[Practical inexperience] From a local government employee to a web engineer of an in-house developed company [30s]

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・ 31 years old ·married ·Man ・ Number of job changes 0 (only one company)

As a new graduate, I entered a city designated by a government ordinance. I had almost nothing to do with engineers and was a clerical worker. I was a so-called general local public servant and worked for about 7 years. This time, I will be working at a company that develops Web services in-house from January next year, so I thought that it would be a verbalization of reflection and help someone, so I wrote a ** brief ** article. ** By the way, I learned programming completely by myself and never attended school. ** **

0: Opportunity to become a web engineer

I will briefly describe the motives for my aspirations. The staff of the government office are repeatedly transferred in a short span. Looking back over the last seven years, I was wondering about the skills I had acquired. Although I can acquire general skills such as writing documents and writing emails, I thought that all of them are alternatives. It doesn't have to be "only me". As I worked at the government office for the next 30 years, my salary increased little by little according to seniority, and I was afraid that I would grow old without learning anything. And to be honest, the work itself wasn't something I enjoyed. I'm not criticizing civil servants. There is a word for the right person in the right place, but when I looked back on the past, I was wondering if it would be okay as it is. Also, after working for about 7 years, I had the image that there are many hard people. Among them, I was often told that the synchronization was "changing." I don't know what has changed, but when I think about it now, it may be so-called "not suitable for civil servants."

While working with such doubts, I saw the news that an era of engineer shortages would come. Of course, I knew the profession of "engineer", but I had never thought about it as a new job, so I was very interested in it. Originally I liked personal computers, and as a hobby I designed illustrations using Photoshop, Illustrator, and Clip Studio, so I was interested in developing web services myself.

While researching engineers, I learned that there are many types of engineers. Among them, I decided to aim to be a web engineer who can provide new values ​​through web services.

Start studying programming from 1: 0

2020/04/early ~ I started to bite programming while working in my previous job. Even if you say that you bite, it's just a word or google that you care about. Fortunately, I was originally using a MacBook Pro, so I was able to start studying smoothly. I watched videos of people who are disseminating information as engineers on youtube. When I started programming on my own, there seems to be data that ** nearly 90% are frustrated **, but I was able to continue without frustration every day, so I thought it might be suitable. I remember that I was always conscious of playing videos of engineers instead of radio so that I could feel closer to the new occupation of engineers.

2 Start studying in earnest and create a portfolio

Around the beginning of 2020/05 ~ While collecting information, I understand that the shortest route is to create deliverables (portfolio) using Ruby, which is a Japanese developer, and Ruby on Rails, which enables more efficient Web development, and to change jobs. Did. Age is also age, and I thought I didn't have time to worry. In order to blast myself, I decided to retire and cut off my retreat and spend time on programming efficiently. She had a wife, but she didn't enjoy the civil servants in the first place, so she understood that it was time to quit, and decided to retire without much dispute. I think that married people absolutely need the understanding of their families. I was able to become an engineer because her wife understood me. It would probably seem crazy in the world to quit a civil servant at this time. However, I decided that I would be irreparable if I didn't quit now. We used everything available, such as Progate, Qiita, dot install, and Udemy, and proceeded with portfolio creation. However, I think Qiita was probably the one I used the most. I also referred to what kind of portfolio should be created. We have introduced so-called modern technologies such as Docker, CircleCI, and AWS to our portfolio. I will not describe each in detail, but it is often used by in-house developed companies for various reasons, and it is said that it is a technology that is in increasing demand in the future, and it is better to introduce it with practical experience in mind. That's why I introduced it. I think it is strong to be able to explain "why did you introduce the technology" instead of "introduced because everyone is using it". In June, I almost exhausted my paid leave and retired at the end of the month. I worked hard to create a portfolio every day.

Then the following portfolio was completed. https://cat-pia.com

The idea is to share a cat cafe, but for various reasons I chose a cat cafe as the theme. I will omit the reason. Even though it was completed, I knew that it was functionally inadequate, so I was changing jobs while adding functions.

3 Start of job change activity-Unofficial decision

I created a portfolio and started a career change activity. I used Wantedly, Green, and other job change sites, but in the end I only used Wantedly. I registered as a premium member and applied for a company that matches me in terms of technology stack and business content. After all, I was inexperienced, so I didn't get a reply, and I repeatedly failed in documents and interviews. Through trial and error, I updated my profile and updated my Wantedly score to over 100. In addition to the portfolio created above, we have created a self-introduction portfolio site using React and Vue.js respectively.

Then, one day, the CEO of the in-house development company that I was aiming for directly spoke to me, and through casual interviews and main interviews, I was able to get a speedy offer.

The reason I chose the company was because I thought that he was a person who I could respect humanly, such as thinking about business and being active as an engineer while talking directly with the CEO. Also, he had a solid mindset and was reliable. I intuitively thought that a bright future awaited me if I desperately followed the CEO's back. It doesn't come out suddenly when I'm told to name someone I can respect in my previous job, but now I can answer with confidence with the CEO. I can't wait to absorb various things from now on.

It was about a month for the first time in earnest to change jobs. I cannot thank the CEO and employees. We will grow and contribute to our business.

4 Finally

I myself was in my thirties, but he did not mention my age at all and looked at me equally. The evaluation point is that I felt the enthusiasm that other people do not have from Wantedly and the learning situation. Under the influence of Corona, I am prepared to abandon the stability of civil servants in a sense. Currently, it seems that hiring inexperienced people is becoming more difficult due to Corona's illness, but I self-taught and created a good portfolio and changed jobs with enthusiasm. If you work on activities, I think that there will always be companies that will see you. I also felt that it was important to continue studying, so I think it is important to continue committing while changing jobs. This is a personal subjectivity, but for companies with a large number of people (100 or more), I think that non-engineer directors will be interviewers at the final interview. Even if the on-site engineer's evaluation is high in the interviews up to that point, it will be dropped depending on the appearance of the director in his 40s and 50s, so it is better to aim for a company with a younger manager and a smaller number of people. I think it's good.

The job offer is not the goal, but my life as an engineer has just started. Currently, I am studying and searching for a new address in parallel to catch up with new technologies such as Nuxt.js that are completely different from Rails. From now on, I would like to continue to grow in order to contribute to business growth! If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us on Twitter.

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