If you were in the same industry (potentially the same company) for 12 years, you may be getting tagged with a bit of a "career employee" stigma. I'm 49 now and took 5 years out between the ages of 39-44 to teach English in Japan. I'm back in the industry now. It took me about a month to get a job when I came back.
The key is really flexibility. If you have a a very narrow focus, you will have difficulty getting work. You need to be able to take on anything. In my career, I've worked in health care, Windows productivity apps, telecom and now I'm doing business systems/web development.
There is absolutely nothing wrong being a pre-sales guy. There is tons of work in that area. But if you try to stay in a particular technology area, you may find that there just isn't much work. You need to show that you can branch out and be productive in whatever a company needs you to do.
For me, having a portfolio and a solid side project helped a lot. If you are working now, I recommend spending the next year taking 8-10 hours a weeks to build a good portfolio that show-cases what you can do. A side project is fine, or several projects, or concentrate on writing blog posts -- whatever you think will be able to sell your skills in the future.
Also, take time to go to meetups, coding dojos, etc. Again, if you spend one day a week for the next year in these kinds of activities, you will find that you will be well plugged in to the local scene.
And yes... I realise that this is pretty difficult when you want to also have a life outside of work. But it will pay considerable dividends for your career.
The key is really flexibility. If you have a a very narrow focus, you will have difficulty getting work. You need to be able to take on anything. In my career, I've worked in health care, Windows productivity apps, telecom and now I'm doing business systems/web development.
There is absolutely nothing wrong being a pre-sales guy. There is tons of work in that area. But if you try to stay in a particular technology area, you may find that there just isn't much work. You need to show that you can branch out and be productive in whatever a company needs you to do.
For me, having a portfolio and a solid side project helped a lot. If you are working now, I recommend spending the next year taking 8-10 hours a weeks to build a good portfolio that show-cases what you can do. A side project is fine, or several projects, or concentrate on writing blog posts -- whatever you think will be able to sell your skills in the future.
Also, take time to go to meetups, coding dojos, etc. Again, if you spend one day a week for the next year in these kinds of activities, you will find that you will be well plugged in to the local scene.
And yes... I realise that this is pretty difficult when you want to also have a life outside of work. But it will pay considerable dividends for your career.