I just landed my first Software Development job!

Career Advice
#1

Thank you to FreeCodeCamp! Especially @QuincyLarson!

Here is my story:
For the past 2.5 years I have been studying web development through FreeCodeCamp. I struggled greatly with learning the back-end so six months ago I enrolled in a online coding bootcamp called Thinkul. Great curriculum and I would definitely recommend the mentorship structure of the program but in the end, what led to me getting the job was I was encouraged to do more networking. I went to a meetup and I met a guy who was interested in what I was doing at Thinkful and so I showed him my projects. He showed his boss and next thing I knew they were offering me a job!

For everyone’s reference, the job is with a software consultancy company in Atlanta, GA and they offered me $55k with a $5000 sign on bonus, $2000 annual tech budget and it’s remote three days a week!

Best of luck to all of you! I had my ups and downs along this path. Prior to Thinkful, I had a couple stressful job interviews that didn’t pan out. Just keep pushing forward. Don’t let the rejection get you down. You are getting better through the process and some company will be lucky to have you on their team. Don’t don’t DON’T discount networking. It definitely was the missing piece of the puzzle that I failed to embrace early enough. I believe I would have had a job sooner, if I had networked more.

8 Likes
#2

Congrats! Best of luck at your new job :slight_smile:

#3

Congrats! It is good to hear that you got the job after such a vigorous effort. Anyway Can we see your portfolio?

#4

I don’t have an official portfolio at the moment, but here is my GitHub: https://github.com/escottalexander

#5

Hey man, this is an amazing story! I’m also in the Atlanta area and have been studying for about 8 months, though I just started here on FCC this month (and loving it so far). Congrats on the job! 3 days remote sounds just too good to be true! It would def be great to attend some local events, how did you find them? Meetup.com?

#6

Yes! I found a few local events on Meetup.com and started attending regularly. I am actually out in the Woodstock area, so the events I attended are probably too far away for you if you are in Atlanta proper. But there are tons more events in Atlanta.

#7

Wow I lived in Woodstock too. May I know the company name and how the interview process look like?

#8

The company is called Devnext. They are a smaller company and the impression they gave me is that they are done hiring junior roles at this point. But they have been open to hiring self-taught people for at least the past few years so maybe in six months or so they will be looking for more juniors.

The interview process was literally sitting down and “getting to know” the CEO. As I mentioned, they did see some of my projects ahead of time but other than that they didn’t test me on a technical level. Just conversation and looking at my code.

#9

Congratulations to you and thank you for insisting in your testimony about the importance of networking. It is appreciated.

#10