So, you graduated a year after I did with the same degree. Woo Hoo, go PoliSci grads!
Anyway, you might consider putting some work experience on your resume, even though it’s not going to be related. It shows potential employers that you are used to the world of work and it’s especially helpful if you worked in an office environment.
As far as what to do going forward, I would dedicate no more than one day to posting to jobs, since it usually goes nowhere. Work on projects, be creative and build those skills! And, as everyone else said, go to events where you can network / learn from more experienced people! As a side note, I am hoping to get into web development also, after 8 years as a Systems Administrator. So I am pretty used to the whole recruiter / contractor business and I would say 90% of my legit job leads are from LinkedIn (this is of course probably very different from Web Dev, but maybe not when you are just starting out …)
Also, since you have gone through the basic training a few times over (FCC, Udacity and Thinkful) I would start looking at job descriptions for mid-level people and identifying the skills you lack and start learning those. It would be more self-directed though.
You will get a job, we have been there before. I would suggest you work on a more complex example and put it on your GitHub. Something like an e-commerce website. The projects you have posted are good but you need to set yourself apart. If it is possible, make sure you push to GitHub at least 5 days in a week. My current job did not involve interviews or job applications, someone saw what I did and hired me immediately. So I encourage you to push more work on Github. All the best.
Yeah I was conflicted about adding my past irrelevant job experience because I hear both sides of it. I hear what you’re saying though. I think my past customer service experience could translate into good communication skills and working well on a team. Both are important in a team of developers. I guess I can just add my most recent work experience.
I do need to get back into networking. I spent a good deal of time going to meetups but I got so burnt out from it after a while. It’s the introvert in me. lol. But I guess I’ll just have to suck it up and keep pushing since there are bound to be opportunities at those meetups.
@michaelgichia I think 5 times a week is a good number to aim for. I just want to make sure they are meaningful commits and not just committing frivolous stuff just for the sake of it. lol. Good on your to get that job. I do have a couple ideas in my head I could build for a more complex project. Thanks for the encouragement!
You should dedicate a website or something to this, it’s not so much the money you wasted, but also the time, that’s something that never comes back to you, time you could have spent learning something that the market would value (hence others are willing to pay you for it).
You are in an unique postition to do.
I have some other projects you might be interested in, just drop me an email (its on git-hub)
The resume and portfolio site look great but I have a few thing’s I would bring to your attention.
The picture of you on your portfolio site is not flattering at all. You need a clean professional look.
Your project’s look like you took time on them and made them well polished but they are very generic and don’t stand out at all. You should come up with your own project idea’s.
*Update: I just looked at the documentation for the Markdown Previewer. That one is exceptional. All of your projects should have documentation on par with that.
As someone else pointed out. Your GitHub commits are not consistent. Start coding and committing daily.
Your cover letter is also too long. I would put it at two paragraphs max. You want to grab the reader’s attention quickly. If they lose interest and don’t read it all then if will not strengthen your candidacy.
I hope this helps. Keep plugging along. If you don’t quit you will succeed.
I feel as though you are trying to sell you ‘skills’ too much. As a Junior developer, companies are not necessarily looking for skills as much as they are looking for enthusiasm and attitude. They know that you’re not going to be the best coder.
They are looking for someone who is always open and willing to learn. I’d say you need to get more of your personality out there, why did you start coding? what do you love about coding? Try and flesh our your interest section abit more and be specific. What is your favourite meal to cook? Unless you are going for a corporate role, you need to get your personality and enthusiasm across. Dont be afraid to make your CV 2 pages long (max) to go into more detail.
In your cover letter, you don’t mention why you want to work for the company. It seems again, as though you are trying to focus on your skillset too much which as a junior will never be your main selling point. Do some research on every company you apply for and express what you like about them.
Get a professional headshot. Your picture looks quite blurry and doesn’t look like much care has been put into it. When you do get a good headshot, use it on all your platforms to keep your branding consistent.
Try to message companies directly. Job boards for the most part are trash. Hundreds of people apply to jobs on job boards and most of the CV’s that come through are terrible, as many people apply to junior roles with ZERO experience expecting to get training on the job. Its likely that your CV doesn’t even get looked at. Try contacting people on linkedIn, directly through email or go to meetups and network.
You got this man, don’t give up. These are very useful tips that I have gotten by professionals in the industry and there is alot you can improve upon. I wish you the best of luck in your job search!
I did not read all of the replies, but I do have a suggestion for you. Can you find a temp agency that needs front-end developers in your area? This might allow you to hone your skills while doing actual work. It won’t pay much (maybe even minimum wage) but it will pay something. Also, I think there are some online companies that hire for peanuts. Have you tried those? It might be a step-up. I think your portfolio looks nice, and I think you are talented with front end work. (That’s not my thing.) I’m not an employer, though, so I have no idea how they will view it. Good luck to you.
I would like to encourage you to keep working hard and trying. I have been in the same boat for some time and it was very, very hard.
I dove into development by self-teaching, just like you. Keep trying to get these interviews and it doesn’t actually matter so much if you don’t get the job because there are so many great developer jobs. Furthermore, the longer you will keep searching, the more you will be aware of the medium and the market and the better job you will score.
I would like to say that the interviews made me know what the employees are looking for and how to sell myself to them. I even learned a lot during interviews or immediately looked up on the internet after the interview. I kept coding and learning various data structures and algorithms. I noticed that it’s one thing that employees look at. Also, creating a portfolio website has helped me a lot but I see that you have one already.
I also tried building some apps from scratch for my dad and also talking and explaining what I do helped me a lot. I suggest for you to get some knowledge into databases and backend languages. Just to get familiar, not to become an expert. It’s better to be an expert on one thing, front-end in your case, then be average in both.
I would also suggest you to build apps with vanilla javascript. I actually fell in love with vanilla and I believe you would too. It’s great that you know React which is the most famous framework but frameworks come and go. The company might just switch a framework out of a sudden or even work on a different one. By knowing the basics you will be better to adapt to frameworks. If you need references/resources for this, let me know!
Don’t give up, you are almost there. Best of luck!
You should focus on encouraging others. Your snide comments only hurt yourself. I used to be a cynical individual but that doesn’t bring life and now I am new in Christ. I hope you come to live an abundant life & to know the Living God. Take care.
@drake-king
The misunderstanding was resolved. That wasn’t preaching. I know the main setting for this forum and respect the subject matter but if someone is rude or insulting I’m going to bless them because it’s what my faith call’s those who believe to do.
I have just posted my Medium article on how I got my first developer Job. I hope it can inspire you in the way many articles inspired my self, I would advise you to work on networking. The article explains why.
Yes I do admit I have just been using a template and switching out the position and company name. You are right. I definitely need to personalize it more to the specific job at hand. Thank you for your feedback!
I’ve heard it said that one hour is a suitable amount of time to spend on preparing one job application. That time can be spent researching the company (look at the code behind their website, figure out what they do and why they are hiring you, see if they have GitHub pages of their own), and based on your research, tailor the resume and cover letter. If there’s a phone number on the listing, you could also call to ask if the position would be suitable for a junior developer. Hope it can be helpful to have a concrete idea of how much to put into each new job application. Good luck!
Thanks for the feedback! I will try to trim down cover letter. Regarding my work history, I have worked mostly in customer service. In my old resume, I included it on there. But after speaking with a career coach, he recommended I leave it out completely because it wasn’t relevant to web development. He said I should instead leave more room to talk about my projects.
How long ago did you talk to the career coach? If it was a long time ago, and the changes didn’t help, then maybe the career coach was mistaken. In any event, since there are always more jobs to apply for, why not try A/B testing? For the next 40 applications you send out, flip a coin. Heads, you put in the customer service work. Tails, you leave it out. Keep track of how many responses you get for each condition. Then get back to us in forty days to let us know which one works better, or lands more interviews.
i have some input that may help you, from my own similar experience, if you’re interested, let’s get on a call…
you can post conclusions here afterwards of course…i just have no time…sorry…
Thanks guys! I’m just overwhelmed by the generous amounts of input you all gave me. They were all very helpful and gave me motivation to keep going. I hope that I can return the favor someday. You guys are awesome!
I have applied for five positions and got seven interviews. Do the maths Two havent worked out due to salary, one I got through to the next stage but got pipped by someone who was more experienced and one I got to the technical test section and am waiting to hear back. The other two I was contacted by the company and I have landed myself ongoing work with one, and havent yet heard back from the other. I don’t have any more experience that yourself and actually technically you are more advanced than me… Here is my two cents:
Rewrite your Cover Letter - This needs to focus more on your strengths as a person and what you could bring specifically to the company rather than just saying “I believe my skills would be a valuable asset to the team”. What skills did you learn in your last job? Are you driven? Have you worked in a team before? You need to blow your own trumpet without sounding arrogant or pig headed. Its tricky!! But important.
Rewrite your Resume - Dont focus on the projects in my opinion. Once again, if you have had a job before, then you need to concentrate on telling what you learned from there and what experience that has given you (team work, organisation). The independant web developer section needs to go more in to detail about the jobs for people you did. Its quite generous to call that work experience when all it is is your own projects and help people on freecode camp… see below. Focus more on your degree as well as Udacitys nanodegree.
Get some REAL experience - As stated above, personal projects just arent going to cut it for work experience. You need to network and get some freelance work. Speak to people, ask around friends and family, get yourself on Instagram SEE NUMBER 5. I actually spoke to a recruiter yesterday about a job, and he rung me back and said his missus was looking for a website for her business and would I be able to do it. Chances for jobs are literally everywhere! Look on peopleperhour and similar but be cautious about it and keep your wits about you. I got screwed over on Upwork massively and never got a penny out of them.
Github - Like @wwSchrader has mentioned above, you need to be constantly updating, rewriting readme’s, contributing to projects. This is your main point of call for people looking in at your technical skills and having two weeks of no contributions unfortunately doesnt cut the mustard. Maybe have a sort out of your repositories, follow some people, fork some projects and get contributing. I have had positive comments on my own account - http://github.com/jabedford - Feel free to take a look and take what you want from there! As you can tell I only started last November.
Network, network network - Arguably the most important point of them all. Get yourself connecting with people and recruiters on linkedin. Also get yourself on Instagram and start documenting your journey. I have landed myself three freelance jobs through this platform and met a lot of like minded people from around the world as well as local. I am in regular contact with senior developers from just down the road from me! It is a social network that is often overlooked but it has been incredibly valuable for myself and many others. I went from 70 followers to over 1500 in four months (70 pictures), and this is 1430 more people I am getting my work and mindset in front of. There are loads of local companies I can follow and connect with on there - https://www.instagram.com/countryside.coder/ - Take a look and see what sort of stuff I am posting. It has worked well for me, and often particularly small companies like the fact that you are involved with social media… People make good careers out of social media marketing, so this is another skill to add to your tool belt.
I hope you take something away from that buddy . Don’t feel disheartened, everyone has been there are some point! I was feeling a bit gutted because of the technical test I did at the weekend (I made some mistakes). My old man came in with his pearls of wisdom and said “I fucked a technical test up beyond repair once and still got the job”. Read from that what you will, but this reinforces the fact for me that sometimes people will employ the person rather than their skills. Get yourself in front of the right people, and as long as you show the same attitude and eagreness you display here things will be fine!
Two havent worked out due to salary, one I got through to the next stage but got pipped by someone who was more experienced and one I got to the technical test section and am waiting to hear back. The other two I was contacted by the company and I have landed myself ongoing work with one, and havent yet heard back from the other. I don’t have any more experience that yourself and actually technically you are more advanced than me… Here is my two cents:
- 
. Don’t feel disheartened, everyone has been there are some point! I was feeling a bit gutted because of the technical test I did at the weekend (I made some mistakes). My old man came in with his pearls of wisdom and said “I fucked a technical test up beyond repair once and still got the job”. Read from that what you will, but this reinforces the fact for me that sometimes people will employ the person rather than their skills. Get yourself in front of the right people, and as long as you show the same attitude and eagreness you display here things will be fine! 