I've only been in the software industry for about 2 years now. I graduated with a Bachelors in Software Engineering in 2016. I can say that the one thing I regret the most is not doing and side work/projects to gain more knowledge about software development.
With that being said, it was really difficult to find a job at first. Being a recent grad I had NO experience. So to land a job I had to really sell my self. I was lucky to land a job and jump straight into developing in the .NET/Microsoft stack. I learned SO much more in about 1 month on the job than I ever have in 4 years of University. I have seen a lot of other new developers experience this too.
Over these two years I have worked on about 4 different key projects and have gained knowledge on other tools that help in software development. I have heard many stories where junior devs, or entry level devs, get stuck on a bug queue for about a year before they do any actual development in significant projects. In my opinion this is only going to stifle them. If you give a new developer the proper guidance and tools you can be amazed at what they can accomplish. Being stuck in bug queue for a prolonged period of time doesn't allow a new developer, or any developer for that matter, to grow and gain company knowledge. Because there is nothing more deadly than a great developer who also truly understands the business rules of a company.
What was your experience like as a new developer? Did you work on significant projects, or were you given "easy" work?
Top comments (6)
I have no CS backgroud, i am nurse. lol. but immediatly after gradulation i applied to one startup, was there 2 months and i learned quite much from that world, even it laid my foundantions for my routines in present.
after that i spent 5 years in small company. there in start i get only maintenmence stuff nobody wanted, but after that there was new projects i was assigned to. mostly it was one man show, so i had to learn how to write offerings, calculate price, and so on. i became Full Stack web developer.
Because customers vary i had oportunity to work with many different technologies. W had one bigger project, where we tried how it is to have “big data”, now when doins something small i am like “3Q ueries... isnt that much? :D
I think this experience prepared me very well for my current path: Freelance
sumUp: if xou sre not confortwble with it, try it anyway, you never know that experience will be needed :)
That’s so great to hear! I’m glad you found your path!!
I graduated in 2016 too, after that I worked in a public company where I built one key project (an e-payment website that counts 100k payments till now), but after that there was nothing interesting, so I decided to quit. I currently work in a startup doing mostly small tasks, you can say I'm stuck in the bug queue and that makes me feel uncomfortable (fortunately the salary is good), so I'm looking for new opportunities where I get to work on interesting projects with a team of seniors. This is my story.
Come and work with me on what really matters, so you matter too.
Same story bro! Graduated in 2018 and 1 month of learning experience feels far better than the entire university experience.
Haha yeah! It’s amazing how much you can soak up in one month on the job.