I am a designineer. The problem is that it doesn't make you an expert of all skills. Jack of all trades, master of none.
While I took AP CS in high school, I can't rattle off the to O-notation of most algorithms. While I took plenty of art and design classes over the years, I'm no Jony Ives.
But, its not about what I can't do in my mind, but what I can do. I learn most things very quickly. I'm decent in Ruby and can get stuff done. I can get around Photoshop decently. I'm good at understanding what the customer wants and the product needs. I know how the pieces glue together. I don't mind meeting with VCs, talking to customers or interviewing people.
Yet contrary to popular belief, I don't find people bashing down my door. I don't have the sexiest Github account. The startups I've worked for aren't huge. When I'm asked what I do I reply, "Coding, marketing, product and design". Then they ask if I'm a Java or Ruby coder with 4-7 years of solid experience and a CS background.
Maybe the difference is I don't see myself as being a "full stack" guy, but a "full company" guy. I understand what everyone needs to be doing, and I have (often good) ideas of how a problem might be approached better.
I personally see myself as a huge asset to any company. I often end up doing the productivity of 2-3 people with more traditional backgrounds, but its a really hard sell honestly. I could try selling myself as a manager I suppose, but I'm not sure.
I suspect the scarcity of your skillset is the main contributor to your relative scarcity of opportunities. At a previous company I helped found, we realized that we were trying to find people who were pretty good designers, front-end developers, and really good on the phone with clients for support stuff. We didn't have the margins to split these into different roles, and that was the insight that allowed me to realize that our revenue model was fundamentally broken. It's not that these people don't exist, it's that you can't design your business around reliably finding them. So maybe you're left with a handful of startups who are able to find a place for you because they recognize your value and adapt, not because they had planned on finding you in the first place.
Your last sentence has been my experience so far. Essentially, when a company gets me, they seem to realize that month that they got more than they expected and its a good thing.
One thing I've noticed about some (not all clearly) people who are very good at one thing (let's say back end programming) is they might not really want to do something totally different. Dealing with customers? Writing documentation? Writing front end javascript? Its a bit like pulling teeth.
I don't mind in the least. Documentation writing is great. Making beautiful products is great. Listening to customers (and investors) is great. And yea, I like coding too!
The problem with finding programmers that are good at the social stuff (phone support, dealing with customers) is that the great conceit of programmers is:
That knowing things is more important than knowing people
Hence (most good) programmers will find dealing with customers and doing phone support a tedious chore.
What you are looking for then is a programmer that doesn't passionately love programming. If you find them I am willing to bet that as far as their programming skills go they are not so good.
----
Alternately, look for someone who used to be a hot-shot programmer, but then dialled it back, "got a life". Look for programmers in their 40s or 50s who are more into the social aspect of life. The problem is, they won't work 80 hours if you're only paying them for 32.
I'm building small products. Why don't you try that too? If you can build and maintain 2 or 3 products or SaaS, then you won't need to work for anybody else and you'll enjoy double what a developer gets.
In a product, you'll deal with:
- Coding the product back-end
- Doing its front-end and UX
- Writing the documentation. (I like that too)
- Design the landing page (and may be the Interface, if it's too important/creative)
- Marketing, branding and copywriting
- Customer support
- And finally getting some gigs (and you can charge well for them) from time to time
So you get to try everything. There are lot of opportunities on the web, you just need time to grow the ideas and validate them.
Same, except I don't really enjoy writing documentation. :) I posted my full thoughts in a separate post, but I'm looking for a job, and every job description I read makes me feel like I'm at a crossroads where I have to pick something to give up and something to get better at.
I would really like to have some people post that are looking for someone like you or I, and how someone can actually make themselves the best candidate, or even find such positions. I know how to find standard programming gigs. That isn't a problem.
I keep hearing about the demand, but I keep not seeing it. Unicorns looking for unicorns?
So maybe you're left with a handful of startups who are able to find a place for you because they recognize your value and adapt, not because they had planned on finding you in the first place.
If you are waiting for somebody else to figure out your worth, you're trying to make them do your job, and it's not gonna work.
You have to tell them -- or better yet show them what your value is.
That's the only way to sell products, or sell yourself. The people in the seat on the other side of the desk see a lot of candidates. They don't have time to fully investigate every one. They trust that if a person doesn't have the confidence or self-knowledge to sell himself, or herself, that it's not worth their time to dig deep and find it.
I say this as a person who's kicked ass at job interviews, gotten every job I ever applied for -- 3/5 of which were not open positions, but made for me by my request -- and also done quite a bit of hiring.
That's sort of what I was trying to say, except maybe I have a more pessimistic estimation of how many organizations are open to being convinced. Of course you have to sell yourself, but it still matters who's able to buy. Startups may have the most flexibility in this regard.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure that's a quibble on my part because your post still gave me an adrenaline shot of motivation to GET OUT THERE and MAKE PEOPLE LOVE ME!
I never thought of my self in this fashion but I guess I fit into the designineer category only because I took some graphic design classes in college while I was studying CS. I thought it would help me create video games but I landed in web development which I enjoy a lot of think of myself as lucky.
At my last company they jokingly called me the "Utility Man" taken from the football term. We had a lead designer but I worked with him a lot on stuff. We had developers that I helped. I worked with our Architect to design systems. I lead several projects so I did the PM thing. I even spent 2 years in security and information security audits (yuck!). Even the audit crap I excelled at.
I think some people can just pick up stuff fast. I don't think I'm a genius as this post suggests these types are but I do think I can pick up stuff really fast. I would imagine that most "designineers" could probably pick up in another area fast as well.
I'm in the same boat. Until five months ago I'd only worked for smaller web design/dev/marketing shops because the opportunity to "wear different hats" presented itself more regularly. My current position at a larger company is "Front End Engineer" and I only arrived at that after a significant rebranding of myself.
I think your problem is a marketing problem. I wouldn't be impressed with somebody who said "coding, marketing, product and design" -- I'd wonder why they didn't have an answer with more flair or confidence or one that said how they'd help ME.
How about this: "I'm your trench man. When it's on the line and you need a good layout for a new feature you HAVE to roll out? Me. When you have a bug and all your other developers aren't available? I can drop Photoshop and fix it. And while I do all that, I'm figuring out how to help make your app better… and get more happy customers… which helps you get more customers, period. I can help your developers and your designers make sweet, sweet product love… because I have one foot on each side of the ravine, and can bridge it with my communication skills. One stop shopping, baby."
See what I said above to others about confidence & delivery.
When you only define yourself in terms of line item features "code, design" you invite comparison based on features alone. Hence the followup questions about years of experience. You're making yourself the crappy subnotebook with the bulleted list, and the MacBook Airs are beating the pants off you. :)
While I took AP CS in high school, I can't rattle off the to O-notation of most algorithms. While I took plenty of art and design classes over the years, I'm no Jony Ives.
But, its not about what I can't do in my mind, but what I can do. I learn most things very quickly. I'm decent in Ruby and can get stuff done. I can get around Photoshop decently. I'm good at understanding what the customer wants and the product needs. I know how the pieces glue together. I don't mind meeting with VCs, talking to customers or interviewing people.
Yet contrary to popular belief, I don't find people bashing down my door. I don't have the sexiest Github account. The startups I've worked for aren't huge. When I'm asked what I do I reply, "Coding, marketing, product and design". Then they ask if I'm a Java or Ruby coder with 4-7 years of solid experience and a CS background.
Maybe the difference is I don't see myself as being a "full stack" guy, but a "full company" guy. I understand what everyone needs to be doing, and I have (often good) ideas of how a problem might be approached better.
I personally see myself as a huge asset to any company. I often end up doing the productivity of 2-3 people with more traditional backgrounds, but its a really hard sell honestly. I could try selling myself as a manager I suppose, but I'm not sure.