Pros of working as a programmer
I want to share with you my thoughts about the advantages of being a software developer and working for a company. Bear in mind that this is subjective and it’s possible to easily find more positives.
I’m more like an indie developer or freelancer at this moment but still, I have a few years of experience working in the IT industry as a Java Developer at first and Android Developer later. I hope it will help somebody to decide if they should continue learning software development.
// The article about cons is being prepared and will be published soon
Let’s start then.
1. Constant learning and challenges
In the IT industry, software developers have to learn all the time. Problems are usually complex and even experienced programmers can always find something to learn. It’s also difficult to get bored because new challenges are in every corner. Of course, there are also less challenging tasks, so don’t worry, it’s possible to take a break sometimes 🙂
Anyway: your mind will stay sharp for a long time so if you like to learn new stuff, coding can be ideal for you.
2. People in the IT industry are great
Being a software developer requires teamwork. They often participate in the meetings and share information about current work. Cooperation is also the key to making high-quality solutions for complex problems. Developers have also cooperate with others, like designers, testers, managers and even clients. What’s most important here: people in the industry are usually awesome. Really. They are ambitious and clever. Most of them at least.
3. High rate pay
Programmers are in high demand all the time. It means that pay rates are usually really high and they can get additional benefits like free gym pass, or free pizza every Friday. It rather won’t change in the near future.
But please don’t get me wrong – it’s not that easy to become a programmer and getting the first job can be challenging as well, but when you have 1-2 years of experience… you are in a great position and you should easily find a new job whenever you want with high rate pay.
4. Satisfaction
I know that I talked about challenges above but this feeling when you accomplish something, the code looks great and other programmers gather near you so you can tell them how you did it… It’s great and deserves own point. Sometimes it means that you have worked on one thing 3 days in a row but when you finish it… you know it was worth it.
5. Remote work
It depends on the company, but usually, developers can work from home at least 1 day in a week if they want to and even more if they need to. They still have meetings working remotely so it’s important to have a camera and headphones with a microphone. Of course, every company policy is different, but in rare cases, you can even find a fully remote job.
I love the personal acomodation they make for developers. Althought I am more for not having corporate overlords and I see more of an advantages of NOT being an employee and instead doing your own consulting. For once, you dont need permissions, no title, or certification (althought helps) or special badge or medal can make you a developer expert. So you can start with no money and just use your time and work to gain the expertise needed and become a reference.
Once an expert, looking for clients is relatively easy, most business need IT, so making IT even thought might not be your ideal task, can find enough demand to get paid for it.
Once you have a client book you can rely on them and just work on specializing or jump to the next big thing. Providing support is great, but actually building the next new shinny thing might also be something that you can do if you want.
Another thing is that the industry is pretty open so you can find Linux user groups, Cloud, Bitcoin-Blockchain, Google Developer groups or Oracle Database user group. Really there is no shortage for special interest groups specially in larger cities. And is all global, you can go with your skills and build for companies in Borneo or Sweden or Japan. It's all the same. This flexibility is what makes the IT industry like no other.
I also prefer to not being an employee and work on "my stuff" instead. Having a background as a programmer is really helpful today.
Yep, the industry is really open. It makes things much easier for both - single developers and companies itself.
The best way to start your own clientelle is to work on weekends on side apps or just make it stronger and stronger until it can be a product. I think thats how many Sun employees 'retired' from Sun Microsystem and became Iphone App developers and eventually made very popular apps. It was a popular story when the App Store first came about. Now you have Android, IOS, Nintendo and so many software publishing platforms and you can just get the internet to pay you to code.
Another popular story was the creator of a silly bird game (flappy bird) and was able to make 50k a day. Enough to retired for life in Vietnam where the average yearly salary is only 16k usd a year.
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