A collection of guides and articles to help you start and improve your career.
Whether it’s getting started in the software development industry, finding a job, or improving at your current job, you’ll find articles on this page to help you.
Job Search
A range of articles and other resources to help you with your job search.
Things to Know Before Your Career: A list and explanation of things you should know before you start a programming career.
Starting a New Job: A guide to starting a new job as a software developer.
How to Become a Contractor: A guide on how to become an IT contractor.
Guide to LinkedIn: A guide to LinkedIn for software developers.
Definitive Guide to Becoming a Database Developer: An in-depth guide on becoming a database developer.
How to Find a Programming Job: A guide and list of places you can use to find a programming job.
How to Become a Consultant: A guide on how to become a consultant in the IT industry.
Job Interviews: A guide to job interviews for developers.
How to Become a Database Administrator: A guide and steps on how to become a database administrator.
Resume and Cover Letter: A guide to writing a resume and cover letter.
Business Analyst: The ultimate guide on how to become a business analyst.
Improvement
A range of articles to help you improve your career.
Learning from a Travel Visa Disaster: How a Chinese travel visa disaster helped my career.
Learned as a Junior Programmer: A few things I wish I had known when I was a junior database programmer.
Don’t Reinvent the Wheel: What “reinventing the wheel” is and why you should avoid it in software development.
How to Organise Email: Here’s how I organise email to keep track of it.
Performance Reviews: A guide to performance reviews for developers.
Effective Communication: A list of 26 tips on effective communication at work.
Advice for Computer Science Students: 130 Computer Science faculty share their advice for new CS students.
Real Life Habits We Can Learn From Programming: A list of real-life habits we can learn from programming.
Getting Kicked Off a Project: How to handle getting kicked off a project.
Career Lessons from Game of Thrones: A list of career lessons you can learn from Game of Thrones.
Reduce Stress: A collection of tips to reduce stress and have a positive attitude at work
Career Planning: A guide to career planning for software developers.
Time Management Tips: A collection of 37 time management tips for developers.
Advice for Software Development Client Success: 65 software development companies share advice for client and project success.
Learned from Renovation: A list of things a house renovation has taught me about my career.
Let Go: I was let go. Why is it important to be prepared?
The Importance of Routine: An explanation of personal routine and why it’s important.
Improve Work Performance: A list of 72 ways you can improve your performance at work.
Improve Programming Skills: A list of 32 ways you can improve your programming skills.
4 Books for Programmers: A review and thoughts on four books for programmers that I’ve read.
Tech Conferences 2020: A list of 960+ tech conferences occurring in 2020.
Note: Due to COVID, most of these conferences did not go ahead, but I’ve kept this page up if you want to know more about them.
Reference
A range of reference guides and articles on software development and career.
Employer Pay for Certification: How to convince your employer to pay for your certification.
Test-Driven Development: An explanation and guide to test-driven development (TDD).
What My Average Day Looks Like: A walkthrough of what my average day looks like.
Creating a Web App: My experience creating a web app from scratch on the side.
Simple Solution: An explanation and story of why a simple solution is often better.
Programmer Jokes: A list of 88 different jokes for programmers.
Business Jargon to Avoid: A list of 65 business jargon phrases to avoid and what to use instead.
185 Software Development Acronyms: A list of 185 different acronyms in software development.
189 Career Quotes: A list of 189 different career-related quotes.
JDBC in Java, Hibernate and ORMs: An in-depth guide and resource list of using Java JDBC, Hibernate, and ORMs.