A Computer Science Blog sharing the best methods to go from being a standard muggle to a Computing Sorcerer.
"I've been hanging around here for a while and it seems to me like there's a lot of people on here who are still in school or are in the early stages of a career as a developer. I thought it would help some of you guys to have a thread where you can get the perspective of a long time software development leader about what we look for when hiring, promoting, etc.
As far as my credentials go, I won't say who I work for just that it's a massive company. I manage a team of 105 programmers working across ~40 project teams. Based on lines of code written my teams work in HTML/CSS/JavaScript, PHP, C#, Java and Python most often, with a bit of F#, Ruby and a few others I'm probably forgetting in there. I'm a 15 year vet, the majority of my team are guys who are just out of college or have a few years experience.
That said, here's my top 3 things you can do to get and keep a job:
1) Be Language Agnostic
When I'm hiring there's a 50% chance that I don't REALLY care what languages you've written in before, just that you're familiar with the language I need you in and can get up and running in general. Since most of our projects are short turn around items, onboarding takes a long time relative to how long the project will last (e.g. 3 weeks of onboarding on a 6 month project). Also, be flexible... I can't tell you how many college kids I just fucking walk out of my office because they tell me all about how Lisp is the greatest language ever invented and we're wrong to be using anything else, which brings me to point 2
2) Be Humble
That kid who tells me we should be using Lisp is wrong. You know how I know he's wrong? Because MY TEAM IS SUCCESSFUL. Again, I can't tell you how shockingly shitty most young guys act in that first interview. Obviously once you're on the team if you think we should switch something I ABSOLUTELY want to hear your idea but make sure it makes sense (and is demonstrably better) and don't get all butthurt if I don't agree. We work based on what the developers pitch to me and we decide as a group is the right play, which backs me into point 3
3) Remember that you're a fucking unicorn
You are the aberration here, your non technical managers, bosses, finance people, HR people, NOBODY in the company understands what the fuck it is you do. You may as well be named Merlin to these people. My job (to crib a line from Jay Mohr) is to not let management spook the thoroughbred. Your part in this is to be that thoroughbred AT ALL TIMES and to remember that a thoroughbred just KNOWS that it's a thoroughbred, when that belief is strong enough, other people will get it naturally. Carry yourself like a boss and you'll be a boss."
