Road to Mastery: Half A Year On The Road

Missed me? It’s definitely been a while since my last post. And though I’d love to justify my “hiatus” with the original reason which was “I’ll write a post about being employed for 6 months so I’ll just wait until then”, the real reason was a couple of weeks vacation. Also it’s been 7 months now. But who’s counting?

This will be a slight departure from my usual format. Unlike my other posts, this one will be a personal reflection of what I’ve gone through so far and also what it really meant to me to be a developer with barely over six months experience.

But first, some context.

Where I Stand & Where I Come From

I graduated February 2017 and got employed the following March after some (admittedly not much) prospecting. I previously mentioned how I was looking primarliy for an Android Developer position - but wouldn’t mind Web Development with Laravel.

And so I got hired by a company in Lisbon specialized in Digital Marketing and Web Development. I believe I made one of the best possible choices for a Junior Developer when it comes to where to start. But after giving it much thought, I decided that choosing/prospecting for a company and the importance of that choice will be the object of another post.

For now, I can safely say I’m happily employed in arguably one of the best tech companies to work for in Portugal.

What Was It Like To Start

Given all I’ve written above, and also being somewhat more aware than most on how the industry works due to my own curiosity and passion and also my friends and mentors (props Joaquim Ley), one would think I’d have the best possible start of my career right?

No.

Having to move from the city where I lived and studied the last 17 years wasn’t particularly difficult. I had even lived abroad before. But it did unfortunately happen just as some big personal changes were unfolding in my life. That wouldn’t be a big problem on it’s own. But a new job in tech isn’t particularly free of stress or simple to ease in to.

That being said, it didn’t take long for me to fall in place and really start giving my first confident steps on the provebial Road.

The Four Horsemen

oh yes. webcomicname.com tells it like it is

I was extremely lucky to be integrated into a team with incredibly talented developers and especially a team leader/mentor who - unlike the ones from the horror stories my other developer friends tell me - actually follows the “Do It Well And Do It Right” philosophy that many feel is painfully lacking in our industry nowadays. However, if it all came down to how good everyone around you is, I’d be having it easy right now.

If - like me - you desire to grow and go above and beyond the usual “senior dev” level and actually become someone able to spread knowledge… you better curb those thoughts at the beggining. Because you’ll be in for a world of self doubt, especially when you don’t really know how long it takes for you to get to a basic level of decency at this. Or at least that’s what I try to tell myself.

Either way, after much stress and poorly slept nights but also the occasional burst of happiness and sense of accomplishment, I’ve identified four qualities that I think best describe what you should strive as a Junior.

I call them “The Four Horsemen”. This has been my darkest post so far, there’s four of those qualities and there’s barely any humorous quips unlike the other ones, so why the hell not?

🏇 Confidence

Yes, it does look like something your aunt would share on Facebook. So?

Oh boy.

Being the “extroverted introvert” type of person I am, it’s fairly easy for everyone around me to overlook when I’m actually anxious or in severe self-doubt. Specifically, when I’m dealing with this bastard thing.

I remember the first major screw up I did. The application I worked on had to discriminate between two groups of users based on a promotional code they input via a form. Based on what group the user was in, he would be attributed a prize. There were two prize groups based on what group the user belonged to. Sounds simple right?

A couple of days after that project went live my team leader calls me on the side and shows me what went wrong. I introduced a bug in which no matter what group the user belonged to, he was always attributed a gift from one group while the other wasn’t touched at all. Fortunately that was caught up fairly early and easily fixed. Happy days! …I felt horrible. Almost on the verge of falling into a depression and severe career doubt. If I couldn’t take care of such a simple application, what the hell was I doing in development really?

Turns out, it wouldn’t be the first and definitely won’t be the last I screw up this bad. As my friend told me at the time, once I talked with him about this (and after him laughing it up like a mad man):

You’ve got 2 months experience Alex. You really weren’t expecting any f*ck ups?

While I find it impossible for me to overestimate my abilities and confidence, I have on good authority that it usually does happen to Junior Devs. But clearly, the opposite also stands even more. It’s paramount to not undermine your ability to do the task you’re given.

Remember you are being given tasks by someone with way more experience than you. And that includes knowing what you can or cannot do, and also when to push you harder. You got this. Trust yourself.

🏇 Perseverance

I specifically chose a photo at dusk so you can’t tell how long he’s been running. Let’s assume a lot.

This falls in nicely after the previous Horseman. It’s what really kept me going after the monumental beatdown I took to myself after the aforementioned failure (as I perceived it).

Was it movitation? No. A sense of hope perhaps? Not in the least. I was all out of 🏇Confidence, can’t you read?

What got me through was pure Grit. Resolve. A sense of duty and discipline that, though I didn’t feel like it at the time, I was exactly where I wanted to be, needed to be and had to be. I’m a strong believer that this is what gets you further ahead than any kind of motivation.

Someone has done it before. You will too. It’s always difficult before it becomes easy. It has always been like that and it always will. Keep pushing.

🏇 Appetite For Knowledge

I shouldn’t have to explain this. !

I have previously mentioned the importance of learning and cultivating a passion for your craft, especially in Software Engineering.

What I wasn’t expecting is the mental strain and beatdown one can sometimes get at this job (especially in the first few months). All this can and will make it harder for you to still have the mental capacity to watch a tutorial or read an article. That will eventually subside in time, but until then… what can you do?

Any good tech company will allow you time and budget to spend on honing and advancing your skills. Either by giving you a monthly or yearly allowance, inviting speakers to give talks or give you access to learning websites with exclusive content. Again, I will discuss the importance of a good workplace for your first tech job in an upcoming post.

Other than that, the act of working itself and not being contained in an academic enviroment will be the biggest boost to your knowledge IF (and that’s a HUGE if, otherwise every single developer with 5 years experience would be an advocate) you keep that passion flame well lit and are open and willing to pay attention and learn. Learn from your peers. Find yourself a mentor. As a Junior you’re expected to ask questions and be a dehydrated sponge of potential… whatever you take from that.

DO NOT allow yourself to stagnate. Remember that you’re in a field defined by its constant advancement and mutability. And it’s not enough to just keep yourself updated. Nurture that passion, keep learning and ALWAYS go the extra mile.

🏇 Happiness

When I’m not developing and when this guy’s not producing, sleeping or designing we’re out causing mayhem.

I believe this guy has covered this in the best way possible in one of his videos, in which he was replying to an email from a Junior Developer with which I had much in common, specifically: anxiety, self doubt and feeling like a fraud. It’s important to not let your job overwhelm you. In the end, our job is not easy and especially at the beggining. However it is also extremely rewarding and (I assume) your very own choice of what you wanted to do.

While not a skill per se, it’s important to feel good and find a balance both within yourself and your job vs real life dichotomy. You don’t live to work. You work to live. And hopefully you can be counted amongst the few that actually love what they do.

Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.

That will make you a happier person which in turn will make you a happier and better co-worker and developer overall. This definitely took me a while to pick up, mainly because of the reasons I talked about in the introduction. But just not enclosing in your own shell of self doubt and being able to open up and talk with your friends can make a huge difference.

Something as simple as a slice of pizza or, my personal favourite, a nice big pint of beer at the local student bar in my old city is really what life ultimately ends up being about. Don’t neglect yourself.

Conclusion

I honestly didn’t mean to write this as a cautionary tale. Like I said, it was a personal reflection and a telling of my past months at my first job. But it also hopefully serves as a heads up on what comes ahead, depending on what type of person you are. Truth is, I’ve not even barely started to master those four Horsemen I mentioned.

Am I a hypocrite for giving advice then? Perhaps ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ but as I discussed with someone recently who also shared the same idea: sometimes we already have our own answers, except that we’re much better at recognising our own questions on other people.

As time passed and I got given more challenging and bigger projects, the excitement I felt for it was always accompanied by the creeping lurking self doubt that has never really left. And perhaps it never will. Definitely hasn’t in some of the more experienced developers I’ve talked to. It’s alright. We’ve all been there.

And I do apologise for the hiatus - although it really was planned. I’ve already teased on what my next article might be about. And I also thought about starting to throw in some more technical jazz in the near future. But the main idea will always be to keep this on the “human” side of the developer and my personal journey. I’ll leave you with one of my favourite quotes ever from the great Jeffrey Way:

We’re all in this together — just at different phases.