The reddit cscareerquestions is all doom and gloom 100% of the time so I don’t think I’d get a real answer there so I came here.
I am feeling pretty lost right now. I started at a local company in 2017 initially just as a shipper. They were like 5 dudes in the middle of nowhere running an online retail store and so after shipping was done I had a lot of downtime. They were doing a lot of stuff really inefficiently because of some tech debt they had accumulated, and a lot of that work was getting pawned off on me because I was the new guy. Well, I didn’t wanna do that so I started learning programming, specifically Python, and made a bunch of applications over a few years that automated/worked around/replaced that old broken stuff. This ended up becoming a really important part of everyone’s work day and my software has saved them 1000s of man-hours annually and honestly I think that is a conservative estimate. My work in part helped them grow their product offerings significantly because they weren’t having to do a bunch of stuff manually anymore. (Inventory updates, Customer order and tracking updates, Updating/pulling stuff from databases, eventually integrated my stuff with some vendor APIs who offered them, web scraping to get info on hundreds of thousands of products and more!)
In 2019 I decided I really enjoyed doing this and wanted to get paid to do it for real, so I went back to school for computer science. December 2023 I graduated with a 3.42 GPA. And I’ve had almost no interviews. I was really close to landing one position through a hiring manager I knew personally working with .NET, but right before I was hired the CEO closed the team and shifted priorities. Since then, I’ve had absolutely nothing and I’ve exhausted all my other connections in the industry with similar results.
I’ve been applying constantly. I know the market is in a bad spot right now for juniors and entry-level people, but I can’t even get anyone to respond to my applications and I’m feeling pretty down about it. I feel like I could make an impression if I got into a room with somebody and could talk about my previous job, but I’m just not getting to that point.
I think I really fucked up prioritizing working at said company making software instead of internships and now I’m feeling screwed. Am I screwed? Am I overreacting? Do I just need to keep at it or do I need to go back for my master’s? I really don’t want to do that… I’m not sure I can financially do that. I dunno. Give me advice?
I’m hearing it’s pretty bleak getting a programming job, right now, as a junior developer.
The industry is signaling to you that you’re not needed, and that feels awful.
There has been no meaningful reduction in the actual need for programmers, due to either AI or the stock market.
CEOs are colluding with each other explicitly to lower your salary expectations. You are being fucked with by powerful rich people to minimize your career pay and maximize their bonuses.
In the industry, we call this the “fuck around” phase.
The “find out” phase is coming.
Todd in accounting is not, in fact, going to be able to AI prompt a secure scalable customer friendly useable single-sign on integrated legally compliant webapp.
It’s going to be a huge mess, and you - with your proven experience automating computers - will be invited to help fix it, for large sums of money.
This has happened before in this industry, and it will happen again.
I’m sorry it’s happening at a time that you need to make a change. That sucks.
Hang in there. It sounds like you’re good at this job and well suited to it.
I wouldn’t go back to school for a master’s degree, over this. I would just keep quietly interviewing, while doing a bunch of Cloud Academy style tutorials on interesting topics.
We’ve been through this before. The shit does hit the fan, and they have to pay us even more to clean it up, afterwards. It’s not particularly pleasant, but it is lucrative, over the long term.
They were doing a lot of stuff really inefficiently because…
made a bunch of applications over a few years that automated/worked around/replaced that old broken stuff. This ended up becoming a really important part of everyone’s work day and my software has saved them 1000s of man-hours annually and honestly I think that is a conservative estimate. My work in part helped them grow their product offerings significantly because they weren’t having to do a bunch of stuff manually anymore. (Inventory updates, Customer order and tracking updates, Updating/pulling stuff from databases, eventually integrated my stuff with some vendor APIs who offered them, web scraping to get info on hundreds of thousands of products and more!)
Sounds like you’re not entey level anymore and you shouldn’t think of or present yourself as such. It sounds like you can find businesses that need similar updates to their processes and improve them.
The other person mentioned attending Chanber of Commerce events. If you go to one, tell some business owners how you made the existing staff at the prior company able to do more with fewer mistakes and how much the business expanded as a result.
I know that you have your mind set on a more traditional software development position, but until you find it, you can be more creative with how you can make money using your skills. Data is valuable, you know how to collect it, store it, organize it. You’re clearly able to problem solve, so create some solutions to problems you see or offer to create them for someone you see that has problems (and money to pay you to solve them).
The market will come back around, you’ll eventually be able to find a traditional position that you’re looking for, but in the meantime you have to be more flexible.
I never did any internships or even went to school for CS (which I’ve variously felt was either holding me back or was completely irrelevant). If you’re looking to network, look for local user groups and business group meetups. These groups are normally held together by consultants and other various marketing interests so you will likely not get hired from this but you can get to know people and maybe even have an opportunity to present. This could lead to getting a heads up on upcoming positions and perhaps even good word of mouth.
Unfortunately this just is a bad time to be looking for work due to industry layoffs. It’s impacting me as well and I have 25 years of experience, but I’m stuck in a job that is good but contracted through a garbage company. But it’s remote and not going anywhere so I can weather the downturn and wait until the market improves.
Oh and in my observation, a Masters degree isn’t helpful unless you branch into business or something, but that’s not a technical career track, but management.
I am not a hiring manager (or, more likely a recruiter/HR), so I cannot speak about the value of having a MS listed on one’s resume.
I am a senior developer with a masters degree and I am very grateful for the knowledge I got from that degree. Since I graduated, I have never needed to write a compiler, but i know how to implement a bunch of language features and it makes new languages easier to learn.
Could I have learned all of that without going to school? Definitely. It is all in white papers, software documentation, and textbooks, but for me, that is not the best way to learn. From what I have been able to find, even the most advanced MOOCs are only at advanced undergraduate level but don’t cover grad school level concepts.
Thanks for the advice. I should have mentioned this, but unfortunately I live in an area that is very much the middle of nowhere and not at all a tech hub. I feel this is holding me back as well, since I can only apply for jobs where I’m remote or can relocate, and I’m sure companies would rather hire a local. There’s maybe… two? Software dev companies in my immediate area. (I’ve already applied, haven’t heard back.) I could probably find a group for tractor enthusiasts.
The closest thing I have to anything like that that I know of is the upcoming career fair at my university, which is open to alumni as well, but that’s not for a while yet.
That’s okay. Me too. Rust belt almost my entire career. There are still user groups and chamber of commerce functions everywhere. I worked for a steel company for two years. Great job actually. You aren’t limited to software companies but you’ll probably get the best mentoring and experience in that industry. But any development job gets you started and builds your resume.
You’re no more screwed than anyone else. Don’t go get a masters, it doesn’t carry much weight when hiring with no experience. The work experience you have is better than internships as long as you can sell it during an interview and more importantly on your resume. How do you list that job on your resume? Would you mind sharing a redacted version? Maybe e can help you present it better to get the right attention.
