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Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. - Programming (6) - Nairaland

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The Travails Of Junior Developers / For Developers Especially Beginners And Junior Developers. / 5 Projects A Junior Developer Should Have In Their Portfolio To Get Hired Fast (2) (3) (4)

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Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by orisunmibare01(m): 2:26pm On Feb 24, 2021
Originalsly:


I'm not at all into tech... in fact.. I'm an illiterate. But this your write up is sooo deep... and your point of basically doing research to know your chance of success does not only apply to the tech industry... but to other aspects of life. .. as in travel..... some people up and go expecting to meet all.roses not knowing there were thorns to get by. Excellent write up.... eye opening... one we should chew on.... and like a cow.... regurgitate and chew again.... then swallow and allow to digest.

Oshey!
Perspire to acquire to Maguire and refire!

2 Likes

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Lighero(m): 2:29pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:
Tech is honestly the best industry to get into right now. The opportunities are numerous. Almost every job vacancy out there is tech this tech that, developer this and developer that. I stayed in school for 4 years studying for a useless engineering degree and I have never in my life seen a vacancy for the rubbish I studied but there are tech roles every day. But in spite of so many jobs in tech, a lot of new developers struggle to get opportunities. I started being active in the tech community recently and I am meeting developers who have been coding for 5 to 7 years but have never had an opportunity. Talking with them has led me to discover that it's actually not the tech industry but a few of the reasons I am listing below.

1. You follow the trends: A lot of us developers love to focus on the sexy trendy stuff. Newsflash, what is sexy and trendy isn't used and even when used is used by very few companies. So millions of people who have struggled to learn the sexy stuff are all going to fight for those few roles out there. Take for example the latest coolest CSS framework tailwind. It's really cool and hyped up and it's like the go-to framework right now but the thing is in the industry people are still using bootstrap. People are learning tailwind but they don't know the number one CSS framework out there. Just because something is cool and sexy doesn't mean that everyone is going to switch to it overnight.

If you give junior developers a chance between Angular, React, and Vue. A lot of people are going to pick Vue. They will say it's sexy and cool and has a ton of GitHub stars. There are jobs using Vue but they are so few compared to React and Angular that you would be pigeonholing yourself by learning that. Theres a whole of difference between coding for fun and coding to get a job.

2. You have unrealistic expectations: This is something I usually see on Reddit cscareerquestions but it seems to becoming a norm amongst everybody. People believe that if your salary isnt starting at 100k USD a year or you dont work for a tech company, you arent a developer. Its so elitist and unfortunately a lot of developers in Nigeria are beginning to have this mindset. They learn HTML, CSS, JS. They have built absolutely no projects but because someone said you need the knowledge of DSA to get a job they immediately start grinding leetcode day and night with the hope of getting into Google. You learnt to code from a Udemy course and you really want to compete at DSAs with people who went to MIT. People who have been doing competitive programming since 5 years old. People who get gold medals at the international olympaids of informatics like its nothing. grin grin grin. Funny enough, I also had this mindset when I was learning to code but corrected myself later on. The truth is that not every tech job out there tests with DSA or needs knowledge of DSA and not everybody must work for a big tech company. This reasoning is so flawed. It is like saying every lawyer must work for law firms like wale olanipekun and co or every engineer must work for exxonmobil. There are a ton of jobs that will pay you well as a junior developer like really well and you need not struggle to get them. They wont test you with DSA. They would only look at the complexities of your projects and go through them with you. By well paid I am talking of 500k and above. Ask yourself how many people asking you to do DSA in Nigeria have not yet worked at Google. There are even whatsapp groups dedicated to DSA and if you cant solve one you are kicked out. The person giving you DSA is not working at Google or Facebook hmm give yourself a brain o.


3. You do not know how to cut off the bullshit from social media: There's so much information out there today but if you don't know how to cut off the bullshit from what you need, you would waste your time. A lot of influencers and creators are putting information out there for themselves. They follow the algorithms and put out what is going to give them the most value in terms of money for their time. If I put out WordPress content, nobody will watch it but if I go out there and make MERN stack tutorials I would be getting millions of views but to be truthful you do not need the MERN stack as a junior. No one is using MongoDB in prod. Very few websites use Nodejs. You are just limiting yourself with that. If you want to be a full stack developer look at things like C# and Java springboot. Those pay really really well and there are even certifications you can acquire in those frameworks that can help get you opportunities at enterprise companies that use them especially if you don't have a computer science degree.

4 Your projects are not worth paying for: People put out calculators, todo lists, tictactoe games and a lot of bullshit on their portfolio and wonder why they aren't getting interviews. You have applied for 100 jobs and haven't been called back and you absolutely do not know the reason why. Nobody is going to hire you with a to-do list and a calculator on your portfolio. Even if you get an interview, is a calculator something you are going to show your interviewer. What happened to making a social media application, a chat application, a blog, an analytic tool, a dashboard. Something that people actually use in the real world every day. I remember one of the first interviews I have, one of my projects was a payment application I used paystacks API for. Everything was done with HTML, CSS and Javascript and once my interviewer saw the project and the button I used to connect the API, he made an offer to me immediately. Your projects matter especially as a beginner. One solid project is better than 100 garbage projects.

5 You don't research: Honestly, in this tech thing, I take what everyone is saying as bullshit. The senior developer I work with an Australian guy was telling me to learn web assembly if I really want to get a job with visa sponsorship which I so desperately need. I am tired of remote especially doing it from this shithole zoo of a country. I went to Linkedin Jobs and various countries indeed websites and I couldn't even see up to 500 jobs total in web assembly. Why would I waste time learning something that has no jobs because it might be relevant in ten years. Nodejs came out in 2009 and it is still not relevant in 2021. What is the probability that web assembly will be relevant in 2031. Research. When people tell you to learn a technology. Go to linkedinjobs and indeed and check how many jobs exist for that technology worldwide. People always advise you from their own point of view but the point of view of a senior developer in America, Europe or Australia is not the same for you a junior developer in the world's poverty capital.

Tech pays provided you do it right men.
Please can i get your whatsapp contact too, i do need alot of advice sir
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by xalex77c: 2:38pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:

For freelance just niche down. Na your employers go dey offer you big money. If you do general developmemt anything you see take am grin.
as a student, how long will i have to learn and practice programming before i can become an employable developer
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Lighero(m): 2:39pm On Feb 24, 2021
what is the full meaning of DSA
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by orisunmibare01(m): 2:44pm On Feb 24, 2021
anochuko01:
i almost got hit by bottles in the second page cheesy cheesy cheesy

Abeg, i'm going through a fullstack dev course by EdConnect, and we're being taught the following;

Html
css
javascript for client and server side
Application Testing
react
jquery
APIs
mongodb
cloud deployment

we are also building a webapp as we learn.

Please, what chances does one have if the above skills are well known. Or what more do i need to know to get my first job as a developer?
thanks!
As one who wants to start leaning programming, I'll like someone to answer this.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Enceladus(m): 2:47pm On Feb 24, 2021
I don't know why people like to blindly follow BS trends. Believing everything every project is MERN, me i always use them to laugh sha because when the time comes to pay the technical debt I won't be there.

Mongo Db is just like javascript. At first you enjoy the dynamic typing then one day you find an integer value in a place where array should be. Schema less is tempting but one day a simple change will throw all your code into flames.

Hosting Mongo DB is also a pain. It is on many order of magnitude harder than it's sql counterparts. Many big companies are dumping it for Postgres self.

React is almost cool. But it is not opinionated and that is exactly it's weak point.

How will Node and express cope when you have thousands/millions of cpu intensive requests? MERN IMO is for small scale apps.

lushak:


Stop condemning a certain technology. How could you come up with the idea that MERN STACK is nonsense. Who told u MongoDB isn't used in production. Have u gone through the statistics in stackoverflow and see the community of experienced developers using MERN STACK. That u don't make use of a certain technology doesn't mean there are no opportunities there for it. Useful projects are being developed using this technology and I am a proud of it. I like ur advice in general though but I have heavy exception at the fact that u are condemning MERN STACK. That u don't use it doesn't make it any less important...
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by CSTRR: 2:50pm On Feb 24, 2021
techstack:


You are right
As I am typing this we are moving all the applications to micro-services using C# dotNet Core 5.
So many jobs for c# developers in Naija, young devs need to look at the market and environment.
You are in Naija and following the trend in US
What's is the path to be a C# developer for a beginner.?
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by CSTRR: 2:51pm On Feb 24, 2021
Lighero:
what is the full meaning of DSA
Data structures and algorithms.

1 Like

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Sulele04(m): 2:53pm On Feb 24, 2021
CSTRR:
What's is the path to be a C# developer for a beginner.?
Do you have previous coding experience.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by sonofthunder: 2:56pm On Feb 24, 2021
uuzba:

So we that learnt how to program "hello world" in c++, we should not do again?
Abi what are you saying?
You better take my CV O. That stuff was not easy.
Somebody be checking whether it's >>cin or <<cout he should write, night and day.


Lol

Be like you'll be teaching me c++ as I can't program "hello world" in said language grin
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by mhiztalee(m): 3:03pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:
Tech is honestly the best industry to get into right now. The opportunities are numerous. Almost every job vacancy out there is tech this tech that, developer this and developer that. I stayed in school for 4 years studying for a useless engineering degree and I have never in my life seen a vacancy for the rubbish I studied but there are tech roles every day. But in spite of so many jobs in tech, a lot of new developers struggle to get opportunities. I started being active in the tech community recently and I am meeting developers who have been coding for 5 to 7 years but have never had an opportunity. Talking with them has led me to discover that it's actually not the tech industry but a few of the reasons I am listing below.

1. You follow the trends: A lot of us developers love to focus on the sexy trendy stuff. Newsflash, what is sexy and trendy isn't used and even when used is used by very few companies. So millions of people who have struggled to learn the sexy stuff are all going to fight for those few roles out there. Take for example the latest coolest CSS framework tailwind. It's really cool and hyped up and it's like the go-to framework right now but the thing is in the industry people are still using bootstrap. People are learning tailwind but they don't know the number one CSS framework out there. Just because something is cool and sexy doesn't mean that everyone is going to switch to it overnight.

If you give junior developers a chance between Angular, React, and Vue. A lot of people are going to pick Vue. They will say it's sexy and cool and has a ton of GitHub stars. There are jobs using Vue but they are so few compared to React and Angular that you would be pigeonholing yourself by learning that. Theres a whole of difference between coding for fun and coding to get a job.

2. You have unrealistic expectations: This is something I usually see on Reddit cscareerquestions but it seems to becoming a norm amongst everybody. People believe that if your salary isnt starting at 100k USD a year or you dont work for a tech company, you arent a developer. Its so elitist and unfortunately a lot of developers in Nigeria are beginning to have this mindset. They learn HTML, CSS, JS. They have built absolutely no projects but because someone said you need the knowledge of DSA to get a job they immediately start grinding leetcode day and night with the hope of getting into Google. You learnt to code from a Udemy course and you really want to compete at DSAs with people who went to MIT. People who have been doing competitive programming since 5 years old. People who get gold medals at the international olympaids of informatics like its nothing. grin grin grin. Funny enough, I also had this mindset when I was learning to code but corrected myself later on. The truth is that not every tech job out there tests with DSA or needs knowledge of DSA and not everybody must work for a big tech company. This reasoning is so flawed. It is like saying every lawyer must work for law firms like wale olanipekun and co or every engineer must work for exxonmobil. There are a ton of jobs that will pay you well as a junior developer like really well and you need not struggle to get them. They wont test you with DSA. They would only look at the complexities of your projects and go through them with you. By well paid I am talking of 500k and above. Ask yourself how many people asking you to do DSA in Nigeria have not yet worked at Google. There are even whatsapp groups dedicated to DSA and if you cant solve one you are kicked out. The person giving you DSA is not working at Google or Facebook hmm give yourself a brain o.


3. You do not know how to cut off the bullshit from social media: There's so much information out there today but if you don't know how to cut off the bullshit from what you need, you would waste your time. A lot of influencers and creators are putting information out there for themselves. They follow the algorithms and put out what is going to give them the most value in terms of money for their time. If I put out WordPress content, nobody will watch it but if I go out there and make MERN stack tutorials I would be getting millions of views but to be truthful you do not need the MERN stack as a junior. No one is using MongoDB in prod. Very few websites use Nodejs. You are just limiting yourself with that. If you want to be a full stack developer look at things like C# and Java springboot. Those pay really really well and there are even certifications you can acquire in those frameworks that can help get you opportunities at enterprise companies that use them especially if you don't have a computer science degree.

4 Your projects are not worth paying for: People put out calculators, todo lists, tictactoe games and a lot of bullshit on their portfolio and wonder why they aren't getting interviews. You have applied for 100 jobs and haven't been called back and you absolutely do not know the reason why. Nobody is going to hire you with a to-do list and a calculator on your portfolio. Even if you get an interview, is a calculator something you are going to show your interviewer. What happened to making a social media application, a chat application, a blog, an analytic tool, a dashboard. Something that people actually use in the real world every day. I remember one of the first interviews I have, one of my projects was a payment application I used paystacks API for. Everything was done with HTML, CSS and Javascript and once my interviewer saw the project and the button I used to connect the API, he made an offer to me immediately. Your projects matter especially as a beginner. One solid project is better than 100 garbage projects.

5 You don't research: Honestly, in this tech thing, I take what everyone is saying as bullshit. The senior developer I work with an Australian guy was telling me to learn web assembly if I really want to get a job with visa sponsorship which I so desperately need. I am tired of remote especially doing it from this shithole zoo of a country. I went to Linkedin Jobs and various countries indeed websites and I couldn't even see up to 500 jobs total in web assembly. Why would I waste time learning something that has no jobs because it might be relevant in ten years. Nodejs came out in 2009 and it is still not relevant in 2021. What is the probability that web assembly will be relevant in 2031. Research. When people tell you to learn a technology. Go to linkedinjobs and indeed and check how many jobs exist for that technology worldwide. People always advise you from their own point of view but the point of view of a senior developer in America, Europe or Australia is not the same for you a junior developer in the world's poverty capital.

Tech pays provided you do it right men.

Where can I start from...I have zero knowledge in coding..
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Karleb(m): 3:05pm On Feb 24, 2021
I see people hating Javascript stacks. grin

Let those MERN stack guys feel what PHP guys felt. grin grin
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by ninety5: 3:13pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:

Sent you a DM.

I just sent you a DM bro, I would really love to get a piece of info from you.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by alcuin(m): 3:16pm On Feb 24, 2021
spartan117:
What do you mean nobody is using mongodb in production
Something I used this week

I stopped reading at that point.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by africonn: 3:22pm On Feb 24, 2021
AZeD1:
1) Saying MongoDB isn't used in production is false and misleading
2) Off the top of my head, Paystack and Buycoins were built with Nodejs. It's not a nothing language or a fad.
3) The advice should be learn to program and not learn a language. Understanding the difference between learning to program and learning a programming language will take you far.
4) The aim of side projects should be to learn, it doesn't matter if it's a calculator or a to-do list. Your should learn something or reinforce something you've learnt before. The goal of a side project should be to learn not the project itself.
5) At the end of the day, it doesn't matter what language you know, I've gotten jobs in Java, Ruby, Scala, Go and Nodejs without ever knowing those languages because someone earlier told me about point number 3.
6) An advice I would love to have been given when I started out is this, ensure your learning is focused. This is related to point number 4. As a junior dev before you start a side project ask yourself what am I trying to learn?
Building a to-do list just to learn about promises in JavaScript is a good thing. Rebuilding that to-do list with MongoDB just to learn how MongoDB works is valid and good. When you start out, most companies want to know you can learn and are teachable so being able to explain what a promise is in JavaScript will get you a job faster than having a million side projects and not knowing the basics.
7) If you ever have the opportunity to take a course in data structures and algorithms, do it. While you might never work in Google or Facebook, the knowledge would help you become a better developer.

Great ADVICES!!!
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by RemiAbdulSamad(m): 3:23pm On Feb 24, 2021
supportnija:

Op try add one JavaScript frame work, eg jquery
I know jQuery. I'll be learning Vue Js soonest

1 Like

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by RemiAbdulSamad(m): 3:24pm On Feb 24, 2021
Albertone:

You have a nice portfolio and a good eye for UI/UX designs.
When did you start learning?
Thanks. May 2020
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by techstack: 3:54pm On Feb 24, 2021
CSTRR:

What's is the path to be a C# developer for a beginner.?

techstack:
1) learn the basics
2)Practice 70% read 30%
3) Combine the basics to solve problems
4)Learn how to solve real-life problems
5)Think about how does computer solve that problem
6) Tackle it step by step
7) Ask questions, seek help
8.)Continue to learn and challenge yourself
9)Keep abreast of new technologies
10)Build as many applications as possible
11) Move with experienced developers(very important)
12) Get a job(Work experience)

techstack:



Focus on dotNet core. Most applicants now are web base. go to YouTube and search Tim Corey.

Watch, learn and practice, push code to Github
Learn about SOLID principles
ask questions, move with experienced developers

Deploy to heroku and netlify

Employers will ask for your projects

If you can get a coding bootcamp too. you will learn alot
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by doxijaw: 4:03pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:
Tech is honestly the best industry to get into right now. The opportunities are numerous. Almost every job vacancy out there is tech this tech that, developer this and developer that. I stayed in school for 4 years studying for a useless engineering degree and I have never in my life seen a vacancy for the rubbish I studied but there are tech roles every day. But in spite of so many jobs in tech, a lot of new developers struggle to get opportunities. I started being active in the tech community recently and I am meeting developers who have been coding for 5 to 7 years but have never had an opportunity. Talking with them has led me to discover that it's actually not the tech industry but a few of the reasons I am listing below.

1. You follow the trends: A lot of us developers love to focus on the sexy trendy stuff. Newsflash, what is sexy and trendy isn't used and even when used is used by very few companies. So millions of people who have struggled to learn the sexy stuff are all going to fight for those few roles out there. Take for example the latest coolest CSS framework tailwind. It's really cool and hyped up and it's like the go-to framework right now but the thing is in the industry people are still using bootstrap. People are learning tailwind but they don't know the number one CSS framework out there. Just because something is cool and sexy doesn't mean that everyone is going to switch to it overnight.

If you give junior developers a chance between Angular, React, and Vue. A lot of people are going to pick Vue. They will say it's sexy and cool and has a ton of GitHub stars. There are jobs using Vue but they are so few compared to React and Angular that you would be pigeonholing yourself by learning that. Theres a whole of difference between coding for fun and coding to get a job.

2. You have unrealistic expectations: This is something I usually see on Reddit cscareerquestions but it seems to becoming a norm amongst everybody. People believe that if your salary isnt starting at 100k USD a year or you dont work for a tech company, you arent a developer. Its so elitist and unfortunately a lot of developers in Nigeria are beginning to have this mindset. They learn HTML, CSS, JS. They have built absolutely no projects but because someone said you need the knowledge of DSA to get a job they immediately start grinding leetcode day and night with the hope of getting into Google. You learnt to code from a Udemy course and you really want to compete at DSAs with people who went to MIT. People who have been doing competitive programming since 5 years old. People who get gold medals at the international olympaids of informatics like its nothing. grin grin grin. Funny enough, I also had this mindset when I was learning to code but corrected myself later on. The truth is that not every tech job out there tests with DSA or needs knowledge of DSA and not everybody must work for a big tech company. This reasoning is so flawed. It is like saying every lawyer must work for law firms like wale olanipekun and co or every engineer must work for exxonmobil. There are a ton of jobs that will pay you well as a junior developer like really well and you need not struggle to get them. They wont test you with DSA. They would only look at the complexities of your projects and go through them with you. By well paid I am talking of 500k and above. Ask yourself how many people asking you to do DSA in Nigeria have not yet worked at Google. There are even whatsapp groups dedicated to DSA and if you cant solve one you are kicked out. The person giving you DSA is not working at Google or Facebook hmm give yourself a brain o.


3. You do not know how to cut off the bullshit from social media: There's so much information out there today but if you don't know how to cut off the bullshit from what you need, you would waste your time. A lot of influencers and creators are putting information out there for themselves. They follow the algorithms and put out what is going to give them the most value in terms of money for their time. If I put out WordPress content, nobody will watch it but if I go out there and make MERN stack tutorials I would be getting millions of views but to be truthful you do not need the MERN stack as a junior. No one is using MongoDB in prod. Very few websites use Nodejs. You are just limiting yourself with that. If you want to be a full stack developer look at things like C# and Java springboot. Those pay really really well and there are even certifications you can acquire in those frameworks that can help get you opportunities at enterprise companies that use them especially if you don't have a computer science degree.

4 Your projects are not worth paying for: People put out calculators, todo lists, tictactoe games and a lot of bullshit on their portfolio and wonder why they aren't getting interviews. You have applied for 100 jobs and haven't been called back and you absolutely do not know the reason why. Nobody is going to hire you with a to-do list and a calculator on your portfolio. Even if you get an interview, is a calculator something you are going to show your interviewer. What happened to making a social media application, a chat application, a blog, an analytic tool, a dashboard. Something that people actually use in the real world every day. I remember one of the first interviews I have, one of my projects was a payment application I used paystacks API for. Everything was done with HTML, CSS and Javascript and once my interviewer saw the project and the button I used to connect the API, he made an offer to me immediately. Your projects matter especially as a beginner. One solid project is better than 100 garbage projects.

5 You don't research: Honestly, in this tech thing, I take what everyone is saying as bullshit. The senior developer I work with an Australian guy was telling me to learn web assembly if I really want to get a job with visa sponsorship which I so desperately need. I am tired of remote especially doing it from this shithole zoo of a country. I went to Linkedin Jobs and various countries indeed websites and I couldn't even see up to 500 jobs total in web assembly. Why would I waste time learning something that has no jobs because it might be relevant in ten years. Nodejs came out in 2009 and it is still not relevant in 2021. What is the probability that web assembly will be relevant in 2031. Research. When people tell you to learn a technology. Go to linkedinjobs and indeed and check how many jobs exist for that technology worldwide. People always advise you from their own point of view but the point of view of a senior developer in America, Europe or Australia is not the same for you a junior developer in the world's poverty capital.

Tech pays provided you do it right men.

Get out of Nigeria , you will succeed abroad.

I know what I'm saying!
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by spartan117(m): 4:08pm On Feb 24, 2021
alcuin:


I stopped reading at that point.
The thing shock u abi grin

I also stopped reading at that point until someone pointed out a statement he made that node js is not relevant cheesy at this point I was beyond shocked.

He made some good points though but also garnished it with a lot of thrash. My only fear is for the 70+ people who liked the post whom he has misled.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by akigbemaru: 4:09pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:
Tech is honestly the best industry to get into right now. The opportunities are numerous. Almost every job vacancy out there is tech this tech that, developer this and developer that. I stayed in school for 4 years studying for a useless engineering degree and I have never in my life seen a vacancy for the rubbish I studied but there are tech roles every day. But in spite of so many jobs in tech, a lot of new developers struggle to get opportunities. I started being active in the tech community recently and I am meeting developers who have been coding for 5 to 7 years but have never had an opportunity. Talking with them has led me to discover that it's actually not the tech industry but a few of the reasons I am listing below.

1. You follow the trends: A lot of us developers love to focus on the sexy trendy stuff. Newsflash, what is sexy and trendy isn't used and even when used is used by very few companies. So millions of people who have struggled to learn the sexy stuff are all going to fight for those few roles out there. Take for example the latest coolest CSS framework tailwind. It's really cool and hyped up and it's like the go-to framework right now but the thing is in the industry people are still using bootstrap. People are learning tailwind but they don't know the number one CSS framework out there. Just because something is cool and sexy doesn't mean that everyone is going to switch to it overnight.

If you give junior developers a chance between Angular, React, and Vue. A lot of people are going to pick Vue. They will say it's sexy and cool and has a ton of GitHub stars. There are jobs using Vue but they are so few compared to React and Angular that you would be pigeonholing yourself by learning that. Theres a whole of difference between coding for fun and coding to get a job.

2. You have unrealistic expectations: This is something I usually see on Reddit cscareerquestions but it seems to becoming a norm amongst everybody. People believe that if your salary isnt starting at 100k USD a year or you dont work for a tech company, you arent a developer. Its so elitist and unfortunately a lot of developers in Nigeria are beginning to have this mindset. They learn HTML, CSS, JS. They have built absolutely no projects but because someone said you need the knowledge of DSA to get a job they immediately start grinding leetcode day and night with the hope of getting into Google. You learnt to code from a Udemy course and you really want to compete at DSAs with people who went to MIT. People who have been doing competitive programming since 5 years old. People who get gold medals at the international olympaids of informatics like its nothing. grin grin grin. Funny enough, I also had this mindset when I was learning to code but corrected myself later on. The truth is that not every tech job out there tests with DSA or needs knowledge of DSA and not everybody must work for a big tech company. This reasoning is so flawed. It is like saying every lawyer must work for law firms like wale olanipekun and co or every engineer must work for exxonmobil. There are a ton of jobs that will pay you well as a junior developer like really well and you need not struggle to get them. They wont test you with DSA. They would only look at the complexities of your projects and go through them with you. By well paid I am talking of 500k and above. Ask yourself how many people asking you to do DSA in Nigeria have not yet worked at Google. There are even whatsapp groups dedicated to DSA and if you cant solve one you are kicked out. The person giving you DSA is not working at Google or Facebook hmm give yourself a brain o.


3. You do not know how to cut off the bullshit from social media: There's so much information out there today but if you don't know how to cut off the bullshit from what you need, you would waste your time. A lot of influencers and creators are putting information out there for themselves. They follow the algorithms and put out what is going to give them the most value in terms of money for their time. If I put out WordPress content, nobody will watch it but if I go out there and make MERN stack tutorials I would be getting millions of views but to be truthful you do not need the MERN stack as a junior. No one is using MongoDB in prod. Very few websites use Nodejs. You are just limiting yourself with that. If you want to be a full stack developer look at things like C# and Java springboot. Those pay really really well and there are even certifications you can acquire in those frameworks that can help get you opportunities at enterprise companies that use them especially if you don't have a computer science degree.

4 Your projects are not worth paying for: People put out calculators, todo lists, tictactoe games and a lot of bullshit on their portfolio and wonder why they aren't getting interviews. You have applied for 100 jobs and haven't been called back and you absolutely do not know the reason why. Nobody is going to hire you with a to-do list and a calculator on your portfolio. Even if you get an interview, is a calculator something you are going to show your interviewer. What happened to making a social media application, a chat application, a blog, an analytic tool, a dashboard. Something that people actually use in the real world every day. I remember one of the first interviews I have, one of my projects was a payment application I used paystacks API for. Everything was done with HTML, CSS and Javascript and once my interviewer saw the project and the button I used to connect the API, he made an offer to me immediately. Your projects matter especially as a beginner. One solid project is better than 100 garbage projects.

5 You don't research: Honestly, in this tech thing, I take what everyone is saying as bullshit. The senior developer I work with an Australian guy was telling me to learn web assembly if I really want to get a job with visa sponsorship which I so desperately need. I am tired of remote especially doing it from this shithole zoo of a country. I went to Linkedin Jobs and various countries indeed websites and I couldn't even see up to 500 jobs total in web assembly. Why would I waste time learning something that has no jobs because it might be relevant in ten years. Nodejs came out in 2009 and it is still not relevant in 2021. What is the probability that web assembly will be relevant in 2031. Research. When people tell you to learn a technology. Go to linkedinjobs and indeed and check how many jobs exist for that technology worldwide. People always advise you from their own point of view but the point of view of a senior developer in America, Europe or Australia is not the same for you a junior developer in the world's poverty capital.

Tech pays provided you do it right men.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by spartan117(m): 4:21pm On Feb 24, 2021
Enceladus:
I don't know why people like to blindly follow BS trends. Believing everything every project is MERN, me i always use them to laugh sha because when the time comes to pay the technical debt I won't be there.

Mongo Db is just like javascript. At first you enjoy the dynamic typing then one day you find an integer value in a place where array should be. Schema less is tempting but one day a simple change will throw all your code into flames.

Hosting Mongo DB is also a pain. It is on many order of magnitude harder than it's sql counterparts. Many big companies are dumping it for Postgres self.

React is almost cool. But it is not opinionated and that is exactly it's weak point.

How will Node and express cope when you have thousands/millions of cpu intensive requests? MERN IMO is for small scale apps.

Don't talk like an ignoramus.
Have you ever heard of mongoose schema? Do some research on that it will answer your question.

Node JS thrives in data intensive applications not CPU intensive applications. If you have to build a CPU intensive app do it in another language not in node. But node is much faster and out performs languages like php for data intensive apps. So know when to use each instead of shunning one out of ignorance.

Thirdly React JS is still by far the most popular JavaScript library/framwork second only to JQuery and that's because of legacy code. And it still commands the most Job opportunities than the others.

My advise to you is don't follow the crowd to shun any technology try to understand it and know when to use it.

3 Likes

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Maj196(m): 4:29pm On Feb 24, 2021
Vue.js has got a nice future though
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by qtguru(m): 4:31pm On Feb 24, 2021
cixak95211 it's not fair to attack people anyhow you are not as untraceable as you think.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by qtguru(m): 4:43pm On Feb 24, 2021
Enceladus:
I don't know why people like to blindly follow BS trends. Believing everything every project is MERN, me i always use them to laugh sha because when the time comes to pay the technical debt I won't be there.

Mongo Db is just like javascript. At first you enjoy the dynamic typing then one day you find an integer value in a place where array should be. Schema less is tempting but one day a simple change will throw all your code into flames.

Hosting Mongo DB is also a pain. It is on many order of magnitude harder than it's sql counterparts. Many big companies are dumping it for Postgres self.

React is almost cool. But it is not opinionated and that is exactly it's weak point.

How will Node and express cope when you have thousands/millions of cpu intensive requests? MERN IMO is for small scale apps.


You have painted my pain point, I really hate this Document Object type of Database, we can wipe out all records in Firebase and have no idea what the schema could be like. That is quite accurate Node can't handle CPU Request, it's best for Real Time and Async, in that regard I will move to Spring or Go for speed, Node exceeds for most I/O operations. Enceladus is right , React not being opinionated is a pain point, at Interswitch 7 React Developers all write differently, one uses Saga thunk, the other uses another store management, then some Functional and some Class Approach, Vue and Svelte are one of those frameworks where you focus on the work than the engineering. Working on complex projects will expose all the pain points.

The Frontend is a mess, I will find my way soon to Flutter and Java World, even npm ecosystem is a fiasco, all it takes is to pull a bad package and you can spend the whole day finding out what the hell is going on.

6 Likes 1 Share

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by tosinhtml: 4:45pm On Feb 24, 2021
So this will be a post to further prevent online bullying which was evidently done by cixak95211 who used to be an Intern Team lead at Andela, please note the keyword Intern.

According to Linkedin, he got his first professional job in Software Development in January 2019 & later worked as an Intern in Andela which didn't even last more than 6 months. As at Sep 2019, he was still an Intern.

Everyday we come across bullies like this at our various workplaces and if we don't start exposing them now, we would eventually make life harder for newer devs in the Industry.

If you say you are a Senior, please have Senior Attitude.

cc: tensazangetsu20 and ClixMaster

12 Likes 1 Share

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by tensazangetsu20(m): 4:49pm On Feb 24, 2021
tosinhtml:
So this will be a post to further prevent online bullying which was evidently done by cixak95211 which used to be an Intern Team lead at Andela, please note the keyword Intern.

According to Linkedin, he got his first professional job in Software Development in January 2019 & later worked as an Intern in Andela which didn't even last more than 6 months. As at Sep 2019, you were still an Intern.

Everyday we come across bullies like this at our various workplaces and if we don't start exposing them now, we would eventually make life harder for newer devs in the Industry.

If you say you are a Senior, please have Senior Attitude.

cc: tensazangetsu20 and ClixMaster

And he said he has 10 years experience. At least I wear my junior status like a badge of honour.

1 Like

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by The5DME(m): 4:49pm On Feb 24, 2021
tosinhtml:
So this will be a post to further prevent online bullying which was evidently done by cixak95211 which used to be an Intern Team lead at Andela, please note the keyword Intern.

According to Linkedin, he got his first professional job in Software Development in January 2019 & later worked as an Intern in Andela which didn't even last more than 6 months. As at Sep 2019, you were still an Intern.

Everyday we come across bullies like this at our various workplaces and if we don't start exposing them now, we would eventually make life harder for newer devs in the Industry.

If you say you are a Senior, please have Senior Attitude.

cc: tensazangetsu20 and ClixMaster

see investigation.

1 Like

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by Nobody: 4:52pm On Feb 24, 2021
tensazangetsu20:
Tech is honestly the best industry to get into right now. The opportunities are numerous. Almost every job vacancy out there is tech this tech that, developer this and developer that. I stayed in school for 4 years studying for a useless engineering degree and I have never in my life seen a vacancy for the rubbish I studied but there are tech roles every day. But in spite of so many jobs in tech, a lot of new developers struggle to get opportunities. I started being active in the tech community recently and I am meeting developers who have been coding for 5 to 7 years but have never had an opportunity.

Tech pays provided you do it right men.

You write well but what I appreciate about you is you are willing to share your knowledge with others. That is highly commendable.
Good to know you're making progress in your journey as a developer. You may think your degree is useless but it's definitely is helping you in ways you don't realize.

For most Nigerians they only care about what brings food to the table and any IT skill that does that is cool. A guy in Abj rakes in 2k monthly on graphics design without knowing a single line of code. So I also advise everyone to just niche down and follow what works best for you.

One piece of advise is for you to know that public articles are subject to criticisms. Some will benefit from what you wrote while others will disagree and even abuse you.

How you respond to these demonstrate your soft skills. Pls note that developing soft skill is also very important, I've been in few interview sessions and sometimes not the best person technically is employed.
In my previous job our best Engineer got fired because of a slight brawl in the office.

Pls learn to be calm under provocation, that itself is a life skill.
Rgds

11 Likes 1 Share

Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by qtguru(m): 4:53pm On Feb 24, 2021
The5DME:
see investigation.
wink
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by tensazangetsu20(m): 4:55pm On Feb 24, 2021
Studymore123:


You write well but what I appreciate about you is you are willing to share your knowledge with others. That is highly commendable.
Good to know you're making progress in your journey as a developer. You may think your degree is useless but it's definitely is helping you in ways you don't realize.

For most Nigerians they only care about what brings food to the table and any IT skill that does that is cool. A guy in Abj rakes in 2k monthly on graphics design without knowing a single line of code. So I also advise everyone to just niche down and follow what works best for you.

One piece of advise is for you to know that public articles are subject to criticisms. Some will benefit from what you wrote while others will disagree and even abuse you.

How you respond to these demonstrate your soft skills. Pls note that developing soft skill is also very important, I've been in few interview sessions and sometimes not the best person technically is employed.
In my previous job our best Engineer got fired because of a slight brawl in the office.

Pls learn to be calm under provocation, that itself is a life skill.
Rgds
True bros. But that guy is annoying. If you see his comments on this section how he goes around mocking others lying he has ten years experience when he just started coding in 2019 lol.
Re: Why So Many Junior Developers Struggle To Get An Opportunity. by qtguru(m): 4:59pm On Feb 24, 2021
Studymore123:


You write well but what I appreciate about you is you are willing to share your knowledge with others. That is highly commendable.
Good to know you're making progress in your journey as a developer. You may think your degree is useless but it's definitely is helping you in ways you don't realize.

For most Nigerians they only care about what brings food to the table and any IT skill that does that is cool. A guy in Abj rakes in 2k monthly on graphics design without knowing a single line of code. So I also advise everyone to just niche down and follow what works best for you.

One piece of advise is for you to know that public articles are subject to criticisms. Some will benefit from what you wrote while others will disagree and even abuse you.

How you respond to these demonstrate your soft skills. Pls note that developing soft skill is also very important, I've been in few interview sessions and sometimes not the best person technically is employed.
In my previous job our best Engineer got fired because of a slight brawl in the office.

Pls learn to be calm under provocation, that itself is a life skill.
Rgds

This is a point that is extremely important to hear, I believe in Engineering debate but people these days are too emotional about programming it's all a tool to us and not our religion, we should always learn to be cordial else you cannot work for foreign companies.

4 Likes

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