So, yesterday I finally got my 1st job in coding, and particularly in machine learning! Really excited to share with you guys man! And whole lot of thanks to everyone on FCC! You guys are really awesome!
I think ended up getting a job in the field of machine learning is a quite a different experience from most FCCers, so I hope that sharing these experience with you guys will help you on your decisions making when searching for your dream job in the future, and also open up more options to choose which field to specialise after finishing FCC extensive curriculum. Here is my story and experience to share with you guys.
So I started out on FCC in July last year after dropping out from my university since I couldn’t transfer my degree to CS. It was long long hours of coding back then until December when I started FCC backend projects pair-programming with another FCCer. At that time, she and I were also searching for jobs, and since we lived in the same city, and so we can help out each other in finding jobs. She wanted to get a job on UI, especially CSS and RWD, and me particularly on AngularJS or Node.js, no matter as frontend, backend or fullstack developer.
We got interviewed for a few times in our city. But since the pay for a junior developer in my country is extremely low, she then decided to apply for a working holiday visa to UK, and try to get some progressive experiences on UI designing there. And now she is getting a very good pay and learning some really good designing skills there.
About me, after completing some FCC backend projects, but not all, I started to work on some projects of my own based on my ideas, while improving my AngularJS and Node.js skills progressively. After a few months, I came across an article about machine learning, and was really interested in it and got hooked. After the legendary battle between Lee Sedol and AlphaGo, and realising that the pay for a data scientist is extremely high in my country, and with some prior statistics and algebra knowledges, I started to find the resources and tutorials to teach myself the coding skills needed to be a data scientist. I’m very appreciated to have incorporated the self-teaching skills I’d gained from learning experiences in FCC.
Since I’ve got my coding foundations here in FCC, learning Python to do data science was extremely smooth. While learning data science, I’d joined some hackathons in my city and got to know some really impressive people. Lots of them are from startup accelerator programs. We hanged out sometimes for some coffees and then they brought me to their offices, where lots of startups worked there in a public area. Then I got to know that lots of the startup teams there were hiring. So I bravely talked to lots of the team, and we shared ideas. Very fortunately, one of the team there was looking for someone who can code some machine learning algorithms then deploy it to the backend for production. Knowing that they were hiring, I maintained some meetings weekly with them to tell them what can I do and provide for them. At last, they hired me yesterday!!! It was such a relief!!! Finally!!! This is my dream job!!!
It has been nearly half a year since I left FCC to pursue data science, but this all could happen just because of FCC. Big thanks to all the campers and anywho who’d contributed! Before started out on FCC, I was trampling around in the internet, especially Google to search for tutorials that best fit a beginner. But when I found FCC, I was so excited and instantly knew that I would spent some months on here learning some coding skills.
This is my story, it has been a year since I joined FCC. It was a very long long journey, it’s hard but certainly proved to be worth persisting. I hope this story is motivating and encouraging enough and everyone here can get their dream job in the future.
My advices:
- For a non-CS-degree guy like me, getting a job in a typical company is hard. Maybe try interviewing jobs from some smaller startups. If you don’t mind a low pay, try to interview for an intern instead of a full-time position.
- Connections are extremely important. Join some hackathons and try to make as much friends as possible in there. You might not know any of their company is hiring! I’ve a friend of friend of mine who now work in Google just 'cause of a good friend he’d known in a hackathon.
- Everyone feels not employment ready at some point. After all, just don’t care about it and show the recruiters and employers all the best projects you’ve ever done.
- You’ve learnt a lot from FCC curriculum to become a fullstack dev. But if you’re not good at CSS but really good at backend skills like me, you’ll have to be more professional on the backend than as fullstack does. If you’re good at frontend but not backend, you’ll have to be more professional on the frontend than as fullstack does too.
- Possibilities are all out there. You might be feeling not as confident when talking with other devs on some dev topics, just be curious and ask. You’ll be improving after all.
- Opportunities are not only to be found but can be created too. Don’t be shy to talk about your capable skills. You wouldn’t know that the one who you’re talking to might need you. You’re worth it!
Work hard!!!
