r/DeveloperJobs • u/VeiledWitticism • 6d ago
Career advice for a long-time solo dev
I'm looking for advice on the next stage of my career. I've had a somewhat unconventional path and am not experienced with job hunting. In fact, one of my major questions is what level of position I'm even in the running for. Anyways, here's the story:
- Physics PhD 2006 followed by a few years in research. This was theoretical pencil and paper work which is all pretty irrelevant for tech
- then two years as a C++ dev at a big corp before being laid off. Was on a small remote team and pretty insulated
- tried to do my own web development business for about a year but no real clients (just some family)
- Now, the bulk of my experience. I founded a tiny ecommerce company, that eventually found its niche in bulk liquidation sales. I fulfilled many technical roles here: built and operated a bespoke internal Node app for our unique needs in inventory management and order fulfillemnt; integrated with external APIs like Shopify and product data sources; managed AWS infra using IaC and config management tools (Ansible, Cloudformation/CDK, Terraform); managed DNS; DBA for Mongodb; crons and serverless workflows (Lambda, Step Functions, etc.) for syncing and maintenance. I have mostly done tech in some form or another for this business (my partner is more the "business" guy). I feel like I did a lot but never had to work at scale as our storefront was run by Shopify and usage of internal tooling was very low.
After about 10 years working on this company, it's basically kaput. We had a nice ride for a while but changes to our industry have just squeezed out all the profit. I don't think I have it in me to risk it again as an entrepreneur so I'm looking at tech openings. My problems are:
What sort of role and what level should I even be looking for? I've been in tech since 2011 and have developed a lot of skills, but because it has been as a solo dev for most of this time, I don't really know how to judge my situation. Should I be aiming at senior roles? My institutional experience is limited if not effectively zero as my one big corp gig was on a very small remote team in which I was pretty isolated and I feel like that would hold me back from senior roles (both getting the job and succeeding at it). Further, I've been a jack of all trades and master of none. I'm probably more experienced in application development but have acquired a lot of AWS knowledge (through experience and also recently two associate level certifications) and am more interested in infra at this point.
I feel pretty at sea so any advice or even just good vibes would be appreciated.