8 things you need to know if you’re looking for your first tech role in Lagos.
If you are new to my page, my name is Tochukwu Nwanguma. I am a Frontend Developer based in Lagos, Nigeria. To read about my tech journey please start here.
Getting a decent job in Lagos is hard, 10x harder without experience even more so in tech where experience is coveted. This talent pipeline problem isn’t peculiar to Nigeria, read a report a while ago that suggests that the demand for junior developers globally is waning *will link if I find the report*.
This article is for folks who are trying to land their first tech roles. I have gone through sh*t my friends so you don’t have to.
Here are eight things you need to know if you’re looking for your first tech role.
It is not a walk in the park.
There aren’t many decent junior friendly roles — I found this out the hard way. For a smorgasbord of reasons (which I really can’t get into), companies aren’t keen on recruiting junior developers. It takes time, patience and money to get junior developers up to speed and those are luxuries most startups here can’t afford.
Build, build more things and build some more.
So, now we know landing a junior developer role is hard — building things is a great way to stand out. Build small displayable projects, a portfolio page, volunteer to work on open source projects, whatever you do sully your hands with code. You are going to get better fast with actual work to show for it.
Share your work.
Oh, so you know things now? great, built projects too? awesome! Sharing your work online is a great way to get noticed; people get jobs every day off of displaying projects online. Strive to write the best code you can, try to find out what the best practices are and apply them. Your Github is a great way for tech recruiters to see what you are about.
Reach out.
Thanks to the internet your favourite tech people are only one click of a button away. Get a LinkedIn account, get Twitter — I have met remarkable people via those platforms — one of whom is my current boss and probably the most influential person in my career so far. People are generally friendly and are willing to help with a myriad of stuff, advice, referrals, code reviews etc. Being polite, direct and respecting the other party’s time is the clincher.
I won’t talk too much about meetups — didn’t attend any, but since putting yourself out there is the goal, you should consider attending a few.
Send out applications.
This goes without saying, apply, apply some more, send solicited and unsolicited applications, stalk your favourite company’s careers portal, scour Twitter for ads, check LinkedIn, I sent between 20–25 (I know a lad who sent 50+) applications scoring a few interviews in the process too before finally landing my frontend position.
Reach out to people who can help directly.
So, sending applications via email isn’t everything, as you will soon find out :) most job applications go straight to “voicemail”, you are better off just reaching out to founders or CTOs. I’ve also learned that most vacancies are unadvertised, so the upside of this approach is high, you will get aired a lot too *small price to pay*. Again, being polite and direct gets you in front of the queue.
You will get rejected a lot.
Do not take rejections to heart; they aren’t a measure of your skills. You get used to it after a while too, I did.
Be patient.
Landing your first job in tech is probably the hardest bit both physically and mentally, but if you do all of the above and with some luck, it will come, have patience. It took me four(4) months of hair pulling, darting across Lagos for interviews and meeting plenty time-wasters to finally land a decent one.
Finally, you can reach me on Twitter @Tochistry. I’d be happy to answer all your questions.
Good luck!
