I’ve messed around with programming over the years but I never really got ‘hooked’ until I started learning Ocaml recently.
As a 31, almost 32 year old starting their journey in earnest, I wanted this community’s take on potential interview potential down the road.
Some online seem to think that to get an engineering job you have to have company contacts and/or go through the Bachelor’s/Grad → Internship route. Others seem to think that all you need is to contribute significantly to open source and/or personal projects related to your interests and try to get involved with the community in whatever ways you are able: eventually you’ll fall into a well-matched team.
As a case study, I noticed that on Jane Street’s website open roles are split into ‘Experienced’ and ‘New Grads and Interns.’ How should one go about presenting themselves in the application
process given that neither category completely applies? Perhaps Intern could, but do they consider non-traditional Internship applicants? Maybe JS expects these candidates to work for a period of time somewhere else before considering applying?
All thoughts are welcomed.
P.S. Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this. I didn’t see a category that jumped out.
Essentially. My ideal would be a place that’s not too stifled by corporate routine and really values the curiosity of its employees. And yeah Ocaml would be amazing. But I don’t know if I have quite enough experience yet to commit to a particular niche.
I took a “non traditional route” into being a working programmer. I also know a good many others who’ve done the same.
From what I’ve seen, there are many routes into this line of work. The smoothest and most suitable one varies depending on the inclinations and drives of the person, the vagaries of the economy, and the fads in the industry. I know people who went thru boot camps, others who went back to school, and a good number like myself who self-studied at the intersection of what was interesting to them and what was of interest to industry.
It’s probably worth noting that the macroeconomic climate and the tech landscape is quite different in the last few years, which I expect will present quite different challenges and opportunities than what my cohort of outsiders faced. So unless you’re talking with people who have made this move after like 2022, the anecdotes you hear might not been that relevant.
That said, I do still expect that someone who has an interest in programming, and the good fortune to be able to spend time training the skills that support this interest, will be able to find reasonably interesting and meaningful paid work putting those skills to use.
The actual tactics should depend on your circumstances: If you can afford to go to school and generally find academic environments conducive to your psychological health and intellectual growth, you might get a lot out of a program. If you don’t have the time or funds for that, and/or you find academia stultifying, you might do better with self-study, or studying alongside some other alternative learners. Assuming you have the time, contributing to OSS projects is a decent way to learn how to work on collaborative programming, whether or not you go thru academia.
“Organic” networking is also really valuable: which just means finding the communities who share your particular interests and joining them. Local meetups can be great for that, and also communities like this one
Feel free to DM me if you’d like to chat more in depth or on specifics.
