“Sir, I‘m not interested in that” — What Happened
Yes I really did tell that. To a CEO. Tag along, I’ll tell the story…but first, introductions.
Hi, I’m Ayan (“oy” as in “Soy” + “own”) — a self-taught Frontend Developer from India and employed for almost 2 years. This blog is about how I was hired as a Frontend Developer (being self-taught and all), my time spent earning a CS degree and things I learned about myself as I job-hunted.
Wait..CS Degree!?? How can you claim to be a self-taught web developer if you already have a degree!!?
I’ll explain it, but a first a rant about universities.
//rant start
I completed my graduation in 2016 from a university that doesn’t exist anymore. It doesn’t help me in any way, not for what I do or for what I aspire to become.
Except for a few great friends, all the university gave me were reasons why people shouldn’t attend it in the first place. I mean, why would you spend a fortune to learn outdated practices only to graduate and get a job in a company as a “Software Developer” which, in my country at least, is codename for “do what we tell you to”.
You can’t blame the companies, since grads do not have any practical knowledge to be put straight into work — and that’s on the university.
//rant end
Okay, so who are you and why should you be here?
You are an aspiring/amateur/frustrated Developer (hi to the guys from FreeCodeCamp) who needs to hear from people who’ve got a job by being self-taught. (If you’re someone else and you’re still here, do stay. I tell stories).
I plan to write three blogs — what I did, what I’m doing now and what I intend to do in the future. Part One (this) will have three stories, where I look back and try to “connect the dots” as Steve Jobs once said.
Let’s get started.
“Genius hits a target no one can see”
I’m not a genius. It’s sibling, talent, didn’t want me. No skill whatsoever either. I was silly as a kid and asked a lot of stupid questions. I did like to code and draw — I was average at both…obviously.
So, when I enrolled into college in 2012, I was hoping learning to code better would allow me to have some tangible skill that’d get me a job. Fast-forward to 2015, last year in college, 6 months away from placements and I wasn't sure I’d manage to get a job.
But..there was a difference this time. I had a general idea of what I wanted to be.
The idea was to excite people, be excited doing it and all this must somehow involve a computer.
Enter Web Design. An infusion of creativity (formed via my experience with drawing) and coding, both of which I liked. I was not very good at either of them individually, but combined…I think I had a shot.
So for the next 6 months I worked on becoming a good designer. I had mentally dropped out of college, didn’t do it in reality because that’d be a stupid financial decision. The journey wasn’t romantic though — I worked deep into nights on college days, and weekends meant just more of the same. Bouts of flu, deaths of close family members, personal issues — I worked through them all. It was like the whole world was conspiring to stop me, but I had found a drive I didn't know I had and a passion that I had never felt before.
Looking back now, I’ve realised that it wasn’t some miracle that made me get through all of that stuff. It was a burning desire to prove myself, and because I had found what I loved to do. Finding and doing what you love to do is extremely powerful, it’s like getting an adrenaline shot — you do stuff you thought you couldn’t.
In college, I prepared and orchestrated Powerpoint Presentations that drew appreciations — but it involved restless nights of preparation from both the team and myself. I discovered a talent I thought I didn't have— a talent to work hard — but only for what I like.
That’s what I want to say to you readers — find what you love and work hard at it. If you really love web design, meaning you would really give up everything for it — for that excitement of building your first website to that sparkle in a user’s eyes when they see your little animations — then this is for you.
“Talent hits a target no one else can, genius hits a target no one can see”
Yeah? We’ll see.
“It was the principle”
When it was 6 months to Placements and I found web design, I immediately went looking for resources to learn all about it. I found Codecademy’s beginner courses and FreeCodeCamp’s community, both of which I delved into.
About a week later, I was trying out stuff in Codecademy’s editor when I decided, on a whim, to build this “cool thing” I had seen on some website. I felt mighty confident about, went on to Codepen, whipped up an editor and I sat, point-blank, for several minutes thinking how to start.
I just couldn't move a finger. There I was before, hammering out courses left, right and centre, and yet I couldn’t build this thing. I realised it was because of the guides — they were always present to help me, and I didn't have to fend for myself. I made a decision to go through with building what I had originally planned, and it took two days of intense googling, hair-tearing (some) to actually make it. It was still crap, but I didn’t have to google the basics anymore. I loved it.
(btw, the “it” was a simple “fixed navbar” — a menu bar that sticks to the top of your page — it had this cool animation where it slid down revealing more items).
Once I built this, I saw that I remembered a lot more now, and that this was more efficient than the courses ever were. It was because I was learning WHAT the tools did, not WHY they were needed. So I decided to just build stuff — scour the web and just build whatever catches my eye. It might turn out crap(and most of them did), but I’d still learn something new.
I have followed this process whenever I have learnt any new thing — learn the basics, build something with it and once you have a good grasp, learn more about the tools themselves. Also, code as native as possible — meaning without external libraries.
Start coding with raw HTML, CSS and Javascript in a plain text editor— frameworks will always be there — but the fundamentals will never change.
So that’s what I did to learn before getting a job — coding in a plain text editor using raw HTML, CSS and JS(some jQuery) — and with it I built my first ever website — my portfolio.
It was so ugly, but it was still a standing testament to the work that I had put in, to all the struggles I went through. It was showing myself that I was capable of building something out of nothing, and it felt wonderful.
See, it was never about getting a job, I knew I needed a job but it wasn’t that.
It was the principle — I would rather perish doing something I loved, than live doing something I hated.
(That was kinda stolen from House of Cards. Also, notice there’s no “CS degree coming to the rescue” moment in the story. :))
“I‘m not interested in that”
No it wasn’t clickbait. And if you’ve just scrolled to see this, congratulations, because I’d have done that too.
As the six months ended, and Placements started, people started tensing up and I started tensing up too — I had no reason to, but I just did (It’s apparently because of this thing called cortisol in our brains).
Now, my college couldn’t attract any big companies — it wasn’t reputed enough and was located in the middle of nowhere — that along with a bad job market meant only fringe/small companies came to recruit us. I wasn't sure I had marketable skills as a web developer yet, it needed a couple more months in my opinion— so I planned to get a job, any job — and then search for a web developer job once I was good. I felt college might be good choice for once.
The first company that hired people, hired me — but I had to relocate to a different state and the pay wasn’t good — so I let it go. I was pretty confident about the others, having already been offered a position once.
“Piece of cake”, I thought to myself.
Boy oh boy. Seven companies, on the trot, rejected me at the last round. One of them gave me chocolates at the end — I thought I had made it — it was a parting gift, because the others had got it with a confirmation letter.
Wow.
I had had enough. Web Development. Job Hunting. Playing by the rules has never been my thing, and it has never worked for me. The path less taken is always hard, but hey, less competitors and an opportunity to stand out.
I doubled down on learning web development. As weeks rolled on (I got rejected by three more companies; stopped going to interviews after that), and I got better at it— I started applying to different companies. I was targeting small ones, ones that could do with a dedicated Frontend Developer, but not big enough to have a dedicated team. That way I’d learn, and still get experience.
It was unnerving, sending out cold emails to companies and never hearing back. It was terrifying, not attending the college interviews at the same time. It was peaceful, because it was a decision I took and I was standing by it.
Must have been about more than 70 different companies that I had applied for, and I got a call from one of them. 1 in 70. I gotta make it. Three hours later, I was gobsmacked from what I had faced in the interview — I was asked questions that are meant for core web developers — not for students about to graduate.
I was like a cheetah in a land of lions — it could run fast and climb trees — but wouldn't help when it’s in a flat terrain surrounded by lions. This was the real world. Like that metaphor, I loved the challenge.
All of this preceded a pretty important event — the final year college project. I made a website — but this time it was good. The idea was to make a fictional website that hosts data about all the doctors, hospitals and organ donors in the country. We had a group for this, and we decided to use a theme at first — it turned out to be hard to implement and kind of crap. The next day, I was home and there was a power cut, so to pass the time, I decided to build a website for our project. It turned out pretty good and the team loved it so we went along with it. (I’ll host it on github and then link it sometime later).
I must have applied to over a 100 companies by then, cold emails one after the other and I was starting to lose hope. One evening, a company I had recently applied to called. They called to tell me that they would be recruiting at my college anyway, so if I like I could give the interview at the college itself.
I was like, sure!
The first round of interview consisted of all candidates giving a written test that tested your logical ability — it had questions from Java and C++, so I was like “wait what”. I did it anyway and got through to the next round. People were being called for interviews, and I was nervous because till this moment I was thinking “they aren’t interested in hiring web developers, and I’m not prepared for a Java/C++ round, so should I stay or go??”.
I got called. I sat down, infront of the CEO (it was a startup with just 8 people), and as he started examining the sheet on which I had written the answers to the previous round, I blurted out —
Sir, I’m not interested in that.
He looks at me, goes “Ok” and pushed the sheet away. I told him about my passion for web design and he proceeded to ask me some questions. It was the previous interview all over again. I was simply not expecting the questions that were being asked. I did manage to answer some of them, but overall was a pretty poor performance — I sensed that, but I was pretty sure I was skilled enough to build a website — so I asked him to take me on for a 3-month trial period instead of the 6-months they were offering. I also asked him to see my portfolio and the college project website, and to take a decision only after that.
The result? I was exempted from taking the third round, but was asked to stick around. Later they called me and I was informed that I’d be given a test, specifically for Frontend Developer, but — and I later confirmed this from the CEO himself— after they saw the website, they offered me a position straight out of college.
So on 16th August, 2016, after 4 years of hard work and intense turmoil, I joined them. This August, it will be two years of me being an employed self-taught web developer.
The untrodden path brings a lot of failures, but its these moments of everlasting bliss that make it all worth it. Be brave, work hard and above all, know what you want.
So if I hadn’t had that drawing experience, that idea to infuse code with creativity and that website I built during a power cut, I might not be doing what I do today.
I guess those are the dots Steve Jobs talked about. You really can’t connect them going forwards.
This was my first blog post ever, so I apologise if it’s too long — I felt I needed to explain in detail what I went through to actually get the point across.
If you liked this, spread the word! Also, I’ll be posting in the coming week about how it’s like to be the 9th employee at a startup and see it grow. See you there!
