There isn't any public announcement yet, but they sent out this email to leadership:

Dear Women Who Code Community,

It is with a heavy heart that we write to inform you of the difficult decision to close Women Who Code, following a vote by the Board of Directors to dissolve the organization. This decision has not been made lightly. It only comes after careful consideration of all options and is due to a variety of factors that have materially impacted our funding sources. We understand that this news may come as a disappointment, and we want to express our deepest gratitude to each and every one of you who have been a part of our journey.

As a community, we are powerful. For more than a decade, Women Who Code has created a sense of belonging in tech and support for our community, thanks to the dedication and commitment of our members, volunteers, and staff. We have brought together a vibrant community of over 360,000 technologists who deeply care about building an industry that is more diverse, inclusive, and equitable. We’ve delivered more than 20K community-led events, awarded more than $3.5 million in scholarships, held developer conferences and technical summits in tech hubs around the world, logged more than one million high-skilled, leadership-building volunteer hours, given away more than $2.5 million in conference tickets for broader industry engagement, and shared more than 14K job opportunities. Even more than these trackable outputs, we’ve come together to support each other, navigate the industry as a powerful force, share both technical protips and strategies for rising in our careers, and break barriers.

While so much has been accomplished, our mission is not complete and our vision of a tech industry where diverse women and historically excluded people thrive at every level is not fulfilled. Despite our collective efforts, the challenges we face have become insurmountable and we must confront that what worked for us is no longer working. We are deeply saddened by the difficult decision to dissolve the organanization.

As we embark on the process of winding down operations, we are committed to ensuring a smooth transition and fulfilling any remaining obligations to the best of our ability. Unfortunately, we will not be able to continue offering any program services, and will be cancelling all upcoming events. We will be refunding any ticket purchases made by members for our upcoming developer conference, WWCode CONNECT 2024.

Although this chapter is coming to a close, we believe that the spirit of our community will endure and hope that the relationships and experiences you've gained through your involvement with Women Who Code will continue to inspire you in your future endeavors.

On behalf of the Board of Directors and staff of Women Who Code, we extend our heartfelt thanks for being part of the movement, and encourage you to continue to seek support from other like-minded organizations who authentically support the careers of women in the tech industry and keep inspiring each other as you navigate the industry. It has been an honor and a privilege to serve the mission, and work alongside such passionate individuals.

Thank you for your understanding and support during this challenging time.

Hey there! I'm an office monkey doing IT stuff. I've mercenary'd my way across multiple teams for the last decade (level 1 support to basically DevOps for payment systems) with no formal training or certification at a fairly large company. It's nice that my bosses all seem to appreciate that I'm flexible, but my work kinda swells and relaxes every couple months, and sometimes it feels unstable since I've never actually put any of this knowledge into an accepted certification. I look into certifications but nothing jumps out; recently I gave AWS a shot in a self-guided course and realized I was pretty bored by it. Something that popped into my mind as I noticed that I don't really have a "portfolio" is that I have tons of car work, audio editing, off-the-cuff writing about games, etc things that have to do with my hobbies in gaming, cars, music, shitposting on the internet, etc that I'm happy to make without feeling pressured. I feel like if someone asked me to pick up something like this for pay and give me a deadline - a program to edit, a car to work on, an image or audio to manipulate, something analyzing a piece of art - I'd happily do it without even thinking about it, and they're the kinds of things I could do for hours losing track of time.

Being a breadwinner right now with a kid I don't have the risk factor to jump careers right now, but if I lost my job I feel like I'd want to give some different industry a shot. Problem is I just don't get how people... weasel into these things? Is that how this happens? Or do they just eat a ton of time/money making these laterals? Where do they get the experience, where do people find the connections? I'm curious - has anyone ever turned a hobby into a career? Did it work out?

I've always been interested in entrepreneurship, and I think I want to get serious about doing something. I checked out the Millionaire Fastlane forums, and it's just completely saturated with the whole "grindset" BS. I tried reading a couple of threads, and my eyes almost rolled out of my head. 🙄

I've also hung around on the entrepreneur subreddit, and it just seems like a bunch of people without much experience trading unproven advice and people trying to sell courses.

Does anyone know of a better community? I'd like to find some friendly, welcoming adults with actual experience to talk with. Are entrepreneurship and hustle culture always a package deal?

Greetings Tildeans!

I am wrapping up my Ph.D. and am pursuing a teaching-focused career in higher education. I am currently in talks for a 4-year institution teaching faculty position that would revolve around teaching a subject I am passionate about and could provide a lot of intellectual stimulation. Unless something wild happens the offer is there and we are just negotiating the parameters. I also have a position that is in 2nd-phase interviews for a community college tenure track position that would be teaching general biology, anatomy, and physiology. I feel optimistic that they are going to offer me a position, but nothing is concrete yet.

I'm at this impasse because both have really good reasons for doing them and would provide experiences unique from the other. I am trying to balance the pros and cons between these two positions and consider what might be good for my career in the long run, and so I was hoping I could get some advice. Even if you're not in academia I think it would be helpful to get some outside prospective. I'm gonna list my thoughts on it below.

4-year University

Pros:

-Teach upper level and domain specific courses with opportunity to design courses I am passionate about.
-Integrated into scientific community if I want to to do more research/keep abreast of scientific advancements.
-Great community of teaching faculty with lots of support.
-Could be good curriculum vitae experience if I want to stay teaching at a 4-year institution, and could open up teaching psychology courses.
-Option to develop a community outreach project I am passionate about, not sure if there is support for me but there is infrastructure there.
-Partner's family is in the area, and it is a big metropolitan area with lots to do.
-Can get tuition at 25% cost for my partner and I incase we want to get some other degrees.

Cons:

-Pay is not great (does have option of picking up extra summer online classes to earn more).
-My partner and I don't want to live here long term, primarily because of climate, and cost of living is increasing. We are already ready to move, but this is a good opportunity.
-Is contract based, so not as much job security. Having said that, many of the teaching faculty have been there a long time and it seems like the student body for this department is generally growing.

Community College

Pros:

-Pay is pretty good, and there is a baked in growth of salary as long as you stay there long term. Pay could be as much as $15K more starting out than the 4-year institution.
-Small class sizes, so better teacher:student ratio means more involved education.
-Cost of living in the area is pretty cheap (so far).
-Beautiful area and would put us closer to a part of the country we would like to live in long term.
-I do like biology and physiology, just not as much as neuroscience.
-From my understanding there is lot of support and easy options to get into administration if so desired. All the faculty I briefly met had been there at least 7 years.

Cons:

-Only lower levels courses, with little room to develop new ones.
-Not sure how this would impact my ability to switch to a 4-year institution if I end up craving that intellectual stimulation.
-The area is in a part of California that does have issues with forest fires (not the town proper), and the county swings hard in the opposite direction of my politics.
-Small town so there isn't as much to do.

Overall, the community college looks best on paper. We're not planning on having kids so family support isn't as big of a deal. My main concern is if I could switch back to a 4-year institution if I feel like I'm missing something. So if anyone has any thoughts please let me know, in particular if there are other things I'm not considering that you think are worth examining.

Edit: Just to add some additional information. As part of making myself a good candidate for higher education, I have worked as a teaching assistant for several courses during grad school and I have taught online physiology as an adjunct professor at a community college, so I have some experience in both environments.

Thanks ahead of time!

I've seen a few posts on Tildes now about careers - sometimes personal posts about burnout and how to manage it, other times links to articles about layoffs.

The end result of both of these is often a need to find a new job. For some it may be as simple as applying for the same title at a different company and having success, for others it may be a long process of determining what type of career to go for next and perhaps education or other factors that can help them get there.

I wanted to try starting a thread to see if those of us who are struggling can ask for advice, and perhaps those who are doing well can help or even post their career journey to show how they got where they are today.

The company I work for laid off half of my office this week. I'm one of the survivors, and trying to process what happened.

The company has been transparent about revenues. However, we had no idea that we would be so badly penalized for management choices that created significant operating cost overruns in the face of a projected short-term demand decline. I've lost half the members of my immediate team, good friends, people whose work and thoughtfulness I deeply respected. The entire department structure is being upended. The harshness of the selection for people who were being laid off included a teammate who's in the hospital, parents of young children, people on the edge of retirement. I'm suspicious and extra hostile towards the company - it's very significant to me that all the people of color and people who've had recent medical leave are among the lost.

It's not the first time I've watched and survived a company's poor management and bad choices, but this is by far the worst. I've worked very hard at staying professional with the customers this week. I'm still inwardly seething with rage. I'm trying to figure out how to be supportive to the people who are leaving. I'm trying to figure out how to help a team lead who's in his first management job, and is totally devastated and nearly frozen with helplessness. I'm decent at my job, but don't know why I was kept and others with equal or greater skills were let go. I don't feel good about what qualities I might have had that corporate desired to keep - dutifulness, compliance, amiability, reticence?

At the same time, I'm looking at months of double workload even though corporate management claims they'll outsource part of the duties (so that's another symptom that I'm replaceable) and manage the task pipeline. There's a frankly insulting retention bonus if I stay for another year. We've gotten the usual anodyne HR garbage about the employee assistance program and coping skills. The corporate management's left us with the ominous "stay tuned for further announcements over the coming weeks".

I don't have a lot of choices here. I'm trying hard to stay focused on the present, without looking over the cliff of dread at the future. At the moment, I'm the sole support for our household and source of health insurance. My spouse is badly burnt out, and I don't want him to look for work a minute before he's healthy and enthusiastic about a job. I'm a late-50's end-career professional who wouldn't normally have much interest in restarting yet again elsewhere. I very deliberately chose this company, job and location, liked the work I was doing, the people I was doing it with, and I was looking forward to building on it. There's still the possibility that our half-vacant remote office will be closed and consolidated with the corporate headquarters. I have less than zero interest in relocating, and plan to keep separated coworkers who live here as personal friends.

I'll be grateful to hear any advice on coping with this situation, and hope the replies will be helpful to others in future.

There is a horse race. The horses are running as fast as they can around the track. Around and around and around. This is what they're “meant” to do. Suddenly, a horse trips and crashes to the ground. It breaks its leg. It tries to get up. It tries to limp around the track, but it cannot. Try as it might, it can no longer run around and around and around. It is done. The horse is dragged off the track, a white curtain is pulled up around the horse, and a gunshot is heard. The race continues. That is how it goes. Around and around and around.

I've had this recurring thought of the lame racehorse for a few years now. Once I realized I needed to make a living, I set off out of the gates at high speed to become a software engineer. I frantically caught up in math, something I always struggled with in grade school, I took transfer classes at a community college and got 4.0s across the board, I applied to a local university, I got admitted, I stressed and had mental breakdowns and did all my assignments, I graduated Magna Cum Laude, what an honor. I worked so hard, running around and around and around. I actually got my first software engineering position while I was still in university, I worked there part-time for my last year of university, and once I graduated I went full-time. And here I've been running for five years around and around and around. I don't think I can run anymore.

I feel like trips and crashes have been happening over the years, at least I feel like they happen when I suddenly think of the racehorse. And I feel like they get worse and worse. Every time though, eventually I forget about the racehorse, but now I think the racehorse is really lame. And I feel like I am limping along the track not yet being noticed by the referees for some reason, around and around and around.

What keeps me running, and now limping, around and around and around is fear and anxiety. I don't want to think about entering the job market. I don't want to lose my health insurance. I don't want to become financially dependent on my partner. I don't want to feel like a failure. I have watched my brilliant colleagues from university very recently get laid off from their software engineering positions at various companies. And yet somehow I'm still limping around and around and around. I don't even know if I'm limping anymore, I think I'm stuck on the ground just moving my limbs around and around and around. And I'm honestly surprised nobody has noticed yet.

I understand some might suggest burnout. And maybe that is the case, but I've tried to take vacations, I've tried to focus on my own hobbies, and I know this post sounds pretty depressing, but outside of work, I am not depressed. The thing about burnout is that I think you have to actually catch fire before you burnout. Maybe for me it was a slow burn, not a sudden moment of catching on fire. Or maybe I did catch fire at some point, so long ago that I don't remember working so hard, although I probably could be reminded of it by my partner and friends, but I feel like I have never recovered from it. I feel like lifeless ashes from a burnout. I don't feel like I have ever rejuvenated, my ashes did not become soil from which new life can grow.

I have a performance review soon. This year has been the worst performance I've ever had so far. I'm in this weird feeling zone of simultaneously no longer having the energy to care anymore, while also harboring fear and anxiety because I don't want to have the uncertainty of being unemployed. But it generally comes out that "not caring" currently "wins" over the anxiety by a large margin. My work output has been seriously pathetic for at least the past month. Like completely slacking off almost. And I do feel guilty about it, just if anyone is wondering.

I feel like I'm waiting for them to pull up the white curtain and to hear the ringing of a gunshot.

I don't know why I wanted to write this, I guess I am just wanting to connect. I wonder if anyone else has felt such feelings that freeze you and make you feel like you're watching a trainwreck in slow motion that is your own life. And I wonder if anyone else has ever felt like a lame racehorse. I know there are a decent amount of software engineers here.

Thanks for reading.

Yo everyone, I'm fresh from the first good night's sleep I've gotten in awhile. I'm ecstatic to finally be finished (I took a longer road than most) and just felt like chatting with you fine folks.

Getting that dissertation done was a real challenge and while I'm happy I finished before George R. R. Martin finished the next ASOIAF book, I have a lot more sympathy now for him or anyone who has to write something lengthy.

Anyone else in a graduate program or recently finished? To those who have gone through the process, what'd you do immediately afterwards? I'm in the middle of a job interview process so I can't quite take a vacation, but I am planning to stick at least a full week somewhere where I travel and do nothing.

Tonight, I'm going to relax and watch The Magic Flute opera with friends which I've not done before.

Hey all. I'm looking for a little career advice. For the past 1.5 years I've been working as a full-stack web developer for a proprietary eCom framework. It's LAMP and pretty antiquated and not very interesting. However, I have been able to work on a fun (for me) project parsing sales data with Python and Pandas. Before this job, I worked for myself for a good amount of time doing something creative outside of tech, and before that I was a Senior IT Consultant in a big market.

I'd really like to get out of web development. I don't really enjoy frontend work, and I don't really care about the web or eCom that much. I've been considering moving toward DevOps as I've got a lot of skills in that department, but I've also recently started thinking about Data Engineering. But when I look into jobs in that world, a lot of them require higher degrees in mathematics or science that I don't have. I've got a bevy of tech skills, I'm very into Linux, and I really enjoy working with data. I have some personal experience with Prometheus and Grafana, though nothing professional.

Ultimately, I'm not sure how I should be breaking into Data, or breaking out of web development. Maybe there's a career path I'm neglecting to look at, but would be perfect for. I would be looking for remote only jobs, as I live in a very small market that has very few tech jobs. I'd really love to work in Python. I'd like to learn Rust. I've read on here comments from users saying there are a ton of opportunities in this world, but I'm not quite sure how to frame myself on a resume to make me look like a good candidate. My education isn't in tech, but much of my work experience is. Maybe I'm just overthinking it all. Admittedly, I've been so exhausted from work and life recently that I haven't had the time to really start applying for anything.

Anyhow, any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Hi everyone — I am trying to get a job in web development after a decade in a mostly unrelated field.

I am looking for ideas and tips to create a portfolio to send with applications. All of the websites I worked on ages ago have been taken offline or redesigned by someone else. I do have a website I created for my music, but it’s just vanilla HTML. I also have a personal website which is really the only thing I have to show.

I know HTML/CSS quite well, but that’s basically it. I’ve worked with WordPress for years but only just recently began learning enough PHP to do anything custom. I don’t really know Javascript much at all.

I have quite a few paid courses through Udemy for all these different areas but even as I have completed them, I don’t feel confident in knowledge of the different languages. These courses nearly always come with projects that the students create with the instructor. Should I use these as part of my portfolio? For some reason I never felt right doing that, since I didn’t build it myself.

So I guess I’m curious (if any of you are web developers) if you have suggestions for how to fill out a portfolio without any previous work examples.

Side note: I wasn’t sure how to word the title or my question particularly well so please edit it more clearly, Those Who Can Edit.

edit: thank you to everyone who took the time to reply to this. it’s all been very helpful and i appreciate everyone’s input immensely!

Apologies if this isn't in line with the spirit of the group/site but I'm just looking for some advice really.

I'm 27m and just feel really stuck career wise. I didn't do very well in school and it took me a lot longer than everyone else to figure out myself. I have a degree in a redundant subject (very niche, no value in any career). Before COVID I was finally able to get my live music photography work off the ground but then that came crashing down. Other than that I mostly only have experience in retail and hospitality, and I've been a manager in both fields.

I'm looking for a work from home job for multiple reasons, mostly customer success/account management jobs and have had a few interviews too. I even got down to the final 2 for a promising one a few months ago. Every single job basically said that it was only down to my lack of experience compared to other candidates, but they did like me.

What is there I can actually do to aide this? I'm just worried that the older I get with only retail management work the harder it will be for me to start a real career path. The whole thing is getting me really down and I just don't know what to do.

Thanks.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1048984322000583

Abstract

We submitted over 12,000 job applications, to over 4,000 job advertisements, to investigate hiring discrimination against six ethnic groups for leadership positions.

For leadership positions, applicants with English names received 26.8% of positive responses for their job applications, while applicants with non-English names received 11.3% of positive responses. This means ethnic minorities received 57.4% fewer positive responses than applicants with English names for leadership positions despite identical resumes.

For non-leadership positions, applicants with English names received 21.2% of positive responses for their job applications, while applicants with non-English names received 11.6% of positive responses. This means ethnic minorities received 45.3% fewer positive responses for non-leadership positions despite identical resumes.

Ethnic discrimination for leadership positions was even more pronounced when the advertised job required customer contact.

I've been doing a postdoc in molecular biology in academia for a little while now, and getting ready to take next step. I'm looking into industry careers, but it's difficult to know what they entail since we don't often get exposed to them.

If you or someone you know works in biotech, I'd love to hear about it.

How did you get into it? What do you enjoy or not enjoy? Where do you see the industry heading? What are some of the positions like?

I've been having a particularly rough time finding a new job in the field I graduated in. I'm doing pretty much everything most job sites have told me but networking is kinda hard.

I don't currently work in my field so I don't know anyone that would be particularly useful. Everyone I know is already aware of my situation and some of them have even found leads for me but no luck yet.

I have gone to events related to organizations I'm interested in and spoken to people there but it feels super weird to just approach people and tell them I'm looking for a job.

Similarly Linkedin is super foreign to me. This post is literally the most I've ever interacted with a social media site. What do I do once I open that app? Am I supposed to just stalk people on there that might hire me someday? I tried joining a "group" but it's been pending for a week now.

This week marks my 8th year of working in IT, and I have been feeling more and more that I am ready to move onto something different. Both my undergraduate and masters degrees were in the arts (Japanese, and Linguistics respectively), and I just sort of fell into IT as a job because I was always good with computers and it seemed like it had a pretty great pay-to-effort ratio. Now that I am approaching the decade mark, I feel like it's not what I want to do any more. Even my current job (which I once described as my dream role) has lost its sheen, and the prospect of spending the rest of my working life having to study and learn new technologies, and keep up with the latest developments just fills me with dread. I don't want to be in my fifties and reading endless documentation to try and understand why MacJibbleGPT is now the preferred way to skilter a virtualised quallock. In short, I would like to relegate my computing to the level of "hobby."

The problem is, I really don't know what I would like to do instead. The last time I had an idea of a career that I wanted to follow was as a teenager when I wanted to be a doctor, but I didn't get the grades. Since then I've just sort of fallen from thing to thing, and been a bit directionless, just assuming that IT would be enough to carry me through my working life, and focus on my hobbies for fulfilment. Well my hobbies are now very fulfilling, but they just make the slog of the work day even harder.

So how do I go about figuring out what it is that I want to do? I have done a few quizzes online (via reputable organisations), I've contemplated the jobs of my friends and family, and I still just feel like nothing is inspiring me. There are a few problems that I need to try and work around with finding something new as well:

• At least for the next 6 years or so, I am geographically fairly restricted to being within a reasonable driving distance to my daughter's home
• Shit is expensive, so I need to minimise the hit to my salary
• I do not have the money to get a degree or similar vocational qualification
• I would like stable hours, and not to work weekends or evenings (this is more job-specific than it is career-specific)
• Hybrid working is preferable to full-time in the office or full-time WFH (ditto)

So I ask my fellow Tilderen, have you ever pivoted into a completely different career after several years of investing your time into another? How did it go? How did you go about figuring out what you wanted to do instead? What advice would you have for me, a nearly-31-year-old who still has most of her working life ahead of her?

For example, this article shows demand for aviation mechanics. What are your observations and experiences re demand in hiring?

https://apnews.com/article/jobs-workers-shortages-hiring-manufacturing-airplane-mechanics-84176a760eaacd1b629e9cef2f6ee42c