You didn’t go through all those years of training to become a web developer just to flounder in your career. Remember when you dreamt of reaching the top of your field? It’s possible for you to scale those lofty heights and fulfill your professional aspirations — you just have to be willing to persevere. If you have the know-how, the skillset, and the talent, all you have to dois work for it!
Do you want to climb to the top of your chosen career ladder and fulfill your potential as a web developer? If so, be sure to put all of the advice laid out below into practice.
Develop an action strategy
The best-laid plans of web developers often go awry when they don’t develop an action strategy. By laying out your own road map for reaching the pinnacle of your profession, you’ll always have something to refer to when you feel yourself veering off course. What’s more, with this strategy at hand, you’ll also be able to track your success and measure how far you’ve come since you decided to climb your career ladder.
As a web developer, your action strategy should look a little bit like this:
- Weeks 1-2: Learn about HTML and CSS
- Weeks 3-4: Get to grips with design fundamentals
- Weeks 5-6: Play around with Bootstrap and start creating your own practice website
- Weeks 7-8: Seek to understand more about JavaScript (if you feel confident enough to do so, move on to advanced JavaScript)
- Weeks 9-10: Spend your time building your personal portfolio
- Week 11 onwards: Start reaching out to potential clients (don’t be afraid to build their sites for free, as this will allow you to gain experience without any added pressure)
Pick up a number of habits
Your knowledge, talent, and skills will only get you so far in the field of web development. If you truly want to reach your full potential in this industry, you also have to pick up a number of all-important habits.
Here are four professional mannerisms that you should put into practice:
• Get into the habit of writing out code that is easy to read and test
• Always write code that is going to benefit your clients
• Never compromise quality for the sake of speed
• Don’t be afraid to ask for help when you feel overwhelmed by your workload
Make use of container technology
If you’re to stand a chance of reaching the top of your career ladder, you need to equip yourself with a number of useful pieces of equipment. There are a host of different tech tools and software solutions that play a crucial role in the web development industry, but one sticks out above the rest as being game-changing — container technology.
What is a container? This type of tech is a solution to the common issues that occur when pieces of software struggle to survive in new computing environments. As a web developer, you’ve probably experienced this sort of problem countless times before — sometimes, applications and software solutions just don’t like to be moved! With a container by your side, you will be able to circumvent issues surrounding reliability and downtime, simply because this type of technology is designed specifically to aid in the migration of applications from one environment to another.
If you want your container to continue to work in a safe and seamless fashion for a sustained period of time, you have to go out of your way to protect it. You need to safeguard the infrastructure of your container as well as its ecosystem, its software supply chain, its system tools, and its various libraries. To provide your container with the best possible level of protection, be sure to check out the container security options made available at McAfee.
Raise your online brand awareness
How are you going to get people to trust in your ability to build their website and ultimately improve their web presence if your own online brand isn’t up to scratch? If you want to attract clients and ultimately carve out an expert reputation for yourself in your field, you have to raise your online brand awareness.
To improve your personal brand awareness as a web developer, you must:
- Use a consistent palette and balance white space — this will signal the fact that you are aware of the important role that color and aesthetics play in your field
- Simplify your fonts — this will make potential clients aware of the fact that you don’t overcomplicate things
- Integrate videos and infographics onto your personal webpage/blog/social media handles — this will showcase the fact that you have your finger on the pulse of the latest content trends)
- Create a podcast — this will provide you with the perfect platform to prove just how much an expert you are in your field
- Create an ‘About Me’ page on your website and use it to discuss both your backstory and your vision for the future — this will help your brand to stand out from the crowd
- Make use of Linkedin — Linkedin is a great platform for IT professionals to boost their profile. There are high chances of getting hired through Linkedin as many top companies prefer Linkedin for hiring professionals. If you’re not on LinkedIn, you should be. There are many automation tools can help you. Have a look a the 8 Best LinkedIn Automation Tools (2021) by Bumped.
Showcase your credentials
If you were looking for a business coach, would you rather hire?
- A 40-year-old who has just finished their MBA course with a distinction grade, or;
- A 35-year-old who didn’t go to university but has already owned a multi-million-dollar company and sold it for a profit?
Experience trumps theory every single time, which is why you need to actually showcase your credentials instead of just talking about them. Whenever you meet with a potential client for the first time, don’t claim you can provide them with a particular service if you haven’t got evidence to back up your assertions. Prove that you are capable of helping them to develop their website by showing them examples of your past projects.
If you want to reach the pinnacle of the web development profession, you need to put the above advice into practice. Develop an action strategy, pick up a number of habits, make use of container technology, raise your online brand awareness, and showcase your credentials — do all of that, and you’ll climb your career ladder in no time.