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What would a recession mean for developers?

blog.boot.dev

61–70 of 143 posts

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#61
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean if that's what you gotta to do get your foot in the door, that's what you gotta do. My first job out of college in the late 90s took 3 months to find. I already had an internship where I did development for money and networking and workstation support. For the first job, I built the applications, designed the database, setup all the servers and all the workstations. I even crimped network cables and managed a…

"if you bust your ass like you're trying to impress the hell out of someone, people will notice and eventually, good things will happen" In most industries, most of the time hard work no longer pays off. It is not rewarded, it is exploited. The people who would notice are increasingly sociopathic and short-highted, because that's how you make it these days. Hard work can still open doors, but you have to be smart abo…

the point is to impress while delivering, not delivering to impress. perhaps a subtle difference, but of huge importance to priorities of the individual.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#62
post #17

I'm someone who qualifies as a junior developer even though I have a minor in CS, a BS in math, and a BS in mechanical engineering. My career has been an interesting journey. I've worked in sales, taught high school mathematic and computer science, and led technical SEO for multiple successful startups. I left all that in January to pursue my dream of becoming a full-time frontend developer. My wife and I have two da…

If you’re willing to “out” yourself publicly here, and assuming it’s not against any rules, you could post a link to your GitHub profile if you’ve got some open source work out there. Can’t promise it’ll help, but a lot more people read these comments than comment themselves… …a LOT more.

I'm one of those.

I'm more interested in the comments than the posts.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#63
This is something worrying me, looking for a junior role. I was a teacher for 5 years (math and physics) and recently went back to get a masters in Theoretical Physics and Applied Maths, mostly leaning towards the latter. Lots of data science-y stuff and mathematical modelling. Been applying to jobs for a while now, and no luck unfortunately. Wondering if I should just give up and go back to teaching, especially as I can return to my old school which was laid back and not horrible (and I didn't hate teaching), or keep pushing through. I've got a runway of about a year, depending on how reasonable the housing I can find in Ireland is (not very).

Part of my issue is I'm also looking in Ireland, where I'll require a visa, even if it's a critical needs job so they're easier to get. Does hurt, but I haven't had any luck with my applications in America either.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't really paid attention to that market for quite a while, but when I was actively looking for a job as a junior dev in SF in 2012, I remember being absolutely maddened by patio11's repeated comments the roaring demand for devs. "Anyone who can fizzbuzz" was the phrase I remember him using. At that time I was junior, but I'd made and published 3 flash games, hacked on the UI of my WP blog quite a bit and made…

Part of the problem is perhaps that you were looking for titles explicitly coded 'junior' at all. Title inflation basically means that many devs that would basically be juniors in real engineering companies are considered senior. It's a weird market where the difference between 0 and 1 year of experience can be so dramatically reflected in salaries and opportunities.

I saw a job posting recently looking for senior developers with 3 years of work experience. I mean, I have 3 years of full time experience + a little more experience working part time and internships, and I would consider myself a junior dev.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#65
post #17

I'm someone who qualifies as a junior developer even though I have a minor in CS, a BS in math, and a BS in mechanical engineering. My career has been an interesting journey. I've worked in sales, taught high school mathematic and computer science, and led technical SEO for multiple successful startups. I left all that in January to pursue my dream of becoming a full-time frontend developer. My wife and I have two da…

No post body was provided.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#66

If you really just need work asap, Upwork is a great place to go. However, I have love/hate relationship with the platform, as getting noticed can be very hard and they take money off the table. But having found permanent employment on there, and also having hired people on there, sorry to be biased, but if you sound like a native speaker and can hold your own in a Zoom meeting, that's half the yardstick met for me w…

Backed by YC, there is one startup doing that:

https://techcrunch.com/2021/07/27/boldvoice-y-combinator-pre...

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#67
post #10

The market being harder for juniors seems correct from what I’m seeing. I’ve been looking frequently for the last month to see what’s out there, and virtually no one I’ve noticed is seeking junior developers.

If the funnel for juniors tightens up for a couple years, won't the shortage for senior+ worsen down the road? I see this as overall bad for innovation.

No post body was provided.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#68
post #8

The weird part of this advice to me is all the "CS fundamentals" biz. It's admittedly been quite a while since I've felt the need to go out for "junior" roles, but I have a lot of close friends who are recent boot camp grads, and it seems to me that most success in an interview boils down to interpersonal skills and confidence in problem-solving. There's a significant backlash at least in the startup space to "whiteb…

We are in the middle of interviewing for our first ever intake of graduates/juniors and this describes what we are looking for to a T. We are far more interested in problem solving, reasoning about systems and constraints, and an ability to work well with others, and most importantly a strong desire to learn new stuff. We will have a small code related test, but it's short and relatively simple but of but fixing/changing existing code.

Re: What would a recession mean for developers?

#69
post #58
post #8

The weird part of this advice to me is all the "CS fundamentals" biz. It's admittedly been quite a while since I've felt the need to go out for "junior" roles, but I have a lot of close friends who are recent boot camp grads, and it seems to me that most success in an interview boils down to interpersonal skills and confidence in problem-solving. There's a significant backlash at least in the startup space to "whiteb…

"Brush up on CS fundamentals" means "grind leetcode" which is already table stakes for getting a job, and about to become more important. In a recession, companies will crack down on candidates with interpersonal skills and confidence but no competence. Interpersonal skills and confidence are deciding factors after you've filtered out the candidates with low technical skill , as determined by leetcode, whiteboard, on…

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