Totally true, but there's a big difference between a self taught engineer who learned because he saw a video and the lifestyle looked cool, and other engineer who was self taught but because he used linux since high school, they're not the same
@@cbazxy2697 Nah, my main point it's you need passion and be interested in the area, if not the market will correct itself and you will be left out, which is what it's happening right now, just the top ones are the ones getting a job, and you can see a common denominator between them it's they have the vocation to do it
Yeah I feel in love with and learnt to use Linux and ended up skipping a year of IT uni when I applied, so self learning is recognised if it’s the right kind. Before Linux, I really knew much less. But I’m a bit like some of the personalities described in the video.
I've been working as a software engineers for 20+ years. Over the years, I've been lucky enough to work with a few exceptional engineers. The top 3 I know did not have CS degree. One has a MS in chemistry, one dropped out sophmore year to work full time the third dropped out of CS to work. If I include famous developers I follow, half have CS degree. The common traits for the top engineers I know: love to learn, passion for the subject matter and doesn't have a bloated ego.
John Carmack is a good example, the dude is all self taught and while he went to university he dropped out right away and all of the things he learned was from studying research papers and applying those concepts to problems he wanted to solve and along the way innovating himself.
It's been a mixed bag from personal experience and really depends on the individual rather than their pathway. Though I will say, some of the most knowledgeable devs I've known went the CS route. Especially the ones who are able to explain the 'whys' rather than just the 'hows'. Particularly useful when dealing with very complex non-standard problems. This is something I've personally never seen a bootcamp dev be able to do. Some of them do tend to pump out work faster though. Going back to the original point, I've seen good and bad devs from both sides overall.
You'll invariably end up working with systems and tools that you didn't train for in school, even if you start your career doing exactly what you studied for. The real key is being able to learn new skills well.
@@SpinningSandwich I think learning something is better than nothing. And you can't really fault education here. Education itself is learning new skills. Unless you have bad education.
I agree here. Bootcamp devs will not be able to solve the more complex problems. They just know the "how's". The real challenging work is done between the ears and not on the keyboard.
The thing is very talented self taught developers almost always learn the fundamentals through self study. All the information you learn with a CS degree is readily available online, and if we are talking about the 0.1% they do. But I would typically agree for bootcamp devs, but self taught developers have an every harder time breaking in and to do that they really need to prove themselves.
I love your insight! I think this is survivorship bias, however. In my 15 years, I also know amazing self taught devs. But I think they stand out because of their history. The vast majority of amazing devs I know do have a CS degree. Self taught and boot camp can nurture the insane grit and endless drive to get better, but it’s definitely not normal from my experience. (NOTE: I wrote this comment before watching every minute. I added another comment in the replies)
@@lowwastehighmelanin of course, and yeah, all the above 😂. Defensive contracting, Fortune 500 finance, 4 Silicon Valley startups, couple friends in FAANG, and maybe 2 middle of the road boring corporate companies. I’m a freelancer, so that has allowed me to work with hundreds of engineers so far.
@@lowwastehighmelanin I do want to call out that the premise of this video is very flawed. Where you started and how you learned to code is only like 4 out of the maybe 30+ years of your working life. The greatest engineers prove themselves in the actual job market. The drive to be in the 1% comes from your work ethic and curiosity more than your education.
Well I feel a little dumb now. I skimmed the video and made a few assumptions. KC, you did cover survivorship bias and you did highlight it's more about the insane drive that comes from within. I think I just got triggered by the title, haha, which means it is a good youtube title.
Definitely at least some survivorship bias. Anyone willing to self teach that succeeds is at least someone willing to work hard. They're probably also very happy with the work so willing to keep at it with passion. They didn't need someone to hold their hand through it like school does.
I can only share with everyone that effort counts. For example, I applied as an Android Developer because I already had knowledge in that area and wanted to build upon it. However, during the interview, it became clear that they weren't looking for someone in that role, but rather someone skilled in web development with Javascript. I was so impressed by their kindness and felt so comfortable among the people that I decided to dive into a completely new area. For me, it was absolutely worth it because it's only within a good team and with strong self-initiative that one learns a lot.
Boot camp dev here who previously worked in faang's, 7 years in industry now. I've out performed CS grads for a couple reason: - Interpersonal advantage due to managing restaurants. Engineers often hate communicating, being willing to lean into coordination and communication is a highly leveraged skill. - Grinding out self study for hours on end feels good compared the alternative of working 70 hours a week of physical labor. Natural hunger from years of non competitive salary jobs instill a natural hunger that is almost impossible to compete with. - As others have said, coding is the easiest part of the job as you grow in seniority. Previous real life experience allows non cs grads to really shine in the 'non-coding' aspects of the job. Great video.
Also nepotism. I’m sure top 1% of most career fields didn’t just get the degree and climb up a corporate ladder, they had talents, opportunities, businesses, etc.
These people are natural developers and something like bootcamp showed them what they are capable of. Nobody should think completing some program will make you a rockstar developer smoking something.
Survivorship bias js. The one's who do succeed are going to be better than usual as well. This isn't saying you can't be good with those things, but if you take the same person and give them a formal CS education, I think they would be even better. Don't let it stop you if you want to become a programmer though.
Some non CS majors switch from a non-software to software job within the same industry. Such as lab or hardware work to software development so they know a lot about the software needed. They often start switching because they need software for a project and they can’t get software developer time.
I personally don't do well in standardized learning environments so college was and still is something I won't do because I know it doesn't do anything for me. So I went down the self learning and work experience route and have advanced at a very quick pace thus far. Everyone learns differently and great minds come out of both sides.
Keep doing that. I studied for 10 years (3 different studies, none finished), got depressed from the fact I could not study properly and then just did the job and grew like a rocket. Now 8 years in.
I learned Pascal to solve my math homework with. Then I learned about drawing pixels with code and made local multiplayer versus games to play with friends. Then I realized I needed some kind of job and went for programmer. I can imagine someone starting with "hey, programmers make good money!" but that will likely not work that well without intrinsic motivation.
True, a wall st company I worked for took Ivy League English Majors, 2 weeks of training, and they were doing work. Great devs, and they were very good at looking things up. No leetcode bullshit. 90% of companies do not need that. In 5 years they were in management.
Key thing - they had degrees, they know how to learn. It's very hard to get outside of a structured learning environment, so self-taughts without degrees (STEM ideally, but humanities do surprisingly well too) are very far behind.
@@vitalyl1327 With the right training. And they have excellent communication skills. Even the best devs can't solve everything. The key though is asking the right questions, communication, etc.
I really appreciate the video you created. Your explanation was clear, and I'm grateful for your insights into the three points you mentioned earlier. Additionally, thank you for helping me resolve the dilemma I was facing.
im a self taught dev. the "expecting to get a job when ur done with college" applies to bootcamp grads as well. that's the entire point of the bootcamp. you go through and you say to yourself "ok im job ready" and if it doesn't work out some people have the surprised pikachu face and can't move forward. i agree with the comments where it really depends on the person. there are people that learn hello world and have their hands out waiting for someone to give them a job, and there are people who apply themselves and learn because they like the field.
Im a bootcamp grad and im not saying I’m the best, but I’ve been a top performer at 2 companies so far. I dont work extra hours or anything. I just think bootcamps involve more coding then traditional CS degrees so we have an advantage when it comes to practical application, which is about 80% of the work. System design, networking, and operating systems are areas where CS graduates shine. If i could start over, i would get a CS degree.
@@user-qd1fd7ei8h you can have problem-solving skills without going through CS theory classes. Design patterns you can learn just by actually reading docs and why people design frameworks and libraries a certain way which will help you solve pretty complex problems. I agree with OP, the closer you get to hardware/ lower level languages, complex sys designs, networking, OS, etc the more CS grads will shine.
I don't even have a degree of any kind. I've worked in tech literally since I was 16 (I'm 44 now), did a bunch of contracts in a bunch of different areas like networking, PC / Server support. I moved into software development when I was around 23 so that's now 21 years. Am run a team of developers writing PR software with a salary in the top 3%. The degree 'requirement' is not just misleading - it's an actual scam.
I think one of the biggest things that isn't mentioned here is humility. Even if you are getting a CS degree. Our field is so big and there is so much domain specific knowledge in any given tech stack / industry / company that lacking the humility to say "I don't know this specific thing, will you reach me about it?" will prevent you from excelling as an SE: even (and maybe especially) if you're in the first group. Group 1's with the humility to ask for instruction and a whole other level because they ask to be taught and get it immediately, and the "time to value" that they can deliver on that new info is super small.
I guess It really depends… If you look at web dev that might be the case, but if you look at say kernel development, I doubt you’ll have the same conclusion.
I've wanted to learn programming for years. I spent several months learning Java script in high school(almost a decade ago) but it just didn't stick. The free course i was doing was difficult and poorly explained so I just gave up. Eventually after many years of teaching English(which just happened as I live abroad) I realized I needed to find something I really wanted to do and actually put in the time and money. Free courses are better now but paid stuff is best. I want to be a programmer because I'm passionate about tech and love problem solving and finding new solutions. So I am willing to persevere until I get a job I want.
From my experience, CS majors were the best coders in my 6 years in big tech (Google). The boring answer is usually the correct, as the “fun” answer usually involves mental gymnastics. Almost always, whenever someone claims something like in this video, they work in a non-engineering company, where the engineering culture is secondary (ie: bank or something in finance)
by your definition then, most people in software work in non-engineering companies. there aren't that many "pure" engineering companies, and the ones that are have grueling interview processes and are ok turning away competent devs for extra competent devs. in my experience, i've worked with very smart cs grads. i've also worked with cs grads who were unable to write more than 30 lines of simple code a day. i've also worked with cs grads that overcomplicate the simplest things and end up costing the company time and money (but let's be honest we all do that sometimes). not all workplaces have infinite time and money like the big tech companies. the self taught ones were much better "self starters" which goes much further in companies that aren't Microsoft and Google. that's most companies, and most total jobs in the field. so while it might not fit your definition of an engineering company, i agree with KC's opinion with self-taught vs grads for companies in general.
@@KineticCodething about it is that both you and OP’s anecdotes are correct. The truth lies somewhere in middle and what camp you fall under. If OP is a CS grad himself, he is more inclined to lift his anecdote higher were as you might be a “self taught” dev and lean more into “validating” your experiences. IMO even as a self taught dev, CS grads will most likely always edge out self taught devs on average simply based on the pool of people each route has to choose from. But that doesn’t mean one is always gonna be better than the other individually. I gathered syllabuses from CS programs to see exactly what is taught on average amongst CS programs and found a course for literally every class (including college math course for DS) and taught myself. That type of effort most likely isn’t being replicated amongst every self-taught dev but is being replicated amongst every CS grad. Either way anecdotes don’t validate truth and the truth is in this day in age self taught vs CS is just a discussion on who can validate the amount of time sacrificed into doing the same job. Better for us to focus on refining our skills and becoming a better version of ourselves
Google's interview style wouldn't capture many good self-taught devs. Frankly a self taught dev who is an exceptional leetcoder (practiced at the level of questions that google asks from leetcode) are most likely the ones who just hard optimized their learning in a particular way to pass the google interview, and I would also be suspect of their abilities.
Banks (and finance in general) are full of STEM graduates though. They know how to solve problems. What you won't find there is bootcamp graduates without any proper higher education.
@@clusterfrack13 why would you suspect that? I know cs graduates that didn't heard graphs before. I am self thought and I learned them when I was learning how to code.
I have a software engineer job with economics degrees, meanwhile my friends with CS bachelor's can't even get a job. Well, because university alone doesn't mean anything if you don't have the knowledge.
I started with self-study as a child, when I learned about CS, I self-studied CS. You can self-study CS, you don't have to sign up for a course to read a book and learn some data structures, algorithms, and hardcore CS theory. Unfortunately, if you come out of a boot camp not understanding algorithms, data structures, and other CS concepts, then you're going to be limited in your ability as a software engineer. Those limits may not show up in some roles, immediately, but those limits will persist until you learn what you are missing. Thankfully, that knowledge is in a book. It's not locked behind a tuition paywall. Regardless, college is still valuable and if you can afford it then I would recommend it for most people. The social network you develop there is the most valuable part. Just remember that there are many ways to do anything, so long as you include all of the ingredients.
"they knew it was going to be a grind" - my experience has been the opposite, in a way: I do everything in my power to *avoid* letting coding/learning feel like a grind. As a non-CS degree professional software engineer, the only reason I've been able to succeed is because I actually really like coding, and the most important thing I do for my career (every day) is to actively try to fuel that interest/love by working on projects that interest and excite me. I'm terrible at forcing myself to learn something I'm not interested in or excited about, but I'm pretty good at finding ways to spark my own interest in subjects that would be useful to learn.
Small companies need devs but don't know how to hire them or what they are looking for (not talking about startups that can't pay the bills). At least this was my experience in the Midwest US. I constantly read anecdotes from aspiring engineers swinging for the fences with the faangs of the world and cannot imagine I would have ever had success if I went this route. Great opportunities exist for new developers but might be disguised or viewed as less sexy. If it wasn't for small companies I'd still be working in supply chain and operations and making 1/3rd my current compensation.
I’m self taught. Coding is kind of fun but it’s still a job so I can’t be that passionate about it. I’m lazy and I wanted a job that would get me the most amount of money for the least amount of effort. That’s what I got in the end. I’m likeable, not arrogant and always looking for help improving. I think that goes pretty far in getting and keeping jobs.
Doing a bootcamp and currently pursuing my CS degree, I feel like I know more than most of my classmates. I try to also self study quite a bit using linkdlen learning, udemy, and youTube. Can't forget about my mentor ChadGPT I hope all this makes me a bit more competative when enterning the job market.
I appreciate everything of old school. Only myself, we would use Unix BSD with Fortran, Ada, C languages without any database engines, only data structures et binary files with a highly documented environment and a lot of rapports. I prefer doing algorithms analysis and formal methods. Don't need remote work job, only a seat with a computer keyboard and a timer. You give your report and documentation, receive authorization to implement and get out at the exact time you are supposed to achieve the job. No cheat possible, no stole of data possible, and any policies between colleges. You prepare your meeting because this is similar to a math exam without any social, only the time for the project.
I think not having a CS degree is just making people insecure. I’ve also met a lot more bad developers making easy mistakes that haven’t gone through a CS program, the coping is real.
0:28 "Successful" self-taught people are super rare. They are motivated. Because they lack degrees, recruiters reject most of them, except the few that have a proof of competence. Therefore, you are faced with a population that is skilled not by the mean, but because of selection. TL;DR: Most self-taught are shit, but the few ones that are hired, they are hired thanks to undeniable proof of excellence and an injustly harsh selection.
All I have to do is get my foot in the door . I already have the tenacity for the work . I study for at least 8 hours there are days where I did 12 hours or even stayed up and broke day studying
Hey man I did the exact same thing and it worked! Keep at it, build impressive side projects and show them off and then speak with some third party recruiters and you'll eventually get your foot in the door. Keep on going, you'll do it!
I'm pretty sure my long, thought-out comment got deleted, but I'm not sure why I don't want to try to remember everything I typed, so I'll just reiterate the main points. I've actually done both, having 2 CS degrees and went to a full stack bootcamp. I often noticed that devs who come out of bootcamps or are self-taught tend to be frontend where the theory of computer science doesn't always apply or present itself, which can kinda make a CS degree moot. I've simultaneously noticed that those frontend devs often avoid compiled languages like C++ and Go and all costs, which is actually where CS degrees really excel. People who do "full stack" often specialize in either frontend or backend, and it's actually really rare to find anybody who does both well. I was wondering what types are the people you worked with. Were they frontend or backend? Both? Did they tend to specialize?
Im a CS major graduate. It's useless, there's too much general info and BS you will never use on the job, and not enough of what you NEED TO KNOW for the job. All theoretical BS. Not worth the 4 years and not worth all the money.
I'm a Geologist (not a CS major) but I disagree. I study Data Structures and Algorithms/Leetcode in my free time I come to really appreciate the theory of how standard libraries (collections, heapq, bisect, itertools, etc) and external ones like (numpy, pandas, etc) work under the hood. Even ArcGIS uses graph algorithms. My point is that a C.S degree in itself will help you DEEPLY understand how computers work. You may not use the knowledge all the time but you want to have the knowledge for the ONE time you may need it 👍.
@@firesennin1690 That crap about turing machines. Forgot what it was completely abstract. Some weird things about computer architecture and switches. All the abstract math courses. (Even doing game dev on unity I didn't use them). My game programming course was taught in C even though that was useless because unity was out and using C#, all the assembly courses, all the electives, and a bunch of other crap I forgot about.
@@moyndebs6759 my friend you don't live in the real world. NOBODY CARES. The only thing that matters is the solution and how fast you can provide it. Meaning that in 2024 the most valuable person is who knows how to properly use the latest tools and frameworks to get fast results (AI, etc). Your algorithms and leetcode are effing useless. If I have a difficult problem I'll ask GPT 4 and it solves it in 2 minutes where it would take me 20. Time is money and the solution is all that matters. I'm happy that you enjoy sitting around like a good uni student solving leetcode, but it doesn't matter nor is it increasing your value
I think in some ways self study people were some great software engineers but these two people were already incredibly smart and their parents are computer science professors. In my experience the best engineers I have met have degrees in computer science and even phds. But I also don’t do web development but instead distributed systems. All of the people in my team have or had a computer science degree while the other people that worked on the web dev side had a few people without a degree. So i don’t necessarily agree only because the self taught people that made it were one in million and they were comparable to a very good programmer with a cs degree.
Sorry this is just not true. My company sent me to a boot camp and transitioned me into a software engineer role. I work my ass off, but so do most of my coworkers. I’d say my company is in the tier below FAANG. My coworkers have either come from or gone to Uber, Google, Apple, Meta, Adobe, Duolingo, Microsoft, Amazon, MasterClass, and a range of other companies. Almost all of the best engineers have CS degrees. I know maybe 2 of the best that don’t. And those people have just been into programming since they were kids. It’s a fallacy to think non CS degree recipients have some kind of monopoly on hard work and grit.
well, you worked at start-ups, right? usually, the top graduates from top schools get hired at big companies (we're talking FAANG) before even graduation, so if you're comparing mediocre CS graduates to passionate, self-taught, highly intelligent SWEs, of course, this is what you see. also, your sample size is only 10. top graduates from top schools will probably do better because they have IQs that match or surpass the self-taught SWEs AND they have formal training, as well as the grit that got them into and through these programs.
Huh? Never met a competent bootcamp graduate (or any self-taught engineer who does not have a STEM degree, a top-notch humanities degree or at least was a university dropout). Not once in my over 30 years career.
I'm a rust engineer with 3 years of experience in cryptocurrency, and I am so done with it. I would take a TC cut if i could work for a company where I can see that my work is materially benefiting working people, instead of making some rich kid's silver spoon bigger
It helps to build up knowledge of a subject matter like medicine, chemistry, or manufacturing. There are certificates in topics such as Medical Informatics, Cheminformatics, Bioinformatics that could be done online that might help get into writing software for healthcare, drug development or manufacturing automation. Medicine is always a large industry and manufacturing automation is growing.
Just comes down to how hard you have learnt to work, I went through a brutal college programme and can easily do 60+ hrs a week of corporate development work.
I understood C pointers immediately. Something I don't get why other people don't. People complain that I miss messages and email. I am not a slave to beeps and boops. I'm the type of programmer who just gets things done without perfection. I have never failed to solve a problem with at least an acceptable workaround. But I constantly feel stupid. I notice however that programmers have different talents. There is so much to know, every day is a challenge. Genius programmers at Python are literal morons with C++ and vice versa. So experience with your tools and language are the most important skills.
I would caution against being too productive like the people who take initiative in fixing bugs without being asked (to what? kiss your boss' feet?) bc often if not usually, it works against you. Oh, 3 years of dev time was budgeted to get through this big backlog and you went above and beyond and did it in 1 year? Well here's your standard bonus, no higher than normal, but you know what, we are expecting hard times this upcoming year and since this backlog is done we need to divert your team's budgeting elsewhere. Sorry fam but it's the economy 🥺 you understand, here's one month pay and you get to continue to pay the group rate for your healthcare for a few months - not bad right?! You should be grateful. Good luck! 0 mercy even if your child is dying of cancer. I wish more people adopted a culture of human dignity instead of working themselves to death to outcompete each other
CS degree sucks now. I have one. Everytime I see video like this it makes me quite sad. Luckily I got it for cheap moneywise, but it took me 5 years to graduate. 😢
Degrees are mainly used as filter mechanisms. You'll be able to use that degree to get almost any job if you decide to change careers. I'm sure you learned a lot, no?
touch some grass, get offline. your degree isn't worthless, stop watching youtube videos that tell you otherwise. KC is just saying that SOME college students graduate expecting a free job when in reality you still have to work for it. you could say the same about bootcamp grads too.
A piece of paper doesn't tell anyone that you know how to do the job. It means you did what you were told which was rewarded with a piece of paper. If you have a piece of paper and don't actually do the coding, why should you get the job.
Im exactly in this situation. I've been self taught all these years and recently finished a 15k bootcamp thinking they would get me past HR, but this job market has been brutal. Im 30 y.o this year but i know for a fact id make a great software engineer. Its just none of these HR reps even give me a chance in this saturated market except for Tiktok, but their interviews were fcking impossible. I dont have 4+ years of grinding DSA but I know a decent amount. If anyone knows of anyone willing to take a chance on a talented non CS grad please let me know.
P.S. I know Python, JS, React, some Rust, Java, some PHP. Also been studying ethical hacking about to get my PNPT cause the soft dev market is so trash
The universities are teaching loads of irrelevant stuff. Self learners are self motivated, self financing largely and learn the relevant stuff, not an entire course on implementing linked lists with Java.
I have to disagree. You're talking like self taught programmers and boot-camp graduates were better on average than CS majors, which is not the case. People forget that the computer science major is very selective, a lot of people that become cs major doesn't even graduate. I'm not saying that self taught programmers are dumb, but it's a really biased opinion to say that just because you didn't followed the classical path, it's mean that you're automatically smarter.
I think that in the video you showed your point of view .. you get your degree easily, what about other students in other universities? Give you some numbers we started the first year of CS in more than 200 students, 15 students graduated in time, then 13 students of the 15 started the Master .. the class had in total 66 students, 5 students graduated in time and everyone belongs to the first group of 13 .. I was one of them.. to graduate successfully in my university you need to have all the characteristics that you described: a bit smart, organized and displined . There were useless courses but in the end of the day they teached you something. Why? Because everything was hands on, pratical exams, projects, assignment. After 3/4/5 years the gap between someone with a degree in a good university and someone that dedicated for 6 months is huge. Not only did the former spend more time and therefore have an advantage, but they also saw a variety of topics that they could not have seen on their own. For example, Machine Learning, a person really wants to understand it, they have to study the mathematics behind it. It's one thing to do it on your own, you see it's complicated and you quit. It's one thing to do it in a university course, you can't drop it otherwise you won't graduate. You can say the cost of universities is higher than a bootcamps. True if you re in the US, in Europe is free .. The financial companies that pay the most who are looking for? e.g. TwoSigma, Hudson River, Jane street ... Even simply successful startups like SNOWFLAKES.. Who built ChatGpt? Bootcamps software engineers? If you want to change country, is easier to get a visa with a bachelor's/master's degree or a bootcamp?
This is FALSE! NOT TRUE! I have 10+ years in this industry as software engineer. If you want to be a code monkey and do procedural work that doesn't change much (like maintenance) then sure you can do it without a cs degree. If you really want to work on projects where you apply your skillsets for complex stories etc, then you will need to rely heavily on theory. Especially, if you want to be a full stack developer you will rely on your theoretical understanding when switching between tech stack.
Nah you still can. That’s when I go to other software engineers (cs major) within my company for guidance. I’m at the same level as others who have masters degrees and went to elite colleges like Berkeley and Stanford. I went to public state school and graduated in finance. I also look at the design patterns in my companies code base and learn a lot through that.
4 years of study from a well reputed university vs 4 months of online bootcamp!? Come on, give me a break. You remember what happened to the guard worker that tried to copy Walter White just by watching him in Breaking Bad? Reminds me of that. LMAO.
I have had CS majors from a well-reputed engineering university (albeit not software) come in and still can't complete tasks on their own after more than 2 years. There are few actually good universities for CS. Most are outdated, you can get by just on theory, and some you can't understand what the lecturer is saying because of the accent. You really need to be willing to consistently learn and find good solutions, a lot of people are not willing to. Many people will just write whatever comes out of their *ss that day or copy and paste from previous projects without understanding anything, invariably causing bugs in the process.
@@csy897 That is fair. It really comes down to the individual. However, I'd rather have a top CS major on my team as apposed to a top bootcamp developer.
@@nikflix8331 of course, that's a no brainer. If you have access to 2 people of the same skill but one has a CS degree, you'd choose the guy with a CS degree cus he has that additional knowledge.
Good video, but I don't like the massive clickbait. It's still a fact that the large majority of the best software engineers are CS/EE graduates, so no, the top 1% of software engineers aren't non-CS majors.
Unpopular and hated opinion; TL;DR Stop shaming on CS Majors. As if they are not good. CS Major or not people can be good at programming / software engineering. And can also be a good teammate. YOU are so BIAS and quite HYPOCRITE on those opinions. I know you have an opinion, but let me tell you something. 1.) The first and foremost being *Acknowledge* is the biggest gift anyone can get in this industry. You can do all sorts of things but if no one wants you, it is nothing. People don't know how important this is. 2.) Do you think all people who wants to be a Software Engineer or Programmer just in for the money? I don't even ask. Or if I ask, I'll just ask which is enough for me. If I can live at 80K (net) then it is 80k 40K? then it's 40. LOL 100K 300K as if I need those. I like more when my work gives satisfaction for me and my career. 3.) Are you saying all CS Majors you worked with are bad? If that's the case are you sure it is because they are CS Majors. Or is it something else? (Unless CS Majors in your area is declining). 4.) Oh boy Bootcamps if you see a good bootcamp you are either in heaven or lottery winner. Since most bootcamps are shit. Management who can't answer question. But then if you try doing your best. Or initiative of your own. They would abandon you. What? Doesn't poster healthy social interaction. Etc etc. 5.) Tech Influencers bias on CS Majors? (if anyone didn't notice it is becoming a dangerous trend) Do you guys hate CS Majors? OR Did you get paid?, to promote this notion? I mean why not just left their education status or level alone? It is like you guys are shaming people's education. In fact there's almost no career today who are being shamed than CS Majors. This is embarrassing when it doesn't need to. CS Major or not don't mind it. Mind what they can bring on the table.
Honestly this makes me laugh. My dad's a CS grad, has the worst social skills I've ever seen. Meanwhile the only reason I'm not working as a dev is lack of time to practice. But you know what I do have? Soft skills. I can talk to people. I'm open to change. I'll be fine once I finally start looking.
I don't hire "CS majors" for my team. There's something about the University/College process that completely destroys creativity. Every time, they've been dead weight and had to let them go a few months later.
Sounds like survivorship bias to me. But this is all just "hurr durr higher edumacation is a waste of time" content for the algo anyways. So first non-STEM majors were worthless and now STEM majors are worthless? Show me all of the self taught professional engineers working for NASA.
Totally true, but there's a big difference between a self taught engineer who learned because he saw a video and the lifestyle looked cool, and other engineer who was self taught but because he used linux since high school, they're not the same
I remember celebrating Linux Kernel 2.0 while at high school. Memories....
gatekeeping?
@@cbazxy2697 Nah, my main point it's you need passion and be interested in the area, if not the market will correct itself and you will be left out, which is what it's happening right now, just the top ones are the ones getting a job, and you can see a common denominator between them it's they have the vocation to do it
very fair point that I should have pushed harder on in the video !
Yeah I feel in love with and learnt to use Linux and ended up skipping a year of IT uni when I applied, so self learning is recognised if it’s the right kind. Before Linux, I really knew much less. But I’m a bit like some of the personalities described in the video.
I've been working as a software engineers for 20+ years. Over the years, I've been lucky enough to work with a few exceptional engineers. The top 3 I know did not have CS degree. One has a MS in chemistry, one dropped out sophmore year to work full time the third dropped out of CS to work. If I include famous developers I follow, half have CS degree.
The common traits for the top engineers I know: love to learn, passion for the subject matter and doesn't have a bloated ego.
I dropped out of CS after my sophomore year too. Been self studying ever since. Please help me find an entry level if you can
John Carmack is a good example, the dude is all self taught and while he went to university he dropped out right away and all of the things he learned was from studying research papers and applying those concepts to problems he wanted to solve and along the way innovating himself.
Thanks for your 2 cents, gives me an idea of what traits the best engineers have.
It's been a mixed bag from personal experience and really depends on the individual rather than their pathway. Though I will say, some of the most knowledgeable devs I've known went the CS route. Especially the ones who are able to explain the 'whys' rather than just the 'hows'. Particularly useful when dealing with very complex non-standard problems. This is something I've personally never seen a bootcamp dev be able to do. Some of them do tend to pump out work faster though. Going back to the original point, I've seen good and bad devs from both sides overall.
You'll invariably end up working with systems and tools that you didn't train for in school, even if you start your career doing exactly what you studied for. The real key is being able to learn new skills well.
@@SpinningSandwich I think learning something is better than nothing. And you can't really fault education here. Education itself is learning new skills. Unless you have bad education.
I agree here. Bootcamp devs will not be able to solve the more complex problems. They just know the "how's". The real challenging work is done between the ears and not on the keyboard.
The thing is very talented self taught developers almost always learn the fundamentals through self study. All the information you learn with a CS degree is readily available online, and if we are talking about the 0.1% they do. But I would typically agree for bootcamp devs, but self taught developers have an every harder time breaking in and to do that they really need to prove themselves.
I love your insight! I think this is survivorship bias, however. In my 15 years, I also know amazing self taught devs. But I think they stand out because of their history. The vast majority of amazing devs I know do have a CS degree. Self taught and boot camp can nurture the insane grit and endless drive to get better, but it’s definitely not normal from my experience. (NOTE: I wrote this comment before watching every minute. I added another comment in the replies)
Can you qualify that? Is this corporate, startup, or public sector experience?
@@lowwastehighmelanin of course, and yeah, all the above 😂. Defensive contracting, Fortune 500 finance, 4 Silicon Valley startups, couple friends in FAANG, and maybe 2 middle of the road boring corporate companies. I’m a freelancer, so that has allowed me to work with hundreds of engineers so far.
@@lowwastehighmelanin I do want to call out that the premise of this video is very flawed. Where you started and how you learned to code is only like 4 out of the maybe 30+ years of your working life. The greatest engineers prove themselves in the actual job market. The drive to be in the 1% comes from your work ethic and curiosity more than your education.
Well I feel a little dumb now. I skimmed the video and made a few assumptions. KC, you did cover survivorship bias and you did highlight it's more about the insane drive that comes from within. I think I just got triggered by the title, haha, which means it is a good youtube title.
Definitely at least some survivorship bias. Anyone willing to self teach that succeeds is at least someone willing to work hard. They're probably also very happy with the work so willing to keep at it with passion. They didn't need someone to hold their hand through it like school does.
I can only share with everyone that effort counts. For example, I applied as an Android Developer because I already had knowledge in that area and wanted to build upon it. However, during the interview, it became clear that they weren't looking for someone in that role, but rather someone skilled in web development with Javascript. I was so impressed by their kindness and felt so comfortable among the people that I decided to dive into a completely new area. For me, it was absolutely worth it because it's only within a good team and with strong self-initiative that one learns a lot.
Boot camp dev here who previously worked in faang's, 7 years in industry now. I've out performed CS grads for a couple reason:
- Interpersonal advantage due to managing restaurants. Engineers often hate communicating, being willing to lean into coordination and communication is a highly leveraged skill.
- Grinding out self study for hours on end feels good compared the alternative of working 70 hours a week of physical labor. Natural hunger from years of non competitive salary jobs instill a natural hunger that is almost impossible to compete with.
- As others have said, coding is the easiest part of the job as you grow in seniority. Previous real life experience allows non cs grads to really shine in the 'non-coding' aspects of the job.
Great video.
Heavy communication and focus on feedback improvement got me Lvl 3 where LVL1 is LVL1 in 10 months.
It's often the difference between coders vs problem solvers.
Being able to code is the easiest part of the job.
Also nepotism. I’m sure top 1% of most career fields didn’t just get the degree and climb up a corporate ladder, they had talents, opportunities, businesses, etc.
These people are natural developers and something like bootcamp showed them what they are capable of. Nobody should think completing some program will make you a rockstar developer smoking something.
Survivorship bias js. The one's who do succeed are going to be better than usual as well. This isn't saying you can't be good with those things, but if you take the same person and give them a formal CS education, I think they would be even better. Don't let it stop you if you want to become a programmer though.
Some non CS majors switch from a non-software to software job within the same industry. Such as lab or hardware work to software development so they know a lot about the software needed. They often start switching because they need software for a project and they can’t get software developer time.
Thanks for making this video and sharing your thoughts with us. Salute to you and and your coworkers mentioned in the video.
I personally don't do well in standardized learning environments so college was and still is something I won't do because I know it doesn't do anything for me. So I went down the self learning and work experience route and have advanced at a very quick pace thus far. Everyone learns differently and great minds come out of both sides.
Keep doing that. I studied for 10 years (3 different studies, none finished), got depressed from the fact I could not study properly and then just did the job and grew like a rocket. Now 8 years in.
I learned Pascal to solve my math homework with. Then I learned about drawing pixels with code and made local multiplayer versus games to play with friends. Then I realized I needed some kind of job and went for programmer. I can imagine someone starting with "hey, programmers make good money!" but that will likely not work that well without intrinsic motivation.
True, a wall st company I worked for took Ivy League English Majors, 2 weeks of training, and they were doing work. Great devs, and they were very good at looking things up. No leetcode bullshit. 90% of companies do not need that. In 5 years they were in management.
Which wall street company ?
@@UnixBro Morgan Stanley
Key thing - they had degrees, they know how to learn. It's very hard to get outside of a structured learning environment, so self-taughts without degrees (STEM ideally, but humanities do surprisingly well too) are very far behind.
@@vitalyl1327Very true. A leetcode robot will likely not do well in most companies.
@@vitalyl1327 With the right training. And they have excellent communication skills. Even the best devs can't solve everything. The key though is asking the right questions, communication, etc.
I really appreciate the video you created. Your explanation was clear, and I'm grateful for your insights into the three points you mentioned earlier. Additionally, thank you for helping me resolve the dilemma I was facing.
im a self taught dev. the "expecting to get a job when ur done with college" applies to bootcamp grads as well. that's the entire point of the bootcamp. you go through and you say to yourself "ok im job ready" and if it doesn't work out some people have the surprised pikachu face and can't move forward. i agree with the comments where it really depends on the person. there are people that learn hello world and have their hands out waiting for someone to give them a job, and there are people who apply themselves and learn because they like the field.
Passion > going in school doing something just for money
Maybe for the average, low-tier grunt positions. The best programmers I've known usually have a master's in CS or something similar like math.
Im a bootcamp grad and im not saying I’m the best, but I’ve been a top performer at 2 companies so far. I dont work extra hours or anything. I just think bootcamps involve more coding then traditional CS degrees so we have an advantage when it comes to practical application, which is about 80% of the work. System design, networking, and operating systems are areas where CS graduates shine. If i could start over, i would get a CS degree.
It's never too late to get a degree but it doesn't mean as much as experience... especially once you start working.
@@user-qd1fd7ei8h you can have problem-solving skills without going through CS theory classes. Design patterns you can learn just by actually reading docs and why people design frameworks and libraries a certain way which will help you solve pretty complex problems.
I agree with OP, the closer you get to hardware/ lower level languages, complex sys designs, networking, OS, etc the more CS grads will shine.
Which boot camp did you attend?
@@miked1052 flatiron school
I agree the CS degree is favorable to a bootcamp in the long run but a lot of CS students start off slow
I don't even have a degree of any kind. I've worked in tech literally since I was 16 (I'm 44 now), did a bunch of contracts in a bunch of different areas like networking, PC / Server support. I moved into software development when I was around 23 so that's now 21 years. Am run a team of developers writing PR software with a salary in the top 3%.
The degree 'requirement' is not just misleading - it's an actual scam.
I think one of the biggest things that isn't mentioned here is humility. Even if you are getting a CS degree. Our field is so big and there is so much domain specific knowledge in any given tech stack / industry / company that lacking the humility to say "I don't know this specific thing, will you reach me about it?" will prevent you from excelling as an SE: even (and maybe especially) if you're in the first group.
Group 1's with the humility to ask for instruction and a whole other level because they ask to be taught and get it immediately, and the "time to value" that they can deliver on that new info is super small.
I guess It really depends… If you look at web dev that might be the case, but if you look at say kernel development, I doubt you’ll have the same conclusion.
I've wanted to learn programming for years. I spent several months learning Java script in high school(almost a decade ago) but it just didn't stick. The free course i was doing was difficult and poorly explained so I just gave up. Eventually after many years of teaching English(which just happened as I live abroad) I realized I needed to find something I really wanted to do and actually put in the time and money. Free courses are better now but paid stuff is best. I want to be a programmer because I'm passionate about tech and love problem solving and finding new solutions. So I am willing to persevere until I get a job I want.
From my experience, CS majors were the best coders in my 6 years in big tech (Google). The boring answer is usually the correct, as the “fun” answer usually involves mental gymnastics.
Almost always, whenever someone claims something like in this video, they work in a non-engineering company, where the engineering culture is secondary (ie: bank or something in finance)
by your definition then, most people in software work in non-engineering companies. there aren't that many "pure" engineering companies, and the ones that are have grueling interview processes and are ok turning away competent devs for extra competent devs. in my experience, i've worked with very smart cs grads. i've also worked with cs grads who were unable to write more than 30 lines of simple code a day. i've also worked with cs grads that overcomplicate the simplest things and end up costing the company time and money (but let's be honest we all do that sometimes). not all workplaces have infinite time and money like the big tech companies. the self taught ones were much better "self starters" which goes much further in companies that aren't Microsoft and Google. that's most companies, and most total jobs in the field. so while it might not fit your definition of an engineering company, i agree with KC's opinion with self-taught vs grads for companies in general.
@@KineticCodething about it is that both you and OP’s anecdotes are correct. The truth lies somewhere in middle and what camp you fall under. If OP is a CS grad himself, he is more inclined to lift his anecdote higher were as you might be a “self taught” dev and lean more into “validating” your experiences.
IMO even as a self taught dev, CS grads will most likely always edge out self taught devs on average simply based on the pool of people each route has to choose from.
But that doesn’t mean one is always gonna be better than the other individually. I gathered syllabuses from CS programs to see exactly what is taught on average amongst CS programs and found a course for literally every class (including college math course for DS) and taught myself. That type of effort most likely isn’t being replicated amongst every self-taught dev but is being replicated amongst every CS grad.
Either way anecdotes don’t validate truth and the truth is in this day in age self taught vs CS is just a discussion on who can validate the amount of time sacrificed into doing the same job. Better for us to focus on refining our skills and becoming a better version of ourselves
Google's interview style wouldn't capture many good self-taught devs. Frankly a self taught dev who is an exceptional leetcoder (practiced at the level of questions that google asks from leetcode) are most likely the ones who just hard optimized their learning in a particular way to pass the google interview, and I would also be suspect of their abilities.
Banks (and finance in general) are full of STEM graduates though. They know how to solve problems. What you won't find there is bootcamp graduates without any proper higher education.
@@clusterfrack13 why would you suspect that? I know cs graduates that didn't heard graphs before. I am self thought and I learned them when I was learning how to code.
I have a software engineer job with economics degrees, meanwhile my friends with CS bachelor's can't even get a job. Well, because university alone doesn't mean anything if you don't have the knowledge.
if your friend doesn't have any knowledge after graduating a CS degree. It is not the CS degree's fault.
I assume you’re engineering software related to economics so you have subject matter expertise to plan the software you develop.
I started with self-study as a child, when I learned about CS, I self-studied CS. You can self-study CS, you don't have to sign up for a course to read a book and learn some data structures, algorithms, and hardcore CS theory. Unfortunately, if you come out of a boot camp not understanding algorithms, data structures, and other CS concepts, then you're going to be limited in your ability as a software engineer. Those limits may not show up in some roles, immediately, but those limits will persist until you learn what you are missing. Thankfully, that knowledge is in a book. It's not locked behind a tuition paywall.
Regardless, college is still valuable and if you can afford it then I would recommend it for most people. The social network you develop there is the most valuable part. Just remember that there are many ways to do anything, so long as you include all of the ingredients.
"they knew it was going to be a grind" - my experience has been the opposite, in a way: I do everything in my power to *avoid* letting coding/learning feel like a grind. As a non-CS degree professional software engineer, the only reason I've been able to succeed is because I actually really like coding, and the most important thing I do for my career (every day) is to actively try to fuel that interest/love by working on projects that interest and excite me.
I'm terrible at forcing myself to learn something I'm not interested in or excited about, but I'm pretty good at finding ways to spark my own interest in subjects that would be useful to learn.
Small companies need devs but don't know how to hire them or what they are looking for (not talking about startups that can't pay the bills). At least this was my experience in the Midwest US. I constantly read anecdotes from aspiring engineers swinging for the fences with the faangs of the world and cannot imagine I would have ever had success if I went this route. Great opportunities exist for new developers but might be disguised or viewed as less sexy. If it wasn't for small companies I'd still be working in supply chain and operations and making 1/3rd my current compensation.
I’m self taught. Coding is kind of fun but it’s still a job so I can’t be that passionate about it.
I’m lazy and I wanted a job that would get me the most amount of money for the least amount of effort. That’s what I got in the end.
I’m likeable, not arrogant and always looking for help improving. I think that goes pretty far in getting and keeping jobs.
This is because if you make it learning by yourself to be self employed it means you have to be really good.
Yeap selection and survivorship bias.
Doing a bootcamp and currently pursuing my CS degree, I feel like I know more than most of my classmates. I try to also self study quite a bit using linkdlen learning, udemy, and youTube. Can't forget about my mentor ChadGPT
I hope all this makes me a bit more competative when enterning the job market.
I appreciate everything of old school. Only myself, we would use Unix BSD with Fortran, Ada, C languages without any database engines, only data structures et binary files with a highly documented environment and a lot of rapports. I prefer doing algorithms analysis and formal methods. Don't need remote work job, only a seat with a computer keyboard and a timer. You give your report and documentation, receive authorization to implement and get out at the exact time you are supposed to achieve the job. No cheat possible, no stole of data possible, and any policies between colleges. You prepare your meeting because this is similar to a math exam without any social, only the time for the project.
The one's at the top outperform everyone else, whether they have a college degree or not.
I think not having a CS degree is just making people insecure. I’ve also met a lot more bad developers making easy mistakes that haven’t gone through a CS program, the coping is real.
0:28 "Successful" self-taught people are super rare. They are motivated. Because they lack degrees, recruiters reject most of them, except the few that have a proof of competence.
Therefore, you are faced with a population that is skilled not by the mean, but because of selection. TL;DR: Most self-taught are shit, but the few ones that are hired, they are hired thanks to undeniable proof of excellence and an injustly harsh selection.
All I have to do is get my foot in the door . I already have the tenacity for the work . I study for at least 8 hours there are days where I did 12 hours or even stayed up and broke day studying
Hey man I did the exact same thing and it worked! Keep at it, build impressive side projects and show them off and then speak with some third party recruiters and you'll eventually get your foot in the door. Keep on going, you'll do it!
@@thinkoutsidethebun8811 thanks bro appreciate the support 🙏
I'm pretty sure my long, thought-out comment got deleted, but I'm not sure why
I don't want to try to remember everything I typed, so I'll just reiterate the main points. I've actually done both, having 2 CS degrees and went to a full stack bootcamp. I often noticed that devs who come out of bootcamps or are self-taught tend to be frontend where the theory of computer science doesn't always apply or present itself, which can kinda make a CS degree moot. I've simultaneously noticed that those frontend devs often avoid compiled languages like C++ and Go and all costs, which is actually where CS degrees really excel. People who do "full stack" often specialize in either frontend or backend, and it's actually really rare to find anybody who does both well. I was wondering what types are the people you worked with. Were they frontend or backend? Both? Did they tend to specialize?
You are a magnificent person.
Im a CS major graduate. It's useless, there's too much general info and BS you will never use on the job, and not enough of what you NEED TO KNOW for the job. All theoretical BS. Not worth the 4 years and not worth all the money.
I'm a Geologist (not a CS major) but I disagree. I study Data Structures and Algorithms/Leetcode in my free time I come to really appreciate the theory of how standard libraries (collections, heapq, bisect, itertools, etc) and external ones like (numpy, pandas, etc) work under the hood. Even ArcGIS uses graph algorithms. My point is that a C.S degree in itself will help you DEEPLY understand how computers work. You may not use the knowledge all the time but you want to have the knowledge for the ONE time you may need it 👍.
I'm curious what "BS" things you learned and what you really needed.
@@firesennin1690 That crap about turing machines. Forgot what it was completely abstract. Some weird things about computer architecture and switches. All the abstract math courses. (Even doing game dev on unity I didn't use them). My game programming course was taught in C even though that was useless because unity was out and using C#, all the assembly courses, all the electives, and a bunch of other crap I forgot about.
@@moyndebs6759 my friend you don't live in the real world. NOBODY CARES. The only thing that matters is the solution and how fast you can provide it. Meaning that in 2024 the most valuable person is who knows how to properly use the latest tools and frameworks to get fast results (AI, etc). Your algorithms and leetcode are effing useless. If I have a difficult problem I'll ask GPT 4 and it solves it in 2 minutes where it would take me 20. Time is money and the solution is all that matters. I'm happy that you enjoy sitting around like a good uni student solving leetcode, but it doesn't matter nor is it increasing your value
@@moyndebs6759 but you didn't study stuff like point set topology, discrete mathematics, graph theory, combinatorics
Comouter engineering degree here....hardest 6 years if my life lol but im glad i learned hiw to grind and overcome in college!
Why companies ask for cs major
From where do u get these titles, from gut?
I hope your channel has 1 million subscribers
It's really interesting to watch your videos. It reminds me, I'm just getting old. I don't fit it any of your groups.
What a great vid!
I think in some ways self study people were some great software engineers but these two people were already incredibly smart and their parents are computer science professors. In my experience the best engineers I have met have degrees in computer science and even phds. But I also don’t do web development but instead distributed systems. All of the people in my team have or had a computer science degree while the other people that worked on the web dev side had a few people without a degree. So i don’t necessarily agree only because the self taught people that made it were one in million and they were comparable to a very good programmer with a cs degree.
Easy. CSE love the problem. Non CSE want the outcome
Sorry this is just not true. My company sent me to a boot camp and transitioned me into a software engineer role. I work my ass off, but so do most of my coworkers. I’d say my company is in the tier below FAANG. My coworkers have either come from or gone to Uber, Google, Apple, Meta, Adobe, Duolingo, Microsoft, Amazon, MasterClass, and a range of other companies. Almost all of the best engineers have CS degrees. I know maybe 2 of the best that don’t. And those people have just been into programming since they were kids. It’s a fallacy to think non CS degree recipients have some kind of monopoly on hard work and grit.
true
well, you worked at start-ups, right? usually, the top graduates from top schools get hired at big companies (we're talking FAANG) before even graduation, so if you're comparing mediocre CS graduates to passionate, self-taught, highly intelligent SWEs, of course, this is what you see. also, your sample size is only 10. top graduates from top schools will probably do better because they have IQs that match or surpass the self-taught SWEs AND they have formal training, as well as the grit that got them into and through these programs.
Huh? Never met a competent bootcamp graduate (or any self-taught engineer who does not have a STEM degree, a top-notch humanities degree or at least was a university dropout). Not once in my over 30 years career.
I'm a rust engineer with 3 years of experience in cryptocurrency, and I am so done with it. I would take a TC cut if i could work for a company where I can see that my work is materially benefiting working people, instead of making some rich kid's silver spoon bigger
It helps to build up knowledge of a subject matter like medicine, chemistry, or manufacturing. There are certificates in topics such as Medical Informatics, Cheminformatics, Bioinformatics that could be done online that might help get into writing software for healthcare, drug development or manufacturing automation. Medicine is always a large industry and manufacturing automation is growing.
Just comes down to how hard you have learnt to work, I went through a brutal college programme and can easily do 60+ hrs a week of corporate development work.
I understood C pointers immediately. Something I don't get why other people don't. People complain that I miss messages and email. I am not a slave to beeps and boops. I'm the type of programmer who just gets things done without perfection. I have never failed to solve a problem with at least an acceptable workaround. But I constantly feel stupid. I notice however that programmers have different talents. There is so much to know, every day is a challenge. Genius programmers at Python are literal morons with C++ and vice versa. So experience with your tools and language are the most important skills.
I would caution against being too productive like the people who take initiative in fixing bugs without being asked (to what? kiss your boss' feet?) bc often if not usually, it works against you.
Oh, 3 years of dev time was budgeted to get through this big backlog and you went above and beyond and did it in 1 year?
Well here's your standard bonus, no higher than normal, but you know what, we are expecting hard times this upcoming year and since this backlog is done we need to divert your team's budgeting elsewhere.
Sorry fam but it's the economy 🥺 you understand, here's one month pay and you get to continue to pay the group rate for your healthcare for a few months - not bad right?! You should be grateful. Good luck!
0 mercy even if your child is dying of cancer.
I wish more people adopted a culture of human dignity instead of working themselves to death to outcompete each other
CS degree sucks now.
I have one. Everytime I see video like this it makes me quite sad. Luckily I got it for cheap moneywise, but it took me 5 years to graduate. 😢
Degrees are mainly used as filter mechanisms. You'll be able to use that degree to get almost any job if you decide to change careers. I'm sure you learned a lot, no?
touch some grass, get offline. your degree isn't worthless, stop watching youtube videos that tell you otherwise. KC is just saying that SOME college students graduate expecting a free job when in reality you still have to work for it. you could say the same about bootcamp grads too.
A piece of paper doesn't tell anyone that you know how to do the job. It means you did what you were told which was rewarded with a piece of paper. If you have a piece of paper and don't actually do the coding, why should you get the job.
Im exactly in this situation. I've been self taught all these years and recently finished a 15k bootcamp thinking they would get me past HR, but this job market has been brutal. Im 30 y.o this year but i know for a fact id make a great software engineer. Its just none of these HR reps even give me a chance in this saturated market except for Tiktok, but their interviews were fcking impossible. I dont have 4+ years of grinding DSA but I know a decent amount. If anyone knows of anyone willing to take a chance on a talented non CS grad please let me know.
P.S. I know Python, JS, React, some Rust, Java, some PHP. Also been studying ethical hacking about to get my PNPT cause the soft dev market is so trash
Some people are too smart for college.
The universities are teaching loads of irrelevant stuff. Self learners are self motivated, self financing largely and learn the relevant stuff, not an entire course on implementing linked lists with Java.
I have to disagree. You're talking like self taught programmers and boot-camp graduates were better on average than CS majors, which is not the case. People forget that the computer science major is very selective, a lot of people that become cs major doesn't even graduate. I'm not saying that self taught programmers are dumb, but it's a really biased opinion to say that just because you didn't followed the classical path, it's mean that you're automatically smarter.
I think that in the video you showed your point of view .. you get your degree easily, what about other students in other universities? Give you some numbers we started the first year of CS in more than 200 students, 15 students graduated in time, then 13 students of the 15 started the Master .. the class had in total 66 students, 5 students graduated in time and everyone belongs to the first group of 13 .. I was one of them.. to graduate successfully in my university you need to have all the characteristics that you described: a bit smart, organized and displined . There were useless courses but in the end of the day they teached you something. Why? Because everything was hands on, pratical exams, projects, assignment. After 3/4/5 years the gap between someone with a degree in a good university and someone that dedicated for 6 months is huge. Not only did the former spend more time and therefore have an advantage, but they also saw a variety of topics that they could not have seen on their own. For example, Machine Learning, a person really wants to understand it, they have to study the mathematics behind it. It's one thing to do it on your own, you see it's complicated and you quit. It's one thing to do it in a university course, you can't drop it otherwise you won't graduate.
You can say the cost of universities is higher than a bootcamps. True if you re in the US, in Europe is free ..
The financial companies that pay the most who are looking for? e.g. TwoSigma, Hudson River, Jane street ...
Even simply successful startups like SNOWFLAKES..
Who built ChatGpt? Bootcamps software engineers?
If you want to change country, is easier to get a visa with a bachelor's/master's degree or a bootcamp?
Yeah I’m a career changer from medical
This is FALSE! NOT TRUE! I have 10+ years in this industry as software engineer. If you want to be a code monkey and do procedural work that doesn't change much (like maintenance) then sure you can do it without a cs degree. If you really want to work on projects where you apply your skillsets for complex stories etc, then you will need to rely heavily on theory. Especially, if you want to be a full stack developer you will rely on your theoretical understanding when switching between tech stack.
Nah you still can. That’s when I go to other software engineers (cs major) within my company for guidance. I’m at the same level as others who have masters degrees and went to elite colleges like Berkeley and Stanford. I went to public state school and graduated in finance.
I also look at the design patterns in my companies code base and learn a lot through that.
4 years of study from a well reputed university vs 4 months of online bootcamp!? Come on, give me a break. You remember what happened to the guard worker that tried to copy Walter White just by watching him in Breaking Bad? Reminds me of that. LMAO.
I have had CS majors from a well-reputed engineering university (albeit not software) come in and still can't complete tasks on their own after more than 2 years. There are few actually good universities for CS. Most are outdated, you can get by just on theory, and some you can't understand what the lecturer is saying because of the accent.
You really need to be willing to consistently learn and find good solutions, a lot of people are not willing to. Many people will just write whatever comes out of their *ss that day or copy and paste from previous projects without understanding anything, invariably causing bugs in the process.
@@csy897 That is fair. It really comes down to the individual. However, I'd rather have a top CS major on my team as apposed to a top bootcamp developer.
@@nikflix8331 of course, that's a no brainer. If you have access to 2 people of the same skill but one has a CS degree, you'd choose the guy with a CS degree cus he has that additional knowledge.
Video is too long and doesnt focus on title 👎🏼
Good video, but I don't like the massive clickbait. It's still a fact that the large majority of the best software engineers are CS/EE graduates, so no, the top 1% of software engineers aren't non-CS majors.
He is speaking from his own experience. You have to elaborate on why you think your point is valid if you want others to believe your opinion.
My opinion is the opposite. They overwork, but still sub-par when the complexity increases.
Unpopular and hated opinion;
TL;DR Stop shaming on CS Majors. As if they are not good. CS Major or not people can be good at programming / software engineering.
And can also be a good teammate.
YOU are so BIAS and quite HYPOCRITE on those opinions. I know you have an opinion, but let me tell you something.
1.) The first and foremost being *Acknowledge* is the biggest gift anyone can get in this industry.
You can do all sorts of things but if no one wants you, it is nothing.
People don't know how important this is.
2.) Do you think all people who wants to be a Software Engineer or Programmer just in for the money? I don't even ask. Or if I ask, I'll just ask which is enough for me.
If I can live at 80K (net) then it is 80k 40K? then it's 40. LOL 100K 300K as if I need those. I like more when my work gives satisfaction for me and my career.
3.) Are you saying all CS Majors you worked with are bad? If that's the case are you sure it is because they are CS Majors. Or is it something else?
(Unless CS Majors in your area is declining).
4.) Oh boy Bootcamps if you see a good bootcamp you are either in heaven or lottery winner. Since most bootcamps are shit.
Management who can't answer question. But then if you try doing your best. Or initiative of your own. They would abandon you. What?
Doesn't poster healthy social interaction.
Etc etc.
5.) Tech Influencers bias on CS Majors? (if anyone didn't notice it is becoming a dangerous trend)
Do you guys hate CS Majors?
OR
Did you get paid?, to promote this notion?
I mean why not just left their education status or level alone? It is like you guys are shaming people's education.
In fact there's almost no career today who are being shamed than CS Majors.
This is embarrassing when it doesn't need to.
CS Major or not don't mind it. Mind what they can bring on the table.
Nah it’s cause the top %s are all engineers and not cs majors 😂
Honestly this makes me laugh. My dad's a CS grad, has the worst social skills I've ever seen. Meanwhile the only reason I'm not working as a dev is lack of time to practice. But you know what I do have? Soft skills. I can talk to people. I'm open to change. I'll be fine once I finally start looking.
0:03 stopped watching after that series of facial expressions
I have to disagree with this.
I don't hire "CS majors" for my team. There's something about the University/College process that completely destroys creativity.
Every time, they've been dead weight and had to let them go a few months later.
Manny SWE think different buddy
Sounds like survivorship bias to me. But this is all just "hurr durr higher edumacation is a waste of time" content for the algo anyways. So first non-STEM majors were worthless and now STEM majors are worthless? Show me all of the self taught professional engineers working for NASA.