For some reason I thought OP was talking about continuing to work full time and also taking courses toward the masters, paid for by the employer after the courses are completed? Not taking a couple years off from his job. If that is the case, would that not make him more appealing to prospective employers down the road--to have the uninterrupted work experience plus showing the initiative to work toward a masters at the same time?
True, getting the degree while working minimizes the lost experience that would come with taking time off work to get the degree. However, I still think the time spent on the degree is much better invested elsewhere. Let's say that a masters degree would take XXXX hrs of your time above and beyond work. In my mind, there's so many better ways to use that time.
For me, I'd vote personal development first - always wanted to learn to play guitar? speak another language? rebuild an engine? You won't believe how little time you have once you settle down with family - that XXXX hrs of personal time will be worth so much more when you're 40.
But focusing on career development - the biggest problem I see with developers is that they're too focused on the code. I blame schools for instilling this almost religious treatment of technology and almost no focus on the business of creating solutions. Becoming a more well-rounded team member means you'll have a huge advantage over your peers.
1) Learn your business/industry - whatever industry you happen to be in, spend the time to learn how it works, and get to a point where you can talk shop with your users and your customers. PMs generally spend most of their time trying to figure out how to make business users happy - if you can communicate effectively with them, they'll love you, and so will your PM. As a bonus, if you stay in your industry when looking for another job, your knowledge of the industry will be a tremendous advantage.
2) Learn how to communicate - there's lots of options - public speaking, technical writing, meeting facilitation, presentation skills, etc. Generally be someone that can communicate well, don't be the guy that the PM locks up in the back office - be the guy that the PM would be comfortable interacting with anyone and everyone.
3) Learn how to estimate properly - nothing more frustrating for a PM or Business than a techie that estimates everything at "more than two days and less than two months". Learn how to estimate work and help the project manager. Do a proper work breakdown into logical units, estimate tasks using reasonable historical data, document your assumptions. Basically, make it easier for the PM to understand how you're approaching a problem. That's his problem? Maybe, but he'll like working with you 100x more than the guy who claims things get done when they get done.
4) Learn how to do light graphical and user experience work - appearances are everything to most non-technical folks, and like it or not, your work is going to be judged by how it looks more than just about anything else. Most projects don't have access (or enough access) to folks that can do a proper visual treatment. Learn enough image editing and authoring skills to create decent looking user interfaces and documents. Learn enough usability and interaction design skills to create efficient screen layouts. You'll be amazed how much more people love your work when it looks nice and flows well
5) Learn how to do proper testing - take classes in QA and Testing. Learn the testing tools your QA folks use. Your code will be more robust and you won't be the guy that gets blamed next time there's downtime due to an emergency patch.
I could go on and on, but you get the idea. Yes, you have to be a good developer first and foremost, but realistically, no one is going to judge you on how elegant your code is - at least, for the folks that matter, they'll judge your value on how you contribute to the overall development process. Each of the items above will help elevate your status in the eye of your boss (PM), and his boss (realistically the Business)
Sure you could be like the vast majority of the developers out there that stick their head in the sand on anything unrelated to technology - there was a time (.com bubble) when technology was king, but now, technology is just another commodity - the more generic your skills, the more likely you'll be outsourced or downsized.
Instead, be the standout - sooner or later you'll be the go-to guy/gal that the business can't do without. Even if you don't go into mgmt, you'll find you get a lot more input into what projects you get assigned to, and what parts of those projects you get to work on. You might even make some more money
OP - hopefully you don't think I'm implying by the above that you're lacking in the skills listed. I don't know anything about you other than that you want to make more money, don't want to go into mgmt, and like software development! Lots of generalizations on my part, but hopefully you get the gist of it, which is that, even if you don't stop work for a masters, I think your time is much better spent developing useful skills vs. collecting degrees.
