Remote: The Future of Software Engineering Jobs

The world has officially made the switch to remote work. Working remotely has been a growing trend since the early 2000s, but with the coronavirus pandemic, it seems like the entire working world has officially jumped on board.

Unlike other sectors, the tech industry has fully embraced the remote-work trend since the beginning. Silicon Valley-based tech companies have realized that hiring remote workers is a realistic alternative. In fact, remote work makes financial sense as it reduces costs for the company. Tech companies have been able to hire top tech talent from around the world at a fraction of the salary of Silicon Valley-based professionals. Silicon Valley tech companies typically pay in-house, local salaries that are anywhere from 20 to 30 percent higher than the national average.

This bootcamp market report published by Career Karma illustrates how the rise in interest in tech industry careers among young people and seasoned professionals has precipitated the creation of secondary tech hubs outside of New York and San Francisco.

Cities like Austin, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago and Denver are becoming hotbeds of up-and-coming tech talent, becoming recruiting pools for tech companies based in Silicon Valley and New York. Bootcamps in LA are turning the West Coast metropolis into an even more robust tech town. 

Coding Bootcamps

Coding bootcamps are developing up-and-coming tech talent by teaching the programming skills required to succeed in the tech industry in less than a year. These short-term and hyper-focused coding bootcamps are starting to replace the traditional academic routes. Pursuing a four-year university degree—or a two-year program at a community college—in computer science or software engineering is just not as relevant to today’s tech hopefuls.

Coding bootcamp programs from schools like Kenzie Academy offer students flexible class options, including online and self-paced programs. With these programs, students learn their new programming skills from the comfort of their home and in as little as 10 to 24 weeks. Many of these bootcamps also offer flexible financing options like deferred tuition payments and income-sharing agreements that allow students to delay payment until they have landed a job in the industry.

 

Software Engineering

Software Engineers are responsible for building, designing and maintaining the computer programs that we rely on every day, including word processors, spreadsheets, presentations, sales, accounting, chat-based message programs and email applications.

Software Engineers are becoming largely remote workers, as all that is required to build the software is a high-powered computer, and software development environments for languages like C++, Java and Python.

 

Embedded Systems Engineers

Embedded Systems Engineers are responsible for building the software that powers standalone machines like ATMs and self-checkout kiosks.

 

Quality Assurance Engineers

Quality Assurance Engineers, or QA Engineers, update and maintain the computer software that we use every day. When bugs and glitches are found in the software, it is up to these professionals to find the source of the problem and fix it.