- Why did you get into the field? What did you focus on at first?
I never planned on being a coder, I was a derivatives trader at first. It turns out being able to code helps a lot in finance. I co-developed my skills between building quant strategies with coding. And coding quickly swallowed up everything, it turns out it would have been easier to be a systems coder first, then develop quantitative skills. I've done an enormous amount of coding in different areas now from that journey as well as a variety of web side projects. A small amount of GUI/FE coding, a lot of micro performance and networking type stuff.
- What are you doing at your job? Is it everything you dreamed of and more?
I have a lot of freedom to decide what I want to do. So I code a lot, but it's what I want to do.
- How did you break that first-job barrier?
Responded to an ad out of uni, went to interviews.
- What were you doing before this?
Uni, where I learned a little bit of coding, but not enough to appreciate the depth. Zoomed over algos and data structures, which it turns out I ended up relearning.
- Any tips for the rest of us?
You can't really do this if you don't like it, but you also won't like it if you haven't learned a bunch of code-related skills. For instance if you don't know how version control works, you'll forever be reluctant to modify your code, which will stunt your growth. Same with sysadmin type skills like how to set up a network, how to move files around, how to set up the OS. You'll think everything is a chore if you can't write some scripts to simplify your coding flow. Something like Docker takes learning before you can use it, but once you have it it helps a lot.
I never planned on being a coder, I was a derivatives trader at first. It turns out being able to code helps a lot in finance. I co-developed my skills between building quant strategies with coding. And coding quickly swallowed up everything, it turns out it would have been easier to be a systems coder first, then develop quantitative skills. I've done an enormous amount of coding in different areas now from that journey as well as a variety of web side projects. A small amount of GUI/FE coding, a lot of micro performance and networking type stuff.
- What are you doing at your job? Is it everything you dreamed of and more?
I have a lot of freedom to decide what I want to do. So I code a lot, but it's what I want to do.
- How did you break that first-job barrier?
Responded to an ad out of uni, went to interviews.
- What were you doing before this?
Uni, where I learned a little bit of coding, but not enough to appreciate the depth. Zoomed over algos and data structures, which it turns out I ended up relearning.
- Any tips for the rest of us?
You can't really do this if you don't like it, but you also won't like it if you haven't learned a bunch of code-related skills. For instance if you don't know how version control works, you'll forever be reluctant to modify your code, which will stunt your growth. Same with sysadmin type skills like how to set up a network, how to move files around, how to set up the OS. You'll think everything is a chore if you can't write some scripts to simplify your coding flow. Something like Docker takes learning before you can use it, but once you have it it helps a lot.