Hello, dear Dev.to community. I need to get some things off my chest, so here I am, hoping to share something useful with young IT professionals. O...
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There's no guarantee anything you do will ever make you "succeed" and I worry that this outlook is dangerous. It's "Disney thinking" - hard work will make you rich and respected (and possibly royalty; their movies are quite misleading).
The problem is that when you don't succeed, the logical inference is that you didn't work hard enough - you're lazy, or defective somehow. And since the majority of us won't get that golden dream, it's extremely unhealthy to hold this belief in the long term.
"Disney Thinking" is a nice metaphor I must say, distills to the point.
I think the main issue is how many define success, usually success is defined as an end goal that needs to be achieved, and it can be quite damaging.
Anyone who is reading this, remember anything from which you either learn, unlearn, or learn that this thing doesn't interest you is a success.
Yep, exactly this type of 'toxic positivity' got me into downward spiral of 'more work -> less energy -> still not succeeding -> more work -> less energy -> still not succeeding' until there was no more energy left. I was asking myself 'how should I put in more energy when there is nothing left? and I still can't make it!'... go straight into Burnout... do not go over 'Start', don't take any money.
Well said.
But learn to Pivot. There are loads of successful professionals out there, few of whom will tell you they didn't work hard and didn't analyze and then adjust. Know when.
Quite. There're all sorts of factors out there dragging you away from the so called success, like the industry you're in and the persons you're working with. Being positive is vital, but understanding the environment is also a must-do.
Luck is always the factor in some or the other way.
As someone coming up on just over 35 years in the IT biz, what's helped me survive is being a "jack of all trades", stay flexible and adaptable, close to #5.
If something calls to you and you feel it's something you want to work with then do it, even if it becomes a dead end and you have to walk away then you will have expanded your experience. I must have coded in close on 30 languages, used operating systems people under 30 have probably never even heard of, let alone will ever work on. Everything I've ever worked on from my first micro at age 9 in 1981, to messing around with my first PC in 1986 as a teen, right up to literally today working on Terraform with AWS and Azure, it's all just constant experience and exposure. I love working on certain things, automation is my "safe zone go-to" when I need to just chill at work and still get something done but I almost never say "no" to anything.
Just see everything you do as expanding your experience. It's the reason my manager has let go of many people but kept me and a colleague I've known for 25 years now, the second our manager says, "Guys could you take a look at....", me and my mate will be off and trying to out do each other on who can learn the nifitiest tricks about whatever it is! Even if it gets canned 3 weeks later, so what, we learned something.
I quite like your mindset ("Jack of all trades")
+1. Your client is human. Learn how to speak with human. Many beginner only focus to sharpen their technical skill. Well, it's good, but for long terms career you should sharpen your softskill
Thank you , this is truly pro content.
@vorniches ,Thanks for posting your experience. Its been a year as backend developer and I can co-relate most of the things. Specially these words.
Your blog gives me hope to continue, thanks ❤️
I'd add one advice, especially for people in USA. Don't do overhours. Never. If your "full day" is 8 hours, then after 8 hours turn off your computer and do something else, whatever you like to do in a spare time. In two years the only people who will remember that you did overhours will be your kids (or family in general).
Why USA? Well, because of stuff I seen on social media so I may have a false view, but it seems that in USA there is a mindset "put more hours -> earn more". No. If it works in some countries then it can work everywhere, just be assertive and don't look at your colleagues who maybe do overhours. It's their problem. It's easier on home office but I can't relate because I never did overhours (I'm a software developer with almost 10 years of experience).
6.) If you sign a contract as consultant developer, make sure that there is a clause that regulates payout/benefits if your efforts are used during a sales process. Otherwise all the benefits will go to the sales person while you're the one doing the actual job.
But you’re getting paid for your efforts leading up to the sales right? Never heard of this clause, been a consultant for 15 years. Interesting idea tho :)
Thanks for sharing.
Point#3 has been my worst career mistake: staying too long at a stagnated job hoping and praying for things to change without any action on my part.
Thank you for sharing 🙏🏿
I am a junior full-stack web developer, I am 22 years old, and everything I have learned, I have learned on my own. I feel that this type of career suits me, but I haven't been able to find a job in this field so far. I felt like I had no hope, and many times it was very difficult for me to even open my laptop. But it seems that my whole life has led me to this point, where I now want to learn more and more, to understand things much more easily. It feels like any programming language is extremely easy to understand and use, at least that’s how it seems since I moved to Germany, where I’ve already changed two jobs that were physically very demanding. Now, I've ended up doing something completely different. I'm not working as a programmer, but at this job, I have the opportunity to see experienced programmers and interact with them daily, which excites me a lot. I just hope that somehow, someday, I will manage to find a job in this field that I love so much and that can offer me not only a salary increase but also freedom... which I can't fully enjoy at the moment. I've never been an optimistic person when it comes to myself, but for the past few months, I feel like I’ve matured and started to become more aware of my abilities.
100% agree to that. In my first year of work, I chose to do front end while many of my batchmates chose full stack.
PS: All of us were new to all the technologies we were about to use.
Fast forward after a year, anything related to frontend, I became the go-to UI man for my team and for my juniors / interns. Because I was able to give 80% of my time understanding the nuances of frontend, I was able to dive deeper into it and build certain expertise around it. While many of my friends have definitely gotten good at full stack, they have not gotten the same kind of expertise either in UI or backend or DB. So you become just another developer who can do the task assigned. Not the 'go-to' guy for something.
Now any project I undertake, I can confidently write code for UI, because of the hours I spent on it. Now I plan to explore backend and see how it works out for me, while continuing contributions in UI. But me choosing just one thing and focusing my energy on it, has definitely been a game changer.
8 years into the programming for a living here - 100% agreed.
Thank you for this! As a fresh graduate, one question I still have, though, is how to know when I should stick to a technology or pivot into another. IT is such a broad topic and I know I won't be able to learn everything, but should I pivot into technologies or roles that many companies need like test automation? Or do I stick to my strengths, say web development, even when I know it's harder to find a job?
Thanks for sharing. I have also worked for 10 years in the IT field. In my opinion, every opportunity is valuable. I once left a job due to low salary and high effort, but I now regret that decision. After all, we are all human and everyone faces challenges. Many insights come with time. Consistency and perseverance teach us to endure and become more resilient. And not everyone may achieve success, but no one can succeed without effort.
Over 30+ years working experience: you are totally right, thx 4 share.
You have done one of the best explaination on what it mean to be a dev for a long time. Thanks for sharing this!
Thanks a lot man !!
As a newbie in this field your points gave a lot clarity to me.
looking forward to see such posts more often from you.
Great points! Love the humor too.
Great thoughts of your journey Sergei! ⚡️🙂
I liked the content but the way everything was phrased seemed a bit low on enthusiasm. I mean sharing was a really good option but, some points are really on the positives and why talk about negatives when you can gain a ton of experience from it? If a developer hates losing then I would say he has not joined the field out of his own free will or interest
Very Informative
This is a good article. Very useful advise for beginners. Thanks for sharing.
thank you!
This is excellent advice. More generally, reading a lot (and listening to podcasts, YouTube videos, and other sources) builds new connections between the different knowledge bases you have and helps form an understanding of new topics and concepts. The more I've read, the more I've advanced my knowledge and my career.
I'm 51 and have only started studying I.T./developing this year...my house now has more screens, keyboards, mouse and network cables that the set of the Matrix. After many years enjoying the problem solving, technical side of Automotive world and losing that...what I feel now is excitement, this world of endless creativity...I hope that feeling stays with me.
thank you very much.
very useful.
Thank you very much. This helps me alot.
Woow! This piece helped me understand a lot. With everything I face now, reading this now puts everything clearly!
thanks for sharing
Top, very nice !
Thanks for sharing
Man... right now i'm at point 3.... feels bad... but i can't really drop it to focus an a path because i don't have a secure net below me.
Great post. Thank you!
Thanks for sharing your valuable thoughts as an article.
Thank you
Thank for sharing !
This post helped me a lot. Thanks so much and keep sharing, we all need a post like this.
Nice
Obrigado pelo conteúdo de qualidade, me ajudou a analisar melhor minhas decisões.
so if there's am opportunity for a wordpress technical writer should I apply for it.
Consistency, consistency, consistency. If you never quit, you will eventually get somewhere.
Great insight for someone new and just starting on the web dev track! Thanks Sergei!
Thanks very much. This will help me alot
Wow. very impressive.
Thank you.
thanks, I feel motivated.
Awesome post
thanks for sharing this with us
Don’t cling to a Bad Job
any suggestion for that because i felling the same.
thank you
It is true.
Thanks, Sergei for your advice it's very helpful to me.
You just described my situation, it helps to know I not alone
Thanks! This was especially helpful coming from someone very new to web development.
Can you please bring how git hub can bring developer on its way ....