Hello everyone!
My name is Sean, and I am a junior Android developer. Since 2024, I have been learning Android development on my own. I have built 3 pet projects, one simple but useful library, and I am currently working on a production-level application.
I moved to the US last summer, and starting in August I began applying for Android positions of various levels (intern, junior, middle, and very rarely senior) on LinkedIn, Glassdoor, Indeed, and other platforms. After my thousandth application, I stopped counting.
During this time, I had 2 interviews. The first one ended with me completing a take-home task, passing the technical interview, and having an interview with the director. After that, I was simply ignored. I followed up several times hoping to get at least some feedback, but without success. I will not name the company, but I can say that it is a fairly large company in the video surveillance industry.
The second interview was with a company everyone knows and that is part of the top 5 FAANG, but there I seriously messed up during the live coding.
In December, I took a short break from the job search because I was starting to lose motivation and burn out. I began taking various courses to earn certifications, and by early January I already had 3 certificates: Meta - Android Developer, JetBrains - Kotlin for Java Developers, and IBM - Databases and SQL for Data Science with Python (don’t ask why I needed this certificate).
Starting last week, I resumed my job search and began sending out about 50 applications per day, slightly expanding my search scope. Now I am considering not only Android Developer roles, but also Mobile QA and Software Developer positions. This expansion is related to the fact that earlier, when I was working on my pet projects, I did not pay attention to testing at all. Starting with the library, I became interested in testing, and after writing any logical piece of code, tests always follow.
At the moment, I am working on a large project (at least for me) where tests play a key role, since I started development using the TDD approach. Sorry for the long digression, but it is necessary to explain why I am suitable for a Mobile QA position, at least at the intern level.
As for Software Developer roles, in addition to Kotlin and Java, I also know Python and SQL. I graduated from an international IT university with a bachelor’s degree in IT and Engineering. During my studies, I gained some experience with C, C++, and JavaScript as part of coursework and academic projects.
Getting back to the main point, I am writing this post after yet another 50 applications across all possible platforms, and I keep thinking that I am once again wasting my time. I do not believe that the IT industry in the US is in decline. I see more and more new job postings every day. I am more inclined to think that the issue is with me. Perhaps I am doing something wrong, and I need to change my approach.
I am asking for advice on how to get my first offer, or at least to understand what I am doing wrong. Maybe I am missing some technologies from the modern Android development stack.
My current stack:
- Programming languages: Kotlin, Java
- Android & UI: Jetpack Compose, ViewModel
- Architecture & patterns: TDD, Clean, MVVM, MultiModule, Dagger, Hilt, Koin
- Networking & Data: Ktor, Retrofit + OkHttp, Coroutines + Flow, Room + SQLite
- Testing: JUnit 4, Mockito, Espresso
- Tools & platforms: Git, CI/CD, Firebase, Postman, Google Play Publishing
I definitely forgot to mention something, and I will add it as I remember.
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