I’ve learned that yeah, and me too, especially since it’s not what I studied and I can’t really give any input on research methods - they are a research group in Spatial Data Science and I’m constantly learning new stuff that’s not directly related to my work. I was hired to build and maintain software tools for their own research and help with code architecture of their own creations. I just love learning so perfect job for me!
It’s a good profession to have! ;) and I wish I could give some solid tips, but this is my first job in the academics and I ended up here by accident. I do know something though: he should not settle for public job postings only. Universities consist of multiple research working groups and many of the working groups just wait until someone who knows software well enough rolls into their team or pay a company to do the job.
Before me for past 20 years they got software devs by either someone walking in and asking if they need a freelancer or if a PhD student had previous studies/experience in software. Apparently they had never posted this job online.
Recently I got another offer from a different working group at a different university, and only because one of their employees had worked with me a year before and knew me. There was np job posting for this position either.
Maybe your buddy already knows all of that about university working groups, but thought that this might be useful info. I work in Europe but academics seem to be the same no matter where lol.
And good luck with the fight against mosquitoes! Those assholes…
That does sound like a pretty rocking job! And it sounds like you’re the only dev, so at the very least you get 100% autonomy in how to solve the problem put before you!
Those are actually really helpful bits of advice. My work is actually at a University (nowhere near the academics though) but I imagine I know enough people who know people that it’d be worth asking about research groups that may need devs. Hadn’t even oxcured to me, I just assumed all groups would put up job postings so if neither interview goes his way, I’ll round up the usual suspects…!
I’ve learned that yeah, and me too, especially since it’s not what I studied and I can’t really give any input on research methods - they are a research group in Spatial Data Science and I’m constantly learning new stuff that’s not directly related to my work. I was hired to build and maintain software tools for their own research and help with code architecture of their own creations. I just love learning so perfect job for me!
It’s a good profession to have! ;) and I wish I could give some solid tips, but this is my first job in the academics and I ended up here by accident. I do know something though: he should not settle for public job postings only. Universities consist of multiple research working groups and many of the working groups just wait until someone who knows software well enough rolls into their team or pay a company to do the job.
Before me for past 20 years they got software devs by either someone walking in and asking if they need a freelancer or if a PhD student had previous studies/experience in software. Apparently they had never posted this job online.
Recently I got another offer from a different working group at a different university, and only because one of their employees had worked with me a year before and knew me. There was np job posting for this position either.
Maybe your buddy already knows all of that about university working groups, but thought that this might be useful info. I work in Europe but academics seem to be the same no matter where lol.
And good luck with the fight against mosquitoes! Those assholes…
That does sound like a pretty rocking job! And it sounds like you’re the only dev, so at the very least you get 100% autonomy in how to solve the problem put before you!
Those are actually really helpful bits of advice. My work is actually at a University (nowhere near the academics though) but I imagine I know enough people who know people that it’d be worth asking about research groups that may need devs. Hadn’t even oxcured to me, I just assumed all groups would put up job postings so if neither interview goes his way, I’ll round up the usual suspects…!
Much appreciated!