u/michaelnovati replied ·
RE: hard truths:
1. I semi-agree. I can share my personal story. I started programming at age 12 and didn't decide to be an software engineer until 10 years later. It took years before programming started to make sense and the first few attempts to learn didn't click. But at the same time I got really good grades across the board, was studious, went to the one of the hardest university programs in the world to get into, so presumably I have the "technical aptitude" but it did still take a lot of attempts of many years before programming itself clicked.
2. I see this a lot, people at less strong companies who want to go to FAANG, people at FAANG who want to go to smaller more up and coming companies, people at startups who want to go to any stable big less strong big company. There's both tremendous freedom in a lot of SWE jobs, but also tremendous responsibility, accountability. In additional, some SWEs can be hard to work with, there's a huge lack of diversity, and other things. I do it because I LOVE solving problems with software and seeing immediate impact. DO NOT become a SWE for the money, I've never seen that go well.
3. \+1, you never stop learning new things feeling like a noob. I tell people their first job post bootcamp is just the first baby step of a long journey. I get accused of being a downer sometimes on those "I graduated from my bootcamp 2 months ago and just got a $150K job, ask me anything!" because that's like buying a ticket to Disney World for the first time, stepping foot on main street and telling the world... there are so many things ahead of you to discuss that you don't even know about yet before you can be a Disney expert - navigating queues, wait times, food reservations and food in general, hidden mickeys, multi-park in a day planning, photos, coordinating for show times, prepping for the weather - both clothing, sunscreen, and impact on queues and rides, navigating the intentionally distracting store layouts, optimizing what time of day to buy souvenirs, balancing the whole groups preferences, add int children, grandparents, and the one off distractions and unexpected distractions. If you want to be a SWE for your career, you are committing to becoming the equivalent of that Disney expert, and it changes your perspective on the "Disney magic" that someone going for the first time might experience.