How to get job
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One of the wonderful things about DDD North yesterday was that a bunch of developers (and me) spent a big chunk of their lunch hour in a meeting with students telling them how get a job in this business. There was a lot of good discussion which I’ve boiled down into 10 points. I apologise if I’ve misquoted or misconstrued folks who were there - feel free to hit me in the comments…
Employers hire people who “get stuff done”. So, get some stuff done and tell the world about it.
Employers also hire people who they know about. So, get out there and meet them. Join user groups, go to conferences, contribute to open source. If you get it right, they call you before you call them.
Keep your bio brief and to the point but put in things that differentiate you from the rest. Recruiters are busy people. Put your technical skills and project experience right at the front of your details to encourage them to read more.
Don’t say “I can’t do that”. “I’ll find out more and get back to you tomorrow.” is a much better response. Then find out more and get back to them tomorrow.
The recruitment process can be a snake pit. Be prepared for industrial scale rejection and duplicity.
Get yourself into a situation where you can get lucky. And if you aren’t lucky try to take something from the experience and go on to the next one.
Work with people who aren’t software developers and learn to see the world through their eyes. Solutions aren’t just built by coders, there are lots of other folks involved and you need to be able to work with them.
Consider everything you do in terms of “how can I use this to promote my brand”. Even “train wreck” projects can be useful if you describe what you learned from them.
Keep learning. Your knowledge has a half-life of a few years. It will start to decay in usefulness as soon as you’ve learned it. (Although you should also remember that there are universal constants in terms of how you work with people)
Stay nice. I’ve found that nice people end up the happiest.
