Level Up to Become a Junior Developer

At Netmatters, we have employed people from almost every educational or professional background you can imagine. Over the ten years we’ve been in business, what we have learnt is that there isn’t just one straightforward path to success. As a result, we are dedicated to providing opportunities to anyone who has the right mindset and the drive to succeed. A great example of this is our Scion Coalition Scheme (SCS), an intensive in-house training program for aspiring software developers with little to no professional experience.

Seeing the growth of the Scion Coalition Scheme has been a truly rewarding endeavour. In fact, we were recently awarded the Skills of Tomorrow Award in the Eastern Daily Press Business Awards, due in part for our efforts developing the scheme. However, what has been even more rewarding is seeing our graduates go from strength to strength in their new careers. We just have to look back at our beginnings to see how far the scheme has progressed.

We started the scheme because we encountered issues finding developers that we thought would grow with us as a company. Upon further examination, we felt we had identified a critical skills gap for developers in the Norfolk area. People looking to start a career would face the same problem over and over again – not enough experience to get their foot in the door, and not enough companies with the resources to train them.  

Like with most new ventures, we started small. We hired three candidates – or “Scions” - who had experience in commercial environments but not necessarily software development. Balancing their training with entry-level development tasks, within six months all Scions had reached their goal of being promoted to junior developers.

Once we saw that the scheme worked, it was just a matter of scaling up. As we grew, we started to receive interest from local tech companies. Their interest in recruiting eager and talented people developed into some fantastic sponsorship opportunities. Scions would then have the chance to join these companies as junior developers upon completion of the scheme.

Our Scions have brought a diverse range of experiences to the table. Some are recent university graduates who have decided to diverge from their original career path. Others have had years of experience in one industry and have decided to take a new leap. As we reach the end of 2018 we now have 12 Scions at Netmatters, and we’re very pleased to announce that we have funding to train more in 2019.

Are you a self-motivated lover of all things technical? Are you looking for a springboard into a challenging and exciting career? Like we said, our Scion Coalition Scheme is growing, and you could be a part of it with the right skills and attitude. Contact Netmatters via the form below, or ring us on 01603 515007 for more information.