being recently unemployed, I began my coding journey on FCC around a month ago. I have a little technical background in similar fields but am facing a financial dilemma. With limited knowledge in development having only completed the first 3 sections on FCC. How or what roles can I obtain while continuing my self taught journey. I would love to continue to gain experience with coding, but I am having a very hard financial time at the moment. Even if there are intern/ junior roles that use smaller skillsets such as html/ css/ java script etc. I would greatly benefit from a role to use these tools and continue to grow. Any advice, suggestions, or help would be greatly appreciated.
I would say get a job to alleviate the financial stress you’re feeling now. Any job will do. If you hate the job you get, then it’ll motivate you to learn to code more. I don’t recommend getting a job that you hate because this will have other bad externalities in your life. Go for a job you think you can get that will pay you what you need to alleviate the financial stress. As you continue learning on FCC or wherever you learn, throw your resume around to jobs you would like to get. Who know, you could get lucky and get a job quickly. This will also reveal gaps in your knowledge that will help you get a job. It will also help you get better at technical interviews.
I learned to code on FCC over the course of 1 year and 3 months while working a pharmacy tech job. When I got laid off from the pharmacy job, I looked for jobs for about 3 months while collecting unemployment and doing odd contract IT jobs. I did get a job writing/reading Python for a healthcare company. You can find a job in coding but you don’t need to pressure yourself into getting one while you’re not qualified.
Yeah, getting that first job is VERY difficult. There isn’t a lot of middle ground between novice and employed. This isn’t like wanting to become a carpenter so you get a job assisting and sweep up sawdust and work your way up. In web dev, you can either do it or you can’t. Sure, there are levels, but companies are wary about tying up salary caps on people that are going to struggle. They can hire an experienced dev who can do the work of 5 trainees for half the money.
At the risk of some shameless self-promotion, I once wrote up a doc with my thoughts about getting the first job.
But like dmoney is saying, don’t put all your eggs in that basket. If you need money, try to get a job to support you. There is a dream coding job out there for you, but it’s probably going to take longer and be harder to find than you are thinking.