How to Get Hired as a Junior Developer
Tags: webdev, beginners, programming, devjournal
Published: 2022-12-27 13:12:43

As 2022 ends, I have come to my senses and decided to create my realizations for getting a job as a junior developer.😄

Let me tell you my story, 🤗

Since I was college, I look down on myself and kept thinking I cannot make it. I cannot get a job in the IT industry. I visualize myself after I graduate I will just take methods in teaching and decided to just teach in the college. But to be honest, there's a lot of opportunities for the IT graduates, they just have to find out what skills and what career path in IT that they want to take. So back in the days when I was a college student, I was still undecided of what IT career path should I take, but before I am interested of game development, mobile apps and cyber security.😎

> Learning is fun in IT and you always keep solving problems. To create solutions through hardware and software development. And I find myself enjoy working in the laptop and do many projects alone. As an introvert person, this is an advantage to me because I don't have to keep communicate with other people and just do my job done.

There's a circumstance that I doubt my skills and I always trying hard to do the projects done. If you have this kind of feeling right now, its okay. Imposter syndrome happens to everyone. We don't need to know _everything_. But we should not stop learning. You are in a work in progress. Don't afraid to ask questions and keep exploring. Now, I'm working as web developer and a designer and even myself can't believe it. Here are some tips that I can give you to keep you motivated and land a job as a developer. 

_If you're a college student taking IT/CS degree, these tips are for you._ 

1. **Keep Studying. Practice a lot.** - Create many projects as you can. Study some tutorials and always be curious for the latest technologies. Keep up to date and do projects as many as you can. You are eager to learn and never stop learning. Your created projects also helpful because you can also showcase this to your hiring managers and others who wants to check your projects.

2. **Git and Github** - If I would go back, one of the things that I regret in college is that I didn't tried to study about git and github. These git versions are so useful when it comes to development especially for the developers. You can check you saved changes and latest commits in your code. You can saved your code in your repos and this will help you track your latest changes in your codes. Most IT industry preferred candidates who are knowledegeable in git version control. 

3. **Join in Tech Communities** - This is also an advantage because you can be able to meet some of the experienced developers and you can ask them anything regarding to software developement. But remind you to always ask when you cannot really find out how to fix the problem. **Mentors** are very kind and they will also give you an advice for your career path too. But don't spoonfeed too much because the objective here is to learn each other.

4. **Join Contests and Organizations about Software Development** - These are also an advantage because you can showcase your work projects and be able to contribute in the community (ex. Research Projects) You can add this to your resume too.

5. **Communication Skills** - I also didn't realize that this is also important, and also difficult because I myself as a shy person, I really get anxious when people's attention are focus on me. But I'm trying to overcome this and trying to practice how to speak confidently and be able to express my thoughts without hesitation. When it comes to interviews, it is important to be prepared but with these you should know how to showcase your skills and be able to answer all of the technical question that is according to your skills. Be also be honest to your employers what knowledge do you have for the programming languages.** Mock Interview** is also helpful if you want to get an honest feedback and you will be able to know what are things that you would like to improve.

6. **Just Apply** - Don't get discouraged when you received hundreds of rejections when you are applying. Among all of those there's a one company will worth its salt to hire you. Just be yourself and show your character. Just think of it like that you would like to getting to know each other between the hiring manager and yourself. 

6. **Internship**  - this is also an advantage beacause you get experience to work like in a real work setup and it is an advantage if you get an internship that is related to your career path. Hiring Managers consider experience this mostly to the fresh graduates and accepts fresh grad who has experience in internship related to software developement.

7. **Resume** - creating a neat and direct resume is also a plus. If you want to work in the IT industry you don't need to add a picture to yourself and it is important to put your contact details, work experience, education, tech stack and others(certificates, portfolio, projects) that you want to showcase. 


And that's it! Just be yourself and hopefully these realizations will help you to land your job as a developer. Never stop learning and keep grinding!😉 Comment down below if you want some questions.😁