Issue 5

Today’s Issue: Today I give some insights into a developer’s career growth and I go over some of React 19’s new features…SPOILER, they’re really cool!

Welcome to #5.

First Up - Guide to Career Growth for Developers

Becoming a software developer opens many career opportunities. As tech evolves, your skills and roles will adapt.

You’ll likely begin your journey as a wide-eyed Junior Developer just trying to learn and pick up some new tricks without breaking production or wiping the database. Or some of you may not even be a developer yet and you're still in the process of learning. That’s okay, you’ll get there!

For those that are, after you’ve been in this role for a bit, you’ll likely move up to a mid and/or senior-level role. This can take some time and the progression forward really depends on how active you are outside of your organization with continually learning new stuff and also how big the company you work for is.

Once you’ve been in a senior role for a while, the doors forward really start to swing open! You're hit with multiple options for where to take your career next. Do you want to stay a senior and keep coding, become a lead or technical architect, and help design and structure the complex systems your developers are building? Or do you want to transition into a management role like a Team Lead where you’ll oversee teams and handle large-scale projects? These management roles could eventually even lead to becoming a Director, Vice President, or CTO!

The choices are ultimately up to you and come down to what you’re interested in, your skills, and your ability to adapt to the ever-changing landscape of tech! Regardless of what you choose, there’s one thing that is constant and that’s the habit and mindset required to maintain a successful career. Let’s take a look at some of these:

• Continuous Learning: Tech evolves. So should you. Stay curious and keep updating your skills. Attend workshops, take courses, and read up on new trends.

• Develop Technical and Soft Skills: Balance is key. While coding expertise is crucial, don't ignore critical thinking, communication, and leadership. These "soft" skills can make or break your career.

• Build Relationships: Network with peers, mentors, and industry professionals. Relationships can open doors you didn't even know existed.

• Seek Mentorship: A mentor can provide invaluable guidance and feedback. They can help you navigate career paths, overcome challenges, and reach your professional goals.

• Be Open to New Opportunities: Don’t get too comfortable. Explore different career tracks. Take on new challenges. Whether it's a new project or a different role, stepping out of your comfort zone can lead to growth.

• Deliver Consistent Results: Reliability matters. Show your team and clients that you're dependable by consistently delivering quality work.

• Earn Trust: Build a track record of reliability and success. Trust is a currency in the professional world.

• Think Big and Take Action: Identify bigger problems and opportunities. Don’t just think about solving them—take bold steps to address them.

• Be Self-Critical: Learn from failures. Every mistake is an opportunity to improve. Don’t shy away from evaluating your own work and making necessary adjustments.

These tips aren’t just for the short term. They’re habits that can propel your career forward for years to come. Keep applying these principles, and you’ll find yourself constantly progressing and reaching new heights!

If you’d like a deeper dive into this topic, take a look at an article I wrote about it. You can find it here.

Second Topic - React 19…I Can’t Wait!

React 19 will be dropping soon and with it comes a bunch of new updates and improvements that you’ll need to implement in your code base! Some of the big ones are:

• Updated React Compiler

  • With these changes, React code will be compiled into regular JavaScript so handling memoization, state changes, and UI updates will be way smoother. We’ll no longer need to use the useMemo(), useCallback(), or memo hooks anymore. The compiler will do it all for you!

  • The new compiler will also figure out when to update the UI making development easier and your app faster. Instagram is already using it!

• Server Components

  • Previously, react components were all client-side rendered. The drawback to this is you take an SEO hit because search engines have a harder time crawling these types of sites. You also took a performance hit when working with resource-heavy applications. Now with server components, all your components will run on the server side and send HTML over to the client. This means faster page loads, better SEO, and less JavaScript sent to the browser. And if you didn’t know, usually less JavaScript means faster page loads!

  • Server components also make server-side tasks like API calls more efficient by processing these on the server before the page is delivered.

• Actions

  • The new Actions concept in React makes form handling way easier by replacing onSubmit and using HTML form attributes for server-side execution. Actions aim to simplify how you handle async operations and side effects within server-side components.

  • Actions allow server-side mutations so you no longer have to deal with complex data fetching and state management logic in client components. Instead, you’ll define functions on the server that will perform data operations and be able to use that data right away.

  • Actions are also built to integrate smoothly with concurrent rendering. Since React can start rendering before all async tasks are complete, Actions ensure data-fetching logic does not block rendering while still keeping the UI responsive.

There are a bunch more new features coming as well! If you’d like to read more about it, take a look at this article I wrote up that goes into more details about each feature and also provides code examples.

Interesting Plugs

• I’m going to plug my squad on the Daily Dev in case anyone uses that site and would like to join the community!

• This was a very interesting article I read about the shift in our economy and how to win in it

  • Some awesome points that I would agree with. We are headed to a more “Adaptive Economy” as the article puts it where being able to adapt to the fast-paced changes in tech will help you stand out and stay above the masses.

• I’ll also plug beehiiv, which is the platform I write this newsletter on! It’s easily the best newsletter platform I have found.

Job Board

• Frontend Engineer with MetaMask

  • Salary: $95,000 - $198,000

  • Experience: +3 Years

  • Tech Stack: React Native/React, Node/Express/NestJS, Solidity/Web3.js

    • This is a Web3 company so understandings of smart contracts and blockchain is probably a must

• FinTech Web Developer

  • Salary: Not mentioned

  • Experience: Entry-Level

  • Tech Stack: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript with some experience with CMS’s like Wordpress, Hubspot, or Shopify. Also would like some SEO experience

    • This looks like a great position for someone who is starting out!

Till Next Time

That’s all I got this week! As usual, if you have any questions don’t hesitate to reach out, I’m very active in this space and would love to help any of you become a better developer or get that first dev job! Take a look at the jobs I posted, the FinTech one would really be a great opportunity for someone who is new, just make sure to have a decent portfolio of some projects you’ve created or worked on so you have something to show.

Have a great weekend and as always, happy coding!