Why am I writing about how to do my job?

I am in a position of privilege because someone else gave me some of their time to show me how to build my career. I have guided a few others along the way and they found it valuable. There are other parts to the job, but the technical skills are where people need the most guidance, so I’m writing about that.

Facts

  • I am a software engineer at SalesLoft.
  • My highest educational qualification is a Highschool diploma, but my last two jobs didn’t ask to see it.
  • SalesLoft and many other companies can’t find enough people who can do my job, so if you could do this job, you can get a job very easily.
  • I am not a genius, but I have very particular set of skills, skills I have acquired by studying from home and learning/studying on the job.
  • I spent less than $500 on learning resources before I got my first job in tech, and now my employer pays for whatever books, videos, courses I want.
  • If the money for the books or courses is a problem for you, contact me, I can guide you toward free resources and if you have done all those and truly need a paid course or book, I will seriously consider paying for it.

Technical Skills Summary

I am a web developer. That can mean many different things. But in my case, I use open-source tools to build web applications. I can build something, press a button and then any of the 4.6 billion people who use the internet could access it seconds later. I am a web developer who took steps toward doing web development at a high enough skill level that I am now called a Software Engineer which usually means more responsibilities and more pay than a Web Developer role.

Technical Skills List

I am comfortable with all the basic concepts of these.

Learn these and build a basic personal website for yourself, like the one you are reading right now. If you can do that, you have learned enough here.

  • Linux. I had a Windows computer, I replaced Windows by installing Ubuntu, it is free.
  • How to run commands in the Linux terminal.
  • HTML. I learned it here for free https://www.codecademy.com/
  • CSS. Same as above.
  • Touch Typing. All the other skills will go faster if you can do this one well, so take the time to learn it on it’s own.
  • Git. (I went pretty far with Git, but you don’t need to)

I completed several books/courses for each of these, but I suggest you skip them, and pick them up when needed.

  • Ruby.
  • Rails.
  • Javascript.
  • React.

I completed several books/courses for some of these, I am still reading and consuming learning content weekly.

  • Elixir
  • Phoenix
  • LiveView

Elixir/Phoenix can do everything Ruby/Rails can do, but better.

LiveView can do 60% of what Javascript and React can do, but with MUCH less code and less complexity. It is brand new compared to the other technologies here, and is changing the world of web development :)