I'm at a crossroads - career pivot?

[jeromedawg]

Hey guys,

How many of you have successfully pivoted your careers? Or any fails/horror stories?

My background is QA and InfoSec but heavier on the QA side at this point. I feel pigeonholed and not marketable. Very little practical/significant automation experience which is definitely a damper, but something that takes tremendous effort for me to want to ramp up to (and subsequently tires/burns me out... like in a good way but because it requires so much energy and thought, not so sure in the long run). I've often thought about trying to get into management but feel dead-ended even with that and not sure how to make that transition. My InfoSec skills are lacking since I've been out of the industry for a while. Either way, I'm not motivated to go "above and beyond" at least in the current role and not sure what it would take to get there. Further education in this arena (be it Agile, Infosec certs, etc) just sounds drab to me. I guess I'm burnt out?

Things at my current workplace are changing... and not sure if that's necessarily a good thing. My current manager is leaving on the 28th (he just announced today) and that's going to be a huge shake-up as things were relatively stable under him and he was very easy to work with and for. I'm disappointed with that news but happy for him that he has found something better. The company I'm at can very much be described as a "sinking ship" or at least it feels that way.

Other than trying to climb the ladder, further educate, etc in my current role, I'm wondering about pivoting to something else. The problem is that I have no idea what that would be. I maybe have some ideas but usually it ends up with some sort of ideal entrepreneurial FIRE situation where I'm working for myself and have multiple streams of income (mostly passive). Hahaha. Maybe Amazon reseller, doing under-signings as a notary public, etc... I really have no idea.

I literally feel like I'm at a crossroads with no direction (and not just with career but even feeling stuck with the current housing situation we're in and not even knowing where we'll live). Our older kid is starting K in another month and all I really want is just some stability. We're thinking about having another kid (I really want one and my wife is neutral) but I feel like this current situation (both with housing and job) is dictating that we don't and just concede to being done on that front. I'm already 40 (wife is 34) so while being told to wait on that sounds great, I'm also not getting any younger (I'd prefer not to be an "old dad")

It feels like I'm always one-step behind in so many ways...



 

[FLBiker]

First of all, I'm sorry to hear how you're feeling.  If you're on this forum, I doubt very much that you're "one step behind" all the time.  And it's lousy working at a place that feels like it's sinking.  I was recently in that situation, and it just wrecks the ambient morale.

I've pivoted in my career, but I'm not sure if my experience is useful.  It all happened very organically.  I was an teacher in a university ESL program.  Knowing I was good with computers, my boss hired me as a 50% teacher, 50% database admin.  Then the university decided (against our will) to partner with a big recruitment company.  My department blew up as a result, and I had several different admin opportunities, eventually ending up as the leading the Operations department.  Now, I'm an IT Business Analyst for that partner company (because I wanted to WFH so I could move to Canada, and because my former department is, as you say, a sinking ship).

There were many times over the past decade where I felt frustrated and like I was pigeonholed and had all sorts of plans for how I would change careers.  I remember talking to my dad about it -- at the time, I think my plan was to get an MFA in Creative Writing.  He very much encouraged me not to start over in something new, but to see if I could find some sort of lateral move that would leverage my existing skills, but move me to an area that I was more interested in and / or had more growth opportunities.  I wouldn't say I super intentionally followed this advice at the time, but this is absolutely what I ended up doing.

You say some instability is coming to your work place -- this can definitely be an opportunity.  I was absolutely against the partnership my university entered into, and it brought with it a time of tremendous instability, but I was able to take advantage of some of these changes to move myself around to different positions.

[jeromedawg]

Thanks @FLBiker

I should also mention that it seems I'm overpaid for what I'm doing (imposter syndrome?) and I feel like it would be hard making a lateral move and still getting paid what I'm paid now. I've heard it before not to undersell myself but it just feels hopeless. I've applied to other positions and have gotten a call back maybe 5-10% of the time. The position I did apply and got an offer for (with CA state) was nearly a 40% paycut, which tells me that I'm not worth what I'm paid now (even if state jobs are lower paying, 40% is significant). It would just be really tough taking any sort of paycut, especially here in SoCal. I feel like in order to survive out here, either I need to magically land a job with FAANG, become a doctor or lawyer, and or have my wife start working.

[formerlydivorcedmom]

A 40% pay cut sounds about right if you're moving from industry to a state job.  That has nothing to do with your skillset, just their budget.

I have felt like you have multiple times.  I'm 42 and have had 21 years in IT.  Until now, I've used my skills to slide sideways into other roles - from Lotus Notes development to .NET to report writing to data visualization.  Each time, I asked myself what pieces of my job I liked and tried to figure out how to market that to do more of it.  I also got a PMP certification a few years ago in the hopes that would make companies overlook the lack of experience in a certain area I was trying to move into (it really did help!). 

If you've done QA for a long time then you have an attention to detail and an ability to understand requirements - how the stuff is *supposed* to work.  Those are really marketable skills and can help you in other career paths. 

Now, I'm so burnt out that I'm taking time off and maybe transitioning to teaching.  I also have a few leads on other jobs because I've been telling my network that I'm planning to leave and want a change.  Ask your boss to look for something at this new org for you.  Ask your old colleagues what's going on in their companies.  You might be surprised.

[jeromedawg]

A 40% pay cut sounds about right if you're moving from industry to a state job.  That has nothing to do with your skillset, just their budget.

I have felt like you have multiple times.  I'm 42 and have had 21 years in IT.  Until now, I've used my skills to slide sideways into other roles - from Lotus Notes development to .NET to report writing to data visualization.  Each time, I asked myself what pieces of my job I liked and tried to figure out how to market that to do more of it.  I also got a PMP certification a few years ago in the hopes that would make companies overlook the lack of experience in a certain area I was trying to move into (it really did help!). 

If you've done QA for a long time then you have an attention to detail and an ability to understand requirements - how the stuff is *supposed* to work.  Those are really marketable skills and can help you in other career paths. 

Now, I'm so burnt out that I'm taking time off and maybe transitioning to teaching.  I also have a few leads on other jobs because I've been telling my network that I'm planning to leave and want a change.  Ask your boss to look for something at this new org for you.  Ask your old colleagues what's going on in their companies.  You might be surprised.

Yea, I pivoted from QA into infosec earlier on in my career, then pivoted back (mostly via keeping in touch with a prior manager). I've considered just getting my CISSP but it feels like a long process getting there. I hate studying for tests.. especially, when I don't pass them (this happened once on a highly technical exam. I'm still traumatized by that and part of the reason I'm not so excited about infosec anymore...not l33t enough I guess).

But yes, you're right in terms of the attention to detail and ability to break out and understand requirements. I just don't know how to map and translate that to other career paths, exactly...

What kind of teaching are you considering doing?

[Metalcat]

I've made major career changes a few times, a lot of people do, it's not a big deal.

What is a big deal is figuring out what you want your life to look like, determining what trade offs it will take to get there, and deciding collectively as a family if those trade offs are worth it.

Changing your career isn't a big deal, changing without a clear sense of what you want to get out of the change and what that will take is where things can go sideways.

[formerlydivorcedmom]

But yes, you're right in terms of the attention to detail and ability to break out and understand requirements. I just don't know how to map and translate that to other career paths, exactly...

If you stay in the IT realm, you could easily switch to be a Business Analyst or Systems Analyst.  Project Management could also be an option.  Product/Program manager for software products may also be a possibility.

You might also be able to switch to any kind of "Analyst" position.  Financial analyst / logistics analyst /etc, especially if you have strong Excel or data visualization skills.   It is possible that would require an initial pay cut, but the Sr Financial Analysts at my company make more than I do as a Sr Business Analyst.

What kind of teaching are you considering doing?

I've obviously lost my mind, because I want to teach junior high or high school history.  I'm going to substitute teach this semester - I have friends who will request me and leave me actual lesson plans to teach.  If I like it enough I'll get my certification; if not I hope I'll have decompressed enough to get back in my field. 

[thesis]

The people in QA at my company don't do automated QA testing. In fact, not too long ago we stopped using much of our testing infrastructure because it wasn't actually helping anybody and cost more than it was worth.

Imposter syndrome is interesting. Sometimes you really aren't qualified, and sometimes you simply don't feel qualified. But either way, it's an indicator that you aren't happy with your skills and abilities, and that could be a clue to your next step. Do you need to acquire a particular skill to feel good about yourself? Or was it a skill you even wanted in the first place? I'm not very good at offering advice, but I think it's worth something to find a job that you want to be highly proficient at, and in your searching for what to do next, it helps to ask what you would need to be doing to feel that desire.

In the somewhat near future, I intend to take a year off work entirely. On good days, I feel tempted to find a different arrangement, but I know that I need it because something deep inside is slowly burning out. I've always known my current job was a step in the right direction, but it's still not exactly where I want to be. But a lot of things interest me. Part of taking all that time off will be processing where exactly I want my career to go.

(Also, if your gut tells you your current job is a sinking ship, there's a good chance it is.)

[norajean]

Sounds like you are partly driven by the upcoming management change. Give it time to occur and settle out before deciding if you like it or not.

[jeromedawg]

The people in QA at my company don't do automated QA testing. In fact, not too long ago we stopped using much of our testing infrastructure because it wasn't actually helping anybody and cost more than it was worth.

Imposter syndrome is interesting. Sometimes you really aren't qualified, and sometimes you simply don't feel qualified. But either way, it's an indicator that you aren't happy with your skills and abilities, and that could be a clue to your next step. Do you need to acquire a particular skill to feel good about yourself? Or was it a skill you even wanted in the first place? I'm not very good at offering advice, but I think it's worth something to find a job that you want to be highly proficient at, and in your searching for what to do next, it helps to ask what you would need to be doing to feel that desire.

In the somewhat near future, I intend to take a year off work entirely. On good days, I feel tempted to find a different arrangement, but I know that I need it because something deep inside is slowly burning out. I've always known my current job was a step in the right direction, but it's still not exactly where I want to be. But a lot of things interest me. Part of taking all that time off will be processing where exactly I want my career to go.

(Also, if your gut tells you your current job is a sinking ship, there's a good chance it is.)

It's interesting. Everyone out there (especially in the Agile world) talks about how automation is the way of the future and that you're obsolete if you are manually testing anything. The problem is with the overhead and expense of managing test automation frameworks. You basically need to have a dedicated team of people who are maintaining the framework. Now, if you're able to maximize value by squeezing more out of these folks (by having them come up with the test cases and automate everything) then it's a winning proposition for the company especially. As it is, it takes a lot of time and effort just to understand the requirements, use cases and write out the actual test cases and scripts. I guess the one ideology is to automate *while* you go through manually testing the first round but that's a major case of task and context switching, which is never good. So it goes back to the whole point of needing a dedicated team of persons who solely focuses on automating manual tests AND maintaining the infrastructure. I think a hybrid approach of using both can work out best, especially if the framework is homegrown. But if you are paying for licensing on top of all that, it's a major PITA. My last place they built out an internal framework that launched and tracked test cases (I like to take *some* of the credit for the idea behind all of this as back in the day I designed a test tracking and inventory website that my colleague took over and built out into this huge complex machine after I left... guess I shouldn't have left LOL). Anyway, that's all in the past and I'm not really that motivated to revisit. I do like the idea of web design but it feels like another one of those things that you could spend countess hours in for relatively little return or slow progress. I've thought about picking up React and Node.js but I don't have as solid an understanding of APIs and all that jazz.

[jeromedawg]

Related question but have any of you applied for a position where they've disclosed the salary range and it's lower than what you wanted but you interviewed with them and had them offer you what you actually wanted or more?

[AccidentialMustache]

Yes I pivoted, ish. CS degrees -> Sysadmin -> Developer. I never quit programming, and as programming crept into my sysadmin job I decided I didn't much like the sysadmin half, so went back to programming. I still bust out the sysadmin skills though and do things like fix ctrl-c not working (python hangs; main thread dead, other threads still alive), or diagnose deploy issues with salt, or access issues with ssh/etc, because of the sysadmin knowledge.

Given I doubled my salary going state->industry (that did also include the sysadmin->dev switch), only a 40% cut sounds like the pay is pretty good for a state gig.

You might be able to find a QA/product hybrid role that writes cucumber/gherkin test cases. They look like english, but are really method calls into code your devs write, in order to run tests.

If you like data manipulation, there are usually gigs writing etl pipelines, be that in sql/spark/hadoop/kafka streams depending on how complex you want to make it. Understanding requirements = understanding data -- neither is ever well documented.

[lhamo]

Do you ever listen to the ChooseFI podcast? They have been touting Salesforce training as a way to quickly change career tracks. They have some free training links to try it out. Entry level Salesforce admins apparently make 60-80k, and you can pretty quickly get over 100k.

Or you could get a real estate license ;)

[use2betrix]

Have they named a replacement for your boss? Would you have any interest in moving into a management role, or do you think you could have a possibility of landing it?

I have been a manager for several years and it really throws a different dynamic than being one of the workerbee’s. Of course, there’s a lot of BS, but there’s also a lot of enjoyment. Some days I wish I could really just focus on one sect of what my group does, but most of the time, I really like to be involved in “everything.” It also gives me a lot of autonomy for what I do, and how I can direct my team to add the most value to our company and project.

[jeromedawg]

Have they named a replacement for your boss? Would you have any interest in moving into a management role, or do you think you could have a possibility of landing it?

I have been a manager for several years and it really throws a different dynamic than being one of the workerbee’s. Of course, there’s a lot of BS, but there’s also a lot of enjoyment. Some days I wish I could really just focus on one sect of what my group does, but most of the time, I really like to be involved in “everything.” It also gives me a lot of autonomy for what I do, and how I can direct my team to add the most value to our company and project.

No - my manager just announced that he's leaving yesterday. I think he likely announced this to his manager pretty recently as well. I think it would be a far stretch for me to move into his position. In terms of seniority, I'm probably the least senior person on the team. Also, having a small taste of what he dealt with and how busy things were for him, I'm not sure I'd want to enter into that situation. They've been shaking things up on the higher levels and not in a comforting way as of late. I feel like only way to make a move or change would be out of the current place IMO... the company has garnered a *horrible* reputation over the past 5-6 years and they're not really doing much to save face (right now they're blatantly forward about the bottom line - we have axe men at the C-level). I'd likely be putting an even larger target on my back if I were to move into this position (if I coud even qualify for it which I doubt I would).

Do you ever listen to the ChooseFI podcast? They have been touting Salesforce training as a way to quickly change career tracks. They have some free training links to try it out. Entry level Salesforce admins apparently make 60-80k, and you can pretty quickly get over 100k.

Or you could get a real estate license ;)

I've probably heard of it in passing but have not listened. Salesforce as in Salesforce admin?  I guess those "admin" niches are always great to land in, like JIRA admin or the now-dated Sharepoint admin haha. A large part of me doesn't want to settle for a pay-cut even with a pivot, but I don't know how practical of thinking that is. I really think I'd have to get a management level cert (PMP and or CISSP) and just get into that track or dedicate my time and resources into software engineering and development. the latter seems like it would be more interesting but more time-consuming and lead to faster burnout. Although, I'm not sure how I feel about management especially as it pertains to managing with people.

[ender]

Do you want to stay in tech?

How long have you been in the same company?

[Californiablonde]

I highly recommend reading Finding Your Own North Star by Martha Beck. It guides you through exactly what you’re grappling with and helps you to determine which career/life decisions are best for you.
Also, keep in mind that mid-40’s is mid-life crisis stage. Your feelings of discontent could have to do with brain growth at this age which can cause hormonal changes that influence mood. I would recommend reading the book, and waiting for six months before making any major life changes. I know that you’ll make the right decisions (for you). Good luck!

[jeromedawg]

Do you want to stay in tech?

How long have you been in the same company?

I'm not sure... I want to say yes but mostly because I don't know what else I could switch to. Honestly, if I were to Coast or Barista FIRE, I'd consider working in a ship yard or becoming a deckhand on a fishing boat.... but only if I were single LOL

I've been with this company since 2016.

I highly recommend reading Finding Your Own North Star by Martha Beck. It guides you through exactly what you’re grappling with and helps you to determine which career/life decisions are best for you.
Also, keep in mind that mid-40’s is mid-life crisis stage. Your feelings of discontent could have to do with brain growth at this age which can cause hormonal changes that influence mood. I would recommend reading the book, and waiting for six months before making any major life changes. I know that you’ll make the right decisions (for you). Good luck!

Thanks, I'll give it a read

[lhamo]

Here's one of the Choose FI posts on the Salesforce career path:

https://www.choosefi.com/salesforce-lucrative-career-no-degree-required/

It wouldn't hurt you to try the free five-day challenge to see if there is anything about it that interests you.   With your tech background you probably could get into the architect option pretty easily.

Don't quit the day job for now but I would not be planning on staying at your current company for much longer.  You lucked out with a good manager but I doubt you will get that lucky again.  Good people run from sinking ships...

[MaybeBabyMustache]

I've made a few pivots:
-Started as a tech writer (major tech company) at an internship during college. Least glamorous internship in tech. I wrote a glossary for a database product. Stayed on the team after I graduated, eventually managed the tech writing team, and some of the UX side. Stayed for ten years. Not because I love it, but because I kept growing, kept getting promoted & paid more, and I'm a sucker for stability.
-Got my MBA (nights & weekends, while employed in above job) in technology management. After I completed my MBA, pivoted to a role (same company) that was on the content/marketing side. So, still in content, but not in tech writing. It was a good transition with the MBA. Continued to manage teams, but also managed some of the partnership side /business end with external partners. That was good exposure
-Moved into another role at the same company, focused on another vertical. Followed my manager to this team.
-My husband got a job at (another) big tech company, so we moved from Seattle to the bay area. His recruiter passed my resume along, and I ended up on the current team I'm at, although my job as grown a lot, as we're in the mobile space. It's been 8 years on the team.

I'd say the two biggest pivots have come with: 1) my MBA, and 2) random other switch that I've bolded. It was completely unintentional, and much more about following a good manager. That vertical switch set me up very well for the job I currently have. I now have 11 years of experience in a very specialized & high demand field, and...never quite planned it that way.

Ironically, I'm about to FIRE, because I had zero desire to go into tech. I'd planned to become a professional writer, but of the non-tech kind. I went with it for 25 years, because... again, sucker for security & the money. I have no idea what comes next for me. Definitely future work, but only because I want it, not because we will need it.

I've also suffered from the impostor syndrome, and it's hard. I don't think anyone "deserves" to make what I make. That said, I'm adequately compensated from a market perspective, and could pull multiple other offers at this salary band, if the right role opened up. I'm a woman in tech (and, even more niche part of the field) & so often struggle with whether I'm "good enough". I coach a lot of other people on this topic. Your current team/employer is paying you at your current salary because your skills, the market, or some combo of that dictate they should. Businesses are selfish. They aren't paying you that much out of the kindness of their heart.

If I were in your shoes, I'd take some time to thinking of 2-3 things I'd like to learn. Find a role that puts you on the correct path to learning those things. Or, learn them on your own time, while you think about a well paying role you can eventually qualify for, that would be more interesting than where you are now.

[thesis]

It's interesting. Everyone out there (especially in the Agile world) talks about how automation is the way of the future and that you're obsolete if you are manually testing anything. The problem is with the overhead and expense of managing test automation frameworks. You basically need to have a dedicated team of people who are maintaining the framework. Now, if you're able to maximize value by squeezing more out of these folks (by having them come up with the test cases and automate everything) then it's a winning proposition for the company especially. As it is, it takes a lot of time and effort just to understand the requirements, use cases and write out the actual test cases and scripts.

Yeah. Back in the early 2010s, before I was a software developer, Test Driven Development came into its prime, proselytizing the land, and it has many faithful adherents to this day. But the whole focus on "100% code coverage" for tests has largely been dropped as the industry has woken up to the reality that you've just described. It's not going away anytime soon, but I'm seeing a general shift toward "test what really matters" rather than "test everything." One of the most senior developers at my company is not a huge fan. As a dev, there are things about these automated tests I should probably learn better, but none of my jobs have required this knowledge thus far. And of course, it's a little different from the dev side. My present company's QA will write normal test cases, but then they manually test them. They are a highly competent crew, and they don't do automated testing, as, like I mentioned, the UI testing framework was a major pain, and only one guy could really write those. The net benefit just wasn't very great, as every single UI change required the tests to be modified.

Honestly, our QA would do much better with some knowledge of SQL. A few know the basics, but I occasionally give them some handy scripts to help them find the right data in our test database. I don't mind doing this, honestly, as I like helping other people, but I would be really impressed if somebody in QA knew enough SQL to get everything they need from the database.

All this to say, I think there will always be some jobs out there that don't require automated tests. They may not be exciting and new, but there is still a demand for highly competent QA testers without automation skills.

Related question but have any of you applied for a position where they've disclosed the salary range and it's lower than what you wanted but you interviewed with them and had them offer you what you actually wanted or more?

I had a similar experience for my first software job. Because it was super entry-level but they were hiring several people at the same time, they wanted to weed people out by saying the pay was basically going to start at minimum wage with the opportunity for growth. But they actually started higher than that, and the growth on top of that was pretty fast. I always smile inside when I remember this because it was a pretty clever way of seeing who really wanted to work for the company and who didn't. Now being fairly experienced, I'd be a bit more cautious of that sort of thing, but there are good companies out there who want to test if you are the sort of person who is just going to walk if you see bigger dollar signs.

[ender]

QA is undergoing a pretty rapid transition right now in industry too.

It's one similar to the sysadmin --> devops one, imo.

[jeromedawg]

It's interesting. Everyone out there (especially in the Agile world) talks about how automation is the way of the future and that you're obsolete if you are manually testing anything. The problem is with the overhead and expense of managing test automation frameworks. You basically need to have a dedicated team of people who are maintaining the framework. Now, if you're able to maximize value by squeezing more out of these folks (by having them come up with the test cases and automate everything) then it's a winning proposition for the company especially. As it is, it takes a lot of time and effort just to understand the requirements, use cases and write out the actual test cases and scripts.

Yeah. Back in the early 2010s, before I was a software developer, Test Driven Development came into its prime, proselytizing the land, and it has many faithful adherents to this day. But the whole focus on "100% code coverage" for tests has largely been dropped as the industry has woken up to the reality that you've just described. It's not going away anytime soon, but I'm seeing a general shift toward "test what really matters" rather than "test everything." One of the most senior developers at my company is not a huge fan. As a dev, there are things about these automated tests I should probably learn better, but none of my jobs have required this knowledge thus far. And of course, it's a little different from the dev side. My present company's QA will write normal test cases, but then they manually test them. They are a highly competent crew, and they don't do automated testing, as, like I mentioned, the UI testing framework was a major pain, and only one guy could really write those. The net benefit just wasn't very great, as every single UI change required the tests to be modified.

Honestly, our QA would do much better with some knowledge of SQL. A few know the basics, but I occasionally give them some handy scripts to help them find the right data in our test database. I don't mind doing this, honestly, as I like helping other people, but I would be really impressed if somebody in QA knew enough SQL to get everything they need from the database.

All this to say, I think there will always be some jobs out there that don't require automated tests. They may not be exciting and new, but there is still a demand for highly competent QA testers without automation skills.

Related question but have any of you applied for a position where they've disclosed the salary range and it's lower than what you wanted but you interviewed with them and had them offer you what you actually wanted or more?

I had a similar experience for my first software job. Because it was super entry-level but they were hiring several people at the same time, they wanted to weed people out by saying the pay was basically going to start at minimum wage with the opportunity for growth. But they actually started higher than that, and the growth on top of that was pretty fast. I always smile inside when I remember this because it was a pretty clever way of seeing who really wanted to work for the company and who didn't. Now being fairly experienced, I'd be a bit more cautious of that sort of thing, but there are good companies out there who want to test if you are the sort of person who is just going to walk if you see bigger dollar signs.

It's weird because for a long time it felt like I was the only one who feels this way - it's refreshing to know that there are others out there who don't think it's all a gravy train as well. Of course, we're labelled "dinosaurs" at that point hahaha.

I think having an arsenal of extensible automated tests that can be chained together or modularly built out, 'on-demand', to test very specific scenarios is really the most ideal thing where QAEs can launch those tests for additional validation or for testing corner cases and atomic iterations (multiple dropdown selection). But the overhead of maintaining this test automation framework will cost either way.

I love it when I can work with the dev team to dig up data in the backend/DB. Sometimes they'll send me queries but many times I'll end up digging for the data myself unless there's some super complex query required where there are primary keys being referenced across more than several tables. But of all the things I do, this kind of 'data discovery' is actually pretty engaging and fun. I'm not an expert by any means and I'm sure some of the queries I write are not optimal, etc but it is one of the more interesting aspects for sure. Are there any openings on your team? LOL! jk Another related thing that interests me is forensics/investigation I think - when I would do the CTF events for SANS, the part I liked most was digging for and trying to find the flags. It was really tough but satisfying. This kind of 'hunting' is incredibly draining though...

[jeromedawg]

Here's one of the Choose FI posts on the Salesforce career path:

https://www.choosefi.com/salesforce-lucrative-career-no-degree-required/

It wouldn't hurt you to try the free five-day challenge to see if there is anything about it that interests you.   With your tech background you probably could get into the architect option pretty easily.

Don't quit the day job for now but I would not be planning on staying at your current company for much longer.  You lucked out with a good manager but I doubt you will get that lucky again.  Good people run from sinking ships...

Nice, thanks for the lead. I'm checking it out now to see what it's all about. Seems like it could be lucrative, especially with the architect role. But it also sounds like you'd have to work your way into that kind of role starting from admin.... beyond that, I would imagine getting a foot in the door as a salesforce admin is probably the bigger roadblock here though. Or are there plenty of companies out there willing to hire someone on with the cert and no prior [relevant salesforce] experience?

It's definitely a slowly sinking ship here - the outlook is bleak, especially with my manager leaving. I've been fortunate to have one really good manager at the first company I worked at (he subsequently re-hired me back onto his team later on). But yea, this latest run I was fortunate to end up with a really good manager (two actually) who shielded us from pretty much all of the politics. I knew how good it was when I was temporarily moved to a different manager last year... that was a horrible experience - all she did was shovel and offload the burden of her workload back onto us, and most of it revolved around performance reviews (basically, she wanted us to write our own performance reviews, goals, etc and then supposedly she would "hold us" to those standards... it was the most confusing thing ever but it felt like we were basically doing her work for her).

[thesis]

It's weird because for a long time it felt like I was the only one who feels this way - it's refreshing to know that there are others out there who don't think it's all a gravy train as well. Of course, we're labelled "dinosaurs" at that point hahaha.

Nope, not alone :)

I love it when I can work with the dev team to dig up data in the backend/DB. Sometimes they'll send me queries but many times I'll end up digging for the data myself unless there's some super complex query required where there are primary keys being referenced across more than several tables. But of all the things I do, this kind of 'data discovery' is actually pretty engaging and fun. I'm not an expert by any means and I'm sure some of the queries I write are not optimal, etc but it is one of the more interesting aspects for sure. Are there any openings on your team? LOL! jk Another related thing that interests me is forensics/investigation I think - when I would do the CTF events for SANS, the part I liked most was digging for and trying to find the flags. It was really tough but satisfying. This kind of 'hunting' is incredibly draining though...

Aside from diving deeper into the database if you enjoy that, you might even consider looking into security penetration testing. It requires that QA mindset: devs often focus on how to make things work, while QA tends to focus on how to break things. That plays very well into security testing. Mind you, automation is usually involved at some point, but for small teams, just having personnel who know what they're doing is often good enough. I just discovered the PenTest+ certification this past week. I don't want to derail this to talk about the pros and cons of certs, but I've been wanting to learn more about security, and this struck me as something I would learn a lot from studying for. I even saw it listed for several testing positions. Just a consideration. There are some interesting options out there.

[jeromedawg]

It's weird because for a long time it felt like I was the only one who feels this way - it's refreshing to know that there are others out there who don't think it's all a gravy train as well. Of course, we're labelled "dinosaurs" at that point hahaha.

Nope, not alone :)

I love it when I can work with the dev team to dig up data in the backend/DB. Sometimes they'll send me queries but many times I'll end up digging for the data myself unless there's some super complex query required where there are primary keys being referenced across more than several tables. But of all the things I do, this kind of 'data discovery' is actually pretty engaging and fun. I'm not an expert by any means and I'm sure some of the queries I write are not optimal, etc but it is one of the more interesting aspects for sure. Are there any openings on your team? LOL! jk Another related thing that interests me is forensics/investigation I think - when I would do the CTF events for SANS, the part I liked most was digging for and trying to find the flags. It was really tough but satisfying. This kind of 'hunting' is incredibly draining though...

Aside from diving deeper into the database if you enjoy that, you might even consider looking into security penetration testing. It requires that QA mindset: devs often focus on how to make things work, while QA tends to focus on how to break things. That plays very well into security testing. Mind you, automation is usually involved at some point, but for small teams, just having personnel who know what they're doing is often good enough. I just discovered the PenTest+ certification this past week. I don't want to derail this to talk about the pros and cons of certs, but I've been wanting to learn more about security, and this struck me as something I would learn a lot from studying for. I even saw it listed for several testing positions. Just a consideration. There are some interesting options out there.

I actually got my GPEN (which I've let expire) and GWAPT (current but likely won't renew since I don't ever apply or use it).
In some ways, it feels too "competitive" for me, so I actually would avoid the CTF events at security conferences I've attended in the past (but also because I was paranoid about getting hacked myself I were to connect to the wifi at any of those conventions/conferences hahaha).
I never felt super confident about breaking into systems and all that stuff. I had considered going for the OSCP but it never really piqued my interest. I think what set me back and kind of traumatized me was the GXPN - I studied hard for it and failed that exam by a narrow margin. A lot of things went over my head and it just wasn't my cup of tea. After that I sort of lost interest in the subject entirely...
at the current place, I actually discovered a number of XSS issues earlier on when I first started (both stored and reflected, and at one point caused a bit of trouble with something in the QA/UAT env hahaha) but it was never a priority for the team (which was ironic at the time, because this is an internal security analytics team we're talking about). Two jobs ago I was in a security engineer position where we actually did our own internal pen tests, among other things, and I sucked so hard at it - upstarting and knowing what tools to use or apply and when, as well as the subtle nuances to look for when trying to break an app from an outside perspective is a very difficult thing to do. The mentality is different than in QA, where most of the time you're focused on functionality and requirements whereas security/pen testing you're trying to maliciously break an app, exploit vulnerabilities, pivot around the network and between systems, and reveal much worse (dumping hashes, passwords, sensitive data, etc). Having a QA mindset can help but you have to get ultra creative in many instances... something I don't feel I have. One thing I hate is knowing that there are open ports with known vulns and then not knowing what to do or where to go from there - you may try a few different tools or single-shot exploits (Metasploit, etc) to try to get in but they fail to work either because you chose the wrong one or didn't know how to apply the exploit. There are certain fundamentals and "tribal knowledge" you kind of have to pickup... for some people it's quick/natural and for others (like me), it takes hours upon hours upon hours to figure out... if even that. With OSCP, their motto/slogan is "Try harder" - some say that eventually you'll figure it out and once you do it's so satisfying. Eh, I'm kind of just over it...
The worst part IMO is the pressure of having to compile your report and then coming up short on results. It's similar to home inspectors when they look for problems and can't find any - when you have a short report it makes you look bad. You want to be one of the guys who finds MAJOR issues because that "adds more value" - I hate having that kind of pressure.

In short: it's something I've dabbled in and I find it somewhat interesting but I don't feel like I'm actually that good at it. Regarding QA and Security/testing I *do* think there is some crossover and I always thought it would be interesting to integrated penetration/security testing into a QA testing framework - at my last company I was kind of in a role where I was focused on trying to do things like this but my lack of l33tness with pen testing didn't really help much. The l33t guys know how to debug & reverse engineer and develop/modify/tailor exploits - it would be great to know how to do this but if it were that easy, everyone would be doing it :)

[thesis]

In short: it's something I've dabbled in and I find it somewhat interesting but I don't feel like I'm actually that good at it. Regarding QA and Security/testing I *do* think there is some crossover and I always thought it would be interesting to integrated penetration/security testing into a QA testing framework - at my last company I was kind of in a role where I was focused on trying to do things like this but my lack of l33tness with pen testing didn't really help much. The l33t guys know how to debug & reverse engineer and develop/modify/tailor exploits - it would be great to know how to do this but if it were that easy, everyone would be doing it :)

That's fair :)

[jeromedawg]

In short: it's something I've dabbled in and I find it somewhat interesting but I don't feel like I'm actually that good at it. Regarding QA and Security/testing I *do* think there is some crossover and I always thought it would be interesting to integrated penetration/security testing into a QA testing framework - at my last company I was kind of in a role where I was focused on trying to do things like this but my lack of l33tness with pen testing didn't really help much. The l33t guys know how to debug & reverse engineer and develop/modify/tailor exploits - it would be great to know how to do this but if it were that easy, everyone would be doing it :)

That's fair :)

Also, pen testing is one of those engagements where you could be up all night and more trying to find issues... kinda like cramming for finals. Some people are into that kind of thing, while chugging Monster, Red Bull, Rockstar, 5hr Energy, etc. lol You really have to be on top of your game and in the zone to be good at it.

Definitely not my cup of tea hahahaha.

If anything, I'd actually more interested in the detection/prevention side of things and trying to halt someone attempting to or having gained entry.
- blue teaming I suppose you could say.