Hello. Just came across this article and decided to share my story. I was graduated from the Business School in 2014 with a 1st class degree. Shortly after that, I realised that I lack technical knowledge as I could not perform on my first job after graduation at the start-up company. I left this job by myself after only 3 months. Right after, I decided to study computer science topics by myself as well as completing online tutorials and getting some 'Mickey Mouse' certificates (edx, coursera, codecademy, treehouse, youtube and many others). It was tremendous amount of pressure on my shoulders, as I was short of cash, but luckily I had at least my girlfriend next to me, who was supporting my idea. I started with Python and Flask, so that I know at least how to build a website. Surely, it was not enough to get into software development, but was good enough to get into more technical position 5 months later e.g. web analytics and perform pretty well there. Not to say, I had to leave my girlfriend for a period of 7 months, to get some experience in another city, which is egoistic given that she was all these time next to me. It was a hell and I do not know how we saved our relationship on distance. Then, I returned and changed to the similar job, which involved working with data and reporting. Also, nothing too advanced, but still plenty room for demonstrating technical knowledge, integrating different tools, analysing, debugging and even proposing possible solutions. In the meantime, I continued learning programming. Got some work related rewards for performing well. Eventually, in March 2018, I have been offered a chance to step into full-time software engineering at my latest company, after working as a web analyst for 2 years. I was about to be promoted second time, but I reset my career by switching to software engineering, which is mostly front-end related. Now I am junior again and hopefully I can reach mid-level this year. It is crazy, remarkable and very, very painful at the same time. Am I proud? Yes. Do I feel satisfied? Not really. I guess I do well by putting constantly myself under more crazy amount of pressure, which is close to masochisms. There are so many things yet to learn, that it feels that I need a lifetime to reach at least a minimum level of comfort and satisfaction. At the end of the day, I want to be relevant and build something cool, useful, meaningful, rather than just being employed. I work with React Native and React, practice Angular at home by building my app and know a bit of Python, but I am not an expert in any of these technologies yet. New things come out on daily basis and I gotta jump on the bandwagon and learn it, because tomorrow we're going to use it. I am 28 now, I feel lonely in my world and completely have no feeling how I am doing. Meanwhile, respect to my girlfriend as it will be 5 years in October since we're together :))) P.S. I also thought that running a Twitter account may become a long-term investment, but tbh, I deal not really well with that as I am not really a social-media type of person. twitter.com/igorsmirnov_tw
That's quite a journey! Thank for sharing this. I just followed you on Twitter 👍
Would love to keep in touch.
Sometimes it takes hard work (a lot...) to achieve your goals. But dude - you're a software developer now! If you feel like you don't know enough stuff - the sad truth is that you will always feel that way 🤦♂️.
I still feel that way after over 5 years in the industry (not counting 2 years at school). I know developers who are 10 years+ that still feel the same way.
I wouldn't beat yourself up over that. It's just the way the industry is. You're very fortunate though to be working with very relevant technologies like React, Angular, etc. Some devs are stuck working with really irrelevant technologies and struggle to get out of that hole.
I love what you said, "I want to be relevant and build something cool, useful, meaningful, rather than just being employed"
That's something I think many developers feel at some point in their career. There's nothing stopping anyone from building cool stuff! It's quite a privilege to be able to do that.
Thanks again!
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Hello. Just came across this article and decided to share my story. I was graduated from the Business School in 2014 with a 1st class degree. Shortly after that, I realised that I lack technical knowledge as I could not perform on my first job after graduation at the start-up company. I left this job by myself after only 3 months. Right after, I decided to study computer science topics by myself as well as completing online tutorials and getting some 'Mickey Mouse' certificates (edx, coursera, codecademy, treehouse, youtube and many others). It was tremendous amount of pressure on my shoulders, as I was short of cash, but luckily I had at least my girlfriend next to me, who was supporting my idea. I started with Python and Flask, so that I know at least how to build a website. Surely, it was not enough to get into software development, but was good enough to get into more technical position 5 months later e.g. web analytics and perform pretty well there. Not to say, I had to leave my girlfriend for a period of 7 months, to get some experience in another city, which is egoistic given that she was all these time next to me. It was a hell and I do not know how we saved our relationship on distance. Then, I returned and changed to the similar job, which involved working with data and reporting. Also, nothing too advanced, but still plenty room for demonstrating technical knowledge, integrating different tools, analysing, debugging and even proposing possible solutions. In the meantime, I continued learning programming. Got some work related rewards for performing well. Eventually, in March 2018, I have been offered a chance to step into full-time software engineering at my latest company, after working as a web analyst for 2 years. I was about to be promoted second time, but I reset my career by switching to software engineering, which is mostly front-end related. Now I am junior again and hopefully I can reach mid-level this year. It is crazy, remarkable and very, very painful at the same time. Am I proud? Yes. Do I feel satisfied? Not really. I guess I do well by putting constantly myself under more crazy amount of pressure, which is close to masochisms. There are so many things yet to learn, that it feels that I need a lifetime to reach at least a minimum level of comfort and satisfaction. At the end of the day, I want to be relevant and build something cool, useful, meaningful, rather than just being employed. I work with React Native and React, practice Angular at home by building my app and know a bit of Python, but I am not an expert in any of these technologies yet. New things come out on daily basis and I gotta jump on the bandwagon and learn it, because tomorrow we're going to use it. I am 28 now, I feel lonely in my world and completely have no feeling how I am doing. Meanwhile, respect to my girlfriend as it will be 5 years in October since we're together :))) P.S. I also thought that running a Twitter account may become a long-term investment, but tbh, I deal not really well with that as I am not really a social-media type of person. twitter.com/igorsmirnov_tw
Wow, respect
That's quite a journey! Thank for sharing this. I just followed you on Twitter 👍
Would love to keep in touch.
Sometimes it takes hard work (a lot...) to achieve your goals. But dude - you're a software developer now! If you feel like you don't know enough stuff - the sad truth is that you will always feel that way 🤦♂️.
I still feel that way after over 5 years in the industry (not counting 2 years at school). I know developers who are 10 years+ that still feel the same way.
I wouldn't beat yourself up over that. It's just the way the industry is. You're very fortunate though to be working with very relevant technologies like React, Angular, etc. Some devs are stuck working with really irrelevant technologies and struggle to get out of that hole.
I love what you said, "I want to be relevant and build something cool, useful, meaningful, rather than just being employed"
That's something I think many developers feel at some point in their career. There's nothing stopping anyone from building cool stuff! It's quite a privilege to be able to do that.
Thanks again!