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 What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?
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pinedroses




PostPosted: Wed May 25, 2011 9:12 pm   Post subject: What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

I am interested in going into computer science but I've heard from virtually everyone that a job in computer science is tiring and laborious. Also that computer science is always changing, so as you get older it is difficult to keep up with the changing technology since you have to constantly learn new skills. So, my question is: what kind of jobs you can get with a computer science degree and are these jobs are all tiring and laborious like everyone says?
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unoho




PostPosted: Wed May 25, 2011 9:34 pm   Post subject: RE:What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Well... in my opinion, it all depends on where you land your job. so my job right now is kinda tedious but lot of my friends are doing exciting stuff.

and as for where you going to get a job, it totally depends on how much skills you have. if you are smart enough, you may end up working for VERY BIG companies like Google, Microsoft, Sony, EA. but that doesn't mean those are the only companies people work at. There are ENDLESS possibilities in computer science field.

as for learning new skills, I would say that's what makes computer science very interesting and challenging and NOT BORING. You get to learn new exciting languages and tools to develop/maintain products.

everything that you see through your monitor (browsing web, games, music, movies) etc, computer science has a huge role behind them even if you don't see it.
Tony




PostPosted: Wed May 25, 2011 9:39 pm   Post subject: RE:What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Is everyone you talk to looking for a job where they don't have to think much and not have to ever learn new skills? My personal suggestion -- find a more diverse group of people.

But I suppose that you should be asking yourself this question: is it a bad thing if you'll get to learn new skills later in life? Just how much effort would you want to put into a job/career/vocation?
Latest from compsci.ca/blog: Tony's programming blog. DWITE - a programming contest.
pinedroses




PostPosted: Thu May 26, 2011 10:38 pm   Post subject: Re: RE:What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Tony @ Wed May 25, 2011 9:39 pm wrote:
Is everyone you talk to looking for a job where they don't have to think much and not have to ever learn new skills? My personal suggestion -- find a more diverse group of people.

But I suppose that you should be asking yourself this question: is it a bad thing if you'll get to learn new skills later in life? Just how much effort would you want to put into a job/career/vocation?


I just don't want to have a job that is too stressful. I don't mind learning new things, but I'm afraid of losing my job once I'm old and unable to keep up.
Tony




PostPosted: Thu May 26, 2011 11:17 pm   Post subject: RE:What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Stress is proportional to the amount of responsibility you take on. Servers go down in the middle of the night, and you are the one carrying the pager? Bad news. Are you a project lead and made promisses of deadlines that you are not keeping up with? Yeah, that's stressful. But you could also do freelance web-design work from your home, and charge as much as doctors that save lives. So it's really up to you to pick how much stress you want to take on (provided that you are skillful enough to easily move in between jobs and/or set your own rates).

Quote:

I'm afraid of losing my job once I'm old and unable to keep up.

This is applicable to every industry. The only way to be unable to perform your work, but keep the job anyway is to get a tenure or join a powerful enough union. I am under the impression that such is not typically available in technical industries as there is little tolerance for bluntly incompetent work (e.g. would you want to use a building/plane/car where a safety-critical system was worked on by a non-qualified Engineer?). So you could try going into academia instead.

Or... change your mind, decide that non-stressful but guaranteed employment is a shallow and boring path, and pursue something that's really exciting.
Latest from compsci.ca/blog: Tony's programming blog. DWITE - a programming contest.
yoursecretninja




PostPosted: Fri May 27, 2011 10:42 am   Post subject: Re: What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Quote:
...but I've heard from virtually everyone that a job in computer science is tiring and laborious. Also that computer science is always changing, so as you get older it is difficult to keep up with the changing technology since you have to constantly learn new skills.


If a career didn't have those traits, I would not be interested. What worthwhile career does not involve hard work, discipline and life long commitment to learning? Certainly this is required of athletes, musicians, scientists, engineers, lawyers, doctors, educators, accountants, managers, and many more professions. The world changes; disciplines change; people change. Professionals need to keep up with changes and advancements or fall behind and pay the consequences for that.

But hey, the easy road goes nowhere fast.
SmokeMonster




PostPosted: Sat May 28, 2011 1:41 am   Post subject: Re: What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

If you really wanted you could probably find a job where you to have to learn very little new stuff. I mean to this day there exist people who are solely COBOL programmers and make good money at it, there are programmers making a good living programming in VB6 for banks and other such institutions. There are industries which are very conservative in terms of the technologies they use and resistant or very slow to change. It's probably not the most exciting kind of work but hey if it floats your boat.

If you have your fundamentals solid picking up and learning new technologies should not be hard or stressful.
pinedroses




PostPosted: Sun May 29, 2011 2:26 pm   Post subject: Re: What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Are most computer science jobs programming jobs?
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Tony




PostPosted: Sun May 29, 2011 2:46 pm   Post subject: RE:What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Programming and Software Engineering probably make up the bulk of the jobs. But there are also Database Managers, System Administrators, Network technicians, Security... R&D labs are often interesting in many ways.
Latest from compsci.ca/blog: Tony's programming blog. DWITE - a programming contest.
btiffin




PostPosted: Mon May 30, 2011 2:35 am   Post subject: Re: What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

pinedroses @ Wed May 25, 2011 9:12 pm wrote:
... are these jobs are all tiring and laborious like everyone says?

Umm, who have you been talking to? Smile

I've been a fisherman, a door to door salesman, a janitor, a retail flunky, a drywaller and mostly a programmer. In terms of laborious, all but the last. In terms of tiring, all. And the only reason programming is tiring (for me) is that you sit in a chair and rot away while wiggling fingers (or need to pull the odd 37 hour day to meet a poorly managed release schedule).

Work is work. Happy happy fun time isn't. Find what you love and pursue it. If you don't or can't, well, life will likely seem like labour. My drywall boss loves his life, lives it with gusto. I struggled to keep up the pace, but it was still rewarding. We built houses. Hefting 28 kilogram shingle bundles up a ladder is not labour to him, it's 'get 'er done', and he loves it. I've got a few friends that have never left school. I would have exploded by now in an academic career path. I've witnessed office workers that dreaded getting up in the morning, last ones in, complain and mope all day, first ones out. Sad that. In those same offices, others came in whistling, worked harder than everyone else and left satisfied, looking forward to attacking every tomorrow.

I'd be hard pressed to call computer science careers laborious (but I also love it and fill in my free time with the same things that I get paid for). COBOL for fun, at the moment.

Cheers
2goto1




PostPosted: Mon May 30, 2011 8:23 am   Post subject: RE:What jobs can one get with a Computer Science degree?

Walmart would be a pretty low-stress "career"...other than that I don't know of many careers that aren't labourious or require upgrading of skills, or at least keeping them at a consistently high level. Your best bet for a happy life is to find something that you enjoy doing rather than trying to figure out what is the easiest possible job you can do.

As far as what else can you do with a comp sci degree, there are lots of things that you can do. There are other jobs with a comp sci degree. Tech consulting companies are good in that you can often learn a lot of non-tech stuff, such as leading development teams (soft skills), meeting clients face to face and facilitating meetings with them for a wide variety of things (project kick-offs, discovery phases, requirements phases, etc.), writing proposals and presenting them to potential clients (business development), etc. Plus you often get the chance to collaborate with other disciplines in your company (information architects, graphic designers, project and program managers, directors, etc.).

If you like tech, communicate well verbally and in written form, are quick to think on your feet, are a people person, but don't really know what floats your boat in tech, then a tech consulting job can really help you to identify your strengths and weaknesses, as well as what your likes and dislikes are.

If you're not sure if tech is the path that you want to go, but you like it enough to study it, perhaps get a minor in something else to keep other interests open such as finance / economics, etc.
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