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Tips for a Junior Dev

Wilfred on October 26, 2019

I have read a couple articles with advice for Junior Developers so I decided to write a few myself to share and reflect on my journey in that role....
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Ben Halpern

These are all really great tips.

  1. This one is key... DON'T CALL YOURSELF A JUNIOR DEVELOPER!!!

Opinions could probably vary here, but this really helped me. In fact, I think I was such an outsider to the developer community (I didn't have DEV back then 😄) that I didn't even have "entry level" in my vocabulary per se. I just tried to rise to whatever task was presented.

Granted I did look for junior jobs where I could, but I also didn't pigeonhole myself, I just tried to be a dev and get better every day.

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Wilfred

Thanks for your feedback Ben!

I do agree, its a bit controversial. I hope it helps Junior Devs not feel tied to that title and grow as developers as you did.

Really curious to know about your developer journey. Do you have an article/ podcast on it?

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Ali Ilman

Having a positive mindset when solving a task can increase your chances of solving it. I find that if I tell myself I can solve a task, often times, I end up doing so. And when I am not too positive, I find that I take longer to get the task done.

This is important! 🤓 It’s easy to drown yourself in feeling you’re a failure when you’re stuck on a, let’s say, 5-point card for 2 weeks (!). I was in that boat and I felt I chose the wrong career when all I needed to do was to think outside of the box and use a different package for the problem in hand.

Another thing I find important is always to keep an open mind. Not just to suggestions, but to your approach towards a solution.

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Wilfred

Very true. Keeping an open mind when solving a problem is a great trip! Glad to hear you solved it 🙌

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Henri Helvetica
  1. Being part of a community

I can't begin to mention how many times I've emphasized this. When conducting lunch n learns, I end by saying that joining communities will allow you to find your voice, let alone others to bond with. And after that, anything can happen - from basic professional growth, right up to job offers - as it's networking w/o networking (if that makes sense). Great post.

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🇭🇹 DEDE

Great article!

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Henri Helvetica

🇭🇹

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kethmars

All of them are good points, but I especially like the last one. Your job title doesn't define your seniority / skills.

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Abdullah Furkan Özbek

These are aweseome tips. I do all of the above tips. Thanks for sharing it 🙌🏻

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Olivier JM Maniraho

Great insights, we all started from somewhere.
Getting out of the comfortable zone is great too and practicing to read other people’s code.

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Leonardo Furtado

Awesome article!