In today’s technology driven world there are a different set of skills that are needed to thrive in the job marketplace. Right from those initial schooling years, inculcating the habit of thinking out of the box is crucial to helping children and young adults prepare for the working world.
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For young software developers who are just entering the marketplace, what else can they do to ensure they are career-ready?
The following 4 step mantra can help ensure career readiness in Young Software Developers.
- Awareness – Seek more knowledge of the latest software industry trends from Gartner and Zinnov like forums to understand the breadth of career opportunities in an area or specialization. Meetups are also another good way to connect to the industry and gain more knowledge. Subscribing to eBooks, industry podcasts, technology channels, websites is another medium to continuously keep oneself posted on updates. Explore the web for different technologies, software methodologies to better help in laying the foundation right in knowing the variety of opportunities out there.
- Set Goals – Setting goals to gain a breadth of knowledge and depth will be helpful in carving multiple skillsets and interest areas. After having explored the ocean of opportunities, with an open mind there is a need to identify a couple of areas where one intends to do a deep dive. If one intends to be a programmer, this is the time to breathe the code. Apart from the technology knowledge gained, it is also important to polish soft skills like communication, behavioral, leadership skills. There are a lot of institutes to coach/mentor based on the area of expertise one is looking forward to build their career on. Constantly revisit your goals to understand the progress or need for a change
- Experimentation – Challenging oneself by going on experimenting with new tasks and projects, use different options by participating in Hackathons, blogs etc. Also be an active contributor to online communities like Stack Overflow to keep your skills up to date. Based on the learning that happened, this is an experimentation stage for one to understand, which career opportunity is best suitable at a point of time. This is the time for one to match the purpose to his/her learnings. This is the time to see the results realised.
- Stay in the game –
‘It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.’// –Charles Darwin
Positive Attitude and mindset to adapt to change is needed to stay in the game. While challenging oneself, there will be ups and downs in the journey. Need to be tackling them with a positive mind to adapt to the constant changes that one would come through. Early realisation to the need for a change, continuous learning, upskilling, reskilling would be some of the techniques to sail through any rough waters.