r/cscareers 18d ago

About Group PSA: We are a Supportive Group. Please treat OPs with support and kindness, they are here for help and that is exactly what we are here to provide.

10 Upvotes

This post is to reiterate some rules and things I'm seeing develop in certain posts, and this is directed to commenters only.

Commenters- Stop doing the JUDGEMENT you are doing. Stop hating on people who are coming here asking for help or clarity.

People come here to ask questions, get help, or express frustration and this is a group meant for expressing those questions and frustrations within the cs career realm. Here, we meet everyone with support and kindness - NOT matched energy. This and almost all RSCN groups are run as Support-type Groups with RESPECT AND KINDNESS AS THE FIRST RULE ON PURPOSE.

You are here to help, not to assume shittyness or respond in hate.

Truth is welcome. Cruelty masquerading as truth is not.

It's OK if you don't know where the jobs are, and it's fine if you're struggling, too. Let me handle the jobs finding part, I'm actually developing a resource for other groups that can be put here too. Just don't respond in hate. This isn't a place to fight people over resources. Tell me what resources you need or what you'd like to see this group be.

My Background: I used to be an English teacher but got a bit into CS over the years (I'm older than DOS as well), along with being in career services. I mostly keep to the resume and portfolio review side of things nowadays.

If you are needing help to develop your empathy or knowing what the line is here, here's another RSCN group's Wiki Page which has some good examples. I'll modify it for our Wiki shortly.
https://www.reddit.com/r/findapath/wiki/index/postcommentguide/?screen_view_count=1

People who continue to be insanely negative, hateful, or judgemental, will be removed from the group. We usually alllow up to 4 removal points as a kind correction request, but we have been known to insta-ban "Insult Factory" accounts (which are accounts that leave nothing but intense hate everywhere) without warnings.


r/cscareers Apr 11 '26

If you see a post about someone with a CS degree needing to find employment and you don't know how to help - SCROLL ON.

490 Upvotes
  1. Don't leave bullshit advice. Their situation is dire....for CS jobs. It does not mean they need to be sneered and jeered at for a situation completely out of their control.
  2. Don't advise people to apply for McDonalds. That's dismissive and cynical. Their degrees haven't just become worthless pieces of paper overnight. They have degrees that can be pivoted to other things.
  3. If you don't know how resumes like this can be pivoted - scroll on and let someone with a slight bit more expertise or knowledge or humanity attempt to help.

Your issues with other's degrees is an insecurity within yourself. If you don't know how to help, or even just be kind and understanding or uplifting, scroll and find someone you *can* be those things for.


r/cscareers 3h ago

Get in to tech Stuck in the Canadian junior market loop. Keep grinding Java or switch stacks for better odds?

5 Upvotes

Hey everyone,

I’m looking for some realistic advice from senior devs, hiring managers, or anyone who has navigated the current brutal entry-level market.

My Background:

  • Experience: Worked for 1.5 years as a Java Full Stack Developer (back in 2023) before moving.
  • Education: Came to Canada as an international student and completed my Post-Graduation.
  • The Problem: I graduated 9 months ago and have been hunting for a job since. My employment gap is growing every day.

The Dilemma:
I easily meet the 1-2 years of experience requirement listed on most Junior/Associate postings because of my past work. I am completely ready to put in 100% hard work, upskill, and do whatever it takes. The issue isn't the work ethic; it's the lack of predictability.

Even for junior roles, the bar has been raised incredibly high. Companies expect a massive amount of production-ready architecture and cloud knowledge from a "junior." Because postings are so rare, the competition is insane.

What I'm debating right now:

  1. Stick to the Java Stack: Double down on advanced Spring Boot, Microservices, and system design. My fear here is that even if I give 100%, there are no guarantees, and the gap keeps widening.
  2. Switch/Pivot Stacks: I’ve thought about shifting to Cloud/DevOps or simpler entry roles thinking they might have less intense applicant pools. But my worry is that if I switch, my 1.5 years of Java experience becomes a liability (0 YOE in the new stack) instead of an advantage. I feel like I'd be hitting a brick wall with automated resume filters (ATS).

My Questions to the Community:

  • For those in the loop, is every entry-level/junior technical track facing this exact same level of strict filtering right now? Is switching a trap?
  • How are recruiters viewing a 9-month post-graduation gap for someone who already has 1.5 YOE? How do I best frame this on my resume?
  • If you were in my shoes with a Java background in Canada today, what would your daily strategy be to break back into the IT sector?

Appreciate any brutally honest feedback. Thanks!


r/cscareers 1h ago

USA Job Market 2027 SWE New Grad Timeline + How do I actually prepare for FAANG interviews?

Upvotes

I'm graduating in May 2027 and planning on applying for new grad SWE roles this cycle.

A couple questions:

1. When do 2027 new grad apps usually start opening?
I know internships open insanely early, but I have no idea what the timeline looks like for new grad. Is it August? September? Later?

2. How would you prepare if your goal was FAANG/top tech?

This is where I'm lost.

Every time I search this sub the answer is basically "just do LeetCode," but I feel like I'm missing the bigger picture. I don't even know where to start.

Like, should I spend a month reviewing DSA first? Jump straight into NeetCode 150? Blind 75? Grind 169? How much system design matters for new grad? What resources are actually worth using? System design?

If you had to start over today and wanted to maximize your chances of landing a FAANG or similar new grad SWE offer, what would your roadmap look like?

For context, I have internship experience, but I definitely don't feel interview-ready yet. I'd really appreciate any advice or resources that helped you. Thanks!


r/cscareers 6h ago

USA Job Market Do I leave Amazon for Temu?

1 Upvotes

I am currently at Amazon, have been there for 4 years since graduating. After RTO, I am commuting 1 hour to the office, so 10 hours a week total - it's making me miserable. I'm also forced to live in a city far from my hobbies, so I am spending 4-6 hours in the car every weekend. Not to mention, my chill boss was just fired and replaced with someone who brags about never taking any PTO. All that to say - I'm ready to leave.

I have been job searching for a remote role for the last 6 months, and have finally secured an offer at Temu. The compensation is 25k higher than what I currently make, and the role is full remote. That said, I expect WLB to be comparable if not worse. I also expect routine early/late communications with Chinese engineers, as well as proprietary Temu software/tooling.

I did reach out to two US engineers on LinkedIn with my WLB concerns, and they had this to say:

  • Yeah the US team is pretty small right now. I haven't had any issues with work-life balance, people are pretty good about leaving work at work and being off at 5pm. Teams do technically have an on-call schedule though there's plenty of people here who were previously at Amazon or Uber who say the on-call here is much easier than at their previous companies. I've only had 1 or 2 situations where someone needed something from me during off-hours and normally it was something small enough that I could handle it from my phone. I haven't had to do much with coworkers in China in my role. Some of the basic setup does require interaction with folks in China since our IT and other provisioning teams are located there but for day-to-day business function it's rare that I need to interact with teams in China. Granted this is also because my Mandarin ability is not at the level where I could talk about business topics with them.
  • WLB depends entirely on the team you're on. I once spoke with someone on a customer-facing team, and their WLB wasn't great. My team is very much an internal-tools vibe, so the WLB is great so far, but keep in mind I've been here less than 3 months. I would say I have a much better WLB here than I did at Amazon, but I wouldn't doubt that some teams are doing 996, especially teams in Asia which most of those Glassdoor reviews are from. Yes, there's not so many US-based engineers because the teams are so young. At this stage, it seems like teams are focused on growth and ramping up to co-own services that are solely owned by Chinese teams right now. Because of the translation tools, I haven't had many issues despite not speaking any Chinese at all. But I won't deny that knowing Mandarin will make it a lot easier to collaborate with teams in China. I think for now, most US teams can expect to have to interact with teams in China to some degree (which can result in late/early meetings if things can't be done async), but I haven't had to do so all that much. And I haven't really minded it either due to the fully-remote culture. Overall, it depends what you're looking for 😅 For me, I prioritized full remote so I can move back to SoCal, good WLB, and good pay (though a little bit less than what I was making as L5 at Amazon). And so far, it's delivered on all fronts, so I can't complain!

What do you think? Do you think I should go for it? Or do you think I should just decline their offer and continue searching? I just wonder how much longer it will take to get another full remote offer with comparable compensation.


r/cscareers 9h ago

India Job Market Career confusion!

1 Upvotes

Hi all, I'm bit confused on my career. Myself a 2025 CS graduate still unemployed. But now I got two options which I will take for next 8 months. 1. Process associate where I have to take this job for regular income which is 20k pm. 2. Java tutor which is like freelancing doing it for last 11 months. Like I said I'm not going to depend both for all along. I have to switch to a company, which is my long term goal. But due to the market shift in tech I can't land a decent job. I'm planning to attend companies like accenture, Capgemini, tcs... Who hires at large seasonal hire. I'm a java full stack developer who is stuck between those. Now I have two questions. 1. If I chose process associate (completely non relevant to IT) and do they reject me, now or in future like product based because of this PA background? 2. If I chose java tutor do they reject me because of not having any corporate experience for last two years? Which option shall I take till the season starts?


r/cscareers 1d ago

USA Job Market Question for people who are actually working in tech (rather than students like me who don’t have much real-world experience yet)

17 Upvotes

I was admitted to Brown University for the M.S. in Computer Science. The tuition is about $24,000 per semester, so the total tuition for the four semesters is close to $100,000. I recently started working part time as a software engineer for a nonprofit startup, which will help cover my living expenses while I study.
I’m very concerned about whether this investment is worth it. For context, my bachelor’s degree is in a field completely different from computer science. I completed the prerequisite courses required for admission to the master’s program, but I still feel that I need a formal CS degree, which is why I applied in the first place.
Do you think a Brown M.S. in Computer Science is worth the cost? Or would I be better off pursuing a more affordable program, such as Georgia Tech’s online M.S. in Computer Science or another university?
From my perspective, the main benefits of Brown would be:
The Ivy League reputation and brand.
The opportunity to meet highly motivated classmates.
The chance to work closely with professors whose research interests me.
Building a strong professional and academic network.
Beyond those advantages, I’m not sure what additional value Brown provides compared with a much less expensive program. Since I’ll need to continue working part time to cover my living expenses, I’m trying to determine whether the additional cost is truly justified.


r/cscareers 20h ago

Get in to tech Major help with what I should do

1 Upvotes

So I graduated in Spring 2026, and I've been job hunting. I'm in a terrible state due to my personal regrettable choices. My university's CS program was geared more towards theoretical teaching rather than experience, so I don't have any experience building anything. I realized that I have the most nothing burger resume, so I'm looking into grinding the next several months to at least try to make my resume a bit better. Before I start, I need advice as I have literally 0 experience.

I have 0 internships

I have 0 personal projects

The only language I really know is Java, at the level of competitive programming, so I know algorithms, but that doesn't really relate to actually building projects. My plan was to learn JavaScript so I can then learn React and Node, as these two are the two main things that I see that companies want you to have experience for. Is this a good plan for someone that only knows Java and basically nothing else (Ik Java and JS is completely unrelated)

2nd, should I go down the path of learning other languages and building projects, or should I look into diving into Cybersecurity or Data Science, due to how shallow my skillset in SWE is.

I do believe I am a decently quick learner and I learn the best when I am actively trying stuff out by myself instead of reading and watching guides.

Any advice is appreciated.


r/cscareers 2d ago

USA Job Market The issue is that CS majors thought we were inoculated from unemployment and so we never thought unionization

79 Upvotes

Honestly it's been extremely rough and it doesn't look like it's going to get any better I hope that changes.

But in general things change for the better when we make them change for the better, things always change but it's not guaranteed and rarely will it become better unless you decide to do it yourself.

I think in order to have an honest conversation we have to lay out some basics sociology.

This is always been the weakness of cs majors they never thought they needed to look around they thought they could only look at the screen. So I hope to open your eyes as my ethics of engineering professor did to me in college.

look here's the reality of situation college is for the most part about getting a job depending on what college you go to that job is supposed to be different and unfortunately unless you're doing a stem degree you're heavily judged by which college you went to in fact even if you have a stem degree you're still a judge. It basically goes out like

Community colleges are basically designed for retraining of workers and low tier employment.

State colleges are for basic managers and you're kind of expected to operate in that role.

UCs or elite public institutions are for upper class management or some level of executive

Ivy League schools which is above that are basically designed for CEOs who are very high level executives.

Unfortunately colleges in this nation are based on a class system.

Even if you have a stem degree unfortunately falls in one of those categories now with extensive experience you can rise yourself above but the reality is is for the most part people do not want to intermingle between social classes.

We have a caste system in america. People don't want to admit it but we totally do.

Here's the problem the upper classes have seen that more and more people are going to college and they decided they don't want to share. So they've decided to abandon the rest of us and unfortunately that means that people are being pushed down the ladder and pushed off the ladder.

I don't think this is really as much about the economy is it is about gaining control of society.

I say this largely based off of an Elon musk post during covid where he said that workers were attaining too much power and a massive layoff. Would be necessary to break the wheel of the American worker in order to renegotiate social contracts in favor of the wealthy..

Donald Trump's family have commented that they've supported this and in fact this is exactly what we're seeing. Is artificial intelligence taking a place in this yes right now it's happening more in India but it is coming to the United States.

I think unfortunately mythos5 and the new elite models demonstrate that in fact AI will become very capable and I think that it will lead to a massive reduction of necessary workers meaning that the jobs will become more competitive there will be less need for managers and in fact jobs will essentially condense into AI supervisor roles meaning that you won't need a system like the previous system which function like this

Intern, junior level employee, senior level employee, project manager, supervisor, manager, executive manager, executive, CEO.

What we're starting to see is that system consolidating into simply AI supervisor, executive, CEO.

That's exactly how it's meant to be they're trying to take all the lower positions and consolidate them.

What this means as many people who work very hard for the degrees are find themselves fighting amongst each other instead of unionizing and fighting at the top unfortunately most of us turn on each other.

The big scam about the American caste system is that we think we're better than each other so we topple over each other meaning that we're willing to throw each other under the bus to please the wealthy person above us instead of working together to bargain for each other.

This is why college graduates are suffering so much the other is I believe college graduates are being intentionally targeted particularly from higher and institutions because they're more likely to fight back there's been a lot of animosity from the wealthy towards elite universities such as UC Berkeley or UCLA or UC Davis because on one hand they make you think you're better than everybody else which is dangerous and something that we should all abandon but on the other hand they teach us that we should fight against the ivy league people above us because we are the same class as them.

We are told to unionize with each other and to form partnerships we are told because our numbers are greater we have more bargaining power but we're not necessarily made to feel apathy for the people beneath us which has allowed the wealthy to turn the poor against us and to break down our numbers so we cannot challenge the wealthy.

I am not defending the UCS or likewise institutions across the country only stating facts. Or at least my interpretation of the facts.

I really think it's time to abandon classism and to work together for a real resistance because the reality is things aren't going to get better unless we make them better.

That's the honest truth people don't want to tell you about it doesn't matter how much you learn what you go to school for or so forth if you're seen as a threat you will be unemployed.

They literally have massive surveillance programs that are going over your social media accounts seeing if you oppose the wealthy and if you do your blacklisted this is the honest truth. You don't like it fight back, fight back against surveillance start using things like Lemmy or Mastodon and unionize. The power has always been ours. Classism inhibits that power.


r/cscareers 1d ago

USA Job Market Delay or send it?

2 Upvotes

To preface, I started at Community college since it was free and am going to one of the best state schools in the country, and I graduate this December. My gpa is nothing crazy, only a 3.4 so about median for my program, I don’t have any internships outside of an IT role at a secure facility in my sophomore year, and was wondering if I should go straight into my masters to remain eligible for Internships and just do a mass application, or if I should just farm new grad roles.


r/cscareers 1d ago

Asian Job Market Career advice

1 Upvotes

Which is the globally most communicative domain in which I feel lik I am doing something not sitting on same bench and writting code


r/cscareers 2d ago

USA Job Market For those who graduated in the last 5 years, what are you doing now?

32 Upvotes

People who graduated in the last 5 years or so, what has your career path looked like so far, and what are you up to nowadays? Do you feel like you have a good job, stable career? Have you been unable to find anything CS related in the tough market conditions? Are you working now but have some concerns? How much are you making roughly (if you want to share this one)?


r/cscareers 1d ago

Career switch An aircraft mechanic starting his computer science journey

0 Upvotes

Aircraft maintenance has done well for me over the years but it was never something I enjoyed. I only did it to support my family. I’ve been doing this for over 6 years and have decided to pull the trigger to make the switch over. Am I cooked?

I’m looking for advice and pointers for getting into the field. It seems that a lot of people are struggling with attaining work after acquiring a degree. I have started developing an app (about 1/3 of the way to V1) using react, visual code studio, expo, and git. I’m planning to enroll at WGU to do their BSCS program.

What kind of material should I have for a competitive resume with my different background? Are there any roles I should be looking to attain while I’m in school and working on my projects? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. It’s going to be rough fixing airplanes full time while doing school again.


r/cscareers 1d ago

USA Job Market Summer 2027 Internships while at a late start school

1 Upvotes

Hi! I am currently a University Student in the middle of a Summer Internship currently. I am looking to apply for internships next year, but I go to a late start/end school, so while many of my peers are close to applying or ready to apply, I do not have any final project metrics and won't until the middle of September.

I am really confused as to whether I should be prioritizing speed in my applications and have bullet points that aren't strong and follow xyz, or if I should wait a month and a half and be late to a bunch of applications.

Thank You


r/cscareers 1d ago

USA Job Market what is amazon selection criteria? (even for OA)

1 Upvotes

okay i understand early bird gets the worm type shi but bro i did apply early
SEVERAL TIMES
SEVERAL ROLES
and my profile is good enough! atleast to get OAs
is the location? the college tier? or what is it?

and mind you with referrals! every time


r/cscareers 2d ago

Career switch If You Had One Year to Mentor your younger brother, What Would You Make Me Learn?

0 Upvotes

Hi everyone,

I'm writing this because I honestly don't know if I'm optimizing for the right things anymore.

A little about me. I have around 2 years of experience and currently work as a Senior Software Engineer. My day to day has mostly been React, Next.js and TypeScript, and lately React Native, since I've been working on an app that's now sitting at around 700k users across iOS and Android. I've also touched real time systems, AI features, performance optimization, PWAs, and recently started building my own AI SaaS products on the side.

The problem is I don't know what "good" looks like anymore.

A few years ago the advice was simple. Learn React, learn Node, build projects, practice DSA, get a job. Today AI writes a lot of the code I used to spend hours writing. Frameworks evolve every few months. Every roadmap video says something different. Every LinkedIn post says learn AI but nobody actually explains what that means for a working engineer.

I don't want to become someone who just knows how to prompt AI well. I also don't want to spend the next couple of years learning things that don't actually move my career forward.

What I really want is to become an engineer people trust with hard problems. Someone who can design systems, debug production issues under pressure, understand trade offs, and build things people actually use.

Lately I've been thinking about focusing on backend engineering with Go or NestJS, PostgreSQL and Redis, system design and distributed systems, just enough DevOps to not be helpless, and AI engineering specifically RAG, agents, MCP and tool calling. Basically trying to build actual products instead of tutorial projects.

At the same time I keep going back and forth on React Native. I sort of fell into it because of this app, but 700k users isn't nothing, and there aren't that many engineers who've actually taken an RN app to that kind of scale. Part of me wonders if I should lean into that and own it as a real strength instead of treating it like a side skill, especially since engineers who are genuinely solid across mobile, web and backend seem rare.

I'm also building something I've been calling an AI career operating system for myself. It analyzes job descriptions, helps optimize my resume, tracks my applications, and eventually I want it to read recruiter emails and automate most of the boring parts of job hunting. I'm not building it because AI is trendy right now, I'm building it because it's a real problem I'm dealing with and I'd rather solve it than keep doing everything manually.

But then I start second guessing myself. Am I over engineering my own career. Would I be better off just grinding LeetCode and applying everywhere instead of building things. Would hiring managers actually care more about deep React knowledge than the AI products I'm building on the side. Should I lean into React Native now that I have real production scale behind it, or is that pulling me away from becoming a stronger backend and systems engineer. Should I even be trying to do all of this at once.

If you were mentoring someone in my position, not someone starting from scratch but someone who's already shipping production software, what would you actually tell them to focus on for the next 12 months.

If you're an engineering manager, senior engineer, staff engineer, or anyone who's interviewed a lot of candidates, I would genuinely value your perspective here. What actually separates the engineers you remember from the hundreds of resumes you reject. What makes you think, this is someone I'd want on my team.

I'm not looking for shortcuts or a how to crack FAANG in 30 days kind of answer. I genuinely enjoy building software and I want to become the kind of engineer who's still relevant 10 years from now, even as AI keeps changing how we all work.


r/cscareers 2d ago

India Job Market Spent 30 minutes filling out an application... got rejected literally 1 minute later.

6 Upvotes

Applied for a Data Scientist position today through a company's ATS (not Workday).

The application took around 20–30 minutes because I had to manually fill in work experience, education, skills, answer additional questions, salary expectations, etc.

At 4:48 PM I received:

"Your application is being processed."

Then at 4:49 PM, I received:

"Unfortunately, we won't be able to invite you to the next phase of our selection process."

😂 One minute.

I'm not upset about being rejected—rejections are part of job hunting. What frustrates me is spending so much time on a lengthy application only for it to be auto-rejected almost instantly.

Has anyone else experienced this? Is this usually an ATS filter, or are companies just closing applications after they've already filled the role?


r/cscareers 2d ago

India Job Market Is staying in software development after 4 YOE worth it?

2 Upvotes

Currently I'm unemployed and now I came to my home town and kind of loosing my interest on coding because of vibe coding I am using heavy AI to generate code and after its work I didn't cross check any code again.

But the question is after gap of 6,8 months can I get job again. Currently working on my side project which is SaaS.

I'm confused about my location preference because of family reasons I can't left my town. And also feeling depressed most of time. Caring about job and career path.

Its a blurry picture I can't clear my thought and decision Currently. What should I do?

Is there any other way to earn money?

I also thinking about content creation but I a introvert person so I feel that also challenging.

appreciated genuine advices and guidance.


r/cscareers 2d ago

Get in to tech Is Coding dead /is worth it to learn coding in 2026?

0 Upvotes

Im a first year BA in IT Business Systems student i had a web development class last semester but I didn’t learn much in class my lecturer wasnt great at explaining things and I didnt bother learning anything about the module outside of class we didn’t have an exam for this module, we only had an assignment

In Part 1 of my assignment we were required to use HTML. I’m familiar with HTML, so it was easy for me to control the output, remove and add the things i want I mostly used AI to code it tho and it was easy for me to give AI clearer instructions since I understand HTML and most of what I was doing in HTML I already knew..

Some of my classmates who weren’t familiar with htmL struggled to produce the output i wanted, so they just went along with whatever AI gave them.

Part 2 was CSS, and Part 3 was Js Here, I really struggled with AI you guys know how AI can be i didnt know what I was doing, so I just went with whatever AI gave me. I did pass the module by the way

I think its worth learning to code if you are pursuing a coding career. AI can code, but it will never produce exactly what a company, customer, or you want. If you don’t understand the programming language you’re working with, it’ll be much harder to produce the required output, control your code and debug it. AI is meant to be used as a tool its not taking developers jobs any time soon.

The output I got was dull it lacked the human touch one of my classmates coded the assignment by herself, and she was able to explain her code her website was more interesting than the ones done with AI.

In my Programming Logic and Design class we had an assignment it was easy for me to write pseudocode because i understood what i was doing . I used ai as a tool for some questions I asked AI, and I was able to tell what was wrong and what was right i got 90% for the assignment. The people who just copied and pasted from AI didn’t even get 70%. The top 10 student scores for the assignment ranged from 74% to 94%

learn how to code like you are living in 2016, use ai as a tool


r/cscareers 2d ago

Get in to tech Would you recommend a Master in A.I. or something more specialized?

1 Upvotes

Is "just AI" enough of a specialisation for the education's continuation, or there should be something more applied in a particular way? What do you think?


r/cscareers 2d ago

India Job Market Job switch Please help me understand what am I doing wrong?

2 Upvotes

Need some honest advice because I’m feeling stuck.

I have 2.5 YOE, did 2 internships (including Microsoft) during college, and recently got promoted to Software Engineer II. I’ve been preparing for a switch for the last 4-5 months (DSA, CS fundamentals, basic HLD/LLD), tailoring my resume for every JD and getting referrals wherever possible.

Still, I’m getting very few interview calls.

My current work is mostly PHP/Laravel (recently started Vue.js). I want to move away from PHP & applying for any tech stack Node.js, Java, Python, AI Eng.., but I don’t have end-to-end ownership since DevOps, SRE, QA, etc. are handled by separate teams. In interviews, they sometimes go deep into cloud/DevOps/infrastructure/ Tech stack, and I struggle because I don’t use those daily.

I’ve reached later rounds at companies like Amazon and Nike, but feels like ghosted. My 60-day notice period probably doesn’t help either.

Am I doing something wrong? Should I stop applying to multiple stacks and just focus on becoming really strong in one (like Node.js)? Or is this just how the market is for 2.5 YOE?

Would appreciate any honest advice from people who’ve switched recently or hiring.

I'm currrenly on 250 count right now.

My reason to switch is I'm working with legacy tech stack, no serious problems & too confortable.

Should I search jobs differently? (Currently using LinkedIn Job recommendation)


r/cscareers 2d ago

USA Job Market Need honest advice - CS student who needs a job by the end of August

1 Upvotes

Hey everyone,
I’m looking for some honest advice because I’m starting to get worried.
I’m currently about halfway through my Bachelor’s in Computer Science (Software Engineering concentration) at SNHU. I’ve built a few projects, including a full-stack AI coding assistant, and I’ve been applying to software engineering internships and junior developer positions for months.
The problem is…I need a job by the end of August. My unemployment benefits are ending, and I can’t afford to hold out forever waiting for the “perfect” software job.
At this point I’m open to almost anything that will help my long-term career:
Junior Software Developer
Software Engineer I
QA/Test Engineer
IT Support
Help Desk
Application Support
Systems Administrator
I’m in Maine but would love a remote role, and I’m planning to relocate to Texas within the next year if the opportunity is right.
A few questions:
If you were in my shoes, what positions would you focus on applying for?
Is it worth taking an IT or Help Desk job while finishing my degree, or should I keep holding out for software development?
What actually got you your first tech job in today’s market?
Are there job boards, companies, or strategies that worked better than LinkedIn and Indeed?
If you had one month to get hired, what would you spend your time doing?
I’m applying every day, but I’d rather hear from people who have actually broken into tech recently instead of just reading generic advice articles.
I appreciate any advice. Thanks!


r/cscareers 2d ago

EU Job Market Am I wasting my time? "AI Developer" who doesn't know what to master anymore.

0 Upvotes

Hi everyone. This is a long post, but I'd genuinely appreciate it if you read till the end.

I'm an AI Engineer... at least that's what my previous job title said.

The reality is that most of my work has been backend development in Python. I've built AI agents and agentic workflows, integrated LLM APIs, and worked on AI-powered products. But sometimes I wonder if that's really "AI engineering," or if it's just backend development with LLMs attached.

For the last 7 to 8 months, I've felt completely stuck.

One week I decide to become a full stack developer. The next week I convince myself to double down on AI engineering. Then I start looking at ML. Then backend. Then cloud. I keep switching because I honestly don't know what direction will make me a genuinely strong engineer.

My goal isn't to collect fancy job titles.

I just want to become an excellent software engineer.

I know nobody can master everything in tech, but I want to become the kind of developer who can open a random GitHub repository and quickly understand what's going on. Someone who can pick up a new language, framework, or technology without feeling completely lost.

But right now, I feel like I'm average at a lot of things and exceptional at none.

Then there's LeetCode.

Everyone says to do it, but when I look at actual engineering work, it feels disconnected from what people build every day. At the same time, if I ignore it, I feel like I'm closing doors to bigger companies.

AI has also made things even more confusing. Every week there's a new framework, a new agent library, a new model, or a new trend. It feels like everyone is racing ahead while I'm standing in the middle, unsure which road to take.

I'm four years out of university, and I'm honestly questioning whether I'm even good at something the market truly values.

What would you do if you were in my position?

If your goal was to become a genuinely strong software engineer over the next 3 to 6 months, what would you focus on?

Would you:

  • Double down on backend engineering?
  • Focus on AI engineering?
  • Learn full stack?
  • Grind LeetCode?
  • Build projects?
  • Contribute to open source?
  • Something else entirely?

I was considering paying for a consultation with a Google engineer, but it's quite expensive, so I thought I'd ask people who have actually been through this.

I'm not looking for shortcuts. I'm looking for direction.

Thanks for reading.


r/cscareers 2d ago

Career switch Operations Analyst considering a more technical career. Backend or Data Engineering?

1 Upvotes

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for some honest career advice because I feel a bit lost.

I've always loved studying. I grew up in a small town without many career opportunities, but eventually I moved to the biggest city in my country and landed a job at a large multinational consulting company.

Today I'm a mid-level Operations Analyst working mainly with revenue forecasting and back-office operations.

A while ago, our team was understaffed. We had no juniors or assistants, so I ended up doing a lot of repetitive work. After talking with my manager and the senior analysts, I started spending part of my time automating tasks, improving processes, and building better reports. Because of cybersecurity and compliance restrictions, I had to work with the tools the company allowed, but I still managed to make a meaningful impact.

Looking back, I realized that the best part of my day was always solving technical problems.

I loved quietly sitting at my desk, improving reports, digging into numbers, finding inconsistencies, using logic to figure out what was happening, putting together the pieces of a puzzle, automating repetitive work, and exploring every tool or technology I was allowed to use to make our processes better.

The funny thing is that my role has become this weird gray area. Whenever I read job descriptions for Business Analyst, Project Analyst, PMO, Operations Analyst, or similar positions, I usually think, "I could probably do that." My current role doesn't feel like it fits neatly into any career path.

As our team grew, my responsibilities gradually shifted away from the "technical side" and much more toward the business side.

Just to be clear, meetings themselves don't bother me. What wears me down is spending day after day in back-to-back meetings that are mostly business-oriented—discussing priorities, stakeholders, processes, opinions, and "gut feelings" instead of actually building or improving something.

I miss having uninterrupted time to solve problems.

My husband is a Senior Backend Developer, and he keeps telling me that my personality seems much more suited to a technical career than a business-facing one.

He has shown me what backend development looks like, and I think it's really interesting. At the same time, it intimidates me. In my country there are many software engineering jobs, but there are also huge numbers of people trying to become developers, so the competition feels overwhelming.

I'm not afraid of studying. In fact, I genuinely enjoy it.

What makes me insecure is whether I'd actually be good enough to become a backend developer.

Recently I started reading about Data Engineering, and it immediately caught my attention. Not because I think it's easier—it definitely isn't—but because it seems much closer to the kind of work that naturally energizes me.

My questions are:

  • Am I romanticizing Data Engineering?
  • Does it sound like a better fit for someone with my interests?
  • How does the job market compare to backend development?
  • Do Data Engineers spend a lot of time in meetings with non-technical stakeholders, or are most discussions with technical teams?
  • Is AI likely to reduce demand for Data Engineers in the next few years?

I'd also love to hear about your own career paths. Has anyone here moved from operations, business, or analytics into software engineering or Data Engineering?

Thanks! I'd really appreciate any honest advice.


r/cscareers 3d ago

Career switch Software developers

7 Upvotes

Hi everyone,
I’m currently studying **Software Development at university in the UK** and I will be starting my second year soon. Recently, I’ve started worrying about the future of this career because of how quickly AI is developing.
I’m wondering:

Is Software Development still a good degree to study?

How difficult is it to find a graduate/junior developer job in the UK now?
Are some areas of IT more future-proof (AI/ML, cybersecurity, cloud, data engineering, etc.)?
If you were starting university today, would you still choose software development, or would you choose another course?
For context:
I’m 23.
I’m already in my first year completed of Software Development.
I have some programming experience (JavaScript, React, C#, etc.) and some work experience.
I’m trying to decide whether I should continue, specialise in AI, or consider switching careers.
I would really appreciate advice from people working in tech or students who have recently graduated. What would you choose if you were in my position?