Ask HN: What do with if your experience is 1 year 8 times

2 points by ankalagon 5 years ago | 1 comment

Hello HN friends. I stayed in a company for 8 years and feel severily bad-skilled (I know it was the worst mistake in my life). The point is that I feel like I have 1 year of experience repeated 8 times. Last years I worked in a startup (defunct) and in a medium-sized company with success (project with multinational company as client), and from I know this project is now the most important one in the company and is only in maintenance mode (I keep contact with CEO and other guys there).

However, I recently started in a new place and I feel that am struggling to keep at pace and all my peers are younger than me.

So, fellow HNers, I need your wisdom and I wanted to ask you this questions:

- Have you been in a similar situation? What would you do to increase your skills?

- Is it imposter syndrome amplified to the 10x?

- Could I make up for the lost time?

- Is it possible to change my mindset and don't feel like I wasted my time?

- Could it be that making a Masters programme or some kind of education to feel more adequate?

- Is this a subjective "ego thing" and should to man-up and shut up?

scarface74 5 years ago |

Yep. You probably wasted your time. Been There Done That.

I stayed at one company for 9 years between 2000-2008 between the time I was 25 and 34. My skills atrophied, I was woefully behind technologically - we were still using VB6 in 2008.

Suck it up, try to sell your maturity and soft skills, be prepared to check your ego at the door and learn modern technology and processes from people who are a lot younger than you.

You’ve got a lot of grinding to do, but you won’t permanently be behind. There is a point where you get “get enough” for your local market and where any increase in experience has diminishing returns as an individual contributor.

More formal education is not the answer. “There is no compression algorithm for experience”. You’re going to have to work longer hours to stay caught up and to produce at the level you should until you catch up.