Becoming a Blockchain Developer
Tags: blockchain, web3, bitcoin, ethereum
Published: 2022-05-28 13:44:14

The emergence of cryptocurrency in recent years has made some software developers to turn attention to the technical aspect of it. You cannot talk about developing a cryptocurrency without talking about the entire field that mothers it - **_BLOCKCHAIN_**. Hence, you can only become a cryptocurrency developer if and only if you are a blockchain developer. 

This article will help you to make right decision down the lane. You would learn 4 steps that will not only help you to kickstart your journey on this path but will also make you ride on with successes. 

### Understand why you want to be a Blockchain Developer

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/2fm3row0jixtr3zw7ft4.png)

Yes, you want to become a blockchain developer. It could be because of the pay or skill gap but you should have a driving focus that will always inspire you to continue. You should have a goal at heart for wanting to dive into this seemingly new phase. For example, aside creating tokens, coins, NFTs, etc. there are other intricate aspect of blockchain that are quite interesting. Have you started thinking of areas like deployment, solution architecture, project management, UX design, quality engineering, security, maintenance, legal consultancy and policies, analyses, etc.?
Your choice here determines what you are to start channeling your energy into from the beginning. In fact, you may come to realize that you already have some skills that are needed on the space and you only need to familiarize yourself with the technology and terms in the blockchain space. This is why the next step is important. 

### Take Blockchain Development Courses
Once you are sure of what you are coming to do on the space, the next thing is to start the journey through learning. It is through that there might be limited **physical** classes that teach programming and the technicalities of blockchain, you can still get handful resources **online** that would help scale through whatever hurdle-like steps on your way.
AS a developer, you will agree to the fact that skills such as Agile Scrum, HTML, .NET, MVC, REST, VS, JS, NodeJS, Microsoft SQL, Neural-networks, JQuery, AJAX, C# SQL, C, XML, C++, SOAP, REST, FTP, Regression, Solidity, Golang, are technological skills that are needed on the blockchain journey.

Over the next few months if you are interested in Ethereum blockchain, try to go as deep as possible with the Ethereum EVM, Solidity and also understand how the major DeFi protocols work.  Learn Data Structures and Algorithms.
Take a list of some few resources in this regard:

- Solidity -[here](https://docs.soliditylang.org/en/v0.8.9/)

- Learn Ethereum : [here](https://ethereum.org/en/) and [here](https://github.com/ethereumbook/ethereumbook)

- DeFi Roadmap - [here](https://github.com/OffcierCia/DeFi-Developer-Road-Map)

- DeFi Protocol - [E.g. Aave](https://docs.aave.com/developers/)

- Smart Contracts Development - [E.g. OpenZeppelin contracts](https://docs.openzeppelin.com/contracts/4.x/)

While the list is not exhaustive, you can plan your path and search online for available resources like articles, YouTube videos, etc.
  
### Join communities, and build.
You can only show what you have learnt when you build. That is why this step is quite important. 

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/klxg84vjg5n6zt5hinf5.png)
One interesting way to build is by participating in hackathons. An example of this is the [Ethereum hackathons](https://ethglobal.com/). You will also be building when you contribute to projects. For example, you may want to contribute to [Gitcoin projects](https://gitcoin.co/). Make wise use of collaboration platforms like Discord, GitHub, Medium, Telegram, etc.

### Start something like applying for jobs, grant, freelancing, interning, volunteering, etc.
To gather sufficient experiences, you must work on real life jobs. Since you are just starting, the fulltime role might not be available at the go but interning or volunteering with organizations that have the same goal as yours will go a long way to help you. 
You will find some of the following reports interesting:

- The most emerging job of 2020 according to the [LinkedIn Job Report 2020](https://www.linkedin.com/business/talent/blog/talent-strategy/linkedin-most-in-demand-hard-and-soft-skills) is blockchain developer with an increase of 33x. 

- Average annual salary of a blockchain developer in Switzerland is around USD 180,000. [Source](https://www.simplilearn.com/salary-of-blockchain-developer-article)

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/acj73ci5p5zuu66ybzac.png)

- In the year 2019, there were some 1135 jobs, from companies and startups totaling 472, posted on Cryptocurrency
Jobs.[Source](https://cryptocurrencyjobs.co/)

- Blockchain-related companies are more open to remote positions with 37% of people working remotely while at others that number is around 15%. [Source](https://theblockchainacademy.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2021/04/2021-Global-Blockchain-Employment-Report.pdf)