Getting started
Here’s How To Get Started
Considering the various career paths available in the industry, starting off in tech as a newbie may be overwhelming, especially when you’re trying to figure out how to get started, leaving you almost entirely clueless. Should I go into web development or cyber security? How about product management or data analysis? What if technical writing is my niche?
Truthfully, you may not find the correct answer to these questions by just hearing about these roles from somewhere or coming across them on ‘tech twitter’. To navigate your first steps as you begin your career in tech, you must research and understand these career paths. Sometimes, you may also have to explore more than one niche to find the one you fit into most and pursue it equally. Breaking into tech is a gradual process and requires you to be patient and open to learning.
Thinking of a Job In Tech?
When you think of jobs in tech, you might imagine a developer, engineer or data scientist -someone with technical skills such as coding. Tech companies aren’t just hiring technical people; they’re also hiring for non-technical roles in areas such as marketing, product, writing and design. Let’s look at some of the on-demand roles, their key responsibilities, and how to get started. In this article, We will categorize various skills into two paths.
Technical Path
Non-Technical Path
Technical Path
Let’s look at the list from an engineering perspective.
Software Engineering
Software engineering is a branch of computer science that includes developing and building computer systems software and application software. It involves gathering the requirements of the software, deciding its architecture, creating a design for it, writing the code, testing the code, and releasing the code to the end users.
What does a Software Engineer do?
Software engineers apply engineering principles, computer science knowledge, and math to write, edit, design, test, and debug software programs. They modify existing software applications and create new ones from scratch. Software engineers can work as front-end, back-end, full-stack, UX designers, DevOps, mobile developers, and quality assurance engineers.
Why Software Engineering may be the sublime path for you?
If you have an eye for design, creativity and attention to visual details, you might consider pursuing a career in software engineering. As you may have gathered, software engineering is a multi-disciplinary field, and it requires many types of roles to put one piece of software into running. It is a team sport; you should walk this path if you enjoy working with people.
Data Science
Data science uses advanced analytics and techniques to extract valuable information and knowledge from unstructured data for business decision-making, strategic planning, and other uses.
What does a Data Scientist do?
A data scientist develops strategies for analysing data, preparing data for analysis, exploring and visualizing data, building models with data, and deploying models into applications. They can work as data centre technicians, data analysts, data scientists, data engineers, data architects, and machine learning engineers.
Why Data Science may be the sublime path for you?
You can become a data scientist if you have a curious mind, love looking at data and try to analyse and see patterns. Data scientists provide value by looking over data and trying to discover insights that will help their company solve complex problems and grow.
Cloud Computing
Cloud computing is delivering computing services- including servers, storage, databases, networking, software, analytics, and intelligence – over the internet to offer faster innovation, flexible resources, and economies of scale.
What does a Cloud Professional do?
A career in cloud computing generally involves managing the end-to-end lifecycle of a cloud environment, including designing applications for the cloud, planning the cloud architecture, adapting security measures, provisioning resources, and maintaining cloud components. Career jobs in cloud computing include cloud engineering, cloud computing, cloud consulting, and cloud architecture.
Why Cloud Computing may be the sublime path for you?
You should explore this career path if you are an IT freak with a growth mindset, a good communicator, and love collaborating with others. A career in cloud technology requires you to be curious, flexible, and good at fixing problems and managing people. Learning the basic concepts and how they relate to each other is a good head start for you.
Cyber Security
Cyber security involves protecting computer systems, servers, networks, mobile devices, and sensitive data from malicious digital attacks such as information disclosure, theft, malware, fake communications, and insertions of malicious codes.
What does a Cyber Security Administrator do?
The roles of a cyber security officer include preventing data loss, safeguarding an organization’s network and data files, ensuring the safety of network and security architecture, creating security plans, and tracking and managing cyber vulnerability. They can work as information security analysts, cyber security engineers, ethical hackers, and information security managers.
Why Cyber Security may be the sublime path for you?
You should choose this career path if you are not only imaginative, curious and creative but also have an eye for detail, identifying what could go wrong, and problem-solving. You have to love working proactively and responding timely to cyber threats and security breaches when they happen. We recommend you enrol for this enriched beginner course on Cyber Security to help you get started.
Non-Technical Path
Now let’s also look at the list from a non-engineering perspective.
UI/UX Design
While UI design stands for User Interface Design, UX design refers to the term User Experience Design. UI design is the process designers use to build interfaces in software or computerized devices, focusing on looks, feel or style. Conversely, UX design considers every element that shapes user interaction and experience, how it makes them feel, and how easy it is for them to accomplish their desired tasks. Simply put, UI design is all about how the product’s interfaces look and function, while UX design focuses on the overall feel of the experience.
What do UI/UX Designers do?
The major role of a UI designer is to create visually appealing and intuitive interfaces that accurately convey brands, which are easy and enjoyable to navigate from the user’s perspective. They care for colours and imagery, typography and layout, visual and responsive design, spacing, and animations. UX designers make a product or service usable, functional, enjoyable, and accessible. To achieve this, they understand the user and the brand, conduct extensive user research, develop user personas, build organized information architecture, create wireframes, prototypes and high-fidelity design, and conduct user testing.
Why UI/UX Design may be the sublime path for you?
You should consider becoming a UI/UX designer if you’ve got a strong creative impulse, a background in design, an interest in digital products, and a desire to work in tech. With the same end goal, UI/UX designers work with a team of product managers and engineers to ensure a positive experience for users. Problem-solving, the ability to collaborate, analytical thinking, curiosity, and intriguing learning interests are common traits of good UI/UX designers. We recommend this course.
Project Management
Project management is the application of processes, methods, skills, knowledge and experience towards the organization of a company’s resources to move a specific task, event, or duty from start to finish.
What does a Project Manager do?
A project manager defines the objectives and goals for any project their organization undertakes, organizes and motivates the project team towards realizing the project goals.
Why Project Management may be the sublime path for you?
Are you organized, a master communicator, and love collaborating with and managing people? With a team headed in the same direction, project managers drive the realization of a high-quality project outcome within the scheduled project timeline. You must also have efficient risk management and problem-solving skills as a project manager.
Product Management
Product management is an organizational function that guides every step of a product’s life – from development to positioning and pricing – with the foremost focus on the product and its customers.
What does a Product Manager do?
Product managers identify customer needs and business objectives that a product will fulfil, articulate what success looks like for the product, and rally a team to turn that vision into a reality.
Why Product Management may be the sublime path for you?
It is quite possible product management is the perfect career choice for you if you have a great vision of how things work, need to understand customers, and have a desire to help build things, innovate, and make an impact. Also, consider product management if your life has led you to creative thinking, problem-solving, and curiosity.
Technical Writing
Technical writing is a writing discipline where the author writes about a particular subject that requires direction, instruction, or explanation. It involves efficiently explaining complex concepts, processes, or products that are easy for the intended readers to understand and apply.
What does a Technical Writer do?
Technical writers are responsible for preparing, editing, revising, and maintaining documentation, distilling technical information and clarity.
Why Technical Writing may be the sublime path for you?
If you love writing, have an eye for detail, and do not fancy the coding aspect of tech, technical writing could be a suitable career for you. All you have to do is acquire and master the necessary skills and tools there is to break into this lucrative field.
Customer Success Management
CSM involves maintaining a company’s relationships with its customers to ensure they find success using your product or service after the purchase. Learn the eight elements of Customer Success Management.
What does a Customer Success Manager do?
A CSM ensures that customers have a great experience with a company’s product or service by evaluating and analysing customer’s needs, developing a healthy relationship with them, build trust and transparency to promote retention.
Why CSM may be the sublime path for you?
Customer success managers majorly ensure customers are happy by building a close relationship with them. You should become a CSM if you are an excellent communicator driven by results, with thoughtful, passionate and persuasive traits.
Product Marketing
Product marketing is a sub-field of marketing focused on aligning product positioning in the market with customers’ needs so that customers will actually buy and use those products.
What Do Product Marketers do?
Product marketers research, define and articulate products’ position and features in the market to strengthen the brand and boost sales. They also oversee the creation and distribution of effective promotional campaigns for key products.
Why Product Marketing may be the sublime path for you?
You should choose product marketing if you are passionate about problem-solving, business, marketing, and communication. Product marketers focus on driving demand for and adoption of a product among existing customers. They also must have in-depth knowledge of product instinct and technical sense. Read more on product marketing and how it works here.
Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is the promotion of brands to connect with potential customers using the internet and other forms of digital communication, such as search engines, websites, email, mobile apps, social media, and text messaging.
What do Digital Marketers do?
Digital marketers maintain a brand’s online presence, reach customers, and plan and manage marketing campaigns that promote the brand’s products and services across various digital channels.
Why Digital Marketing may be the sublime path for you?
If you are a digital native, can innately understand the people around you, and communicate effectively, efficiently and creatively, then digital marketing is a path you may need to explore. As an aspiring digital marketer, you must also be willing to be flexible and work in an ever-changing environment.
Conclusion
Final Words
Now that you’ve decided to get into tech, the next step is learning and mastering skills relevant to your chosen path.
Where do you get started?
aptLearn, an e-learning platform that trains over 50,000 students monthly from across the globe, offers a robust course library covering today’s most in-demand skills you need to compete in our fast-evolving tech ecosystem.
aptLearn recognises the myriad opportunities technology creates and is passionate about youths tapping into these opportunities. With aptLearn, you’ll have access to a wide range of fun, easy and engaging courses with video content and certification at a fraction of the cost, time and location.
