New to Coding? Master These 3 Skills to Stay Ahead of the Curve
Learning to code isn’t enough.
10 years ago, being able to write some HTML, CSS, Jquery and JavaScript could land you a job.
Honestly, you can still make money just knowing these basics. BUT, if you want career where you work on interesting problems and are highly compensated, there are 3 skills you’re going to need which I’ll outline below.
Unfortunately, I meet too many developers who think getting infinitely better at writing React or JavaScript or collecting certificates like Pokemon cards makes them indispensable.
Business > Code.
Developers do more than write code. The smaller the company, the higher likelihood that you will be:
- Working with other teams to figure out the future of the product
- Responsible for deploying your code and monitoring it
- Managing timelines for large projects
Imagine you are the evil CEO for a large, greedy corporation. You only made a measly few million last year and it’s time to do budget cuts under the guise of “AI” (not like this ever happens).
Who are you cutting from the engineering team?
- Suzy, who suggested and developed a feature that is attracting more customers and works closely with the marketing and design teams?
- Gerald, the lone-wolf super smart nerd who cranks out error-free code by working 12 hour days?
I’m keeping Suzy personally.
If we’re a start-up — this becomes a no-brainer. The smaller the team, the more important it is that we deliver products that our customers care about and generate revenue… even if a few bugs slip through.
Here are the 3 skills you need as a developer in 2024 and how to acquire them, even if you’re still learning to code.
Need to learn to code? Join a small cohort of nerds and change careers here.
Skill 1: Product Mindset
Code is only as valuable as the problem it solves.
LeetCode, CodeWars and stupid interview culture has fooled you into thinking that solving toy problems is a high-paying skill.
Solving these ridiculous challenges actually might land you the job but it will NOT keep you there or get you promoted.
Learn to care about the customer… or at least fake it.
If you’re a developer who’s already employed then ask your product team what they’re looking at to understand user behavior. Check out the error reports and site metrics to understand where users spend their time and areas where you can make improvements that the business actually cares about.
It may shock you, but businesses like making money and delighting customers.
If you are learning to code, then build a side project with the intention of actually getting people to use it. You will learn more about business than most developers who build a project that they only built to add to their portfolio site that no one is looking at in the first place.
Skill 2: Dev Ops (Light)
Seriously, stop with the certificates.
No one cares.
If you are truly a dev ops engineer then by all means, get AWS certs or whatever your team requires.
For the rest of you JavaScript developers out there — just stop.
Learning how to deploy, roll back and automate code going from your machine out to the world is a critical skill.
You can learn the basics by using tools like GitHub actions to trigger a build and deployment of your code to a cloud service provider like AWS. Think through how you would rollback the code if an error happened.
How will you monitor the deployment?
What the hell does a “rollback” even mean?
What git branching strategies make sense for your team? How about for a team of 1 if you’re learning to code?
Googling those 3 questions should lead you down some interesting rabbit holes.
Skill 3: Project Management
Developers universally hate deadlines.
Businesses love them.
They use them to estimate their budget and tell customers, partners and stakeholders when to expect that button on the “About Us” page. It’s going to be a game changer!
Learn how to estimate and deliver your work on time and you will be in a small class of developers.
I’m still trying to get there myself. Give me 10 more years and I’m sure I’ll get this down. Maybe 12.
There are entire books written on the magical art of estimation for software projects.
Here’s how I’ve learned to suck much less at estimations over the years:
- Write out the sub-tasks needed for delivery of a feature and make estimations in half days for all tasks. This includes things like styling.
- Each day, measure your progress against the sub tasks and see if you’re on track or not.
- Write the actual time next to your original estimation.
- At the end of the project use the adjusted timelines for each task to (more) accurately figure out the time for the next project.
If you’re a new developer or learning to code then use your side project and a task management tool like Trello to mimic this process.
This will help you understand what it actually takes to build your side project and when you can expect to complete it.
One Last Thing
99% of people who read this article and others like it will not take the steps outlined to get the value promised.
Be the 1%.
Take a small step like creating a Trello account or literally copy and paste the questions from the Dev Ops section to read later.
As always, I hope you find this helpful.
If you want to work with me and my team 1 on 1 to build complex software and get hired as a developer then join my totally-not-a-cult online coding school, Parsity.
