Ask HN: I have 3 months severance. Seeking advice preparing for a dev job. Help? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: I have 3 months severance. Seeking advice preparing for a dev job. Help?

7 pointsspenuke5 comments

Greetings.

<Background info>

I have never been employed as a software developer. I have spent the last year casting a wide net and learning interesting web technologies. Began with Python at Udacity. Got through a third of SICP, and began to really enjoy Javascript. I've gone on to learn enough HTML and CSS to build small web apps, familiarize myself with EC2 platform... enough to receive genuine interest from web agencies.

So, I have a fair grounding in good practices, logical flow of program parsing, and I can reasonably design an OO/MV* system. I like this stuff a lot.

I've spent all this time dabbling and exploring. Now, with three months of severance (no unemployment insurance, though!), I have the opportunity and the pressure to drill down into a particular area. The goal, of course, getting a good job afterward.

</Background info>

<The crux>

I'm in my 30s. It seems a crucial choice here that could go wrong if I waste time. I am considering nailing down a MEAN-stack project in a month. Then spend the rest of the time learning iOS development.

The idea would be to give myself options. I'm more interested in finding a company whose product I like than I am in working with any particular technology. But, as you can see, I'm not great at picking a course and going with it. Am I crazy to think that I could be employable from the iOS side in two months? Should I play it safe and just drill down into the MEAN stack?

Sorry for the long, selfish post. I realize it's a pretty sweet situation to be in - and I don't want to waste it.

Thanks for any advice or thoughts... regarding whether this sounds doable, or your experience comparing developing for the browser vs. developing for native, or employability, etc. and so on... I really do appreciate any thoughts.

</crux>

PS: I am in the US, but otherwise open to moving, so geography shouldn't be much of an issue.

What's your previous work history and educational background? That's the first thing that's going to come up with any employer. It could be in your benefit or not depending on what you were doing previously. How you frame it to potential employers will be key in getting callbacks.

Since you don't have a deep dev background I would suggest a portfolio site with links and descriptions of side projects and any other relevant work.

Regarding a resume, if you're going to include all the different technologies you've been looking into you should provide some indication of your level of experience with them, e.g. beginner, advanced, etc. Personally, I get a bit put off if resumes from inexperienced candidates contain a laundry list of technologies without ranking and it just turns out they've only used them in passing.

Generally, you may not want to spread yourself too thin learning so much this early in your career. Getting some deeper experience with a few key technologies could be very desirable to potential employers. It sounds like you've been mostly concentrating on web stacks in which case you may want to focus your job hunt on web developer positions specifically rather than full stack or back end.

Hey, thanks for the response. Years ago I was doing network and Windows system administration for a few years. Went back to school to get a degree in the humanities.

To be clear, I am planning on going the portfolio route. Part of the problem is that I have a few exciting ideas, and one is a full stack project, while two others would work best as iOS apps. Thanks again.

That's hugely relevant experience! And if you can bring good communication skills to the table, even better. Half the battle hiring qualified candidates is establishing if they are organized, communicative, and professional. I too have a humanities degree (poli sci) and as I've become more experienced the critical thinking and communication aspects have been extremely helpful. Use that to your advantage.

It sounds like you know how to navigate the technical waters well enough, I would say weigh which technology stack is more appealing to you and dive in. iOS and rich front end are both in fairly high demand, you might want to investigate your local market a bit to factor in whichever seems to have more opportunities if you don't plan on moving any time soon.

Oh, and the other thing, be prepared for in depth technical exercises in interviews. They're no fun, but a lot of places ask academic and somewhat irrelevant algorithm and data structure questions regardless of if your applied skills are great. My wife got me this book, and language not withstanding, it seems to cover the typical types of technical questions interviewers ask: http://amzn.com/098478280X

Best of luck!

First step I would checkout what jobs are available in your area or where you would like to relocate. Since you're familiar with web application development I would consider learning Rails (Ruby) or Laravel (PHP) . . . look at the opportunities at weworkremotely.com and larajobs.com to get an idea of the requirements. Maybe touch base with local agencies and see if they are have any openings. The best way to expand your skills it to take on paying projects maybe from family, friends or associates initially and start building your network.

Some other sources of inspiration are StartUpsForTheRestOfUs.com, Patio11, Nathan Barry and Brennan Dunn for opportunities to start your own SaaS/Product business if that's interesting to you.

Enjoy your time off. Good luck with your career change.

Get involved with an open source project! You can showcase your work and skills on your cv, plus it shows a level of passion. GitHub is a good place to start. Good luck!

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