Advice for Someone Considering Being a Developer
November 15, 2017A friend of a friend is considering becoming a developer and recently asked my opinion on it. The following blog post is adapted from that.
First, I’ll start with why I like software development. It’s a challenging career where you get to spend your time solving problems. Sometimes the problems aren’t all that exciting or big, and sometimes they are. While I’m sure this could be true of other jobs, I’ve come to love how you can feel like an idiot and then a genius in the span of 10 minutes sometimes. It can and often is frustrating, but that goes away with time and experience and banging your head into the wall.
Starting with Codecademy can be great. It at least can show you if you hate it. I started with similar tools. Once you get an intro there, the best way to learn after that is by doing. You’ll encounter new problems, work with people who show you new techniques, and be able to see more advanced things for what they are. It’s a double-edge sword because how can you do it without landing that first job? Often you’ll hear that you should do side-projects to learn new things. That’s great, and is certainly a straightforward way to learn new things, but it is time-consuming and takes a lot of discipline.
Another way to get into it is taking the sideways route. I’ve known multiple people who’ve done this. Basically, you get in at a medium-sized tech company in a role that fits your background or skills and isn’t directly development. I won’t suggest that’s an easy task, but it’s doable. From there, you can learn what that company needs in terms of development and slide into it. A couple roles that can transition pretty well include quality assurance and project management. Once a company has someone who is interested in being a developer, they’ll often encourage it.
I’d be remiss to not mention coding bootcamps. They tout that their graduates get jobs and that they’re a great way to network. I haven’t worked with or met someone who’s gone that route, so I can’t really speak to it. They do take a significant time and investment since they’re long and not cheap, but it seems likely they would give you a solid foundation and entry point into development.
Finally, I want to make sure I emphasize that there are a lot of opportunities and you absolutely can take advantage. It might take some time to break in, but don’t let that discourage you. Development is like any other job, it takes some time and effort to get the swing of it, but you can do it. It doesn’t take some special person to do it. As long as you’re ok with having a lot of computer time, then you can certainly do it.
