I originally posted this on my blog about a year and a half ago. If it's interesting to you, I post new content there roughly weekly.
This week's ...
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Very good post, thank you. I had never thought about that, but the idea of making hiring me less risky makes a lot of sense! I already write, but I have to start doing more open source contributions!
Thanks again :)
Thanks for the note, and glad if it helped. Best of luck with finding that first gig!
(As an aside, I have a business that pairs dev community contributors with tech companies to write for their blogs. Feel free to DM me if you'd like to learn more about doing that as a side hustle.)
I am totally DMing you about that! Thanks!!!
4 is a good point. I majored in film. Went to a UX Bootcamp, and was hired as a UX Designer. There I learned Javascript while getting paid. Caviat: I knew html/css since high school and was kind of coming full circle back to it. Still no CS degree, although I've had some brief periods where I felt imposter syndrome (namely only when prepping for coding interviews, not for day to day stuff).
I'd also recommend broadening your scope to Smaller businesses who still need digital technology/website devs. Not all companies you work at will have prestige, but they will take a chance on you and can lead to bigger better things if you so choose.
Applying to smaller businesses is a great point. (Personally, if I were still a workaday dev I'd have less than zero interest in FAANG companies and would almost exclusively want to work for smaller businesses, so it didn't occur to me to even make that distinction while writing.)
Very Intersting read! I've been in Software for over 20 years, I have degrees but in nothing based in Computers / Engineering / Mathematics, in fact they are all Environmental Law related (including most of a PhD). I began in Ireland during the tech boom (Celtic Tiger) and have ended up the past 15 years in Finland, and I can say in that time, about 95% of all those people I encountered in my career, Software people, Agile Managers etc had almost no related edcucation in Software, and those that did found the degrees to be largley out of date by the time they left academia and entered the job market.
CS degrees, particularly in Finland, at least previously, tended to focus on the engineering and networking side of things, there was very little coding. In fact, a friend of mine undertook a Bachelors in CS here (a rather less common degree, most are Masters) and he had only 6 weeks of Java as the software aspect in the entire course! Wanting to go into software, he took a further Masters in Software Engineeering after, but still has trouble finding work as the time he had completed the course, technology had moved on somewhat.
I am entirely self taught, I threw in a few bootcamps when I could, but I landed my first junior role many moons ago on the back of a self studied Java course, and a bootcamp, and now I am a senior Software developer with a range of languages and skills under my belt, no official cs education.
Things do seem to be progressing though, the advent of the internet, online education and the sheer range of technology needs (such as the rise of AI) mean that several colleges and instiutions here are pushing a more softwatre centric curriculum in CS and other courses, and there is a greater structure for industry involvement in the Universities, giving students some experience of real life work in actual real projects and research.
One thing that pushes this was the Finnish Governments move to reduce public funding for universities and encourage better industry ties for funding, this has led to some great interactions, which is great for making CS and other academic study more relevant and up tpo date with technology, and to keep industry in touch with the next generation of software developers and engineers.
Now I am seeing younger people coming into the industry with a far greater range of skills and knowledge than before which is pretty exciting.
The focus of CS degrees is an interesting topic. I feel like a lot of them are probably making concerted efforts to include more relevant/applicable coursework for actual work as a software engineer.
Personally, my bachelor's in CS (graduated in 2001) involved a lot of programming in C and C++ with a little assembly language. I remember projects that involved building lexers and parsers, implementing TCP/IP, implementing memory allocation and freeing, encryption algorithms -- stuff like that. So it was code-heavy, but not the kind of stuff you'd do in the real world, for the most part (too wheel-reinventing, with the exception of what we did for a database course I took).
By the time I got a master's (graduation 2011 or so, IIRC), there was at least available coursework that was specifically designed more to coincide with the corporate world. I took a couple of software engineering courses that touched on project management methodologies and code maintenance techniques/patterns, for instance. But it was still largely academic (with the code we'd write being the same).
With all of the years I spent in CS programs, it seemed like the main thrust was to give you the mathematical underpinnings of programming concepts. The merits of this approach are certainly up for debate, but I wonder if the pendulum can possibly swing much further as long as FAANG companies model their interivew process after my CS-451 Alogrithms midterm exam.
In other words, Silicon Valley seems to fetishize theoretical/non-practical knowledge into its qualification processes, which probably puts a natural governor on how practically useful CS degrees can make themselves. At least, as long as companies insist on conducting interviews this way.
Really interesting read. Even for people looking for a new job!
Cheers 🍻
Thanks for the kind words!
I thoroughly enjoyed reading your post. It was pleasantly surprising to discover that the tips you shared are still applicable even after almost 3 years, especially with the current concern over new technology and the AI revolution. I've taken notes and am prepared to implement them. Thank you very much for sharing.
Just going through the learning stage, I just started coding and I'll be doing my best to build up relationships from today.
Great write up
Thanks! And yeah, this is absolutely the best time to start. It looks like you're one step ahead of the game, too. Just being on a site like this and interacting with folks is a great start.
Nice Read Bro. 😍
Thanks for writing.
Thanks for the kind words -- glad you liked!