me - different keywords etc and I&amp;#x27;ve actually done some hobby projects already.
I think if I applied for a job I&amp;#x27;d get rejected as there is no track record of being able to work with that tech.
Best get case I could probably apply for a junior job which would pay well below my current. It will probably take years to get to the same level of pay, assuming that particualr tech stack takes off.
Is there any eascape from this?
Are there any companies that would be willing to hire a grumpy 30-something and recognise his&amp;#x2F;her experience as something reusable?</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>hkarthik</author><text>I did this back in 2009. Here&amp;#x27;s how to do it.&lt;p&gt;Pick a technology stack that you want to get a job in and build a side project in your spare time. Attend meetups with experts in your local community and learn how to make it awesome. Build relationships with them along the way.&lt;p&gt;Use those relationships to get some part-time contract work in said technology stack with someone local. Document this experience and build up a portfolio.&lt;p&gt;Eventually, use the knowledge you&amp;#x27;ve obtained from your side project and part time contract work to apply for full time jobs. You&amp;#x27;ll then be very marketable, and you will have enough knowledge to do well in interviews.&lt;p&gt;Good luck!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>hliyan</author><text>I did this in 2013. &lt;i&gt;This advice is spot on&lt;/i&gt;. Learn the hell out of the new technology stack, and then build up a portfolio (for example, you can contribute to open source projects, or start your own).&lt;p&gt;If the antiquated tech you have experience in is more complex than the new stack (antiquated tech usually is), it sometimes works as a positive: you have a perspective &amp;#x27;native&amp;#x27; users of the stack don&amp;#x27;t.</text></comment>