Aspiring Developers Are SEVERELY Underprepared to Land Their First Job (Rant)

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Video description:
Let's talk about the reality of the entry-level developer job market and where most aspiring developers stand.

[@_Holiday]

"Shortcuts make long delays"

[@LeftoverSundriesMan]

"That's why companies are hiring CS grads and not you." As one of those mythical CS grads, I can confirm that they aren't all getting hired over self-starters.

[@painexotic3757]

esp if you don't have any projects to show, which alot of CS majors don't lol.

[@headlights-go-up]

Aspiring developers don’t know things such as the fundamentals because they don’t know that they need to know, if that makes sense. If there was some master list that they could reference whenever they’re told “you don’t know the fundamentals” then things would be a bit better lol

[@crazydrifter13]

Let's make that list happen

[@cootook]

Pick up any CS course and you find the list))

[@DonTheDeveloper]

There are plenty of lists like this out there already. It may take a little digging on your end. Feel free to respond with some of those lists that you find here. Maybe we can take some time out to pick 1 or 2 and I can review them on stream.

[@lizziethelemon]

You'll find a master list in any college/university curriculum.

[@InfamousTVHD]

Someone @ me when this develops

[@j2devstudio]

Yup. I needed to hear this today. As I've said before, Don - keep doing what you're doing. I truly appreciate the straight talk.

[@andrewlitten6609]

Honestly you are the most helpful KZbinr for aspiring developers. I look to you for guidance all the time. Thank you so much for HONESTY. Fundamentals are key and I’ve been finally taking that seriously / focusing on that the last few months.

[@zach_authvow]

Thanks for the honesty Don. Started as a UX/UI Designer, found I loved coding more than designing when learning JavaScript when I took a self-paced mentorship program to build empathy working with devs. I later decided to explore JS for backend (Node, Deno) after getting very comfortable with vanilla JS. I found it was a good way to dip my toe into both (front and backend) and understand what I liked. Learned that I dealt with the UI side a decent bit and wanted to continue learning backend. However, I strongly believe a different language is best to dive deeper into CS concepts. After researching and playing with some languages, I decided on Go. Would love to hear your thoughts on different languages or if it matters all that much outside of JS/TS world.

[@riacharda]

Hey, I worked as a UI/UX designer too! Glad I'm not alone. 😃 I got tired of pushing pixels, the visual design subjectivity, not having a challenge and responsibility to design high impact solutions. Most of my UX skills were underutilized. Creating prototypes for feature demos, dev handover and user testing sessions was my outlet. It was my entry back into coding. I loved bringing designs to life and knowing how technology can enhance and influence design. Previously, I had a computing background (UK college) then studied multimedia at university where we had to design and develop web interfaces.

[@DonTheDeveloper]

Thanks for sharing! And yes, with a backend focus, I'm becoming much more open to suggesting that aspiring backend developers should explore more than just a high level functional programming language like JavaScript.

[@henrysalvador7537]

Hey don, wanted to leave a comment on your video earlier today but I got caught up in work mid type up. I wanted to say that I watched and found you back in 2020/2021 at the surge of aspiring developer trend. I also wanted to say just like you commented on how Lukas's words stuck with you, your words stuck with me. Most of all was a video at the beginning of the downturn and how you were blunt about how the window of 'easy' (you didn't say easy, but let's go with easy) breaking in is over and the bar is raised but you drilled it in that if you can accept and embrace that, there is going to be opportunity for you. And shortly after that I made the decision of going back to school. Going back to school was something I dreaded for years, and I was partially attracted to this idea of becoming a dev b/c I was told degree wasn't needed. So as intimidating as it was to hear that the bar rose, I sat on it and found myself more than willing to accept that. Shortly after I was taking my first class in the summer. I had my ups and downs, and I still got my struggles, but I never felt more adamant. I'm still looking at graduating at end of '25, and I'm viewing school as just one stepping stone, and expecting alot of self teaching, but it's the realization and expectation that we're talking of a time line of years instead of months that gives me so much confidence and motivation. I largely got you to thank for that. Keep going strong Don!

[@DonTheDeveloper]

"the window of 'easy' (you didn't say easy, but let's go with easy) breaking in is over and the bar is raised but you drilled it in that if you can accept and embrace that, there is going to be opportunity for you" You summed it up nicely. If more people embraced this idea, their chances of landing that first developer job would increase dramatically. It sounds like you have the right mindset for long-term success in this field. That's awesome.

[@riacharda]

You hit the nail on the head Don! This was a worthy rant and I've experienced most of the things you touched on in this video. In my opinion, 20:59 to 23:28 was the best segment of this video 🏆! The job hunt and interviews has helped me discover the gaps in my skillset. Most of the people in my Jan 2023 cohort (9/13) have landed dev jobs because they spent up to a year or more diving into JavaScript, got comfortable with solving coding problems or had prior experience as a developer before joining the bootcamp. Before I started, I had good HTML, CSS knowledge and knew JS fundamentals, basic DOM manipulation and string methods. Beyond learning more languages and frameworks, I plan on learning CS theory on software architecture, performance, accessibility, conventions (clean code, modules, naming, etc), SDLC and CI/CD. That being said, ultimately I'd like to become a full-stack developer in future but I'm leaning on the front end because that's what I'm good at, more curious about and enjoy working on. 🙂

[@LukeAvedon]

Great rant Don! I've gotten boot camp grads interviews and then realized they are totally unprepared for the real deal and its heartbreaking.

[@DonTheDeveloper]

Thank you! It really is heartbreaking. It drives most of what I do in fact.

[@rustyshackleford2841]

Goal post moved! The truth of the matter is, the market is horrible!! You will get overlooked for wearing a pink shirt on interview day. The abundance of developers with experience under their belt is getting wild with more lay offs.

[@Pavel-on-youtube]

Gold information. Thanks 😊

[@PreCodeCamp]

Thanks for giving us the "Black Pill" - yes fundamentals are the key + learning how to problem solve will help any future developers!

[@user-el3lk1jj4j]

good vid btw, never knew it would take so long

[@Kurauone__]

A lot of influencers are really irresponsible making it sound like you do a 3-6 month camp or program and there are jobs in abundance just waiting for you. I almost quit my job with the idea that I could teach myself and be a front-end developer in 4 months. But the more research I did my intuition told me broadly extend my timeline. I decided to take up the Meta Back-End Developer program and finished it last month. But I know I am far from ready for enterprise level development work. I’m trying to dig more deeply now and focus on building projects.

[@criticalthinker88gis13]

It's really difficult to show and convince companies that you have been diving deep into the code though. With the current market, they look at your CV first, if they receive applicants with decent experience or a CS degree you will get rejected if your self taught or are coming from a Bootcamp

[@bilel9372]

kinda funny but from what I saw in my country, they don't hire juniors from CS/Bootcamps anymore but hire people from other countries who have at least 3 years of experiences while paying them much less than usual junior salary 💀

[@GeneraluStelaru]

C'mon Don, Flexbox and Grid are part of CSS. You can't take them away.

[@DonTheDeveloper]

Tell that to IT departments around the world that lock in the oldest browser versions you forgot ever existed.

[@EduarteBDO]

@@DonTheDeveloper dark ages of using float

[@christianarroyo3033]

Yeah that part is just a bad take. How dare aspiring developers not know how to layout content with... floats and tables?

[@GeneraluStelaru]

@@DonTheDeveloper Indeed, but we're moving away from that. Having to develop for IE 6 is akin to tending to a KOBOL codebase. It's a niche market and such products often get reimplemented.

[@TheSoulCrisis]

@@DonTheDeveloper Every web developer's nightmare lol.

[@sophiebarrie5749]

Hey Don thanks for your honesty. What Im hearing you saying is that aspiring debelopers should be getting a good handle on their vanilla languages FIRST and then make use of the frameworks once they understand the mechanisms of the language in and of itself, is that more or less correct?? If thats the case, then I'm shocked that there are so many aspiring devs out there putting the cart before the horse and using frameworks like training wheels... As an aspiring dev myself, its very important to me to get a handle on the languages Im learning at their base level before I throw frameworks into the mix. I want to know what exactly my code is doing (and by the way I am VERY green to coding in general). But heres what I'd love your opinion on: is it possible to learn the fundamentals without a CS degree?

[@DonTheDeveloper]

Yes and definitely yes.

[@nicolestrahm3013]

I think from what I've seen in my short life so far is that in general, quitting a job to pursue any "get rich quick" scheme will almost always guarantee you disappointment; be it real estate, copywriting, coding, or any job TikTok has sugar coated. It's sad, people fall for it out of sheer desperation, and it IS heartbreaking. You have to want something for more than just an immediate out for it to be a successful endeavor. People need to want to code because they see it as a good long term career that they can grow into for YEARS to come. Honestly, a lot of people are seriously under paid right now in our current economy, and they are desperately searching for relief. It takes exceptional self discipline, effort, and dedication to set yourself apart in this market. For sure.

[@Mel-mu8ox]

When I first started learning, I was constantly bombarded with youtube vids saying "apply for a job before you think your ready"... I'm so glad I didn't follow that advice, I'd probably have quit learning XD

[@skinnytimmy1]

It's good advice, but not for the optimistic reasons that were advertised to us. 1. You will most likely bomb your first few tech interviews, regardless of how skilled you are. May as well get them out of the way ASAP. 2. Interviews will help you learn what you need to focus on Of course, this is assuming you can even land an interview in the first place 😂 (impossible)

[@jefferymuter4659]

My bootcamp was 3.5 months. I got very lucky in this market to have a job. But it was built on 3 years of (badly) self taught. Thankfully my bootcamp was high quality, but 3.5 months is not enough to give you comprehensive fundemental knowledge. I hope one day theres a 2 year program that has the intensity of a bootcamp. Doing DS&ALGOs, cloud, iot, web dev. Doing the projects that university's help you through. I think that would be so much fun. Id probably do it despite not 'needing' to. But here we are. It really is criminal seeing Udemy courses selling people that they're backend ready after Next.js

[@skinnytimmy1]

With how expensive some of these bootcamps are, you may just be better off getting an associate degree

[@TheSoulCrisis]

I think a program like that would be awesome and I thought 2 years would be ideal with the right focus on technology spread and fundamentals needed for the workforce. That means people can't give up their jobs for it though.....bootcamps are short but so intense many require people not to work during that period. Few people could commit to intense programs for longer than a year and not have the financial backing.

[@3ichael7ambert]

Just an input 23:03 from my informational interviews. For the bootcamp grads, they tend to know how to code better than CS grads. But bootcamp grads don’t know anything about mem usage, networking, the architecture etc. I have all my CS classes knocked out (no degree), and I’ve built way more and larger projects at my coding bootcamp than any of the CS classes.

[@TheSoulCrisis]

That's the singular weakness of CS programs, with the rare exception of snagging good internships along the way (I wish there was a year long course where we just worked on a big project we're passionate about and contribute to it every week). CS degree + internships will beat bootcamps any day of the week in my view, but internships are hella fierce and hard to get so that's a long shot. It makes sense for bootcamp grads to be stronger in coding directly because CS is very diverse in topics, it has the breadth and depth of knowledge across domains that bootcamps can never measure up to due to their intense time constraints and narrow focus. So while bootcamp grads are likely stronger in coding and frameworks, CS grads are far stronger in mathematics, basic physics, computer architecture and design, communication, general problem-solving skills, research, and analysis of problems/systems. That's why bootcamps try to fast track you to jobs quickly with marketable technologies, they don't give the foundation to make you marketable to a wide range of jobs across industries unlike a traditional CS education. It's a shorter and quicker solution, but far less versatile and leaves bigger gaps in knowledge due to compressed intensity. Of course making up the difference between any program always comes down to the individual.

[@CROXoDyLE]

To be honest I’m far from the best developer and honestly at times I think I’m average at best, but I got a job as a developer. My number one tip is that if you are just trying to get your foot in the door, there is no shame applying to a non tech place like a hospital. Then you can transition else where a few years down the road

[@user-el3lk1jj4j]

I'm just learning to code. I wish there was coding apprenticeships that was remote and paid minimum wage.

[@DanEMO592]

Me too!!

[@sheriffderek]

It's all true!

[@Dawsatek22]

i think aleast in the webdev space the industry has made a faustian bargain to meet the growing demands at that time made programming more accesible to the average person but at the cost of long term quality of software. because most average people are not the type that goes to a certain depth of learning to get a job while the rest (people who look like coding , who are aspiring ,are curious , want to rise above , are talented , and etc) are always a certain small amount of populations that tries to be better and a lack of care to take that in account it seems made this state it is . just my perspective from someone who learns robotics in c/c++ and python.

[@DonTheDeveloper]

That's an interesting perspective. You're right. Most aspiring developers are people who just want to do the bare minimum possible for a job. I think this space, especially during 2021, convinced SO many people that are only willing to provide minimum effort that they can land a developer job. Now, we're left with a lot of aspiring developers who truly don't have enough enjoyment and curiosity in the dev world to push past that. I think I really need to double down on my focus on people who genuinely won't stop diving deeper into the dev world because they actually love tech and programming.

[@Dawsatek22]

@@DonTheDeveloper great idea wish you luck

[@TheSoulCrisis]

Yeah people shouldn't just dive into the world of technology because the money is good, they need to enjoy analyzing problems and implementing solutions in various domains with intrinsic curiosity for learning and improving quality of life. What matters is the mindset, good habits, discipline, and refining fundamentals to stay competitive, a lot of people don't even continue with CS programs in schools but there are different paths as long as the passion and drive is there.

[@nasko235679]

People love positive feedback loops so what usually happens is they learn something basic in a relatively short timespan and then they keep doing the same basic thing over and over again to get that dopamine hit. I must admit that I too fell into the "nextjs trap" but the difference is I asked myself questions over and over again until I got to the root of what I was actually doing. API routes, server actions, how would I make the same backend from scratch using something like express. Server/Client components, understanding when to use what and how to nest them in a proper way. Things used in real world apps like dynamic routes, pagination etc. Actually understanding what react hooks are doing and why they are needed. Every day I wake up with at least 3-4 questions in my head from my previous day of learning. IMO people spend way too much time using the tools and nowhere near enough time studying them so they get trapped in this boilerplate world where the answer might be a single line of code but because they've not thought through what they're actually doing.

[@BizzaroBrainBoi]

1 of 500 sounds about right

[@nasunorahl]

wow dude

[@3ichael7ambert]

I’m significant other group, but I’m too stubborn to give up.

[@3ichael7ambert]

I learned CSS2 first, of course I use flex and grid these days. But my fundamentals began in a txt document in 2005.

[@3ichael7ambert]

Despite saying that, I utilize vector math in my indie game dev programs, however I’m definitely still getting used to using the debugger.

[@TheSoulCrisis]

@@3ichael7ambert Takes a while.....but it's your best friend!!

[@3ichael7ambert]

@@TheSoulCrisis someone from my coding bootcamp finally got a job after 3 years. He graduated right when the 2021 layoffs began. If it takes that long for me, that’ll be okay. I was freelance static website dev with Flash and Dreamweaver back in 2008-2012 but thought I needed a CS degree and gave up besides indie games. I’ve learned a lot since then, that I won’t give up.