(2nd Part of a Series)

One category of workers in growing demand by employers is web developer. Today any skill in the computer sciences is going to translate to opportunity and one needn’t have a high priced college education to acquire these skill sets.

Whether you are already a skilled computer expert or someone looking for a new career path, finding work as a web developer is a strong choice that can mean steady work and good pay for the foreseeable future. As the New Year comes upon us, let’s look at this land of opportunity.

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, web developer jobs pay a median wage of $32 per hour and $67K per year. Many positions pay much more. What’s even better is there’s a forecast for 22% growth in the number of needed developers from 2012 – 2020.

But how do you get there from here?

Entry Level Opportunity for Web Developers

Let’s start with someone who has zero experience and no education in computer sciences. It was estimated that only about 38% of developers had completed a four-year college degree in 2010. This number will increase but what it does show is that one can succeed even without a formal education. But you need to know your stuff.

Learn! It’s the best way to accomplish anything. In the case of developers there is no substitute for doing. But taking courses and attending learning programs are certainly going to help and they aren’t as pricey as Stanford.

General Assembly is a great way to start and you’ll be taking courses from top professionals. Established in 2011 in New York as a hub for entrepreneurs and startups it’s not only a great place to learn, it’s a place to network. They offer a full program for about $12,000 but there are many other options as well, including online courses that are more reasonably priced.

The Mobile Makers Academy has locations in San Francisco and Chicago but also offers online courses. They are especially known for their iOS bootcamp which is well attended.

The Starter League is great for absolute beginners. They offer two terrific programs in Web Development and then in HTML/CSS and they do not expect you to know a single bit of code when you start.

If you are capable of self-teaching, try W3 Schools, a totally free way to learn development for those that want to try a little before making an investment of time or money.

So you have some knowledge, now what? You need experience.

What you’ll need:

A portfolio. This can consist of your own personal website.
Go to Github.com and open an account and learn how to use the site. (Github is a web service repository for open source software, meaning software that can be built and customized by anyone. Think of it like a community project.)
Any other sites you already have worked on.

Now that you have some knowledge and something to show you’re going to need an entry level job. The key in finding this is to emphasize your willingness to learn. This will definitely open doors for you.

Here are some tips for entry level job seekers and experienced developers alike:

Meet with other developers. You think networking is important in most other industries? In development it’s essential if you want a good job. There are so many openings that never see a job board because they are filled through word of mouth. In addition, you will build strong relationships that can last an entire career. So go to meet-ups, conferences, classes, .NET user groups, and get out there.

Work on an open source project or one of your own. This is easy because even if you start slowly you will eventually be able to build your own website. What’s tremendous about that is then you have something to really showcase to potential hiring managers. Plus they like to see that you love it enough to do it on your own.

Don’t be picky at first. Do I have to even say this? Invest in you as you would with any path. Don’t expect to be making great money from day one or be given the high-profile work right away. Just focus on one thing: learning.

If you are an experienced developer the chances are that you don’t need my advice to find work, you probably have people coming to you if you are good, or well-known. Even so make sure your resume is updated, with no misspellings, and easy to read.

There are many types of programming languages and development styles to learn from so if you do specialize, which I recommend doing eventually, always keep up-to-date on the entire industry and knowing where things are headed. It doesn’t matter if you only want to work on Apple’s iOS products, you should understand Android as well.

There are so many amazing opportunities in development it is difficult to summarize this topic in one posting but this is simply an introduction. We will talk more about this industry and the reasons I highly recommend nearly everyone to familiarize themselves with coding. In the future most everything will be done by computers and the best (and maybe only) jobs will be for those that know how to program and operate them.