Just what does she say? I imagine the answers can be humorous!
PS Take "Mom" to mean Mom, Nana, daughter, Son, or whatever seems appropriate for the comment!
In fact, I had to explain to my wife (and mother in law) what my father in law dad and her brother did in their careers.
They claim the guys never explain it but I found that their eyes glaze over!
Narrator: "In fact, the Internet is never safe"
I've worked on a lot more interesting CRUD, E2E encryption, and projects for industrial manufacturers that easily dwarf the size and scope of that location finder. It's just Google's geocoding API, some KLM files and a CMS I'm sure you've heard of. I think it sticks out because my parents and I are from a small town and we rarely ate out. When we did, that chain was the only place close enough to deliver to us, so they deeply and immediately relate to the value proposition.
EDIT: updated to more accurately reflect language my parents would use
My first job was building custom cars with my father when I went to live with him when I was 14 years old. We worked on a lot of cars for movies and celebrities in Hollywood. My mother lived in Rockford, Il and, honestly, I didn't believe my father either until I moved there to live with him.
Years later when I was in my 30s I started learning how to program and my mother didn't believe I could ever do that until I started a business. And, to make even harder for her I was building web sites and ticketing software for entertainers in Branson, Mo.
She ended up moving here shortly after I did and got to meet a lot of them and she was like a teenage girl when she did, calling all her friends and telling them about it, and bragging about me. She was too cute. It was awesome to see her get so excited.
STILL, "my son built the Breaking News banner on cnn.com!" is the thing that
my mom tells her friends. It's the only thing that my wife ever understood
about what I do for a living.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31598324Breaking News banner on cnn.com!" is the thing that my mom tells her friends. It's the only thing that my wife ever understood about what I do for a living. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31598324
She's not wrong... but it's kind of like saying construction laborers "work on the earth"
Good chuckle regardless
Amusingly enough, my dad, who has written kernel-level drivers, has basically the same answer for what I do.
Me? I’m a janitor for the internet plumbers.
Maybe he's just learned the futility of trying to give more detail.
I've spent 10+ years in SaaS businesses, and I've simplified my job description to: I work for a software company.
It does not say anything about what I do, it could mean engineering or accounting or... And if/when people want to know more, they just ask.
Bring rather vague helps everyone get just what they want. I always show up happy to answer and open for questions but also offer them exit paths regularly.
I happen to be a software engineer, currently employed to manage an enginering team, since you ask.
I see now where I misunderstood. I took that to mean the roles that you performed in the course of your work despite your job title, not that a variety of job roles are available in specific companies such as SaaS. Thank you for clarifying.
I know that's not the answer anyone is looking for, but I'd suspect there are a lot of moms like this.
The other part of my work mix is building websites, since the mid to late-90s. While the web is now common enough that my parents get it, I never found a good way to explain websites to young children.
I'm from India and what she really said was "iski company sabzi delivery karti hai". There's a lot of cultural baggage in that statement but they sounded worried about my future :)
But I don't know what to tell my parents, saying "he builds software for a living" isn't really that much more specific, and they resort to "My son is in IT"
I got slightly more curiosity with "I build Apps" when I used to build mobile apps. But not with my parents.
Web Developer
Software Engineer
This answer also applies to my wife, who knows what I do but doesn't care to explain it to anyone for fear of more questions. :). Also she mostly just cares that the bill get paid.
I'm also often surprised how often (non-tech-industry) friends have thought I "work for Apple". I do Mac & iOS development but have never worked for Apple. One friend in particular honestly couldn't wrap his head around how I made iOS apps but didn't work for Apple.
My mum seems to think I'm some sort of programmer. My background is in software engineering, so I can certainly code, but it's not something I regularly do in my day job.
My dad hears the word "manager" in my job title and thinks my job is to give orders to other people. Leaving aside the fact that management in general isn't really about giving orders, it's difficult for me to explain in a way that he'll understand that just because my job title includes the word "manager" doesn't mean I'm the boss. Yes, I collaborate with colleagues, but I'm not involved in hiring and firing.
It's analogous to the relationship between mechanical engineers and mechanics or machinists. Yeah, they're both working with 'physical technology' and there's some overlap in skills, but they're ultimately very different roles.
Mom has a fairly reasonable idea of what I do. Once upon a time, she was the public library director and ran the NOC for country government, because the T1 terminated in the library. (It was a small town.)
...as an intern for a computational engineering program in Chattanooga, TN, where I changed RAM in servers. We received like $10k in NASA funding.
His parents told him that was back before Uncle (me) invented color. He bought it.
"Oh! He's the guy that rang the other day letting me know I had something wrong with my computer. He helped me with it after I gave him my password."
Sister: "He builds websites or something."
Grandparents: "Complicated computer stuff."
What I actually do: Lead-Developer/Team-Leader for a data analytics company.
What they think I do: Computer things
What my non-technical co-workers think I do: Make the dashboard better.
What I really do: Talk out loud to the screen and lots of searching
What my cat thinks I do: Not give her enough head scritchies
In the end it does not seem to matter how accurate I have been through my career: Consultant, Solution Architect, Engineering Manager, "integrate banks' systems with other banks", etc, all most people hear is that I work with computers, which always get followed up with a comment about their printer not working.
So I often give up and just say I am a "programmer".
She is also having a very hard time understanding how I/we work remotely from different countries. I’ve never personally met any of my colleagues and that’s almost inconceivable to her generation.
She has only worked with people micro managing her or her micro managing others (Typical old Korean work culture), so the fact that we work effectively without being in the same room with managers is surprising to her.
She usually says her son is a computer programmer and sometimes, if asked, mentions what the company that I work for does.
You could tell her to butt off, but only if you feel you need to...
What I want to do: make them an amazingly capable human being and leave them to make themselves happy.
What I must stop myself doing: intervening ALL the time, advising how to do it better, helicopter etc etc.
It isn't always easy to stand by and watch your kid hurt themselves.
It's by far the hardest thing you have to do, but the only consolation is that if you let them push the boundaries early they more quickly learn that they have boundaries.
Of course you limit the maximum harm, but finding things that are "acceptable" is the trick.
Now she asks for money and I tell her she should get a real job. She’s of course just confused, as she in her view was only trying to help while I “drifted aimlessly”, building a company up and cashing out.
It was definitely easiest to explain when I worked for Groupon. The funny thing is she would actually email me about Groupons for things she thought I needed… I bought a blender and a vacuum cleaner by her recommendation.
My wife tells people she doesn’t know what I do aside from make money…
i distill concentrates for a medical marijuana cultivator in a part of the country where it's still a real cointoss on how ppl her age feel about that
Which gets the point across pretty well, honestly.
Our industry has lots parents that aren't really equipped in any way to really grock what we do outside of computers, I'd assume taking that limited knowledge and trying to answer with more than 'computers' might be more of a pain in the ass than saying 'IDK'
Wouldn't be to hard on them, there's a lot of valid reasons to say IDK without being a bad parent.
Some days I am not sure what my job is.
Now, you know how conductors twitch their batons and give directions to various musicians and sections of musicians? That's a kind of dance. "devops" means talking to the devs and the operators and writing choreography for that dance, to be performed by another computer system. Then you watch the conductor's dance and make sure that the conductor is doing the right moves at the right time and the musicians are properly playing the symphony.
Which is at odds with how I’m treated by my immediate coworkers. Like there’s some respect there, but my team are the only hourly employees. Suffice to say, it’s supposed to be a white collar job but I feel and get treated blue collar. I don’t feel much pride.
But I look at my desk job and think that even if I am ageist-outed from my job when I am 50 at least I won't have years of physiological damage that actual blue collar workers and tradies can accumulate.
My wife still has about the same level of understanding despite more than one long car trip where I explained exactly what I do, she just doesn't understand "cloud".
So she just says "He works in IT".
"yourapostasy is a programmer"
I'll allow it, it is a step up from "...works on computers".
I am long term IT. Now my son has joined the world of IT I get how people have no real concept of what we do.
This is the line I tell non-gamers so they can repeat it. Usually people end up reminiscing about Blockbuster .
Feels accurate.
She didn't get into specifics as they did ask when I bumped into them.
50% joke 50% that’s the best thing she could come up with :)
Probably this.
that or "plays with computers" -- 'playing' being assigned regardless of how much cash I earn.
I honestly prefer the simplicity compared to some long drawn out explanation and career title .