JAMES SAMUEL

I'm James. I'm a Head of Engineering at TIER, Europe's biggest microbility company. For the past two years, I have been mentoring engineers, helping them grow to become impactful senior engineers and software leads. Occasionally, I get invited to developer's events where I help engineers see the bigger picture and how to grow in their respective organizations.

I transitioned to tech without a computer science degree. People whose paths are similar to mine would know that anyone transitioning to tech without a background in tech has to invest a lot of time in building technical skills to get a foot in the door. This was my story, and the hours I spent cracking code and learning were crucial in getting my first job as anyone else.

However, as the saying goes, great technical skills will only get you so far before they become insufficient. It will come a time in your career when other skills will be as important as the technical skills you have under your belt in order to be effective.

You would start to need other soft skills that are usually not taught in schools. Skills like leading your team to success, working well with people, gaining visibility and branding yourself, expanding beyond your team to drive high-impact initiatives with organizational impact, and transforming yourself into a magnet for opportunities.

I've spent the last 9+ years building software and leading software teams by figuring things out and making mistakes as well in the process. I've gained experience and new knowledge, and if you fit into any of the following categories, we should talk:

– I want to land my first tech job, and I don't know-how.
– I'm a software engineer and want to be a senior engineer, but the path is unclear.
– I'm a tech lead, and I want to lead my team to success.
– I've just been promoted to software lead, and I feel I don't know what to do.
– I want to improve the visibility of work and brand myself better.
– I'm an engineering lead, and we're beginning to hit some performance bottleneck. Our tech doesn't scale. I don’t know how to drive the change.
I have other tech and career-related concerns.