Landing Your Next Developer Job

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Renaud Bressant (Head of Product), Nathanael Lamellière (Head of Customer Success and Solution Engineer), Nouha Chhih (Developer Experience Manager) will be looking at the different developer jobs that you can accounter when looking for your next developer role. We'll be explaining the specifics of each role, to help you identify which one could be your next move. We'll also be sharing tips to help you navigate the recruitment process, based on the different roles we interviewed for as recruiters, but also as candidates. This will be more of an Ask Us Anything session, so don't hesitate to share your thoughts and questions during the session.

FAQ

The main focus of the webinar is to explore various developer roles and to provide guidance on finding your next developer role. It includes discussions on different responsibilities in front end and back end roles and how these roles help in smoothing operations between teams.

The webinar mentions several team members including Sadek, who is setting up the webinar, Francois W., who is involved in business operations, and Nouha, who works with a team called developer experience.

Nouha works with the developer experience team, which operates between developer relations and developer experience. This team focuses on enhancing how the product functions for developers, improving documentation, and providing feedback to the product team to improve both the product and associated resources.

The webinar discusses several roles, including Solutions Engineer, Documentation Engineer, Developer Experience, and Growth Engineer. These roles are chosen based on the interests of the participants.

A Solutions Engineer in the context of the webinar is described as a role that bridges the gap between technical products and customers. They assist the sales team by providing technical expertise during the pre-sale cycle, onboarding, and post-sales processes. They work on developing custom demos and supporting proof of concept stages to demonstrate how products can meet client needs.

The webinar encourages participants to discuss and ask questions about various job roles, emphasizing a personalized approach. It suggests evaluating roles based on personal interests and skills, and provides opportunities for participants to learn more about specific roles they are interested in.

Sadek Drobi
Sadek Drobi
Nouha Chhih
Nouha Chhih
Francois Bohyn
Francois Bohyn
121 min
10 Jun, 2021

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Video Summary and Transcription

The Workshop discusses various roles in software development, including solution engineering, documentation engineering, growth engineering, and developer experience. It emphasizes the importance of finding the right fit and aligning personal interests and skills with job opportunities. The speakers provide insights into the recruitment process, salary negotiation, and the value of collaboration and learning. The Workshop also highlights the need for transparency and communication during salary discussions, as well as the importance of prioritizing personal growth and gaining relevant experience.

1. Finding Your Next Developer Role

Short description:

The webinar focuses on finding your next developer role and explores different roles and responsibilities within the industry. The speakers discuss their experiences and the skills required for various roles. They also encourage the audience to ask questions and share job preferences. The session starts with an introduction to Solution Engineer and emphasizes the diversity of skills and opportunities available to developers. The speakers aim to challenge stereotypes and highlight the wide range of roles that developers can pursue.

React. React. React. React. React. React. React. React. Okay, so hi, everybody. The goal, well, the topic of this webinar is finding your next developer role. And so, what we've been looking at, I don't know if you can put the camera on me because everyone is looking at Phil and I'm the one talking. People like to look at me, I've been told. You can do the intro. Yeah, okay. Back. There we are. Oh, no. Okay. Back to me. Cool. I guess I'll do the intro. Yeah, so the idea of what we're doing today is more of a kind of a workshop about, like we were talking about developer roles which are just front end, back end kind of roles that plug gaps between teams and kind of help companies work smoother and the different roles that that might exist and what the responsibilities are and that's why we've kind of got a kind of a mixed crew here. We've got Sadek who's currently getting us all set up. We've got Francois W. who's more in terms of business. Yeah, business operations. Yeah, and Nouha something very similar. You can maybe explain that a bit better yourself. Yeah, so I work with a team called developer experience. So we do something between developer relations and developer experience. So work on how much the product works well for developers and trying to bring as much feedback as we can to the product team to try to improve both the product and the documentation and everything that's around the product. But we'll look a bit more into it. Yeah, that means that because Luha does that sort of role, she works very closely with myself who is on the education team. Yeah. And we kind of try to bridge the gaps that exist between the developers and us here at Prismic. We try to get that information as quickly and as efficiently as possible to you, the users, so that we can make that process as smooth as possible. So that's what we're going to be talking about. So, it's all those different roles that you may do and what exists in it, and then we'll move into what we've learned in our process of hiring and also the people that are being hired, the things that we've learned over the years and how can we give that information to you and answer any of your questions that you have in regards to any of that stuff. So, we selected some of the job posts that we think might be relevant to you, but this is more meant to be a discussion, so if you have any question feel free to ask and we can also talk about these roles and answer any question that you might have about any other role. So, Daria shared with you a little type form, I think today, asking you which roles you'd be interested in knowing more about. And so the first ones that we'll be talking about are Solutions Engineer, Documentation Engineer, Developer Experience, and Growth Engineer, which are the ones that those of you who answered wanted to know more about. So, we'll look a bit into these. Each person will explain what their team is doing when it's a role that is related to their team. And then, of course, you're free to ask any question. So, should we start with Solution Engineer? Let's go. Let's go and talk about Solutions Engineering, Solution Officer. Saadiq, Saadiq is joining. So, no, the meeting is not specific for Prismic. We're talking about jobs in general, jobs that are also related to some of the stuff that we're doing, but it's not specifically about us, it's about the job in the industry. Yeah, I'm waiting to get a camera on me, but the thing is the idea is, I mean, I'm, and so basically I'm a developer and I felt that sometimes, ourselves we stereotype ourselves too much, and especially the industry gets to stereotype us into like, okay, developers mean write code for like 24 hours, seven days a week, and that's all about it, right? Code, code, code, code which I find that is not true. Absolutely not true. I mean, all the developers that I knew, they did something else in their life, right? They did music, they had guitars, they, my sound, I should speak here, yeah? So, they did something else. They had their, they were passionate about music, about image, about video, about so many different things that that was putting them into some kind of category and I hated that. And I was always thinking like I'm a developer but I can understand a product, I can understand this, I can do more, why should I be in this role? And front end or back end, I didn't like that kind of choice. It's too much, too few for me. So, myself, I evolved into different roles and I'm a software architect and I got more interested in the product and then I became a CEO and all of these kinds of things. But now, in the company, when we're doing this, when we're doing Prismic and building Prismic, we're discovering that there's so much horizon for developers and not as horizon as in things that will be paid less. Actually, things will be paid as much or more, but you need to have some skills and it depends who you are. Some people have some kind of good communication skills. Well, that's great. Developer plus communication or developer plus finding solutions or developer plus growth. This is something that Francois could talk about. Being that person that would care a lot about the business, about how it goes and how can we get more adoption and it will be about numbers, but still a developer, you need to do so much software to get this right. Then you get all about relations, people that can build good relationship, content creation, writing, so many skills that a developer is at the center, of course, at the center, like a company like ours, for instance, it's at the center of everything. But there's a big horizon of, spectrum of jobs. And the idea is let's talk about these things. Maybe people are not aware of them because I wasn't aware that they existed. I don't know. Right now I can maybe right away say like 10 roles in the top of my head that today we have in developers. So this is the idea.

2. Understanding the Role of a Solution Engineer

Short description:

Let's talk about different roles and their importance. Some roles are related to personal interests and skills. The webinar aims to provide a perspective on various roles and help participants find a good fit. The discussion is not limited to Prismic and covers product companies in general. The speakers have interviewed people from different companies to gain insights. The first role discussed is the solution engineer, which varies depending on the company. Solution engineers help sell technical products to engineers and work in pre-sale, onboarding, and post-sales processes. They handle technical tasks, such as custom demos and proof of concept, as well as customer interactions. Solution engineers need to understand the ecosystem and find solutions to customer problems. They play a consultant-like role, bringing value to the sales process. Success in this role often comes from a background in agencies. The scope of the role may differ based on company size, with specialization in pre-sales, onboarding, or post-sales as the company grows.

Let's talk about these, explain what they are, and what's important about them. And then maybe you will find, like, oh, this looks more or less like me. I like that. I want to know more about it. Right? And some roles are really related to who you are and what you like to do. So we try to also touch a bit on this and try to give you a perspective on the personalities with whom we work. And for you, it will maybe be a good opportunity to see which one could be a good fit for you. And so just to answer Juan's question about the fact that maybe this is related to Prismic. I don't think it's related only to Prismic. I think it's for all kinds of product companies that have their product, but also have lots of different rules related to selling the product and talking about the product. So the idea here is not to sell Prismic or anything like that. This is certainly not the idea. The idea is we thought let's share what we know about these kinds of different jobs and let people know that they exist and that they can search about them. This is the topic. Yeah, we also interviewed a lot of people for these kind of jobs. So we learned not only about how we do it, but also about how other companies do it and what we should develop.

So maybe we can start. So yeah, I saw your question, Prabhu. Would it be possible that you post it on the Q and A so that I don't miss it? But yeah, of course, we'll touch on this. Prasad, do you wanna go ahead with solutions engineer first? Yeah. So that was the most requested one during the poll that you ran yesterday or today, I don't know when, but about this discussion. So solution engineer is kind of a really wide role and depends a lot on the company you're working for. This is a role designed for SAS company, especially technical one where you are dealing with developers in the sales process, meaning that developer are going to buy or use your product, but also work with less technical products that are not meant for a developer, but that have some kind of technical implementations. Try, for example. It's not meant for developer, but there is a huge technical. They are used by developers at some point. Yeah, exactly. So it's a role that is starting to be a lot more present in the industry, especially in SAS as a whole, company like Tridio with Datadog having a huge team of solution engineering, but the real question here is what is the solution engineer? And as I told, it really depends on the company. So I can give a lot of examples of what it is, depending on the company. And basically, the main point of the solution engineer is to help sales team to sell the technical product to engineers. So it's working a lot on the pre-sale cycle and in some companies, it's also part of the onboarding and also on the post-sales processes. So in the case of Prismic, for example, the solution engineer is working during the three phases, so the pre-sale, onboarding and the cruising, so the post-sales. And they're doing a lot of technical stuff. At the beginning in the pre-sale, there's going to be a lot about custom demos, how to build a demo that is going to relate to the prospects the lead needs. Also helping during the proof of concept because a lot of these highly technical products have a proof of concept phase at the beginning. Should I talk in this one? Yeah. All right. So I'm just going to move a bit. So working on proof of concept, we're basically trying the product in the real life scenario to see how it's going and how that product can help the prospect achieve what they want to achieve. So that's a highly technical profile, but there is also a huge part of the role that is about business. No, no, go ahead. Which is about business. And that's, is also a customer facing type of role, meaning that you are going to talk with customers a lot on a day to day basis, in the pre-sales, especially where you're going to learn more about the leads, about the potential customer, what they want to achieve with the solution. And then a big part of so, is understanding an ecosystem, because if you take the example of Tribe, Tribe is going to be part of a huge ecosystem in the company. If they want to use a payment system, they will have to integrate it in the framework. So you need to understand how the framework works, how you can integrate that in the framework, how are they going to push the data, maybe in all the solutions. So that's where comes the solution engineer name. The fact that you need to solve problems and find solutions to customer problems. Something that it makes me think of, is that it's close to like the work a developer could do in an agency. I know that some of the people you interviewed are like developers who were working in agency, so they have experience thinking about all the different solutions that they want to integrate and make recommendations for clients. So it's kind of similar role, except that you don't really do the project, but you just give advice on what's the best way for the implementation and maybe it recommend specific tools for them. And be more like some kind of consultant. Yeah, exactly. It's being the consultant in the sales process, so bringing value, not trying to sell, just trying to sell by bringing value to the prospect. And that's a really, a more and more demanded job on the market because we realized that having this kind of profile in sales cycles will help close more deals because we are bringing value. So it's like developers, but still they need to be able to sell, right? Sell in the sense because most of the time, solution engineer are going to be... Yeah, I'll continue. This one might change. We are working with account executives, account managers, so these people are going to handle the whole communication, the whole closing, how to make an offer and everything, while the solution engineer is going to bring the technical knowledge to just help close that deal. So they are more seen as a valuable contract material, more than the salesperson. So as you mentioned, we saw a lot of success when people coming from agencies because in a product like Prismic, for example, you are seeing a lot of different use cases and also we integrate with a lot of different solutions. So having that agency background give you the ability to first understand the code, understand the frameworks and as well the ecosystem. So that's a bit about how a solution engineer works. As I told you, it really depends on the company and the size of the company. When you're working in a smaller company, the scope can be super large. As I told you, it's about pre-sales onboarding and also helping customer success to basically bring value in post-sales process. So when the company grows, we see more and more specializations, this type of profile. So people that are going to be more focused on only pre-sales or only working on the sales cycle with a count executive. Other who are really specialized in onboarding and others more specialized in post-sales. So after the implementation of the products, So what you mean is that like if someone goes to a large company and tries to join as like a social engineer, they might only work on the very first moment where the client is trying to decide if they want to use the solution.

QnA

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What led you to software engineering? 
I was raised in the ecosphere of tech because my dad is a software engineer at IBM, and my mom was a designer there, too. My dad always encouraged me to join STEM and take a look at computer science — however, I was convinced I wanted to be a medical doctor. In my first year of college, I declared a biology major and quickly realized I was not too fond of it. In my second semester, I switched to an actuarial science major where I took Introduction to Computer Science, and the rest is history. In my second year of college, I declared a computer science major and began my journey from there.
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My team always has Fika, a traditional Swedish coffee break, scheduled every afternoon. Every couple of Fridays, we have team games planned to release some stress. 
Also, I tend to have a lot of free time to focus, which is nice but makes for a boring answer to this question!
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What is the most impactful thing you ever did to boost your career? 
Committing to creating high-quality content. That might sound obvious because I'm a full-time educator now, but I would not have gotten my job at PayPal if I hadn't been so active with my blog. In fact, lots of my jobs came out of me being involved in the community around meetups, conferences, or open-source projects. 
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What would be your three tips for engineers to level up their career? 
The number one thing I tell people is to be a nice person. I know that sounds fluffy or silly, but it cannot be overstated. You will get so much further in your career and just in life in general if you're a nice person. That doesn't mean that you take people being jerks lying down, but how you interact with others is out of kindness. You could be the best engineer in the entire world, but if you're not a nice person, you will not reach your full potential or accomplish your goals, whatever they may be.
Second, it's just as important to decide what you are not going to learn as it is to decide what you are going to learn. You could jump into countless things — and there are successful people who are polyglot programmers, but I can't speak to that a whole lot. All I can tell you is that in my experience, focusing on specific things that I want to be truly good at has worked out great for my career. That doesn't mean that I closed myself off to other things. With my website rewrite, I have been doing a lot of dev ops-related work and a lot of back-end stuff that I've typically not been involved in. You want to keep your head up on what's going on outside of what you're doing so that you know what direction to go in when you come across problems you need to solve. However, finding a focus on what you want to be good at has helped me a lot. That way, you feel a little less stressed.
And the third one? 
Learn how to learn effectively. It's a three-step process: you consume, build, and teach. The consumption of newsletters and Twitter and whatever inspires you, but you don't want to spend too much time doing that — implementing it into actually building something matters. This happens naturally if you work at a company, but maybe you're not making the things you want to learn, so you may want to start a side project. The building phase is where you get experience, but you also want to solidify that experience. How? You start teaching. You don't necessarily have to teach it to people, it could be stuffed animals. The goal of the teaching is to retain in your mind what you've learned through the building process.
What are you working on right now? 
The big thing I'm working on right now is a rewrite of my website. It'll be much more than just a developer portfolio — I'll have user accounts, and there'll be fun things that you can do with it. And because it's more than just a website, I'm using Remix, a new cool framework in the React ecosystem. I'm also working on updating my material on TestingJavaScript.com and a TypeScript course as well. 
So, whatever I'm working on, it ends up resulting in lots of opportunities for content.


Do you have some rituals that keep you focused and goal-oriented? 
I have a notepad where I keep all of my notes of what I'm going to do for the day so that when I'm checking things off, I'm not distracted notifications. I've tried apps for that, and that does not work well for me. 
I also am a firm believer in inbox zero. I have my work inbox and my personal inbox, and I keep them both at zero. And I kind of use that as a to-do list. 
And if I'm not feeling excited about working for some reason, I will often hop on my Onewheel, which is an electric skateboard that only has one giant wheel in the middle. It's just a total blast, and I'll hop on that with my backpack and a charger, and I'll go to a Starbucks or a park just to declutter my mind.
What things in the React universe are you excited about right now?
React version 18 is coming out soon. The experimental version is out there, and it's fun to play with. I'm just really thrilled that it's no longer a concurrent mode but concurrent features that you can opt into. Cool things like that will enable React server components in the future. 
But the biggest thing I'm excited about is Remix. That's huge. It eliminates a lot of problems that are solved well other tools, but when I'm using Remix, I don't have those problems, so I don't need those clusters.
You already said that teaching is an integral part of the learning process, and you stand your word since you're also a full-time educator. What inspired you to enter this field?
I have been a teacher for as long as I can remember. I grew up in a church where you talk in front of your peers from a very young age, and my mom was an elementary school teacher, so teaching has just always been a part of me. 
I really just enjoy sharing what I'm learning with others. As far as teaching technical topics, I gave my first workshop when I was still a student at Brigham Young University. With my fellow, we taught how to use AngularJS, and I got Firebase to sponsor pizza so they would show up, and that was pretty fun.
Then I started teaching on the side at egghead.io right after I'd graduated. That was when I first got a paycheck for teaching. And I realized that teaching could be quite lucrative and support my family and me as a full-time endeavor. So I did it — I quit my job. I'm a very risk-averse person, so I'd done teaching as a side hustle for four years just to verify that I could make this work.
When TestingJavaScript was released, and I got that paycheck, I realized that I didn't need my PayPal salary anymore. I could just focus my daytime on teaching and give my evenings back to my family, which was a nice trait.


Apart from that, how has teaching impacted your career? 
Earlier I mentioned that pretty much all of my jobs came because I was perceived as an expert. After the first job, where I was an intern and then converted into full-time, I never applied to another. I worked for four different companies, and they wouldn't have recruited me if they didn't know who I was and what I was doing. My content is how they knew who I was — I just made it easy for them to find me. Teaching made that impact. It made my career. 
We talked about React and Remix. Are there any other open-source projects that you'd recommend keeping an eye on or contributing to?
I have some myself. React Testing Library is probably the biggest one that people are familiar with. And if React isn't your jam, then other framework versions of the testing library. 
React Query is also really popular. If you're using Remix, you don't need it, but if you're not, I strongly advise using React Query cause it's a stellar, fantastic library, and Tanner Linsley, the creator, is a stellar and fantastic person. 
What pieces of your work are you most proud of? 
Probably the biggest thing I've ever done is EpicReact.Dev. It has helped tens of thousands of people get really good at React, improve their careers and make the world a better place with the skills that they develop. My whole mission is to make the world a better place through quality software, and I feel like I've done that best with Epic React. 
There are things that I've built at other companies that are still in use, and I'm proud of those cause they've stood the test of time, at least these last few years. But of everything, I think Epic React has made the biggest impact.
***
Follow Kent on Twitter and listen to his favorite Spotify playlist
Effective Communication for Engineers
TechLead Conference 2023TechLead Conference 2023
36 min
Effective Communication for Engineers
Top Content
Your communication skills affect your career prospects, the value you bring to your company, and the likelihood of your promotion. This session helps you communicate better in a variety of professional situations, including meetings, email messages, pitches, and presentations.
Charlie Gerard's Career Advice: Be intentional about how you spend your time and effort
6 min
Charlie Gerard's Career Advice: Be intentional about how you spend your time and effort
Featured Article
Charlie Gerard
Jan Tomes
2 authors
When it comes to career, Charlie has one trick: to focus. But that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t try different things — currently a senior front-end developer at Netlify, she is also a sought-after speaker, mentor, and a machine learning trailblazer of the JavaScript universe. "Experiment with things, but build expertise in a specific area," she advises.

What led you to software engineering?My background is in digital marketing, so I started my career as a project manager in advertising agencies. After a couple of years of doing that, I realized that I wasn't learning and growing as much as I wanted to. I was interested in learning more about building websites, so I quit my job and signed up for an intensive coding boot camp called General Assembly. I absolutely loved it and started my career in tech from there.
 What is the most impactful thing you ever did to boost your career?I think it might be public speaking. Going on stage to share knowledge about things I learned while building my side projects gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of people in the industry, learn a ton from watching other people's talks and, for lack of better words, build a personal brand.
 What would be your three tips for engineers to level up their career?Practice your communication skills. I can't stress enough how important it is to be able to explain things in a way anyone can understand, but also communicate in a way that's inclusive and creates an environment where team members feel safe and welcome to contribute ideas, ask questions, and give feedback. In addition, build some expertise in a specific area. I'm a huge fan of learning and experimenting with lots of technologies but as you grow in your career, there comes a time where you need to pick an area to focus on to build more profound knowledge. This could be in a specific language like JavaScript or Python or in a practice like accessibility or web performance. It doesn't mean you shouldn't keep in touch with anything else that's going on in the industry, but it means that you focus on an area you want to have more expertise in. If you could be the "go-to" person for something, what would you want it to be? 
 And lastly, be intentional about how you spend your time and effort. Saying yes to everything isn't always helpful if it doesn't serve your goals. No matter the job, there are always projects and tasks that will help you reach your goals and some that won't. If you can, try to focus on the tasks that will grow the skills you want to grow or help you get the next job you'd like to have.
 What are you working on right now?Recently I've taken a pretty big break from side projects, but the next one I'd like to work on is a prototype of a tool that would allow hands-free coding using gaze detection. 
 Do you have some rituals that keep you focused and goal-oriented?Usually, when I come up with a side project idea I'm really excited about, that excitement is enough to keep me motivated. That's why I tend to avoid spending time on things I'm not genuinely interested in. Otherwise, breaking down projects into smaller chunks allows me to fit them better in my schedule. I make sure to take enough breaks, so I maintain a certain level of energy and motivation to finish what I have in mind.
 You wrote a book called Practical Machine Learning in JavaScript. What got you so excited about the connection between JavaScript and ML?The release of TensorFlow.js opened up the world of ML to frontend devs, and this is what really got me excited. I had machine learning on my list of things I wanted to learn for a few years, but I didn't start looking into it before because I knew I'd have to learn another language as well, like Python, for example. As soon as I realized it was now available in JS, that removed a big barrier and made it a lot more approachable. Considering that you can use JavaScript to build lots of different applications, including augmented reality, virtual reality, and IoT, and combine them with machine learning as well as some fun web APIs felt super exciting to me.


Where do you see the fields going together in the future, near or far? I'd love to see more AI-powered web applications in the future, especially as machine learning models get smaller and more performant. However, it seems like the adoption of ML in JS is still rather low. Considering the amount of content we post online, there could be great opportunities to build tools that assist you in writing blog posts or that can automatically edit podcasts and videos. There are lots of tasks we do that feel cumbersome that could be made a bit easier with the help of machine learning.
 You are a frequent conference speaker. You have your own blog and even a newsletter. What made you start with content creation?I realized that I love learning new things because I love teaching. I think that if I kept what I know to myself, it would be pretty boring. If I'm excited about something, I want to share the knowledge I gained, and I'd like other people to feel the same excitement I feel. That's definitely what motivated me to start creating content.
 How has content affected your career?I don't track any metrics on my blog or likes and follows on Twitter, so I don't know what created different opportunities. Creating content to share something you built improves the chances of people stumbling upon it and learning more about you and what you like to do, but this is not something that's guaranteed. I think over time, I accumulated enough projects, blog posts, and conference talks that some conferences now invite me, so I don't always apply anymore. I sometimes get invited on podcasts and asked if I want to create video content and things like that. Having a backlog of content helps people better understand who you are and quickly decide if you're the right person for an opportunity.What pieces of your work are you most proud of?It is probably that I've managed to develop a mindset where I set myself hard challenges on my side project, and I'm not scared to fail and push the boundaries of what I think is possible. I don't prefer a particular project, it's more around the creative thinking I've developed over the years that I believe has become a big strength of mine.***Follow Charlie on Twitter