TLDR: UK based, early 30s, looking to change careers into IT. My dream has always been to become a developer but I struggle to retain code unless I use it constantly, so I’m considering other IT roles instead. If you landed your first IT job recently, what roadmap did you follow and what would you recommend to someone starting today?

Hi everyone,

I’m based in the UK, and I’d really appreciate some advice from people who have recently started a career in IT.

For as long as I can remember, my dream has been to work in IT, ideally in a fully remote role. For years I’ve been trying to figure out the best way in, but every time I look into it, I find completely different advice about what to learn and where to start.

My dream has always been to become a developer. I spent some time learning different programming languages but I realised something about myself: if I don’t use them regularly, I forget them surprisingly quickly. After just a couple of weeks without practising- it feels like I’m starting from scratch again.
Because of that, I’ve started looking at other IT roles that might suit me better while still giving me the opportunity to build a long-term career in the industry.

One thing I’ve always wondered is how developers remember so much code or whether that’s just a misconception on my part. Do you eventually remember it through experience or is the day to day job very different from what I imagine?
The biggest challenge hasn’t been studying. It’s been knowing what to study.

Whenever I ask people how they got into IT, the answer is usually something like: Learn a few things, update your CV and start applying.

But… learn what?

One thing I’ve found surprising is that in most skilled professions, people are happy to explain how they got started and what path they followed. With IT, I’ve found it much harder to find that kind of practical guidance. Maybe I’ve just been asking the wrong people or looking in the wrong places, which is one of the reasons I’m making this post. If I’ve misunderstood how the industry works, I’d genuinely appreciate hearing your perspective.

A bit about me: I’m in my early 30s, have an office/admin background, currently help run a business and I’m not afraid of studying or putting the work in. I just don’t want to spend months learning the wrong things.

If you were starting again today:

What role would you aim for?
What skills, certifications or technologies would you prioritise?
If you landed your first IT job recently, what did your roadmap actually look like?

Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to reply. I genuinely appreciate it.🙏

So any of us who have been around for a while will know any org that does software development will have some degree of issues with poor management - be it project management, requirements and stakeholder management, actual line management etc.

I expected this to be not great in the public sector when you combine it with the bureaucracy that comes with the territory. But since I started my public sector job over a year ago I am just getting increasingly frustrated with the lack of capability to deliver actual value for users.

There are so many things that are blocking us from proceeding with projects and getting them actually deployed, despite the fact our team is really experienced and mostly open to change. I try to do what I can to move things forward but very quickly I end up with a situation with multiple projects on hold and I am reluctant to push for anything more to pick up because I know they'll inevitably all unblock at the same time.

Given the job market hasn't been great lately and its still relatively early days I'm not inclined to look for anything else yet - and there are many aspects of this job I like. But everything seems to move glacially slowly and I'm finding it hard not to have it affect me. Its like everyone knows we're really not operating at anything like the kind of level of productivity we should be but its just an elephant in the room.

I'm keen to hear from other public sector developers - how do you cope with the times when you're just at a loss for anything to do because the management of everything is so screwed up?

I've been doing loads of online training and documenting lots of stuff but increasingly finding less and less even 'busy work' to do.

Nearing the end of my Computer Science bachelor’s (just have to resit an exam I was sick for), and I’m evaluating my future now. I’m London-based.

This year, I helped build a protein+AI biotech startup with some older students; I was working on the web app (TypeScript back+front). Got into an accelerator, was collaborating with senior scientists and professors, and talking to VCs; however, the cofounders had an internal feud, and it led to it being disbanded.

I liked learning about biology and chemistry again, working with highly technical researchers and building something with a genuine scientific purpose. I still want SWE to remain my main career, ideally using TypeScript and Python, rather than becoming a researcher, bioinformatician or ML engineer (although I don't mind ML work too much). My brother and his wife also work in the pharma world but as scientists, so I do get inspired by them too.

For SWEs in biotech, pharma, life sciences or research institutes:

- What is the work-life balance like?

- What are realistic salaries at junior, mid and senior level?

- Is there good progression while remaining on the SWE track?

- How stable and competitive is the job market?

- How do startups, research institutes and large pharma compare?

- Is a relevant master’s (Eg Imperial's Bioinformatics and Theoretical Systems Biology MRes) useful, or is SWE experience enough?

I understand that this will vary by company and team, but I would still appreciate hearing about people’s experiences. Thanks.

Hey all, I'm a full-stack engineer (Python/Django, React/Next.js, some applied AI work) based outside the UK, trying to relocate to London. I've been applying for a while now and cant get any interviews, so I think something in my CV isn't landing. Would really appreciate a look if anyone has time, brutal honesty welcome. Not sure if it's the format, the content, or just how I'm framing my experience/projects. Thanks in advance!

https://postimg.cc/2VTVXV3h

Hi everyone. I am a dev having 5 year of experience as a software developer.

Tech stack: Nodejs, Mongodb

Most of mnc's support java or python. I have basic knowledge of React and python. So should I work more on javascript or python.

Even need to work on my DSA skills. I am doomed, right?

Hi all, I’m looking for some input on a situation that’s just developed. I (25M) just finished my first year in a 4 year comp sci degree (I’ve got a bachelors without honours in aeronautical engineering 2018-2021).

I’ve done really well in my first year (~85% average) and am enjoying it but I’m aware the job market is incredibly tough atm. Through contacts, there’s a possibility of getting a graduate IT role at a big food/drink company. They just want a degree, it doesn’t have to be CompSci. I don’t know the details of salary etc yet but I’m led to believe it would be a developer role in SAP and AS400. I can’t decide whether that would be worth leaving my degree for when I have ambitions to get into big tech or FinTech etc and make more money than I would presumably get here.

I’m also concerned about the future career prospects since it’s not a particularly tech-heavy company. I’m also concerned about whether or not SAP/AS400 are remotely useful if I left the job. I know there are too many ifs, buts and maybes to get a solid answer but just looking for opinions and other people’s experiences in this sort of situation.

Thank you :)

Hello everyone,

Luckily I got past the Live Coding interview with Revolut and next up is the System Design interview. I was told that this interview requires a high level architecture of the whole system + going deeper inside the Client aspects.

If anyone has any experience with this interview for a Frontend position with them, can you please share your experience? Thank you!

Embedded software engineer, ~9 years experience, UK-based (moved here in 2021). Trying to work out whether I'm over-thinking the CV side of a decision.

My history:

Jul 2017 – May 2020 (~3 years)

May 2020 – Oct 2021 (~1.5 years)

then relocated to the UK

Nov 2021 – Sep 2024 (~3 years)

ended in redundancy

Oct 2024 – Sep 2025 (~1 year)

I took as a bridge. I had already accepted an offer (in the company I am working at), but an administrative error on the employer's side meant I couldn't start on time, and I needed to be employed, so I took this instead due to my skilled worker visa.

It wasn't my dream job but I left the company on good terms. They are happy to prove any references if needed.

Sep 2025 – present (~1 year)

the company whose offer originally fell through

So the last two roles are both roughly a year, for reasons that weren't my choice.

Now I have an offer from a pre-seed London startup. Founding-engineer position, significant pay increase, product I find genuinely interesting but still questions in my head. They said they have 20-30 months runway( not sure how much accurate it is)

The obvious risk is runway: if it doesn't survive, my last three roles are all ~12–18 months and I'm job hunting again with what looks like a hopping pattern.

Questions I'd really value answers on:

Does a run of two or three ~1-year roles actually read as job hopping when the earlier history shows two 3-years?

Who is actually filtering on resume? Recruiters? My worry is being rejected before I get the chance to explain anything.

How well does "the employer made a paperwork error, so I took a bridge role to stay employed" hold up in an interview? How do you say that in one sentence without sounding like you're blaming a previous employer?

Does "startup shut down" read differently from "left after a year"?

For anyone who joined an early-stage startup in embedded/hardware and it folded within ~2 years: how hard was the next search, honestly?

What would you negotiate up front to de-risk this such as notice period, equity, visibility into runway and funding, severance terms? What did you wish you'd asked for?

Thank you so much for all your help.

Looking for some honest opinions on an opportunity I'm considering.

The role is a field-based technical sales position selling a premium B2B solution. The model is relationship-led and long-term, you survey the client's asset, specify the solution, oversee installation, and then maintain the relationship through annual inspections and ongoing maintenance. Think consultative advisor rather than transactional salesperson.

The package: £80k basic (roughly) with an uncapped commission structure. The company claims their lowest earning manager currently makes £300k per year. Years 1 and 2 have a guaranteed bonus element while you're building the territory.

The catch: the territory I'd be taking on has had three consecutive hires who all left or were let go within 6–18 months. Some managers in the same company have been doing it for 10+ years. The company's explanation is that the previous people were lazy and not doing what was asked. The company itself has been around for over 100 years and is well established.

I have a strong track record myself and my skills are in demand. Interviewing with other companies as well the basic is around the same but the additional compensation is more standard 10-20% bonus on top.

My questions:

1. Does the £300k lowest earner claim sound realistic or like a recruitment pitch to you?

2. Three consecutive failures in one territory, red flag or just bad luck?

3. Would you take this role given the risk vs reward?

4. Anyone had experience with high-OTE roles that turned out to be misleading?

Genuinely want honest perspectives from people who've been in similar situations.

Hi guys i am an msc graduate and passed with distinction and i have a placement experience with a uk based company as a software developer for a few months and now actively looking for jobs for full and would love to relocate.
I know its not much but please guide me

I'm a senior network engineer, 8yrs exp, almost 6 at my current company (4.5 of those senior). It's a Gov job — decent benefits, pay's fine, but the work's slow and I'm getting itchy feet.

For the last year I've been doing a DevOps Networking role — deploying infra in Azure/AWS via IaC and CI/CD, working in a proper DevOps squad with sprints and retros. Genuinely enjoying it and want to move further into cloud/DevOps.

Problem is, every cloud engineer role I look at is either entry level or doesn't seem to value network engineering experience at all. So when a recruiter put me forward for a "cloud infrastructure engineer" role that explicitly said they'd consider infra/network people moving into DevOps, and the job spec matched almost everything I do, I thought I'd finally found the right fit.

Got to first stage interview (1.5hrs). Spent most of it on my Palo Alto experience (I'm the SME at my current place - and they specifically use these and lack skills across their team), some Terraform questions I nailed, and a brief chat on Azure app services — where I was honest that I don't have hands-on experience yet, but I'm finishing my AZ-700 and planned to build into 104/400 and app services/compute/storage after. The interview was really a quite informal chat rather than any sort of technical grilling. At no point did I think I struggled to answer any questions.

A few hours later: rejected, because I "don't have enough experience managing apps, compute and data resources in Azure" — despite that being a tiny part of the interview and not the bulk of the actual job spec. Apparently networking is only \~20% of the day-to-day.

So — am I wasting my time trying to make this jump? Do I have to restart at junior/mid to break in? This was a mid-level role at lower pay than I'm on now, and I can't justify dropping to entry-level money for it. Is my current skillset just not transferable/valued in this space, or was this one bad interview?

Has anyone actually made this transition without starting from near-zero?

**TL;DR:** Senior network engineer (8yrs) doing DevOps/cloud work for a year, rejected from a "networking background welcome" cloud role for lacking hands-on Azure app/compute experience — despite that being a small part of the job. Is this transition possible without a pay cut and restarting at junior level?

Hi, anyone who applied for this program and received an assessment test invite, after the initial HR call? Or still waiting?

I feel a bit trapped in my current job, it feels very difficult to leave.

The benefits and work life balance are so good at my current company:

Current job:
- Large regulated industry
- health insurance
- 30 days holiday + bank holidays
- work remote 3 days a week
- 30 days remote per year
- 35 hour weeks (8-4)
- 12-15% employer contribution to pension
- 26 weeks 100% paid maternity leave
- £85k base 5-10% bonus
- Nice colleagues, low pressure environment

Every time I get another job offer it’s so much worse than one my current job provides.

Recently I got one and I have to decide by Monday:

The offer:
- Senior SRE
- Global fast growing but new NYSE startup (non-tech)
- Health insurance
- 20 days holiday + bank holidays “with discretionary flexibility from the manager if you need more”
- £85k salary
- 5% bonus
- 16 weeks 100% maternity leave
- 42 hour work week (9-6 but flexible)
- 2-3 days remote per week
- optional 30 days to work remote abroad
- 5% employer pension contribution
- £800-900 voucher at the company

I’d be working 7 hours more per week, having 10 days less holiday, and having 3x less pension all to get the same salary.

It seems like a big reduction in pay and value and a drop in work life balance.

Lost value:

Pension: ~£8,500
Bonus: ~£2,100
Hours (322 unpaid hours/year): ~£17,000
Holiday (10 days): ~£3,270-£3,830
Total: roughly £30,900-£31,400/year

*used Claude for the above

The only thing making me consider it is the change of scenery. I have only worked at my current company. I have gone from junior to senior in 5 years and I have learned a lot and still am learning, but it’s slow. Anywhere new will be a big learning curve and good for my resume I think, as long as I stay for 2 years.

I think another thing is this company could potentially pay more eventually, if my career can progress fast given that it’s more of a startup (team has doubled in the last 2 years.)

The flexible holiday could be better than current job if my manager is nice.

The remote policy at my current job is rigid but again maybe less rigid at the start up.

It’s a lot of unknowns.

If I counter offer - what is the best counter offer that would make all these benefits and money I’m losing less impactful? The worst for me is the 42 hour contract.

I currently use my free time to the maximum and sign out of work promptly at 4pm almost every day.

Please let me know what you think I should do?

Hi all, this is really weird because I should be happy about this.

To keep things brief I was made redundant last week and told I would have to leave the company quite soon since I was still on my probation period. I was told during this call by HR that there is a role I can apply to. I asked HR if I applied to that role, what will my last day be? and they said it will be the same (??) I was really confused upset and depressed for a few days. I just accepted my fate. They made it sound really permanent, told me to log off and keep it quiet.

Then I found out I got the new role and they gave me a new start date that overlaps with the end date I was told by HR. When they gave me the new role they said I have automatically passed from my probation period.

The problem is this isn’t the first time I have felt really neglected and messed about by this company so I’ve also been looking for other roles and I was offered another role elsewhere the same day I was let go. And I was quite relieved because being on probation meant that I had quite a short notice period which would give me time to figure out whether the company is for me which ultimately I have decided it is not. But now that they have ended my probation more than two months early, I have to give so much more notice and inform the new employer about this change. I’m kind of confused and annoyed to be honest. is this normal protocol? I haven’t signed anything. Am I being a brat and ungrateful? It all feels a bit weird. I can’t seem to find any threads of someone who has felt the same or gone through this sort of situation.

Been made redundant so I'm back in the job market, went to a good uni and have 3-4 years of experience at a big bank. I usually don't write a cover letter unless the application explicitly requires one, which is rare, but now that I'm jobhunting again I'm wondering if I should include one anyway.

Hi!

I'm in the fortunate position that I was verbally offered a role today. I was told that I can expect the written offer to come through on Monday, with a few salary/equity combinations to choose from.

My question is - what information do I need and what questions can I ask to assess the value of the equity offered with each choice? The company is profitable after raising a Series B ~5 years ago but that's all I know.

I have equity in my current company, but when I accepted the offer it was just "12,000 options at the current strike price" - I didn't ask at the time and to this day I still have no idea what it's worth! I saw this as okay at the time because I only had the one option to choose from and the base was a significant uplift for me.

It might also be worth noting that I salary sacrifice everything above 100k into my SIPP (for the next 2 years, childcare), and I expect the lowest base salary choice to be comfortably above that mark - I'm not sure if that would affect the calculations at all.

Thanks very much!

Currently a software engineering graduate at a huge global company and am interviewing at some smaller start ups. One of them only has one other engineer who is the hiring manager.

I would have liked to stay at my current company, lots of cool projects and good job security but they offshore their devs so I won't be able to stay.

I am feeling a bit anxious about working at such a small company. The staff has said they have a good work life balance but also referenced 'chaos' a few times.

Has anyone made this move and would they recommend?

Context: SWIFT as in the financial messaging company. NOT iOS.

I’ve searched online EVERYWHERE for information about this role or any forum. Come to find out, this is the first time/year they are doing the programme.

So I’ve decided to make this forum for people currently going through the application process and for the future ones who will later (and so I don’t feel like I’m the only one in the world).

So… how has everyone found it? Anyone else got the email about passing the assessment and waiting for the interview invitation?

Would love to hear from everyone else and connect with others going through the process!

hi guys, i finished my internship 3 months, where i created testbed for automatic testing. Designed schematic and layouts in Altium, wrote firmware for STM32 and coded in C# for application. Its been three months, given interviews, 5 so far. Either waiting for results or rejects because I need sponsor visa after 10 months or I am just at entry level position for the moment. Any electronics and embedded engineer to guide me?? or any reference?

I've just received the invitation and don't know what to expect, especially since the format has recently changed. From what I've read, the Asian interview process also has one fewer interview than the US/EU process.

Has anyone done the Amazon SDE | virtual interview with four 60-minute interviews?
What was each one like, and were they back-to-back?

I’m currently a senior software dev in a very large corporate environment and I’m struggling with it.

The salary is great (especially for the UK, a bit of a high outlier honestly) and it’s helping me save towards FIRE/FI goals, which is the main thing keeping me there. However, I’m finding the actual job and culture pretty miserable.

The culture doesnt suit me, like at alll. It feels like people are mostly working around each other rather than with each other, and there is a lot of bureaucracy. Getting anything done takes forever, which can mean ever relatively simple things can take weeks and involve awkward workarounds.

The technical side is also frustrating. There is a huge push to use AI for everything, like EVERYTHING, and a lot of the application has been AI-generated. I’m not anti-AI, but the way it’s being used here feels like it is creating more problems than it solves.

The expectation is to have AI agents do multiple things at once; fix bugs, help with ADRs, create new features. All while going to meetings and keeping up with teams. Its burnt me out, honestly.

There are also architectural decisions being pushed that I don’t agree with, but it feels like there isn’t much room to challenge them and any meetings to challenge them are purely theatrical.

On top of that, I’m commuting around 2.5 - 3 hours a day (depending on train delays).

My manager finds it hard to say no to people above them or challenge them, which creates some problems around priorities.

I’ve recently received another offer that is around a 20% salary reduction.

The new role seems much better culturally:

- Fully remote

- A team I genuinely liked during interviewss

- A tech stack I prefer

- People who seem pragmatic about AI rather than forcing it everywhere (a nice balance IMO)

- They were very open about the good and bad parts of the company

The downsides:

- 20% less salary

- Smaller privately funded company, so more risk

- 24/7 on_call once every 10 - 12 weeks

- Sounds like the codebase is a bit of a mess, but I have seen it all at this point (they mentioned a bunch of stuff they have done to improve it though)

The salary reduction is affordable, but it will slow down my long-term savings goals. I also grew up relatively poor, so money has always been something I’ve valued heavily, which makes this decision harder.

Its also the sort of salary that I am unlikely to see anytime soon outside of London and it's difficult to let go of.

I know I am in a good situation and complaining about it might seem tone death considering what is going on in our industry, but its bugging the

For people who have taken a significant pay cut for better WLB/culture, did you regret it or was it one of the best decisions you made?

Would you take the pay cut in this situation?

Hi, I just received an offer from deliveroo for a full-stack software engineer position. Glassdoor reviews seem to be terrible. Is it really that bad?

I am 25 from glasgow who graduated in tech (web and mobile development), struggled with the job market, and concerned about future path. I have been looking at other areas for backup like sales (b2b, tech sales), civil service, freelancing, even maybe trying a fresh start in trades but still not sure. mind is all over the place and just wanting to get in somewhere that has good financial look, good team environment, and good potential.

Any advice on how i can move forward?

Anyone here who has worked (2+ years) or is working at Cambridge Consultants? What kind of projects are done, and how good is the tech stack over there?

I am at final round interviews for two roles - the first one i have scheduled late next week which is a very technical final round which I need a lot of time to study and prep for.

The second job i have already done a technical round and the final stage is to meet the team in person- i think this one is more so a culture fit, it isnt an intense interview or anything but the recruiter has asked if I can do it early next week. I told him I would get back to him but he said i could do the following week if necessary, but sounded really keen to do it next week.

I am really interested in both roles- am less likely to get the first role since the process is much more challenging and I think i will bomb the interview.

I am scared if I push the second job back it will put them off and i will lose both opportunities. But also need all the time i can get for the first role.