So a lot of people ask, how can I get into the web development industry, this post assumes you know HTML, basic JavaScript and CSS. Here are my top 10 tips (in no particular order).
1 – Never lie on your CV, saying you have 10 years experience when really you are at a junior level will never do you any good and you will be found out.
2 – Master best practice coding standards, html5 boilerplate is a good place to start. By mastering best practice the rest of the skills you need will come with time and experience.
3 – If you don’t know the answer to a interview question say how you would find the answer (don’t be afraid of not knowing everything, even the best of us use google).
4 – Be willing to work your arse off, with tight deadlines a typical 9-5:30 development job will rarely having you leaving on time every night.
5 – Be willing to learn, from the day you were born to the day you die you can always learn something new and that goes for in your career to.
6 – Do work for friends for free or little cost, do a good job and put it on your portfolio and mention it on cv as experience. The more experience you can demonstrate the better you look to an employer.
7 – Tell everyone who will listen how passionate about development you are, make this shine through on paper.
8 – Keep a career related blog (like this one) to show off all the stuff your doing outside work to make you better at your job
9 – Get involved in the community, for web development you could contribute to open source, even just a little change like a bug fix is a huge benefit to the community and makes you look good.
10 – Help other developers who are having problems, there are forums where people ask development questions, some of which you might be able to help with.
To sum up you basically need to stand out from the crowd both on paper and in person. I hope these tips can help you get that job your after in the new year.
I plan on posting how I got into the industry next week.