Hello Devs! I have a message for Junior Devs and those looking forward to joining Tech. This is meant to share my thoughts on the look of the current Tech Jobs industry and my projections within the next 5 YEARS.

A little about myself

I have been in Tech for some time now. I discovered my passion in Tech back in 2007. At about this time, Dad brought home a Personal computer, a Dell Optiplex (I can't remember the model) but it was running on Windows XP. I tried it and the rest is history... Don't take me very seriously though, as I haven't done so much with my life in tech since then :)

Artificial Intelligence

I am sure that I am not alone in this. Every dev has their fears with the current rise of AI in Software Engineering. My take is that AI is still not mature enough to write perfect code as would be defined in the prompts. Hence the need for an Engineer to shape the codebase as needed. I also feel like AI will replace some developers, (which should be yours to choose, whether to be sent home or stay in the game)

The Job Market

Right now, I feel like it is very hard to be hired in Tech and the situation is worsening. Lay-offs are rampant and tech companies are closing down. With these taking place, most job positions require mid-level to senior-level expertise. Junior devs are disadvantaged.

Skill Acquisition and Growth in Tech

Becoming a developer has become harder in recent years. There are millions of resources, both Videos and articles on the internet teaching Software development. Landing on the right one for your learning needs could be hell. You will end up jumping between resources before you find what works for you. I am sorry about this but I also had to deal with it. You are likely to learn and speak Hindu while trying to learn web development from your favorite YouTube channel. :)

As for those who are already in the industry, there is a problem. With AI in our Integrated Development Environment, we are likely to stop thinking. We will find it easy to just push the TAB button so that Copilot completes the rest of the code. Following this in most cases, would be to UNDO everything after the 10th round of debugging. On the web, ChatGPT also does all the thinking for us.

Good News

Here is one rule of nature that I believe in: Tough times will create tough men. Tough men will create an easy time. An easy time will then create weak men who create tough times.
Put this rule in a loop, before we continue.
Ever wondered how software engineers wrote code in pure Commandline Interfaces? At a time when even Notepad was luxurious. How did they debug?

I feel like Software engineers in this era had a lot of quality skills that we might never achieve today. Skills like mastering huge code syntax and scripts and then applying that to problem-solving and debugging are just but to mention. These were the tough days that created tough men.
These tough men worked tirelessly to change the situation for themselves.
Then came the beautiful modern IDEs, new and better programming languages, and frameworks. Artificial Intelligence is not forgotten. Doesn't this sound like an easy era?

Coding became easy and enjoyable with pleasing colors, code autocomplete, syntax highlighting, and error checks as well us several debugging features. The comfort that came with all these amazing features became the birth of the lazy devs. This generation of developers cannot even read and understand error logs. How can one become crafty around something they don't even understand?

This generation of lazy developers is going to create more problems in the software industry, a tough time. The solution here must be tough men. Developers who understand their craft. This becomes where serious junior developers will jump on the train. This will call for being more passionate about software development, understanding the basics, and upskilling to become good professionals.
Isn't this a good thing? Doesn't it bring some hope for young talents? Tell me what you think.