Finding a job after 5 year career gap

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Sensitive-Ear-3896@reddit

List yourself as employed in a consulting company or stealth startup, gap == gone.

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tndrthrowy@reddit

Get a TIN and a Dunn & Bradstreet number for your LLC… You’re indistinguishable from any other legit business.

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False_Secret1108@reddit

lmao thats so dumb. you can see when it was registered

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This is true. So OP should register it soon I guess. Not that anyone looks at such things. Background check happens at offer stage, nobody cares at that point, they’ve already decided. If you’re not a felon you’re in.

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4dr14n31t0r@reddit

Just tell them that you switched to a startup because it looked promising or whatever and then it went bankrupt. If the startup no longer exists because it went bankrupt then there is no background check to be made. If they insist on giving them contacts or something you can say you were fired right on the spot and didn't even get a chance to say goodbye to your coworkers, let alone asking them for some contact info to keep in touch (many companies are like this so it's a realistically answer).

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False_Secret1108@reddit

theyre gonna ask for paystubs

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Sensitive-Ear-3896@reddit

You gonna rat yourself out? Ok I guess. So you ran a consulting company, who were your clients? NDA, any other questions?

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endurbro420@reddit

Not necessarily. Not every company shows up on a background check. Especially if you have done stuff like freezing your work number.

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ideamotor@reddit

I think that was a good idea a couple years ago, but I’m not sure that’s the case anymore. In fact, even if you really were doing that, I think a lot of people would look at you sideways. Maybe others can chime in here. All that said it’s probably better than nothing.

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ShapedSilver@reddit

I’m not saying you’re wrong but why did it change?

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Savings-Giraffe-4007@reddit

Depends on how many applicants there are, if there's hundreds, its easier to discard work experience where you're your own boss because you can lie as much as you want and it's more work to investigate your background vs. moving to the next candidate.

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ideamotor@reddit

I don’t have a scientific assessment of this, but my impression just from talking to people and seeing people say it in person it just seems like everybody’s doing that now and there’s more people looking for work so there’s more people doing it now. Also I think that this whole AI thing has made it where people can prop up BS a lot quicker so everybody’s just more skeptical and everything’s becoming more based on longevity, reputation and network.

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SlinkyAvenger@reddit

Exactly. You can register your own company for cheap in a lot of places

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inter_fectum@reddit

Tons of people are struggling to find work now.

No one know what direction AI is going to take us and what the impact with actually be.

Economic instability abounds.

Only you can judge how hirable you will be, but no one can predict the future.

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likeittight_@reddit

Worthless answer

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inter_fectum@reddit

This person asked a completely unanswerable question with zero details about what kind of role that are in, what their experience is, etc.

I am sure there are some engineers that could take 5 years off and people would be lining up to hire them when they were ready. There are a lot more with no real network and a mediocre reputation.

In this case only they know which kind they are.

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superlativedave@reddit

Except that’s not what they said, is it? Read it again.

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likeittight_@reddit

Only you can judge how hirable you will be

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ExperiencedDevs-ModTeam@reddit

Rule 3: No General Career Advice

This sub is for discussing issues specific to experienced developers.

Any career advice thread must contain questions and/or discussions that notably benefit from the participation of experienced developers. Career advice threads may be removed at the moderators discretion based on response to the thread."

General rule of thumb: If the advice you are giving (or seeking) could apply to a “Senior Chemical Engineer”, it’s not appropriate for this sub.

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sweetno@reddit

You'll get bored on the second year if not earlier.

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ChibiCoder@reddit

Either you'll be a dinosaur with no experience on whatever engineering looks like after 5 more years of AI advancement, or you'll be a rare unicorn who actually remembers how to write code.

Flip a coin.

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SOLID-DevMan@reddit

You were blessed not diving in ai world

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GongtingLover@reddit

I have a one-year gap with very strong and progressive experience, and I feel like I get a lot of shit for it.

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nickjvandyke@reddit

Could you elaborate on what you did over that year? I'm thinking to take a FTE gap, but fill the resume gap with my open-source projects. They get tens-hundreds of thousands of downloads a week, so I'd like to think it'd look legit, but I still feel anxious.

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GongtingLover@reddit

Got married, summer in Europe etc.

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__bee_07@reddit

Surprisingly, that’s not the case in EU .. many senior developers in my department take 6 months - 12 months break and never felt my colleagues are left behind .. it’s the norm actually, and it’s exemplified by senior management. it takes them 1-2 months at max to catchup, and get back .. that being said, 5 years might be long time ..

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tndrthrowy@reddit

Lol @ these “5 years is an eternity, you’re cooked!!!” responses. The work is largely the same as it was over 30 years ago when I started. Spend some time refreshing your skills by doing a project and call it a business on your resume. That explains my 5 year gap before I got hired last year at another FAANG. The job market is tougher for sure but the gap doesn’t matter if you know how to present yourself.

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AromaticSurround9203@reddit (OP)

You had a 5 year gap?

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tndrthrowy@reddit

Yeah. I had an LLC which is on my resume as my employer. I did a little contract work bit that was less than a year of the 5. I had a few passion projects, some open source contributions… The only real issue with the gap was in negotiating salary when I did get an offer. My income was basically zero so my offer was significantly lower than it would have otherwise been. But still FAANG money so I can’t complain.

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AromaticSurround9203@reddit (OP)

Were you able to get interviews at non FAANG places ?

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tndrthrowy@reddit

I did have a couple interviews at non FAANG, but I think a lot of smaller companies assume with that much experience at high paying companies, you will have unreasonable income demands and they ignore your application. I got rejected (“you were our second pick”) at a really interesting growth company which was a bummer. And I was ghosted after an interview with a government job with the state which I thought I was perfect for. 😁 😭

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gedrap@reddit

It’s an eternity if you’ve been in the field for 3 years and once met someone who remembers what it was like before Docker. :)

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tndrthrowy@reddit

My point is really like… Smart devs I want to hire could walk through a time machine from 1996 and pass my interview, modulo a little bit of prep for the interview. Docker can be explained in a few minutes to someone with 10 yoe, it’s not a gate I care about.

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gedrap@reddit

Precisely. Same with all the AI comments here. If you’ve been around for a decade, it won’t take long to get a good idea of where it’s good at, sucks at, and so on. I get the dread and just grim atmosphere all around, but people really underestimate how quickly someone can ramp back up with true 10 yoe, not just a year of experience repeated 10 times.

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HoratioWobble@reddit

20~ years here and I don't know what industry you've been working in, but even 20 years ago the prominent technologies and work flows were signifcantly different to what they are now.

PHP was gaining popularity, jQuery had just been released, javascript was an after thought on the frontend only, not to mention all the web technologies that didn't exist.

We didn't have Smart phones, cloud services, CI/CD was a pipe dream, Git was new, etc etc etc

30 years ago was even more different.

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Some_Developer_Guy@reddit

No one knows.

My best guess is AI will change the profession so much in 5 years that you will be unhirable.

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Primary-Nose5140@reddit

maybe you'll come back as ceo

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throwaway_0x90@reddit

Nobody has any clue what will happen in 5 years.

Back in 2020 when covid was going crazy, did anyone predict the vaccine, fast turn around, and AI turning the job market upside in the next 5 years?

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gedrap@reddit

But back in 2011, would people have been able to predict 2019 with a reasonable degree of accuracy?

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HoratioWobble@reddit

Impossible to say, I don't think a significant amount has changed in the types of languages or frameworks we use in the last 5 years compared to say the 5 years before or even the 5 years before that.

But, the industry is changing rapidly now to LLM workflows which will change the landscape drastically over the next 5 years.

if you took it 2021 - now I'd say you'd be okay in terms of tech. Although companies would probably not consider you for mid roles.

If you took the 5 years from 2016 - 2021, I think you'd have struggled because of the change in tech landscape.

I suspect if you took today + 5 years, you'll probably find it hard to re-join without taking an entry level role. But honestly, the way companies are acting at the moment I'm not convinced many of us will have jobs in 5 years they're all drunk on koolaid

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diablo1128@reddit

Nobody is going to know, but I won't do it. I've been out of a job since 2021 and I'm pretty much dead weight now as no company will interview me when I apply.

I have 15 YOE working on safety critical medical devices, think dialysis machines, with c and c++. I have been the lead of teams of 20 SWEs and responsible for all software activities on the project, granted patents, had devices complete clinical studies and received FDA approval for sale, and all kinds of stuff. Nobody really cares about me at the end of the day.

I worked at shitty no-name non-tech companies in non-tech cities. You likely have never head of the company I worked for. So maybe you being at big tech may be a difference, but I wouldn't chance it.

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CodeToManagement@reddit

You’ll be rusty as anything after 5 years off and the industry will be very different with AI. You will most likely struggle to get back in at your current level / salary.

With all the change in the industry I’d stick in making money as long as possible

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DangerousPurpose5661@reddit

OP I pulled the trigger, not sure ill last 5 years.

But my plan is to keep my skills sharp during the gap, either by consulting, contributing to open source or maybe building something.

No one need to know you are working 10h a week on your resume

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Savings-Giraffe-4007@reddit

Probably not. You'll be competing with senior devs with 5 years of experience on agentic work.

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_lazyLambda@reddit

Fuck it, life's short, youre obviously pretty well off in your career if you have the ability to travel for that long just do it.

Not the advice you asked for here, but its so ridiculous a career gap even matters. How do you know I haven't been studying trigonometry and doing Ayahuasca

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wiriux@reddit

No. But at least you’ll have traveled the world.

I kid of course. As everyone else have already said, who knows? It’s nebulous.

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OldAnxiety@reddit

I have - 10 yoe - an engineering degree

And some of those years with startups overlap.

My mindset right now is to earn money while I can because I don't have a clue what will happen in the next 2 years

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OldAnxiety@reddit

Why do you need a 5 year gap, try to do 6 months - year and tell us how it goes.

I would never in my life plan a 5 year gap.

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ButchDeanCA@reddit

The bigger concern is whether you’d be able to settle back in should you get a job after your half decade gas. Might be hard to believe but there are no guarantees on that score.

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CubicleHermit@reddit

If you're Staff+, you're probably setting yourself back into a Senior role when you get back.

Once you've been at Senior for a few years, it's pretty hard not to be able to make it back into a Senior role.

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MoreHuman_ThanHuman@reddit

sure why not

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ideamotor@reddit

No. And you won’t be able to start your own company either. You won’t have any clue.

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bonnydoe@reddit

5 years? That's an exit. Maybe learn something completely different in that time. Some manual labour job that will always be needed would be smart.

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Crafty-Slip9231@reddit

No 5 years in tech ever look the same - 5 years ago compared to today are wildly different.

No one will be able to tell you what your career options will be like in 5 years.

Will you be able to get a job? Possibly? That's the most realistic answer you'll get.

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Iam_a_foodie@reddit

Usually you take a career gap without knowing the duration beforehand. However, longest the gap and the older you get, it becomes more difficult to find anything good.