There are as many ways to make money as a Digital Nomad (DN) as there are mind-blowing, eye-popping places in the world to visit. From creating your own products to writing books to freelancing as a SEO expert, designer, marketer, lawyer, bookkeeper, etc, to building your own business, there is no limit to the number of things you can do.
Today we’re going to take a closer look at just one of them – working as a Software Developer.
First, a little about me: I’m a serial entrepreneur with a background in Computer Science and Mathematics. I’ve been programming computers since 1980 and hiring and mentoring Software Developers since 1999. My current business has allowed me to be location independent since 2008, and I’ve been traveling the world with my family full-time since 2016.
Got all those dates? Good, there’s going to be a quiz later.
For the purposes of this post I’m going to assume that you you have some programming experience, if not necessarily work experience, and you want to try the DN lifestyle on for size.
Step 1: Skill-ventory
Let’s assess your skills. Have a seat, grab pen and paper or your computer, and make a list. Do you have a CS degree? If so, did you have a specialty? With what languages have you worked and for how long? In what domains have you worked, e.g. financial systems, web applications, embedded systems, security, data pipelines, machine learning/NLP, cryptocurrency stacks, etc?
In short, what’s going to be on your resume?
Step 2: What Kind of Gig Do You Want?
What is it you want to do? If your answer is, “Any kind of development that will get me on the road,” that’s cool. It’s also cool if you want to do something specific, like cryptocurrency stack dev or developing iOS apps. Most people want to work where the money is, so to speak, and that’s fine too.
Now surf on over to one of the many job search engines out there (LinkedIn, Stackoverflow, Craigslist, Monster, Dice, etc) and look for the jobs in which you’re interested. Start writing down all the “hard skill” requirements for those jobs, like Windows development, PHP, Python, C++, database development, Agile, etc.
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If you’re one of the people that answered, “I don’t care what I do as long as I can do it from a beach in Bali,” then search for jobs that most closely match your current skills and experience.
Now that you have a list of your skills and a list of those skills required for the job you’re targeting, it’s time to…
Step 3: Close the Gap
Look at your two lists. If you already have a good number of the skills required, you’re in great shape and you can start submitting resumes.
If you’re not close, how far away are you? If the jobs you’re looking at (e.g. Data Engineer) require many specific skills like SQL, database tuning, ETL design and development, and evaluation of machine learning algorithms and you have a big fat zero, then you have some work to do. That’s fine.
If you are simply missing a few skills, no problem. Many companies will hire you if you’re lacking in some hard skills but you can show evidence of being able to scale the learning curve quickly. Never underestimate your desirability to an employer.
If you know for a fact that you cannot be hired without learning one or more skills for the job, then it’s time to grind. Make it your number one priority to learn as much as possible. Dig in, read, and execute. Just reading isn’t going to cut it. You have to code to learn.
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So start coding. Grab some books and find websites with sample programs you can code up and start messing with. Find some open source projects in your target language or technology and volunteer to help. Post to your contacts or related groups on Facebook and offer to work on projects for free. Read. Code. Learn.
When you have some experience under your belt it’s time to bring out the Resume Cannon. This sucker doesn’t work like a shotgun, though, as most people would have you believe. It’s a laser, and you have to aim it very carefully.
Step 4: Go Hunting
Now it’s time to find that dream job that will fund your round-the-world travel.
Start in the usual places: StackOverflow, Craigslist, Dice, Monster, LinkedIn, Crunchboard, AngelList, etc. Explicitly search for remote jobs, but also look for companies and positions that might be open to hiring a remote developer. These are typically smaller, younger businesses that rely heavily on technology.
Lean on your network. Reach out to everyone you know and tell them what you’re looking for, and ask them if they know anyone you should talk to. It’s possible that no one in your “first degree” network – people you actually know – will be able to help you, but if they reach out to a few people they know, and they reach out to a few people they know, well…now we’re cooking with gas.
When contacting people, don’t be vague. A soft ask can easily be shrugged off. Don’t write, “Hey, I’m looking for some work as a remote Ruby developer. Any help you can provide is appreciated.”
That’s a preemptive strike against rejection. I get it. If you don’t specifically ask for anything, you won’t get a NO, right? Rejection brings back memories of standing on the wall at the eighth grade dance while all the girls were dancing with somebody else. It stings.
You know what stings worse than NO? Your dream dying a slow death in a dusty ditch. Be bold. You’re going to get rejected, there’s no way around it, but if you keep pounding away you’re going to get closer to what you want most: freedom.
Make your ask explicit:
Hey [name], I hope this finds you well. I’m looking for work as a remote Ruby developer using my killer programming skills, and I wanted to ask you a favor. Would you please pass this on to anyone in your network who might be interested, and anyone who knows someone who might be interested?
If you prefer not to “pass it on”, would you introduce me to some of your contacts who might know others who would be interested?
Thanks so much. I appreciate any help you can provide.
Put yourself out there and ask for help. It’s not easy, but if it were easy everyone would be on a beach somewhere with a laptop.
When applying for a development job, the first thing you should do is read the job description carefully. What is the company looking for? What kind of work do they want you to do? Why? What are their needs? What problems do they have?
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Go to the company’s website. Read everything you can get your hands on about the organization. Review their social media accounts, related news articles, or blog posts about the company.
Create as accurate a picture as you can of what the company’s needs and problems are. Put yourself in their shoes.
What Employers Want
It’s crucial to realize when looking for your next job that employers don’t want an employee. They want a solution to their problems. They want a partner with which they can think through difficult issues. They want someone that they can shovel stuff to who will just get it done.
In order to convince an employer to talk to you, you must first look at the situation through their eyes. How can you best tailor your resume to help them see that you are the perfect solution to their problems? How can you craft a cover letter to grab their attention, get to know you, and want to learn more in just a paragraph or two?
You might be saying to yourself, “Hey, this is a lot of work to apply for just one job. I want to apply to 30 jobs. It’s gonna take me forever to do this.”
My answer: Yup. So don’t use the shotgun approach and try to apply to 30 jobs. Just focus on one. Do your homework, put in the effort, send out one tailored resume and cover letter at a time, and move on. You likely won’t need to do it that many times before you get a bite.
To land an interview, you have to understand the company and their needs as well as possible. That continues in the interview itself. Your first goal in the interview shouldn’t be to “sell yourself”, discover what the culture is like, or find out how swole your bank account is going to get. It should be to figure out exactly what the company needs, what problems your interviewer is trying to solve by filling this role, and how your skills and experience can help.
Keep Investing
On that glorious day when you finally land a remote job and start working in your pajamas, you’ll be grinding every day to climb the learning curve with your new company. Once you get up to speed you might be tempted to let yourself coast for a while. Don’t. Keep investing in yourself, keep learning a little bit every day. Be it 15 minutes before breakfast or an hour before bedtime, make sure every day you’re learning something that can make you a stronger contributor to the organization.
All jobs end. What position do you want to be in when yours does?
Time for Action, Jackson
If you’ve read this far, great. Reading isn’t enough, though. You have to take action to make things happen.
So here’s your homework. Do this right now or, if it’s late in the evening, first thing tomorrow morning:
- If you don’t have development skills, take an hour to read up on how you can begin to learn software development. The resources are endless: books, courses, online tutorials, bootcamps, you name it. It doesn’t much matter which language you learn because the first language will teach you some of the fundamentals of programming. What matters is the quality of the resource. A crappy bootcamp isn’t going to teach you squat, it will only waste your time. Take the extra time to find quality resources (we provide a free Resource Guide download at the end of this post), and schedule time to power up.
- If you do have development skills, spend an hour figuring out what kind of job you want. Then write down all your skills, experience, etc as detailed above. Look at the gap between the two.
- Then put another hour on your calendar for the following day to figure out how you will learn those languages and skills that will help you close the gap.
Get moving now. Don’t wait, don’t think, don’t put this off for a “better time”. Movement has power, and the sooner you start moving, the sooner you’ll find yourself soaking up incredible sunsets, exploring exotic cities, and enjoying all this amazing world has to offer.