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5 toughest questions from self-taught developers and their answers

zooboole

Published By zooboole

A long time ago, the world was so disconnected that the information was out of reach.

Today, with the event of the Internet and the Web, it has become available in every corner of our lives. And, with the birth of Massive Open Online Courses(MOOCs) it's getting better. We have the opportunity to learn from schools that were then closed to the general public. Thus, giving birth to a new way of learning: distance learning.

Today, distance learning is common-place. It is a great opportunity that many of us prefer to embrace. Or, it's the only opportunity most of us can have access to which opens up some knowledge that we wouldn't have had the chance to access otherwise. It allows us to have the freedom to study what we are passionate about and we have control over our time pace. Most at the time, all for free.

But, learning without a mentor can be very challenging sometimes. That's what most, both new and seasonal, software developers go through nowadays. Software development is a huge field which requires constant leveling up and practice. As a developer, you must keep on learning to keep yourself updated. A reason why we always find ourselves into self-education.

Today, self-taught software developers have a great impact and influence in the industry. They are well known to be hard-working, people with strong practical skills. Because they learn by doing. Although it's important to have a formal education, it's not always easy to access it. So, when you are on your own, you need to accept things as they are and go for it.

Like most self-taught developers, I have been into the situation for years. It's challenging for new developers to deal with self-education. I would like to share with you a few challenges and suggest how to overcome them.

1. Am I doing the right thing? and what is considered as the right thing anyway?

Either you make a decision to learn a new skill or you are practicing in something else, you always wonder whether you are doing the right thing. Is that what you are supposed to learn? Or is that what you are supposed to write if you are practicing?. Is that what others are doing or would do?

Rest assured. You are not the only one in such a dilemma. To this, there are several ways of tackling it.

  • The main thing to do is to always take your ideas through the end. This allows you to see the outcome of each decision you make. It also gives you a tool to compare your decisions with other people's opinions.
  • No knowledge is useless. Knowledge, no matter its nature or type is always useful. If it is not used somewhere, it can unlock another knowledge.
  • Always look at your objectives and targets. Are those tools or resources that you are using helping you to reach your goals. If they do, go ahead till the end. They are the right ones until you realize the opposite.
  • Do not hesitate to ask. Ask other people their opinion and how they do theirs.
  • Do not learn for a job. Learn for a task. After all, you will ever and always be hired for being capable of completing a task. Do not follow job offers or success stories from the community and start walking with a waddle.
  • Take the necessary time to master anything you are interested in. This is to say, never give up. Even if the progress is slow, keep on going.
  • Acquaint yourself with many disciplines. No savoir-faire is useless, you remember?

2. Which resource is the right one?

All resources (books, blog posts, essays, etc.) have a good information to give. What makes the big difference is usually how it's given to the reader. My advice here is to always use the one that talks to you. Understand it well enough. Then go to others and see what they did.

3. How much or how long should I learn something?

How much information should I assimilate? Or for I long should I continue to learn something? Well, always target your capacity. Remember when Albert Einstein said that information is not knowledge and that experience is the source of knowledge. Until you are capable of doing, you are not ready. Do not follow the course example and assume you are doing. Here I mean you reason and come up with your own solutions. You explore countless situations until you see limitations and room of improvement.

4. What is needed in the field(jobs)?

You can't keep on learning your entire life. At some point, you need to work. Here too it's hard to find out how much knowledge is required for companies to take you.

Every company is usually unique in its way of doing things. But, I assume that every company would always look at a candidate's capacity before other criteria. Which means, if you are capable of doing a reasonable number of things, you should be ready to ask for a job. Besides, some companies will be ready to take you based on your desires to learn and shape(train) you.

5. What about self-disciple?

This can be an entire article. Self-disciple is where most self-educated people fail. According to a research by Katy Jordan more than half of people enroll in MOOCs don't complete their training. If you look closer, one of the main reasons for this issue is due to people failing to be self-disciplined. I am pretty sure that even you can relate.

Self-discipline is the key to success. Any successful business person would confirm this.

In that, it's not something to take for granted. It's called "discipline" because it needs to be timely applied. You must develop self-discipline on daily basis. Here are a few things I do:

  • Write the date of the day. Never joke with this. If you want to see the value of this. Ask people around you on the day's date. Few will be able to tell you. So, if you don't know the day's date, I doubt you can do any other thing right in the day: meetings, reading time, gym time, dinner with XYZ,...
  • I Learn from my actions and others'
  • I test, analyze, and judge myself often
  • I fight laziness in all circumstances
  • I do my best to keep myself healthy and light(need some physical activity)
  • I sleep whenever and wherever I need it.
  • I schedule everything for a day and I don't miss it.
  • I read books on public transportation when going to/coming back from work
  • I always read my goals from time to time to refresh myself.

Bottom line

Q&As websites are here today. They allow everyone to ask anything that bothers them and get volunteers to answer it. It's fun at first until the same question is asked in different angles of reality to get any freshman confused.

In a world of information where everything seems true at first, I would tell anyone to take only one thing and to do it till the end.

If you get the chance to pair-program with a friend, a colleague(Oops! we're still looking for a job) or a mentor, do not hesitate.

Have a look at what others are doing. It'll guide you. When you develop something, try to have the opinion from others. They might help you sight any potential security risks caused by your narrow knowledge of the field.

And chill.

Thanks for reading. Kindly help me by sharing this with your followers.