To avoid a shortage of personnel, large IT-companies engaged in training programmers and are ready to accept newcomers for probation — so the priority in the formation of IT-specialist are quick learning and independence instead of university diploma and work experience.
High salaries, high demand and the opportunity to become a specialist without higher education attract more and more people wishing to work in the IT field.
Why does IT not matter gender, age and education of a specialist?
There are no entry barriers to work in IT—everyone can do, there would be a desire and free time for learning:
- Age does not matter, even vice versa - gives advantages. Seventeen-year-olds are able to learn a lot and quickly "try on" different professions, and those who change the sphere of activity after 25 do this more consciously and therefore are motivated to study as much as possible.
- The existing education will only help in the development of a new business: banking employees can find themselves in fintech, biologists in bioinformatics, architects in the development of software for smart homes.
- The gender of an IT specialist is not important at all - it cannot be said that men have an advantage over women, and vice versa.
You can get basic theoretical knowledge and practical skills today for free, for example, a video course CS50 Harvard University - these are 23 lectures on the basics of programming, which will replace you with the first year of the university.
What's most important for a beginner
- Be consistent—first "hit the arm" on simple tasks (do them every day to bring them to automatic), and then move on to more complex tasks.
- Answers to all your questions are available in professional communities, on specialized sites - learn to query search engines to quickly find what you want.
- Don't be afraid to ask if something is unclear—but before you ask a question, make sure there is no answer to it in the open sources.
- Learn to ask questions - to colleagues, like-minded people, a mentor. Indeed, useful advice can only be provided in response to a clearly defined question.
- Perhaps the most important thing is to choose IT specialization. Selection criteria can vary: the demand for the profession, the level of wages, prospects for the next few years, but the most important thing is your interest in the chosen field.
How to approach the choice of specialization and direction?
Web development is perhaps the most popular and understandable specialization in IT for beginners. If you still find the professions of DevOps-engineer, data scientist, Python-developer complex, choose web development.
But not everything is so simple - after specialization you need to choose the direction for work. There are three in the development of sites:
- Frontend - layout and interactive elements, i.e. the user-visible part of the site
- Backend — think about site logic, storage and security of data, receiving payments is a server, invisible part of the site
- Full Stack , both destinations together, creates a working site
According to the research, frontend developers are the most desirable among employers, and demand for them continues to grow: for 2016-2018 the number of vacancies increased by 20%. Full Stack developers are less popular, but their vacancy rate has doubled in the same time.
To choose the direction of web development, study the basics of frontend and backend—it won't prevent in any case. Once you have tried both directions in practice, you can decide what is right for you.
Where should I start my study?
Allocate at least ten hours a week for training and do a little, but be sure to do every day - combine theory with practice. It is more interesting and effective to learn if you have real tasks, so to study, take a working project - a site in the development of which you will apply new knowledge.
Regardless of whether you choose a frontend or a backend, the experience of developing a project from scratch will be useful to understand what the specialist's work is.
Think of your project, ask for a real task among your acquaintances, or look for test jobs in job descriptions—important not only for training, but also for the future portfolio that the employer is looking at.
What do you need to know and be able to get a junior position?
Junior developer - the initial level of IT specialist. This is a great opportunity to start in the profession: beginners will not be thrown into trouble by senior colleagues, so experience can be gained very quickly, but it is important to continue to develop, mastering new skills and technologies.
The requirements of entry-level specialists in different companies are theirs - some are ready to take a programmer without experience and teach him from scratch, others are important project portfolios, albeit non-profit ones. Job descriptions converge only in the field of personal qualities of an employee: a junior should be able to work in a team, be curious, show independence in training, calmly treat criticism, it is advisable to have a portfolio, even from their own or training projects, and know basic technical English.
The technical skills required for work depend on the tasks that the specialist has to solve. There are internship programs in large IT companies - a beginner has the opportunity to quickly gain basic skills and grow from an intern to a specialist. In small companies, there is often no one to teach employees, so at the start, the junior needs to have at least minimal skills and work experience.
How to look for the first job in IT?
During the training process, collect a list of projects in which you participated - it will show the employer your level of training. Also constantly review vacancies and find suitable for you - by tasks, necessary skills, work schedule. Respond to vacancies, go to interviews - this is the fastest way to find out what you are missing before the desired position. Do not refuse an unpaid internship - this is how you can get the first "combat" experience and become a junior.
Pour into the community: go to meetups, lectures, hackathons. Meet people from the industry. Perhaps you will find your first work this way.
What you need to pay attention to in the description of the vacancy if you are still studying and want to apply for the position of junior:
- Responsibilities — by looking ahead to the requirements of a specialist in the companies where you would like to work, you can understand what skills you lack to work.
- Programming language and technology stack - experience with the set of tools used in the company will increase your chances of getting a job.
- Skills that will give you the advantage of finding a job—usually a familiarity with graphic editors and specialized software, initial knowledge of layout, frameworks, databases.
- The experience you'll get at work is that for your first job it's important to choose a company where you get the most experience relevant to your chosen area.