Year of terrible mistakes and a wakeup call: Dev Retro 2022

Firstly, I appreciate the idea of dev retro. We often forget to reflect on our journey and see our progress. And I feel the Dev Retro campaign is a great way to encourage developers to share their best and worst experiences and reflect on them.

Introduction

I am Mahek Unnisa from Hyderabad, India. I recently graduated in Textile Technology. As a student from a non-CS branch, it is challenging to get an ideal roadmap to get into the software industry. One step at a time, I began asking relevant people for advice.

Journey

It was Covid-19 lockdown in 2020. My mentor from college guided me to learn Python programming language. Interested students from my University formed a group with me and started learning Python together. My mentor decided to make me the group leader after observing my leadership quality and work ethic.

In the following months, I worked at a startup where I documented AWS DevOps practices. After joining, things changed. I had to do a core internship to get credits for my degree. So I left this internship and got into a Market Research Internship in a Textile based Startup. Here, I was not coding at all.

Placement season started at my University. I started focusing on my projects in Web development using Django. I was also familiar with web development with Node.js.

Experience

I never stopped learning. This year was a roller coaster ride for me. Some things were blessings in disguise and sometimes there was bad luck.

For Off-Campus placements this year, I never got shortlisted. One thing I never let people say to me is don't give up. Because I know I will not. I didn't lose until I accept the defeat.

Whenever I felt I am less, I learned more. I learned Django, Data Structures and Algorithms using C++, Operating systems, Database Management system, OOPS Concepts, and Web Development using Node.js, and Express.js. Now I am moving towards building my online presence in tech communities, technical blogging, and contributing to Open Source projects.

Lessons I learned

In 2022, the major lessons I learned as a self-taught developer are:

1. Think about yourself because no one will.

   You wouldn't know when life will hit you hard, so be prepared for the worst. Think about your future and dream big. If you are in your freshman, second, or third year, you have some time to plan and do some wonderful things. Utilize the time and build your portfolio.

2. Nobody wants a fresher.

   No one has time to hire and train a fresher. Work on yourself by yourself. Learning web development and building 2 to 3 projects is not enough. Learn industry-relevant skills also. For example, Deployment on Cloud, API documentation, and writing integrations.

3. Point No. 1 is not enough these days.

   You don't just need a portfolio. You also need to prove that you can do it. You can do this by Pair programming on a project or open source contributions or creating a tutorial on youtube. Build yourself in public.

4. Nothing is easy, it does get better with time and practice.

   You will not become a software engineer in one day, one month, or even in one year. It depends on what you did the entire year.

   If you just built one real-world required project through collaboration and learning by applying or building 100 projects following tutorials. Which is better? Think yourself.

   Also, be ready to find things difficult. Because if you didn't find it difficult, you didn't do anything great.

   The more you build things and solve errors in your code, the better you can solve them easily in the future when they arise.

5. Avoid being in the learning loop.

   Don't just keep watching tutorial after tutorial, copying ideas and projects. Build something unique which can make you stand out from the crowd.

   I think you should begin turning your ideas into code right after learning a programming language.

You are still reading this, so let me tell you I have made many mistakes this year. I don't want students like me to do these things, waste their time, and find themselves in a challenging situation after they graduate.

Use the Internet to learn skills and educate yourself not to gain experience and guidance.

Don't follow the internet blindly, especially YouTube. Follow only things which you feel can benefit in any way.
For example: Collaborating with people online for projects, Open Source contributions, technical blogging, and participating in competitions. These things always add value to your portfolio.

I got this realization very recently. I want you to know that I am still correcting my mistakes and in the learning stage. If you want to talk or need any help, reach out to me on Twitter anytime.

Thanks for reading.