Your Degrees
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KenBonny wrote:
What is your degree?
BA in Film
KenBonny wrote:
How did you get to this point in your career?
Self taught, learned Windows inside and out. Perseverance. I maintain that nobody can truly be a senior developer with less than seven years solid experience. I also accepted low paying jobs at first. Really low paying. Too many graduates are spoiled into thinking they can start right out with a bang. Some do; we have a guy working for us right now who's still going to school. To be fair, he worked all sorts of crummy jobs at this company before moving onto the team I'm on.
KenBonny wrote:
Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
(For a CS masters degree in US definition) If you want to go into management, it may pay off. Otherwise, no. The time spent on the degree would be better spent teaching yourself and/or taking specific classes in technologies. As a developer, it will take years to recoup your costs of a post-graduate degree. On the other hand, if you really want to go into management, get an MBA. Not because it's worth anything by itself (it's one of the most useless degrees ever invented) but it impresses higher ups, especially ones with MBAs. One more thing: be very careful about bailing now. The single biggest method to eliminate candidates without a ton of experience is how long they've stayed at a job. If you end up with a few jobs of a few months each, you WILL be unemployable. I've had the misfortune of working for several companies that went under. This has hurt me in getting jobs and in negotiating salaries. (Note to any college students here: My advice is simple--upon graduation find a job at the biggest damn company you find, no matter how loathsome. Forget salary completely and stick with them at least three years and get at least ONE good management reference. While there, take advantage of every continuing education benefit the company offers. Do remember, though, that what this will do is get you in the door for an interview, that's it. You better have actually learned how to do engineering, designing, programming, testing or whatever it is you want to do.)
Joe Woodbury wrote:
(For a CS masters degree in US definition)
For a CS masters degree of EU definition, I'm from Europe. I've been looking up information about the courses and I see a whole lot of technical classes ("Modeling and Transformation in Software Development" and "Software Testing", to name two). Yes, you can learn these on the job, but how thorough are you getting them?
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KenBonny wrote:
What do you do / did you do as a programmer? How did you get to this point in your career?
Study, hard work, experience and putting up with a lot of crap
KenBonny wrote:
Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
In your case I would think not. What will help more is experience. As you start to move up the ladder then yes a Masters (depending type) may help to obtain a higher level position.
KenBonny wrote:
every interesting job I encounter asks for a masters degree
Most positions I've seen only ask for BS. Perhaps you are search too high. You have to start somewhere, just not at the top.
I know the language. I've read a book. - _Madmatt
Mark Nischalke wrote:
Most positions I've seen only ask for BS. Perhaps you are search too high. You have to start somewhere, just not at the top.
I'm not looking for the top of the heap, I only apply for junior positions of minimum experience of 2 years. So all pretty standard and basic. But a lot of them say "bachelor or master" degree preferred. This reads to me as "if we can't find a master, we'll settle on bachelor".
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Mark Nischalke wrote:
Most positions I've seen only ask for BS. Perhaps you are search too high. You have to start somewhere, just not at the top.
I'm not looking for the top of the heap, I only apply for junior positions of minimum experience of 2 years. So all pretty standard and basic. But a lot of them say "bachelor or master" degree preferred. This reads to me as "if we can't find a master, we'll settle on bachelor".
You should read it as, we'll take a masters but only pay as a bachelors
I know the language. I've read a book. - _Madmatt
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Joe Woodbury wrote:
(For a CS masters degree in US definition)
For a CS masters degree of EU definition, I'm from Europe. I've been looking up information about the courses and I see a whole lot of technical classes ("Modeling and Transformation in Software Development" and "Software Testing", to name two). Yes, you can learn these on the job, but how thorough are you getting them?
If I understand the systems correctly, in continental Europe a masters certificate is generally a two year academic program. In the US a masters program is typically a three to five year program with a combination of classes and a thesis or dissertation. The UK has a system somewhere between the two, depending on the subject. The first title you listed sounds like silliness masquerading as a class. The second could be useful, but I've yet to see or hear of any university properly teaching testing. (Most universities don't teach how to do team development or things like debugging either.) Moreover, classroom learning is just that and no where near as thorough as real world experience. That aside, you could probably learn both on your own in less time and for less money; factor in the opportunity cost of not making a full salary AND in not getting years of experience and I seriously question whether it would pay for itself. As others have pointed out college degrees in the US may help slightly in getting your resume to be seen by the hiring manager, but that's about it. I have yet to work for anyone who cares and when I hire, I don't care either.
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I have no degree, my articles give you an idea of what I do, but more specifically, I do contract work and currently have two clients, one in the space industry and the other in the, ahem, adult entertainment industry. Pretty much every contract job that I've had has involved working on re-architecting legacy systems. I got to where I am now by getting really frustrated with the mundane aspects of programming. I'm much more interested in doing the interesting work--architecture, UI design, figuring out difficult problems, working with the client to get them what they really want, etc. It's an ongoing process, but I have to admit I feel like I'm falling behind with things like WPF because none of my clients has any need for it, and I certainly can't justify it in their eyes (yeah, yeah, that was my little rant.) I'm quite interested in F# though, and I hope one day, sigh, to finish the poker game I'm writing in F#. As to obtaining a masters degree, I have the following thoughts: no, unless the degree helps for the field of work you're in. That said, I've solved problems in videometric and network topology analysis that have stumped PhD folks for years. I guess it just takes a fresh pair of eyes, or at least ones that aren't myopic in their "try to shove the problem into the solution domain that I'm an expert in" approach. Marc
Marc Clifton wrote:
adult entertainment industry ... re-architecting legacy systems
You wouldn't be un-doing all my beautiful DEC C / RDB work would you? :suss:
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Very good arguement. I thought about this a lot and I kinda agree with both of you. I'm afraid that if I leave now I'll come over as "rough patch = goodbye employer". On the other hand, on this path, my career is taking a turn to a place I've been trying to avoid: consultancy in a financial area. (I wanna get more technical, not towards selling and modding an existing application.) The thing is, I'm working for a small company. 9 people, counting programmers, technicians, the boss and the secretary. The work is pretty nicely spread, with me catching up more and more. But the boss wants to expand the NAV market. So I can't change to another position. Unless the guy across from me is willing to switch jobs. But I quote him (litterly, this is grafted into my memory because I thought it was pretty rude of him, considering I'm very envious of his job) "I'm glad you took over that crappy job". Crappy job meaning NAV programming.
KenBonny wrote:
I thought it was pretty rude of him
Oh boy a sensitive newbie, EVERY junior employee in EVERY industry gets the crappy job. This guys is actually acknowledging that you have the crappy job (that he probably had before you) and is thankful to move on. I'd agitate to get into the .net space but would be surprised if you succeed initially, your current value to your employer is minimal so losing your skills and knowledge would not hurt, wait another year and you will get a different reaction.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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DavidCrow wrote:
What this would say to me as an employer is that when things get rough or don't go your way, you leave.
There is a different way to look at it. He signed on to do .net work. If his employer wishes to change development process/environment, the OP should be free to leave and I would never hold it against him. Of course if the OP will leave or suck it up is up to him, it's an issue of how soon he can find another .net job vs being unemployed vs staying at a job that he is not happy at. How many of you would start looking for a new job if your were suddenly made to support old VB and classic ASP projects?
Whoosh, that was me out the door but then I'm an old fart who has the experience and skill to be in fairly high demand. A newbie with 6 months practical experience is a completely different kettle of fish. I have refused contract when they are not the tech mix I am looking for or the company has no clear plan to move forward. I once refused a VB6 contract with JP Morgan because the had no plans to move to .net, go figure...
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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KenBonny wrote:
I thought it was pretty rude of him
Oh boy a sensitive newbie, EVERY junior employee in EVERY industry gets the crappy job. This guys is actually acknowledging that you have the crappy job (that he probably had before you) and is thankful to move on. I'd agitate to get into the .net space but would be surprised if you succeed initially, your current value to your employer is minimal so losing your skills and knowledge would not hurt, wait another year and you will get a different reaction.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
Mycroft Holmes wrote:
wait another year and you will get a different reaction
Then he'll have me trained in 2 or 3 different NAV courses, all with the jolly sounding names of "Financials Beginner" (800ish pages on how to do accountancy) and "NAV Setup" (400 pages on what booking post go where in NAV). So no programming stuff whatsoever, only more accountancy and financial stuff. The problem is that my boss is not looking for any new .NET programming stuff, but for more and more NAV work. The .NET projects are enough to keep one man occupied, not two.
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Mycroft Holmes wrote:
wait another year and you will get a different reaction
Then he'll have me trained in 2 or 3 different NAV courses, all with the jolly sounding names of "Financials Beginner" (800ish pages on how to do accountancy) and "NAV Setup" (400 pages on what booking post go where in NAV). So no programming stuff whatsoever, only more accountancy and financial stuff. The problem is that my boss is not looking for any new .NET programming stuff, but for more and more NAV work. The .NET projects are enough to keep one man occupied, not two.
Then you are right, you are in the wrong company, if they have no plan to move forward in your preferred platform then move and that is reason enough to move.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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KenBonny wrote:
Now I'm looking for another job...
What this would say to me as an employer is that when things get rough or don't go your way, you leave rather than try and work through them. If after a year things don't improve, then I think you'd be justified in leaving.
KenBonny wrote:
What is your degree?
All are in computer science.
KenBonny wrote:
Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
It all depends on your reason. I earned mine for myself not an employer. My current employer does not even know I have it.
KenBonny wrote:
How did you get to this point in your career?
Time. I also considered everything asked of me to be a learning experience, regardless of the tool used.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"Man who follows car will be exhausted." - Confucius
DavidCrow wrote:
What this would say to me as an employer is that when things get rough or don't go your way, you leave.
That's a little unfair. If an employer changed the terms and conditions of my employment in such a way, I'd feel perfectly justified in looking elsewhere for a job that meets the original terms and conditions.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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Well I have no idea what "nav" programming is however if your shop only has 9 people most of whom are not programmers that actually makes it a much more desirable place to work as a newbie because you will get a chance to learn a *lot* more than you ever would at a bigger shop. Employers in general love to get people that are more well rounded and know more aspects of the business and it's a priceless education for you. I firmly believe a developer that knows absolutely nothing about all aspects of the software business including sales, marketing, management, accounting, customer service etc will go through their career being utterly defenseless like a puppy in traffic. Sounds actually like an ideal first place to work to me. As for crappy job, you're a beginner, if you think you're going to get anything less than a crappy job that no one else wants to do for the foreseeable future you're dreaming. :) Consider that it takes at least a decade to get halfway useful at anything. This rule applies to any human endeavor as equally as it does to becoming a useful programmer.
Yesterday they said today was tomorrow but today they know better. - Poul Anderson
John C wrote:
Consider that it takes at least a decade to get halfway useful at anything. This rule applies to any human endeavor as equally as it does to becoming a useful programmer.
What are you talking about? .NET is hardly a decade old. You're saying there's not one halfway decent .NET programmer out there?
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Hello, fellow Projecteers. I've been lurking on here some time now and I think this is the best place to ask my question. I graduated last June and started working a couple of months later. I'm working 4-5 months now as a Dynamics NAV (a.k.a. Navision) developer. Got hired to work out a .NET project, but two weeks into the job my boss says to drop it because it's too expensive for me to work out. He gives me several NAV assignments and wants me to specialize in NAV. Personally, I hate NAV. It's old, it's clunky, it won't work without a dozen hacks, the development language (C/AL) is limited and frustrating (I'm used to C# from school and personal projects). Now I'm looking for another job, but every interesting job I encounter asks for a masters degree or experience as a programmer. My question to you: What is your degree? What do you do / did you do as a programmer? How did you get to this point in your career? Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
I have bachelors in telecommunications, with major in wireless transmission and almost no experience in programming beside mandatory for university (we don't choose all our fields as in USA) so I never had an option of humanities or history since it has no bearings of technical minded university. If you started working, withing two years you'll bypass anything you might learn obtaining masters. I got here by starting in small company then after couple of years getting up and finding another for simple reason they would always consider me newbie and remember my initial beginners mistakes. Now I'm in fairly big company with small IT stuff and diverse projects (including support for some older stuff(GUPTA, VB6 and such). But if they suddenly left me with only support job only for old stuff, I'd be out before they'd finished the sentence. Little long winded, sorry.
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DavidCrow wrote:
What this would say to me as an employer is that when things get rough or don't go your way, you leave.
That's a little unfair. If an employer changed the terms and conditions of my employment in such a way, I'd feel perfectly justified in looking elsewhere for a job that meets the original terms and conditions.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
And that's certainly your prerogative. When I started this job nine years ago, I was to be doing new/maintenance work using MFC. For the past three years I've been doing Java development. I would not think of looking elsewhere, as I really enjoy the new challenges.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"Man who follows car will be exhausted." - Confucius
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And that's certainly your prerogative. When I started this job nine years ago, I was to be doing new/maintenance work using MFC. For the past three years I've been doing Java development. I would not think of looking elsewhere, as I really enjoy the new challenges.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"Man who follows car will be exhausted." - Confucius
DavidCrow wrote:
I really enjoy the new challenges
Good for you, you like coding in C++ and Java. I'm stuck in C/AL code. It has an IF, REPEAT and SWITCH statement, nothing else. I think it's boring and it's not teaching me anything new. You could say it's a lesson in humility, but basicly I'm just writing code that gets records, adds or multiplies something and then writes the result into another table.
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And that's certainly your prerogative. When I started this job nine years ago, I was to be doing new/maintenance work using MFC. For the past three years I've been doing Java development. I would not think of looking elsewhere, as I really enjoy the new challenges.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"Man who follows car will be exhausted." - Confucius
DavidCrow wrote:
When I started this job nine years ago, I was to be doing new/maintenance work using MFC. For the past three years I've been doing Java development.
That's fine if you're happy with the job/enviromnent/colleagues, but I can easily see it as being the straw that breaks the camel's back, and I certainly wouldn't condemn someone for taking such action as looking for another position. One of the major tenets of good management is that you should do everything you can to help your people expand in areas they're comfortable with. Forcing them to move into areas they're not comfortable with, no matter how much you would prefer not to, conflicts with that tenet, so you have to be aware that it could cause you to lose people.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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Hello, fellow Projecteers. I've been lurking on here some time now and I think this is the best place to ask my question. I graduated last June and started working a couple of months later. I'm working 4-5 months now as a Dynamics NAV (a.k.a. Navision) developer. Got hired to work out a .NET project, but two weeks into the job my boss says to drop it because it's too expensive for me to work out. He gives me several NAV assignments and wants me to specialize in NAV. Personally, I hate NAV. It's old, it's clunky, it won't work without a dozen hacks, the development language (C/AL) is limited and frustrating (I'm used to C# from school and personal projects). Now I'm looking for another job, but every interesting job I encounter asks for a masters degree or experience as a programmer. My question to you: What is your degree? What do you do / did you do as a programmer? How did you get to this point in your career? Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
I've been in similar situations, and it is never pleasant, but it can make a career. Here is how I see it, based on how I've handled such things in the past (I've been a developer, architect, IT manager, industrial engineer, etc. for 30+ years) and the limited understanding I get from your post. It may be that you are doing these or similar things. First, you have a degree. That and $1 gets you a cup of coffee. Your usefulness to a company largely depends on what you can do and what you know, and with a new degree, that isn't much. College is more about indoctrination than education, and in technology, what the academics think is important often isn't in the real world. If you understand that, you can understand why you get the less desirable work. Learn to understand your role in the company and how you can add value to that company. See the "big picture" of what you and the company, as a team, are trying to do. They didn't hire you to write code - they hired you to help achieve the company's mission, and programming is part of how you would achieve that. Second, you need to know more than just how to program. You need to understand the business of the company. If it is accountancy, or whatever, understand what it is they do, and how the customer benefits from it. Understand how the company's products are sold, and what it is that makes them appealing, and what could make them better. Third, take some initiative. On your own time, rewrite part, most, or all of your company's application in whatever language you are comfortable with. It will take a while, but during that time, you are learning more about the company and what makes it work, and you are becoming more valuable. At some point, you can show your boss a prototype and how much better it is, how it is more reliable, new features you thought of, the decrease in time from requirements to delivery, etc. You may also find out why the boss is so stuck on NAV. There are often very sound business reasons for not moving from one old language to another that is newer. As for degrees, I am getting my BSIT now. I am in my last year, and every class I've taken so far is stuff I already know. That sure makes for a high GPA. :) For 30 years, my experience has always been sufficient, since most business folks want results, not what looks good on paper. I can't tell you how many times I've come across degreed developers who do something or believe something because that is how they learned it in college. I try to get them to look past the pr
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Hello, fellow Projecteers. I've been lurking on here some time now and I think this is the best place to ask my question. I graduated last June and started working a couple of months later. I'm working 4-5 months now as a Dynamics NAV (a.k.a. Navision) developer. Got hired to work out a .NET project, but two weeks into the job my boss says to drop it because it's too expensive for me to work out. He gives me several NAV assignments and wants me to specialize in NAV. Personally, I hate NAV. It's old, it's clunky, it won't work without a dozen hacks, the development language (C/AL) is limited and frustrating (I'm used to C# from school and personal projects). Now I'm looking for another job, but every interesting job I encounter asks for a masters degree or experience as a programmer. My question to you: What is your degree? What do you do / did you do as a programmer? How did you get to this point in your career? Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
Degree: BA in Economics Minor in Business Administration What I do: Senior Engineer Design and develop software using C++, C#, Powerbuilder X| , etc. Masters worth it? Not unless you plan to write software for the Space Shuttle.
"Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein
Jason Henderson
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Hello, fellow Projecteers. I've been lurking on here some time now and I think this is the best place to ask my question. I graduated last June and started working a couple of months later. I'm working 4-5 months now as a Dynamics NAV (a.k.a. Navision) developer. Got hired to work out a .NET project, but two weeks into the job my boss says to drop it because it's too expensive for me to work out. He gives me several NAV assignments and wants me to specialize in NAV. Personally, I hate NAV. It's old, it's clunky, it won't work without a dozen hacks, the development language (C/AL) is limited and frustrating (I'm used to C# from school and personal projects). Now I'm looking for another job, but every interesting job I encounter asks for a masters degree or experience as a programmer. My question to you: What is your degree? What do you do / did you do as a programmer? How did you get to this point in your career? Do you think it's worth to obtain a masters degree?
I got to this point in my career (just starting to move up the federal government ladder) by paying an awful lot of dues. I put in ten years of hard time in the video game industry, for example. You never know when that crap maintenance work will pay off. I got some good pay in the 90's because my early OJT was FORTRAN-77 and mainframe operating systems. There are still such positions to be had if you're in the right place, etc. I'm starting a Masters (System Engineering) now because it's very big in the government. In this economy, I'd make some lemonade if I were you.
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I've been in similar situations, and it is never pleasant, but it can make a career. Here is how I see it, based on how I've handled such things in the past (I've been a developer, architect, IT manager, industrial engineer, etc. for 30+ years) and the limited understanding I get from your post. It may be that you are doing these or similar things. First, you have a degree. That and $1 gets you a cup of coffee. Your usefulness to a company largely depends on what you can do and what you know, and with a new degree, that isn't much. College is more about indoctrination than education, and in technology, what the academics think is important often isn't in the real world. If you understand that, you can understand why you get the less desirable work. Learn to understand your role in the company and how you can add value to that company. See the "big picture" of what you and the company, as a team, are trying to do. They didn't hire you to write code - they hired you to help achieve the company's mission, and programming is part of how you would achieve that. Second, you need to know more than just how to program. You need to understand the business of the company. If it is accountancy, or whatever, understand what it is they do, and how the customer benefits from it. Understand how the company's products are sold, and what it is that makes them appealing, and what could make them better. Third, take some initiative. On your own time, rewrite part, most, or all of your company's application in whatever language you are comfortable with. It will take a while, but during that time, you are learning more about the company and what makes it work, and you are becoming more valuable. At some point, you can show your boss a prototype and how much better it is, how it is more reliable, new features you thought of, the decrease in time from requirements to delivery, etc. You may also find out why the boss is so stuck on NAV. There are often very sound business reasons for not moving from one old language to another that is newer. As for degrees, I am getting my BSIT now. I am in my last year, and every class I've taken so far is stuff I already know. That sure makes for a high GPA. :) For 30 years, my experience has always been sufficient, since most business folks want results, not what looks good on paper. I can't tell you how many times I've come across degreed developers who do something or believe something because that is how they learned it in college. I try to get them to look past the pr
MSBassSinger wrote:
First, you have a degree. That and $1 gets you a cup of coffee.
This degree thought me more than to look pretty. I learned how to solve problems analytically. A lot of my friends would be baffeled if they were introduced to the terms "recurring" or "redundant", let alone the complex connections within a database or how to solve some of the basic programming problems. (This probably says more about my friends, but lets not get into that, shall we.)
MSBassSinger wrote:
Second, you need to know more than just how to program.
I agree with you there. Programming is only half the job, the other half is understanding the needs and desires of your customer and satisfying them.
MSBassSinger wrote:
Understand how the company's products are sold
I want to focus on the technical aspect of my job (thus the question of wheter or not to continue my education), why would I want to look into the 'social' aspect (why does this software / service attract customers)? To be fair, I didn't specify that in my original post.
MSBassSinger wrote:
On your own time, rewrite part, most, or all of your company's application in whatever language you are comfortable with.
Problem is that all the applications are pretty up to date, they're written in C# by my collegue. As far as recreating them, he uses the Infragistics framework and the LightSpeed ORM Tool for quick database access. The combined value of those tools is €1500 (about $2000). Not an environment I can just recreate at home. Whatever I do in my spare time with limited tools and resources cannot compete with a guy with a company backed environment (the tools, servers, etc) and almost 5 years worth of experience with our customers and what they want. And while I have social obligations after work (friends, I sport a bit) that will reduce the time I can invest into these projects, whereas he has 8 hour a day (maybe a little less, with other work interfering) to maintain and update these programs.
MSBassSinger wrote:
The bottom line is that it is not the degrees you have, but the knowledge, skills, abilities, experience, drive, loyalty, character, and insight you have - none of which you g
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MSBassSinger wrote:
First, you have a degree. That and $1 gets you a cup of coffee.
This degree thought me more than to look pretty. I learned how to solve problems analytically. A lot of my friends would be baffeled if they were introduced to the terms "recurring" or "redundant", let alone the complex connections within a database or how to solve some of the basic programming problems. (This probably says more about my friends, but lets not get into that, shall we.)
MSBassSinger wrote:
Second, you need to know more than just how to program.
I agree with you there. Programming is only half the job, the other half is understanding the needs and desires of your customer and satisfying them.
MSBassSinger wrote:
Understand how the company's products are sold
I want to focus on the technical aspect of my job (thus the question of wheter or not to continue my education), why would I want to look into the 'social' aspect (why does this software / service attract customers)? To be fair, I didn't specify that in my original post.
MSBassSinger wrote:
On your own time, rewrite part, most, or all of your company's application in whatever language you are comfortable with.
Problem is that all the applications are pretty up to date, they're written in C# by my collegue. As far as recreating them, he uses the Infragistics framework and the LightSpeed ORM Tool for quick database access. The combined value of those tools is €1500 (about $2000). Not an environment I can just recreate at home. Whatever I do in my spare time with limited tools and resources cannot compete with a guy with a company backed environment (the tools, servers, etc) and almost 5 years worth of experience with our customers and what they want. And while I have social obligations after work (friends, I sport a bit) that will reduce the time I can invest into these projects, whereas he has 8 hour a day (maybe a little less, with other work interfering) to maintain and update these programs.
MSBassSinger wrote:
The bottom line is that it is not the degrees you have, but the knowledge, skills, abilities, experience, drive, loyalty, character, and insight you have - none of which you g
doesn't a degree say that you have studied in a certain field, thus giving you knowledge, some skills and abilities in this particular field. Not so much. A college degree is the toolbox, but it is largely empty until you put your own tools in it. Anyone with a decent brain and good drive can study on their own and get what you got in college, at least academically. It is what you learn after college that makes you worth more to employers. In terms of real value in the IT field, college degrees are vastly overrated. isn't it the job of the employer to keep me interested No. It is the job of the employer to make a profit such that they can keep people employed and add value for the shareholders. It is your job to keep yourself interested and fit into your employer's plans towards those goals.