Meet Ricardo: From Marketing Consultant to Front-end Developer

Hello, my name is Ricardo and I’m originally from Brazil, but I’ve been living in the Netherlands for the last 10 years. I have a bachelors degree in International Communications where I specialized in marketing. Before becoming a front-end Developer, I was working as a Digital Marketing Consultant and I even founded my own company Marketing 4 Peers. Eventually, I decided that I wanted to find a role that was more stable, so I began looking into the world of web development and the rest is history. 

Before joining the bootcamp I had a little bit of knowledge when it came to the world of coding. I had done a few courses in HTML, CSS and JavaScript, but I felt like I was still lacking some technical knowledge. I also felt as though I needed to learn more about putting all of my knowledge together in a more structured manner. That's when I began searching for a bootcamp. I really liked what Le Wagon had to offer so I just went for it! 

I did the bootcamp back in January 2021 so at the time, due to Covid, I was in a remote format. Having said this, we still managed to have a nice community feel. One of my bootcamp classmates and I actually began working together at Ask Phill after graduating. Funnily enough, we only actually met in person this year, which was a nice full circle. 

I really wanted to change careers and get into a profession that wasn’t language based. Development is great in that sense as you’re able to work in any location independently without having to rely on your language skills. Besides that, as I had mentioned previously, I had some prior experience when it came to coding, but I was lacking the structure that was necessary to be a developer. I knew that Le Wagon would be the next step in allowing me to acquire the missing knowledge to advance my career as a developer. 

I can say with 100% certainly that in every way it did. Even the referral for my first position after graduating at Ask Phill was through a Le Wagon contact. Le Wagon helped me land my first role as a developer in every way possible.

I graduated from the bootcamp at the end of March and I signed my contract with Ask Phill one month later. One of the things that I found really important after graduating was to ensure that I kept up to date with the skills that I acquired throughout the bootcamp. This applies today as well. As a developer, there’s always something new to learn.

I think it was really great overall. Of course, it’s a very intensive experience, but it’s totally worth it. With all of the knowledge that you gain, you can explore so many different opportunities after graduating. 

One of the great advantages of joining Le Wagon is the network. When you graduate, you join a community of 14,000+ alumni. Within this community there are so many opportunities and this is actually how I landing that first job. The community made all the difference for me. 

After graduating, I began working as a front-end developer at Ask Phill, but I actually just started a new job at SiteSpect Europe. Here, I will be continuing my career as a front-end developer. 

Having said this, I have more experience at Ask Phill, so I will tell you more about my role there. Ask Phill is a certified Shopify Plus agency specializing in e-commerce. One of the great advantages of working at Ask Phill was that we built websites with the Shopify API. One of the great advantages of this is that Shopify was built on Ruby on Rails, so this was really ideal for me as I recognized a lot of what I had learned previously at the bootcamp. I also really enjoyed working at an agency with a very fast work pace as this truly helped push me to improve my front-end development skills and learn. 

Overall, my time at Ask Phill was really interesting and I got to apply everything that I learnt during the bootcamp which was a really rewarding process. 

I think, especially these days, the flexibility is a big bonus. This became a reality for everyone, but especially within tech. For me personally, this flexibility is extremely important. It has allowed me to save time with regards to commute and spend more time with my family. It’s a huge advantage. 

I’d say a big piece of advice is to be open-minded and to do the work. If you trust the process, you can only profit from the experience. If you truly give into the process, you can learn so much and I guarantee that it will be worth it.