What do companies look for?

• Hard skills
  • Ability to actually write code - like be able to sit down and write some code from scratch. Or grab a marker and whiteboard out a class or solution to a problem. This one may sound obvious if you're going for a job but many people actually fail it
  • Being able to actually read code and really understand what it is doing
    • This is an underemphasized skill and you'd be surprised how many people lack this ability. I sucked at code reviews for a long time because I didn't both to really learn this
  • Decent level of familiarity with at least one language/framework 
  • Demonstrated ability to code beyond simple problems 
    • This would be like a portfolio of projects or a GitHub account of work you've done or a website you built that they can visit
    • Or contributions you may have made to an open source project
  • Basic understanding of various commonly used tools: what IDE you use, some kind of source control (git or otherwise), command line(doesn't have to be Linux, but Linux is helpful for a lot of jobs)
  • The ability to troubleshoot and debug broken code
  • Some knowledge of data structures and algorithms 
  • Some knowledge or familiarity with design patterns 
  • How to connect to, write to, read from, and generally work with databases
• Soft skills
  • Good communication skills both written and verbal
  • Willingness and interest in learning new things and continuing to improve and evidence your skills
  • Willingness to work with others, and not just other software engineers but also business people, marketing, other engineering groups (devops, mechanical or electrical if applicable, testing/QA, etc)
  • Problem solving skills
  • Generally positive attitude 
  • General people skills

If you get an interview, even a phone one, spend at least 15 minutes researching the company so that you have a good general knowledge of what they do and are about. If you can spend even more time, maybe try to find some press articles about the company and read them for some interesting facts about the company. It's annoying and seems like politics, but those little things can help prove your interest in the company you're applying for. It can also help you craft your response to the common “why do you want to work here?” Question.

Languages to focus on

So this has a big giant DEPENDS slapped on it.

There are many more industries, use cases, and languages than what I've listed below. This is just a quick glimpse. And you do NOT need to try to touch all these languages.

Pick an industry/direction that sounds interesting to you and focus on deep diving into one language. In the case of web development, you could deep dive into two languages if you wanted to. You could either deep dive into only JavaScript looking at the front end and back end, or you could deep dive into a back-end focus language like PHP or python while also learning JavaScript on the front end.

Gun to my head “WHAT LANGUAGES TO LEARN?!”

• JavaScript - it's just so widely used in today's software environment that you can't really go wrong learning it 
• Python - again, it's just so widely used and is a big player in so many different industries and in so many different ways that you can't go wrong. It's also very beginner friendly 
• C++ - it's one of the oldest languages, but it's still very popular for a reason. It's incredibly fast and while it's not as nice as some of the more modern languages, it will force you to learn a lot about software and good coding habits

Database 

This kind of stands on its own from the rest of the lists below because you'll use databases in pretty much every avenue of software one way or another. You do not need to be an expert, but understanding the basics of these will be helpful in landing and getting up to speed at a job.

Having some understanding for how to connect to, write to, and read from databases.

The two big ones are

• SQL (relational databases - MySQL, MariaDB, Postgres, SQLite, etc)
• NoSQL (MongoDB, DynamoDB, Cassandra, etc)

Hardware meets software 

If you want to do something involving hardware, machines, or physical objects like robots, cars, etc you want to learn C++. There are other languages used these days besides that, but it's still the dominant one

web development 

JavaScript is the big one here especially now that it can be used on the front and backend.

JS frameworks that are popular today:

• backend: Node JS
• Frontend: VueJS, React, or Angular

The other 3 big web development languages are PHP, Python, and Ruby

You'll also want familiarity with HTML and CSS

mobile development 

These days it can be done in JS with certain frameworks like React Native. So yet another reason to learn JS depending on what industry you are interested in

• JS - cross platform
• Swift - iOS
• Kotlin - Android

data science / big data

• Python
• R

Game development 

• C++
• C#/.Net
• Java
• Rust (maybe)

Programming paradigms

It might also be helpful to make sure you have an idea of what it's like to code in different styles/paradigms:

• Scripting (some examples: Python, PHP, JS)
• object oriented programming (also could use one of the previous languages or something like C++ or Java)
• functional programming (like Elixir, Scala, or Haskell). 

You do not need to be an expert in all of these coding paradigms, but it's good to at least have explored them. You can even explore all three concepts in the same language as Python, PHP, and JS all allow for coding in the three different styles. It's just if you use something like Elixir you're sort of more forced into using functional programming, which makes you think about problems and structuring code differently

projects and practice materials 

Make yourself a “learning path”

Don't try to learn everything at once, pick one thing, finish the whole course, or project, or whatever. Don't bounce around too much, especially when it comes to languages. You cannot “know” a language after even a month of use. It's just like trying to learn a speaking language. It takes years to master a language. Deep knowledge in one language is better than surface level knowledge in 5-10.

The sort-of exception to the above is if you are building something on your own. Whether it's a website, home automation, or a little robot - bounce around to whatever technology or language is required for the task at hand. Building is almost always the best and most efficient way to learn. But again, don't bounce from project to project, stick it through until you at least have some semblance of what you wanted. Being able to stick through the boring and tough things is going to help immensely once you get into a software job.

• open source projects - there's so many. Your best bet would be to search around for one you find interesting and start
• Just try building things - pick a language, pick a basic idea like a calculator, to do list, or grocery list app and try to build it
• CoderByte or HackerCode I think are two coding challenge sites
• Freecodecamp
• Udemy.com

Random tidbits

• The Internet is your friend for EVERYTHING. Learning, research, building. All of it
• Literally everything. Don't ever feel like you can't use the web when coding, even on the job. EVERY. SINGLE. DEVELOPER. All of them use the web all day long to look up stuff. Obviously as you get better you need to look up “less” but also not really. You just end up looking up harder and more difficult things.

Nothing from above in any of these lists is by any means completely extensive. There's so much more than these even listed here, which I'm sure seems intimidating because there's a lot of info here. But the key is to just take things one piece at a time and just do what you can and if you're feeling overwhelmed. Jen, you're either worrying too much about the pace you're going at or you're trying to learn too much at once. It is going to take a long time to really absorb a lot of this and you might feel clueless for a very long time like years. I don't mean to discourage you by saying that but hopefully it's the opposite and is helpful because I wish somebody would have explained that to me when I started. Because pretty much everybody feels that way when they start for a long time. And if they don't then it's beginner level arrogance and cluelessness that is leading them to not realizing how much they don't know. Because the thing about software is the more you learn and the better you get, the more you realize how much you really don't know. But hopefully you also realize with time how capable you really are of being able to learn whatever you need to learn to get things done.

Is knowing cloud tools a necessity? Should I be looking for learning materials on Google/AWS, Azure, GitHub?

Yes, pretty much but definitely far from the first thing you should worry about. Worry about learning all the other things first. Cloud integrations you can learn on the job if you don't get a chance to try them out beforehand.

GitHub is a little different. You should know about git (or some kind of version control), which is not the same as GitHub. Git itself is a type of version control for your code. GitHub is a website that hosts your git code repositories online.

Should I be trying to get more learning on Mac/iOS? Linux?

Not necessarily. Again, the most important thing is the other things like learning to actually code and build useful things, and working on your soft skills.

Some experience with Linux is nice to have for a lot of jobs but in my opinion what they really mean is are you comfortable working in a command prompt / terminal. 

What OS you run as your desktop OS is mostly personally preference, but most servers, motherboards, and hardware run some version of relative of Linux and so not have a GUI. They're generally only accessible through a terminal interface, which is what they usually are actually asking about when looking for Linux experience. 

So if you normally work in Windows, I think that's fine. Just try to get some practice in the terminal.

A note on AI

AI coding assistants are all the rage right now. And while I don't want to sound like that old guy or the teachers who used to say we couldn't use calculators because “you won't always have a calculator with you!” And now we have supercomputers in our pockets, I do think it's important to learn without AI. 

Asking AI questions or for help when you're stumped, I think is totally fine. In that case, you're basically using it like a senior developer to ask questions to or a suped up search engine. But using something like GitHub Copilot or Cursor AI, I don't think is a good idea when learning. It will help you build faster, but at the cost of deeper, more efficient and effective learning, which if you're going to be a software dev will be more beneficial in the long term. 

The better you are without AI, the better you will be with AI. AI still makes lots of coding mistakes, and the more you learn without it, the easier you'll be able to spot those mistakes and correct them.

My Background

What do I do? What's my job entail? What's my day like?

I’m tech lead and full stack web developer for a health and wellness company. I work mainly with PHP in the Laravel framework, JavaScript, and SQL (MySQL). We work on the websites for the companies brands as well as internal tools for the customer service and marketing teams.

How did I move through my career?

So how did all that stuff actually happen? Unless you have phenomenal managers, which is very rare, your promotions, raises, and opportunities need to basically be self generated. You need to be willing to step into uncomfortable positions and take on work that you're not sure you can do, and it's okay to admit that when taking it on. I will tell people “I'm definitely open to trying. I don't know what I'm doing, but I'll try”. I've always been very candid with what I think I can and can't do, but at the same time very open to trying new things.

Another thing that helps is, if you have suggestions for change or improvement in the workplace or in the code, instead of just suggesting possible changes, you can suggest how they could be implemented, and also volunteer to be the one to do it. 

Don't be afraid to ask stupid questions. If anyone ever thinks negatively of you for not knowing something no matter how simple, it's because they suck. I have been lucky to work with mostly good people, but every now and then you'll run into a jackass. 

Learning to communicate well and communicate often, both written and verbally. And always keeping management updated even if you have to communicate bad news, is essential.

You need the hard skills to get the jobs, but you need the soft skills to advance.

Being a team player and being okay with changing business needs and properties is huge. One thing that I tend to do is, I'll work on whatever and wherever the team needs someone. Even if that means working on a shit project others might not want to. If it's going to impact my other project deadlines then I make sure to make that clear when volunteering for other things.

Try to always assume positive intent when people are talking with you. A lot of the communication is done through text these days, and it's very easy to misread someone's tone. So I just always try to assume they meant it in a positive way. We're all on the same team trying to make the company successful. 

Sorry if any of this is stuff you know or whatever, I'm just trying to brain dump as much as I can think of

a note about job hunting

Also, something that I wanted to point out, in my transition between the two medical device companies and between Delta and my current job, the hiring process was not seamless. I didn't apply just to one job and get it. Even during the time when the market was hot, I probably applied to 10-15 places each time and went on 3-5 interviews. I actually think it might have been even more between the medical device companies. I just wanted to put that out there because some people get really discouraged, but you just have to keep trying. The software interview process is far from perfect and a lot of the time you are on the spot trying to solve problems by yourself on the fly, which is rare in the real world. Plus, you have the added pressure and nerves of the interview itself. So don't be discouraged if it takes longer than expected to land a job. Just keep applying. And when you get to the point you're ready to apply to internships or jobs, feel free to ask again for any pointers or send over your resume for review or whatever you want to do. 

A lot of people say to practice leetcode (online coding challenges), I am on the fence. I never did. I know a lot of people who never did. But maybe that's why I struggled during technical portions of interviews? I don't know. And soft skills will be a big part of the interview, too. All that to say, maybe check out leetcode and coding challenge websites, but I don't think they are the end all be all that some people act like they are. Maybe if you want to work at Google or Amazon.