Any suggestions on where to look for entry-level remote jobs that utilize the material in this curriculum (e.g. web developer, programmer, web designer, etc.), specifically ones where the bar to apply is doable?
I’ve been looking at sites like Indeed and ZipRecruiter, and I see these entry-level jobs that require a ton of experience (e.g. a bachelors degree in IT, 4-5 years of experience with JS/“enter framework here”, etc). Many of the entry-level jobs in those sites have this very high bar of expectation, which can be intimidating to those who are just starting out/have like around 1 year of experience in the material learned in this site.
Honestly the best piece of advice I can give is to start local. I know a lot of people want to work remote but that is 20x more competitive because you are competing with those around the world. If you stay local then it is a much smaller pool of candidates.
Go straight to company websites and see what jobs are available. A lot of companies won’t post to all of these job sites like Indeed because they know they will get tons of applications where a lot of them won’t be good. Plus they have to pay for those listings. So sometimes it is just easier to post on the company site and ask within their inner circle for any good candidates. That is why networking is so important.
If your local market is not an option because there are very few companies or opportunities in your area and you are not able to relocate to a different area, then you are going to have to learn how to stand out amongst the sea of remote candidates. That’s where building a strong online presence and being really good at networking comes into play.
There are several reasons for this
one reason is that this is a employers market. They know that if they post a junior job with 0-1 year experience that knows xyz technologies, they will get a flood a applicants. Easily hundreds within just a few days.
But companies have a hard time sifting through all of the applicants to get to the ones they actually want. So by putting filters in place like “Must have college degree” or “Must have x amount of years” they are hoping that will deter some people . Or sometimes they will mark that as hard requirements and have these job platforms filter out people automatically if the applicant doesn’t meet those requirements.
Another reason why this happens is because often times the job postings will come from HR or other non technical individuals that will know some tech keywords and design the listings. So of course they want to attract people with really strong skills and experience over those who don’t. It saves the company money and time to just hire someone with experience that can get started quicker then try to train someone greener in the industry.
Overall, hiring is expensive for the company. When you take into account the time it takes to go through the initial job posting, filtering through candidates, going through multiple rounds of behavioral and technical interviews, make an offer and have that employee go through onboarding, that is tens of thousands of dollars right there to see if it actually pans out or not.
So the worst outcome for the company is to spend all of that time and money only to have to get rid of that person for not working out and start all over again.
Companies will do everything in their power to protect themselves.
I made a list of companies I liked, then checked their jobs page once a week. I also connected with devs on LinkedIn and asked if they’re open to chatting about their teams.