I went into college when I was 17 (Associate’s Degree, which I regret), started my first job when I was 19 in a 10 people tech startup doing very simple tasks, went into another startup when I was 20, and then entered a large tech enterprise when I was 21, and now I’m 24 in the same company doing basically nothing productive or interesting.
My work right now is basically tech support, there’s no programming or technical challenge, but because the pay is good I got relaxed and stayed here for almost 4 years, and now I can’t find another job.
Throughout my “career” I’ve worked with a LOT of different technologies which doesn’t help, I wish I had focused on a single thing. As now I have 5 years of work experience but in multiple random technologies, which basically means I have 2 years of experience at max.
I really want to work as a front-end dev, as I love UI/UX and have a good eye for it, I know JavaScript, studied a lot of React, I worked with Git, agile (Scrum and Kanban), and I even worked with Node and have some backend experience. But as I only have basically 1 year of experience with them I can’t find a job that will be similar to mine (regarding benefits, pay, etc). I would gladly take a pay cut if it wasn’t 50-60% less like it currently is for 1YOE folks.
I feel like a junior for programming but a mid+ for the tech industry, and I don’t know what to do.
But to be honest, I was mostly focusing on studying React, and I’ve made some projects with my own design, but I wasn’t studying too hard, mostly because I was feeling like I went back years and was studying for my first job again (which is what I feel). Is frustrating having worked 5+ years and having subpar programming skills because I got relaxed.
Perhaps with time if I continue to study things will go into place, but will they really? Because studying does not equal work experience, so will I have to start as a junior dev anyway? Perhaps I could study hard and say I have more YOE?
Sorry for the vent, not sure if I succeeded in trying to express exactly what I feel.
Look I think you’re blaming your troubles on the wrong thing.
I have 5 YoE. However, I have like 1 YOE with React, 2 YoE with Angular, 1 YoE with Vue, 2 YoE with NodeJs, etc. In my experience companies are more than willing to hire someone for a non architect position that doesn’t have X years of experience overall and a working knowledge of the tech stack they are working in. Sometimes, a similar technology is enough. In the actual interview process, the interviewers seem to either care more about (imo useless) white boarding or your experience implementing solutions on high level.
I don’t see tech stack knowledge as a big barrier to entry unless you have no remotely relevant experience or the position is looking for a greybeard.
I think the MUCH bigger problem is your lack of accomplishments and relevant work on a resume. To be frank, if you view your resume simply in terms of “worked with X language with Y” time, it tells me that you haven’t gotten out of a junior mentality. There should be concrete projects and accomplishments that you did which utilized the a technology. Simply saying “I have X years in react experience” without a real follow up will basically get you bounced from every company that isn’t a third party recruiter.
Also, despite what the internet will have you believe, the associates degree vs bachelors is a massive deal. There are a lot of companies that will simply autoreject you for that. It was easier to get away with in the tech bubble, but walking into this market without a bachelors or ridiculous experience is going to get you nowhere.
Assuming you are set on being a developer instead of leveraging your current body or work take a different career path.