I am currently writing an article on how young people can get into the different sectors of IT and I would like to get a group discussion going about this.
I will privately contact anyone and ask if they will be willing to be quoted in the article if their contribution is relevant.
- How did you get into IT?
- what sector do you work in?
- what difficulties did you face and how did you overcome them?
Here are my answers:
I got into IT more or less by chance. I had a friend who went to university to study IT, and it sounded interesting so I followed his path the following year.
I work in public sector.
As @pilcrow said, the main difficulty is keeping up with all the new technologies.
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I also find this is my biggest problem, I guess it is a curse of the industry
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On the other hand, this very problem is one of the things that make the industry so intereseting - there are always something new to learn.
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Great questions! Here's my answers:
How I got in IT is a combination of factors. From the moment I got my first PC (around age 8) it was pretty clear I was going to end up doing something in IT. I wrote my first QBasic program when I was 14 and my first website when I was 16. I quickly realized that was where my passion lied.
I enrolled for a bachelor program in Communication & Multimedia Design, which effectively trained me to become a UX designer more than a web developer. I found that coding interested me more so I took every opportunity there to expand my knowledge of HTML, CSS and JavaScript instead of learning how to design. When I graduated in 2010 the role of Front-end Developer was just gaining popularity (as opposed to just all-round web developer), so there were many great job opportunities even for fresh graduates.
Right now I work as a Front-end Developer at a consulting agency that rents me out on a contract basis to various companies, currently at one in the education sector (creating e-learning apps). I've worked in finance and the adult industry before this.
I think the greatest difficulty I faced (and stil do) is keeping up with the always rapidly changing world of front-end. New browser versions, javascript libraries and frameworks, testing strategies, programming paradigms and build tools are created every week and if you're not careful your knowledge can be outdated in the blink of an eye.
I try to overcome that by keeping my focusing on a small set of those, usually whatever I work with at my current assignment. On the side I try to read articles, watch videos and attend meetups/conferences about alternative technologies, just enough to roughly know what they are about. If I really like one I might dive in a little deeper and use it to create a hobby project. My employer helps me out enormously with this by giving me a rather generous training budget, and by organizing quarterly hackathons in which we get paid to just mess around with our hobby projects for a day.
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This is why I am happy below the line of UI, mostly backend stuff now. That said I have never stopped learning new languages and skills.
Part of the industry. It moves so fast you blink and you are left behind.
They joy I have in my current post is I am free to push the language I work in (C#) so I can really explore the different ways of using it. Been in the same code base now 10 years, starting from C# 2 and the difference in old and new code is huge. Far more functional now.
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Hi Pilcrow,
Thank you for such a detailed response.
I work as a Penetration tester and I find that I have similar problems with trying to keep current and up to date with ever changing web technologies.
Sounds like a great employer! :)
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Am web designer , this is my sector in IT am student and I am working , I create websites and templates , I have found some difficulties : the peoples and the Criticisms , thank's to share it with us nice to meet you friends ! I have followed you
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I guess other people is the biggest problem for most IT guys. :)
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I started to code when I was about 12 on a ZX81. I then got myself a ZX Spectrum and started coding big time. I was always just going to end up doing that for a job :)
I got real lucky though and landed a trainee posting at a company which made military and commercial flight and tank simulators without a degree and just went on from their.
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