top 5 things I’d focus on when thinking about a bootcamp

written by: the techshed team

tl;dr join a coding bootcamp to build skills, choose time format, in-person/remote, align projects with dream firms, explore emphases, and embrace lifelong learning through investment.

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a development bootcamp is an extensive course where you can gain foundational skills that will help you within the tech world. it allows you to jumpstart your skillset and by the end, you should have a couple of projects under your belt to showcase in your portfolio.

we’ve curated a list of our top 5 things to consider and our choice if we were to do it all over again.

top 5 things to consider

• 1. full-time / part-time

  • whatever time you have, there are definite pros and cons to both. one of the biggest things if you can afford it is the idea of going full-time. coding isn’t easy and almost always takes time to learn and improve each day. like any skill, you’ll need to understand how to learn and grow. going part-time might mean that you’ll be able to continue to make money, but it will also create more time that you will need to learn.

• 2. in-person / remote

  • an in-person classroom creates an amazing atmosphere for people who all want to progress and learn. at any time, you’ll have your peers and mentors near you in case you have questions or can help others as well. depending on your personality and work ethic, remote may be a great option in terms of being able to handle things yourself and learn on overcoming obstacles.

• 3. identifying companies you’d want to work for

  • this isn’t something you’d have to choose this or that, but identifying companies you’d want to work for, will help you decide what projects would be good to work on. if you’ve wanted to work for slack, create something that has a chat feature or team based features that can be incorporated there. this will also help you understand what kind of companies before a bootcamp that you are genuinely interested in.

• 4. emphasis

  • many bootcamps have different emphasis: web development, python, data, etc. there are so many different kinds of paths someone can take and can often cause a lot of confusion. our suggestion is to create a LinkedIn and find people with these roles and ask them what they do day to day, or ask people that you know. the more people you talk to about what they do, the more you can get a sense of what you might be interested in.

• 5. investment

  • a bootcamp is an investment and isn’t a quick way to gain a career. it’s something that will help you learn how to learn in the development world, there are multiple solutions and not just one way to do things, and it is ever-changing. having the right mindset and knowing that the practices that you do at a bootcamp will help shape your habits into a great developer