How long will it take after you’ve completed your course training to get your first interview or to get your first programming job? Let’s talk more about that today.
Another question I often get asked is, after you’ve completed your first programming course and you’ve done some basic training, how long after that will it take for you to be ready to attack a job interview and hopefully get your first programming job?
Well, the answer to that is that it depends on you. Now I know that sounds like a bit of a cop out, but the reality is that people learn at different rates. So what I want you to do is get into the habit of not trying to rush through the training. One of the things I see some students do is try and really rush through. They set themselves a really aggressive time frame and in fact often, I’ll get questions from people or students saying, “Tim, how many hours will it take me to complete this course?”
Well, there’s no set answer to that either, because that is reliant on you; not only how many hours you’ve got, but also how quickly you absorb information. So don’t rush learning the material. Take your time to learn that and by doing that, you can’t necessarily put a time-frame on when you’re going to be ready. Once you’ve completed the training, you should have a sound knowledge of the technology that you learned in that course.
At that stage, yes, you’ll be ready to start looking at tackling an interview and/or going for a job. But first and foremost, focus on learning the technology. If that means re-watching videos two or three times, or rereading the material, depending on whatever training you’re going through, make sure you do that. What is most important is for you to thoroughly understand the material as much as you can before you actually get to the stage of an interview because if you’ve rush through the training to the end and you go out and perhaps you’re lucky enough to score an interview, if someone asks you some questions about the technology that you learned, if you’ve rushed through that course, chances are pretty high that you won’t understand what you have to answer, that question.
Take your time to thoroughly learn the material. That’ll make you a better programmer in the long run but it’ll also make you more employable to an employer and ultimately give you a greater likelihood of succeeding at an interview and getting your first job.
I hope that helped you. If you’ve got any questions, feel free to leave a comment and I’ll get back to you.