Professional Advice for Mid Level Developer

[super_teabag]

TLDR: mid level developer (3 years experience) wants to know path to promotion, but doesn't get a straightforward answer. Advice wanted.

 

So, I've been working for a software company for just barely a year now. I'm a developer there, and we use .NET and MS SQL for our back-end. While the Front End is Angular 8/7.

 

Basically, I wanted to know my path to becoming a "Senior developer", or rather what does  a "senior" member look like at our company. Knowledge wise, business wise and other things.

Walked into my bosses office, and was like "boss man what does a senior developer look like at X company".

 

His response was more or less "we don't distinguish between developers in terms of senior, junior, and mid level developers". Which seems to me like a sub par answer.

 

If I want to further my career as a developer I'd like to know what it would take to get better. Besides that answer I've enjoyed working at this company. Everyone on my team comes to me for complicated Angular questions. Or anything regarding front end development. 90% of the time I can answer their questions for them.

 

This discourages me from trying hard at the company. I'm considering polishing off my resume and finding another job, but I'd like to hear other thoughts.

[DevBlox]

Your manager isn't completely off with his answer, but I think he did evade the question a bit. These things are often just titles, I know some companies where Senior Developers completely lack the skill to be called Seniors, and some Mids that are very skilled, and deserve the title. I think that nobody really knows for sure, everyone has their own definition and you just go by feel. Then again, I'm nor a Recruiter nor a Manager. My own personal categorization/feel of this is:

• Juniors need guidance to carry out their tasks and learn
• Mids are perfectly capable to deliver on their own, able to grow on their own
• Seniors are what they should be - "wise men", knowing pros and cons of different approaches, should guide the team on a path of technical excellence, in both paths of process and implementation. It's all experience and knowledge.

What I'm basically trying to say, there is no event or thing, after which *kablamo!* you're a Senior Developer. You just gradually get there.

[Mira Yurizaki]

I think job titles are more for HR and bean counters.

 

If you want to advance your career, you kind of have to figure out what you want to get out of it. If you don't know, then you have to start seizing opportunities and responsibilities as they come available. And if none are available, then look at what you're doing, figure out what could be done better. The bare minimum is just making the product. But if you can leverage your experiences outside of that to help improve things both to your customer and to your colleagues, then hopefully someone's going to notice.

 

Otherwise, don't expect to advance swiftly. Three years into the career is still pretty fresh.

[infamoustrey]

14 hours ago, DevBlox said:

Your manager isn't completely off with his answer, but I think he did evade the question a bit. These things are often just titles, I know some companies where Senior Developers completely lack the skill to be called Seniors, and some Mids that are very skilled, and deserve the title. I think that nobody really knows for sure, everyone has their own definition and you just go by feel. Then again, I'm nor a Recruiter nor a Manager. My own personal categorization/feel of this is:

• Juniors need guidance to carry out their tasks and learn
• Mids are perfectly capable to deliver on their own, able to grow on their own
• Seniors are what they should be - "wise men", knowing pros and cons of different approaches, should guide the team on a path of technical excellence, in both paths of process and implementation. It's all experience and knowledge.

What I'm basically trying to say, there is no event or thing, after which *kablamo!* you're a Senior Developer. You just gradually get there.

I think you nailed it.