My First Job
My first job, and suddenly I was leading
My first job as a web developer turned out to be much bigger than I had imagined. I joined thinking I would mostly be writing code, fixing things, and building websites. Instead, I found myself working with a team of developers and marketers while also being the only developer responsible for the technical side of things. Apparently, the job description had quietly forgotten to mention the adventure.
I worked on the CMS, built and maintained landing pages, and eventually found myself working on a completely new e-commerce website. There was always something happening — something to build, something to fix, something someone needed yesterday. It was exciting, sometimes chaotic, and definitely a learning experience.
But the biggest lesson wasn't actually about coding. I slowly realised that building a product isn't only about asking, 'Can we build this?' You also have to ask, 'Should we build this?', 'Will people use it?', and sometimes the much harder question, 'Is the product or the sales side more important right now?' I was a developer trying to understand a world that wasn't naturally my domain.
That's where my boss and CEO, Carsten, played a huge role. Instead of letting me stay inside the comfortable boundaries of development, he helped me understand how the other side of the business worked. I started seeing the connection between technology, marketing, sales, and the people actually using what we were building. It changed the way I looked at my role.
And then there was the team. Leading and coordinating people was something completely new to me. I had to learn how to communicate, listen, explain things without drowning everyone in developer language, and somehow keep things moving even when I wasn't completely sure myself. It wasn't always easy, but it was incredibly rewarding.
Looking back, that job gave me much more than my first professional experience as a developer. It taught me that being a developer doesn't mean living only in the world of code. Sometimes you have to step outside the editor, understand the business, work with people who think completely differently, and figure things out as you go. I went in wanting to build websites and came out understanding a little more about building products, teams, and myself.