Life After College
@RayNicholus
Marketing Technology
Innovative
Progressive
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We're Hiring!
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Coming Up...
- Fears
- College
- Choices
- Truths
- Sleep
- Standing Out
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College = Job Prep?
@RayNicholus
Meh?
- Memorization & wheel-invention?
- Unrelated requirements?
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But...
- Finish what you started
- Think about problems
- Work on teams (projects)
@RayNicholus
Choose Your Path
Frontend
- UX
- Aesthetics
- Accessibility
- Web: HTML/CSS/JS
- Desktop: depends
Backend
- DBs
- Scale
- APIs
- C/C++, Java, .NET, JavaScript
Q.A.
- Not just manual testing
- Automate for scale
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Management
Not for everyone
Developer rules don't apply
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Wear Many Hats
- Smaller projects/employers
- May be part of the culture
- Inevitable
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Are You Ready?
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Common Concerns
- Ability (I suck)
- Knowledge/memory (I'm forgetful)
- Landing a job (No one wants me)
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Getting Paid
- Trivial: Finding
- Some Work: Applying
- Hard: Securing
A Career, not a job
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The Interview
- Knowledge questions
- Problem solving
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The Interview - Puzzles
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The Interview - Puzzles
You are shrunk to the height of a nickel & your mass is proportionally reduced. You still have your original density. Then, you are thrown into a blender. The blades will start moving in 60 seconds. What do you do?
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Text
The Interview - Coding Exercises
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success != canned answers
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Non-Tech Interview
- Show your passion
- Research the company
- Talk intelligently about the industry
- Ask questions
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But I Don't Want a Job!
@RayNicholus
Good luck!
Really want to start your own business?
Don't wait!
@RayNicholus
Sleep is for Quitters
@RayNicholus
9am - 5pm
Smart? That's not enough.
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A Day In the Life - During the Day
- Floating between projects
- Answering questions
- Continuing education
- New stuff (innovation)
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@RayNicholus
A Day in the Life - After Hours
- Day project overflow
- Side projects
- Doing this
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Burnout
- It's real
- Balance is hard, & key
- Don't be too proud
- Take a break
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Question Everything
@RayNicholus
Slow Down
- Many solutions
- Which one is best?
- Thinking / Coding = 3 / 1
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Be Critical
Even experts aren't perfect
Understand your solution
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Don't Say No
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Bad Excuses
- Never done this
- No knowledge
- Bad at this
- Too busy
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@RayNicholus
Comfort = Death
- Constant reinvention
- Make your life hard
- Keep up (at least)
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Stand Out
"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself."
- Rudyard Kipling
@RayNicholus
@RayNicholus
Action Items
- Join a meetup group
- Get involved in a side project
- Follow other developers on Twitter, GitHub, etc
@RayNicholus
Thank You
Ray Nicholus
Software Developer - Widen
ray@garstasio.com
@RayNicholus
https://github.com/rnicholus
Life After College
By Ray Nicholus
Life After College
...as a developer
