Benefits of a growth mindset in developer training

A growth mindset can make or break the success of training a developer, and that’s why we made this concept a pivotal element of our teaching method. Check out the benefits of a growth mindset and learn how it works in action at Codecool.

Codecoolers become skilled and motivated junior developers during our Full-Stack Development course. They’re capable of taking on new knowledge quickly at the workplace and have all the hard and soft skills that make them the best on the market.

But how do they get there in only ten months? A huge component is the growth mindset – this ‘skill’ drives their progress behind the scenes and helps them progress and grow in a way they never thought possible. Let’s see how!

What is the growth mindset concept?

The growth mindset describes a way of thinking about challenges and mistakes.

When you have a growth mindset, you know that encountering a setback doesn’t mean you’re bound to keep having them. It’s just the natural way of progress, and you know that your abilities aren’t set in stone.

We’ve known this since Carol Dweck’s 2014 TED talk.

Just because some people can do something with little to no training, it doesn’t mean that others can’t do it (and sometimes do it even better) with training.

Carol Dweck Tweet

The importance of a growth mindset in education

Having a fixed or growth mindset can make or break the success of the training one takes part in.

Why?

Because cultivating a growth mindset during training leads students to understand that their potential depends on their work. It’s not due to talent they should’ve been born with or any other outside factor. Once believing this, students begin to thrive and progress in a way they never thought they could.

Carol Dweck researched this theory for 30 years. According to her research, children tend to have an inherent growth mindset about their potential. On the other hand, adults are already conditioned to a fixed mindset regarding their own and others’ capabilities in many topics, which limits their ability to progress.

What is a fixed mindset?

We all have a fixed mindset about certain things, our own capabilities above all.

We tend to think that our skills are rooted in talent and shaped by circumstances. That our understanding or skills cannot really be improved. And this can limit progress in many areas of life.

Writing code is a perfect example of that. People tend to think they won’t be able to code because they’re not good with math or they’re not the naturally ‘techy’ type. They don’t see how with the proper mindset and the right methodology they could improve their understanding.

The relevance of a growth mindset for organizations

The ever-growing IT talent gap slows down digitalization and many businesses. So there’s a global need to train new tech professionals and to re-skill employees. But many organizations still have a massive wall between tech and non-tech people. And at the same time, there seems to be no concrete plan to make it possible for people to climb it.

We at Codecool believe tech training is best done by cultivating a growth mindset and celebrating initial mistakes. People sometimes make mistakes when they make an effort and dare to step out of their comfort zone. But that’s when they gain valuable experience and progress, so it shouldn’t be a thing to fear.

We’re building on a growth mindset to make the talent gap a thing of the past and enable digitalization. But what does growth mindset look like in action at Codecool?

Let’s dive in.

Growth mindset in action at Codecool

Our business model builds on a growth mindset and it proved to be a winning bet. We break down walls between tech and non-tech talents and help people, even without any relevant background become the best junior tech professionals on the market.

1. We focus on the beginning

During the application process, instead of looking at degrees, tech experience or achievements, we explore our applicants’ goals, drives and peculiar aspects of their personal profiles. We check their logical thinking and English skills, but no further hard skills. Our case studies prove that having certain soft skills provide a better indication of our student’s future success.

2. They get the big picture right away  

Instead of keeping knowledge to ourselves, we let our students in on the bigger picture behind our approach. During the first few days we present them the growth mindset theory, share our implementation plan and point out their place in the bigger scheme. They understand that becoming a tech talent is their own path, they are the driving force behind this decision. If they put in the work, they’ll succeed.

3. We put our signature on their success

Our method is effective, and our belief in our student’s success is rock-solid. So solid that we’re contractually bound to get them hired if they take our job guarantee. If we can’t do that in six months after they graduate from our 10-month Full-Stack Development course, their tuition fee is on us. So far, 98% of our graduated students have found a job with our help, and 100% work in new tech jobs after our course.

4. They work in agile teams in a workplace simulation

Codecoolers work a lot individually, as well as in agile projects groups during the course. They gain experience with the agile way of working and learn a lot from each other. This way, they organically develop a ton of new skills. Not to mention, they become great team players with solid soft skills.

5. We encourage a failure culture

We encourage our students to make attempts and fail. This way they learn to take alternative approaches to problems, develop an analytical attitude, understand that failure is inevitable, get used to collecting themselves mentally afterward and fail less later, in workplace situations with higher stakes.

6. They get challenging but achievable goals 

The tasks our students get are carefully developed to match the actual level of their skills and confidence during the course. Mentors and peers are there to help, and resources are provided. But we make sure not to give out final answers, and instead encourage them to find their own unique solutions to challenges.

7. They take test results as a snapshot, not a judgement

Frequent evaluation of progress helps our students see where they are in a process and what they still need to work on. We try to make sure test and exam results are not taken as a verdict. Instead, we help them understand where they stand in the process and strive to keep up their motivation.

The result of a growth mindset in training

What’s the result of all the above-listed elements?

Well, Codecoolers …

… become great team players. They are good communicators and can share their responsibilities and successes with their colleagues. They take ownership of challenges and support the development of others.

… can get things done. They are capable of solving challenges quickly and efficiently and are okay with trying different options until they succeed.

… quick learners. They understand the direct impact hard work has on their own development, can take on new knowledge quickly, and like raising the bar for themselves.

Looking for talented tech professionals?

If you’re looking for your next developer, consider partnering with Codecool. We have an active network of quality tech pros and flexible recruitment processes, offering you quick access to top talents.

Growing your teams? We can help you find your next junior who could be in your team in just a couple of days after you contact us. 

Don’t want to let your best colleagues go? We offer up-skilling or re-skilling services too. We’re happy to tailor our flexible training programs to your exact needs, and turn them into your most valuable and skilled digital resources.

In case you have any questions, reach out to us! You can also visit one of our Demo Days on any Friday, online or in person, to check out the skills and capabilities of our students if you’re interested.

Hope to talk to you soon.

Meet cool leaders: Claudia Tamași (Niculiță), CM @Codecool Romania

Claudia_Tamasi_CM_Codecool_Romania

In this blog post series, we’re sitting down for a chat with people making the Codecool vision happen. Meet Claudia Tamași (Niculiță), Country Manager of Codecool Romania.

Claudia_Tamasi_CM_Codecool_Romania

If you want to meet inspiring people, Codecool is a great place to be. Every day we meet hundreds of smart, ambitious students and innovative leaders of our partner companies who want a build a better digital future.

But it’s not only our students and partners that inspire us. We also work with equally impressive colleagues who bring the Codecool vision to life.

We had a chat with one of these colleagues about her current goals, challenges, and outlook on the future. We’re proud to introduce Claudia Tamași (Niculiță), Country Manager of Codecool Romania.

Claudia, how would you introduce yourself if you weren’t allowed to mention your work?

I’m curious, passionate about self-discovery, and love going out in nature. I’m a wife, a daughter, and a sister. My family and friends are vital to me, and I intend to develop as many meaningful relationships as possible. Therefore I don’t go in for “small talk.” 🙂

I can’t live without feeling that I’m evolving and contributing to where I belong, without feeling that good things are happening as time passes. I’m very interested in psychology, understanding how people think and feel, and how I can support their growth and evolution.

What does it mean to be a Country Manager? What does your role involve?

I am directly responsible for Codecool’s overall activity in Romania: I coordinate all the operations, including both the educational part, the recruitment of candidates as well as the placement of students in companies, and the development of partnerships.

I strive to convey the Codecool story to our fellow Romanians. We have an incredible story and mission. I think it’s my and my team’s responsibility to show the world how cool the environment and the vibe are and what transformative things you can learn here. We put a lot of emphasis on programming and technical knowledge, but not only that. We equally focus on a growth mindset, a new beginning in a digital environment, soft skills, collaboration, teamwork, and helping those who are behind growing with others.

I am motivated by results because they give me the energy to move forward. But I am also very interested in how we achieve those results. Ethical principles and values give meaning to life, and often it is the “how” that matters more than the “how much.”

What’s your background?

I studied economics, followed by psychology. I started working in service and product sales during my university years; I have over 15 years of experience in the telecommunication industry at companies such as Vodafone and Orange. 

I’ve worked for companies with dedicated Business-to-Business services for the last ten years. I was a national sales director at Adecco and a commercial director at TMF Group; I also delivered coaching and leadership programs to various teams.

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Why did you decide to join Codecool? What do you like most about the company?

In 2016 I decided to take a break and enjoy a sabbatical year. Although I enjoyed what I did before, in 2016, I felt a strong need to rethink my career and make more meaning out of what I did. I wanted the eight hours I invest in the professional environment every day to contribute to society and be meaningful. 

That year I did a lot of volunteering. I attended a coaching and nutrition course – that’s how I understood to take a break and recalibrate. 🙂 It was clear that I needed to go in a different direction. Previously, all my experience had been in large corporations, where you work in a framework full of rules and procedures. I felt I needed more freedom and a context where I could put my ideas into practice. I wanted to be able to make a meaningful contribution to the project I was managing. 

While I was thinking about which direction to go, Codecool came to me. I was very enthusiastic because I found it fascinating how the good of all combines in this project. The candidate wins because we change his life, and they can have a career in IT. Our partners win because they get junior full-stack developers who are very well prepared for their business. 

And in the end, after investing 12-18 months into training students, we also win the Codecool team and investors. It’s a win-win for all parties, which makes me very content. In addition, it fairly respects a principle that firmly guided me in life: I choose to give before asking for anything. 

What is your most ambitious goal at Codecool?

There are two: one that involves Codecool and one that goes beyond Codecool. The latter has to do with Romania, which has great potential to become one of Europe’s most robust IT hubs. We seem to have the right size, the right talent, and a sufficient number of IT people in the country. There are also many talented people abroad who would probably return if given the motivation to return. But we need a well-thought-out political and socio-economic strategy. 

Regarding Codecool, my dream is that it becomes a game-changer both in Romania and across Europe. I would like to see Codecool becoming the strongest school in Europe, being the first choice when a person wants to do reskilling, upskilling, or simply wants to switch careers and join the IT industry. 

What do you see as your biggest challenge currently?

The biggest local challenge at this moment is the educational model offered by Codecool. No school in Romania provides the following two benefits: postponing payment until you find a job and guaranteeing you a job by contract at the end of the study period. 

We are the first private school in Romania to offer these benefits, so there’s reluctance among potential candidates. Many tell us that it’s too good to be true and are convinced there’s something rotten in the middle. But there’s nothing rotten; instead, the opportunity comes with a lot of hard work and sweat from the students because there’s no way to become a full-stack developer overnight.

The intensity of the courses and the schedule of 6-8 hours a day from Monday to Friday can lead to frustration and dissatisfaction. Unfortunately, we are used to traditional education, where we go to school, sit at desks and listen to teachers for a few hours. Whereas in Codecool, 90% of learning is done through practice. We want to offer learners an experience similar to an environment in a software production company: we work in an Agile way, we work in teams, we share the tasks, we have daily standups, peer coding, code review, and so on. And this is how our graduates integrate very quickly into IT companies at the end of the process. But let’s not forget that satisfaction requires a lot of effort from the students and us.

What are some important trends you see in the world that impact your work at Codecool?

It seems to me that all the global challenges we are all facing – starting with the pandemic and continuing with the war in Ukraine – inevitably put us in a zone of insecurity, political instability, and fear. In this context, people choose stability and security. They no longer have the courage to embrace new opportunities, change careers dramatically, put their lives on hold for a year and study IT.

At the same time, we cannot overlook the fact that the pandemic has also increased the development speed of the IT sector. Many processes that used to happen face-to-face have had to move online. Therefore, the need for digitization has become very strong in all industries. In these 2-3 years, we have evolved as much as we would have in 10 years under different conditions.

Codecool_Romania_celebration

Where do you think Codecool is going in the short and long term?

The future looks great!

On 13 September 2022, Codecool merged with Software Development Academy (SDA) and became one of the strongest European training and talent integration centers in the IT&C market. 

The two merged companies will be present in 8 countries (Poland, Hungary, Romania, Austria, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Estonia, and Albania) and will train 15,000-20,000 people annually. In addition, we have over 400 global and local partner companies in Central and Eastern Europe. With more than 300 workers, 17 digital pathways, and a network of 1,600 mentors, Codecool and SDA provide skilling, upskilling and reskilling courses for individuals, companies, and governments.

Our goal is to become the first choice in Europe and implicitly in Romania when it comes to digital education, both for individuals who want to improve their technical skills or want to reskill and for business partners and government institutions.

Why do you think hiring companies should partner up with Codecool?

Because we are a reliable partner. We’re very fast, flexible and good at what we do. If a company comes to us, they receive a list of CVs within 48 hours from which they can choose their candidates – full-stack junior developers. In addition, they can test them for six months before hiring them permanently. Together with the CVs, they also receive a list of technical projects from the Codecoolers, thus saving time in the technical recruitment process. And after hiring, the Codecoolers stay with them for at least 12 months.

Moreover, at Codecool, we focus on both technical and soft skills training: Codecoolers are trained to give and receive constant feedback, to work in a team, to ask for help when needed, to present their projects in English, and to develop a growth mindset. 

Another advantage Codecool has is that we always have a number (10-15) of candidates available, and we have known our trainees for over 12 months. We don’t interact with the candidate for just a few hours – as is the recruitment agency model. We are very focused on the matching part with business partners: we have colleagues who do the recruiting, listen to the business representative, understand the need and the structure of the team and manage to recommend a person both in terms of technical knowledge, personality, and soft skills. 

One last question: How do you see our shared digital future?

I find the digital world fascinating. Remarkable progress has been made, and I believe that digitization and artificial intelligence will dramatically and very quickly change how we see the world. Jobs in 20-30 years will look nothing like they do today. 

It’s fabulous what we can build and how we can help create a new world through digitization. A better, more connected and educated, cleaner, more informed and responsible, more empowered world. All I wish and hope is that those who lead this transformation do it responsibly and for the greater good of all.

Codecool and SDA merge to become a European digital skilling and sourcing powerhouse

We’re thrilled about our next chapter: we’re officially starting a new journey together with Software Development Academy (SDA) to create Central Europe’s biggest digital skilling and sourcing powerhouse. This is a huge step for both companies that will radically transform our ability to help people looking to step into the tech world.

Codecool + SDA = Central Europe’s biggest digital skilling powerhouse

By joining forces, we’ll be a big, trusted provider who can deliver a far higher number of quality candidates to our corporate partners: 15.000-20.000 individuals in a year. We’ll open up a broader portfolio of digital skilling, upskilling, and reskilling programs that our students and partners can take advantage of.

What you need to know about the two companies

We’re two leading Central-European EduTech companies who have already come a long way during the last 7 years. We share a similar vision but until now we’ve each approached it from slightly different angles.

Codecool (started in Hungary) is present in 4 countries: Poland, Austria, Hungary,  and Romania. It has more than 2000 graduates and 300+ corporate partners. The company’s main course is the Full-Stack Developer training that comes with a Job Guarantee.

SDA (started in Poland) is present in 6 countries: Estonia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, and Albania. It has more than 15.000 graduates and 100+ corporate partners. The company offers a variety of shorter IT courses that prepare candidates to enter the tech industry.

Codecool provides longer courses with a job guarantee and places graduates to corporate partners in the region, while SDA offers a wide variety of shorter courses. However, both companies provide high-quality training and teach digital competencies, programming, and IT skills. Different approaches but ultimately, the shared goal of changing people’s lives through digital skilling.

In addition, both companies offer customized reskilling and upskilling projects to their corporate partners. They have also undertaken robust governmental reskilling projects: 10.000 ICT specialists in Albania by SDA and 600 engineers in Hungary by Codecool.

Put those two approaches together and what you get is the perfect product portfolio that serves all market segments.

What benefits does the merger bring to our corporate partners?

As a digital skilling powerhouse, we’ll now be present in 8 countries: Estonia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria, Romania, and Albania.  We’ll have a network of more than 1600 mentors and provide 17 reskilling pathways.

 

“There is a global battle for digital talent, especially coders and programmers, so our main aim remains to provide high-quality digital skilling for employees and employers – but on a much larger scale,” said Michał Mysiak, CEO of SDA, who will lead the merged company as the CEO. “We believe that the combination of Codecool and SDA – with distinct regional and category strengths – will boost the skills level of Central Europeans who are hungry to learn and will be pivotal in the digital transformation of Europe and beyond.” 

Since we’ll have the biggest product development capacity in the region, we’ll be able to produce new courses faster and react to the ever-changing technological landscape as well as the unique needs of our business partners quicker.

“This is an exciting new chapter for both companies where we create a real powerhouse for digitalization,” said József Boda, CEO of Codecool. “Through our consolidated digital skilling programs, we confidently continue to serve the needs of individuals, companies and governments. Graduates from our courses are in high demand, especially as Western European and US organizations look to outsource or find additional talent while lowering costs.”

Combined, we’ll train 15.000-20.000 individuals in a year for our 400+ corporate partners. We’ll be able to serve partners’ needs far better, not only in terms of the variety of tech-skilled people but also on a larger scale and from more countries in the region.

We’ll also keep expanding our geographical coverage and product offering next year. This is required as the Central European region has the biggest digital talent pool on the continent, and there’s an unprecedented need for digitally skilled people in the next decade. 

We’re here to serve this!

József Boda and Michal Mysiak sign the merger contract

Looking for next-generation tech talents?

If you’re looking for digitally skilled people, consider partnering with us. We have an extensive and active network of quality tech talents and flexible recruitment processes, offering you quick access to top talents.

We are also here if you’re interested in up-skilling or re-skilling your existing employees. We’re happy to tailor our flexible training programs to your needs, turning them into your most valuable and skilled digital resources.

Interested in what our new joint company has to offer you? Let’s talk!

SMP Solutions: “We help clients move into the digital era.”

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In our Inspiring Digital Employers series, we’re bringing you some of our 300+ business clients from 4 countries. Meet SMP Solutions from Hungary.

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Our partners inspire us not only to become better employers ourselves but also to contribute to their success with great new tech colleagues, in line with their business needs and matching their corporate culture. We’re proud to be their tech training and hiring partners and happy to connect them with Codecool graduates, the best tech juniors on the market.

Meet SMP Solutions; a company committed to providing high-quality and efficient solutions for challenges in IT, banking and security technology for more than 30 years. They offer their customers complex, best-of-breed solutions to help them fulfil business requirements, from assessment through implementation to operational services.

This time, we sat down for a chat with their HR Manager, Ádám Varga.

Nice to meet you Ádám! Please introduce your company to us. What does SMP Solutions do for the customers?

We work in three broader areas at SMP Solutions: security, banking and IT. We help our customers in these three big areas, from product sales to system integration, custom development solutions, and pretty much everything you can imagine.

We’ve been in business for more than thirty years and we’re constantly expanding our portfolio: right now, we do a vast range of things as a company.

We also have many activities abroad but have local subcontractors there to help us, and everything is supplied from Hungary. We want to keep it that way. We don’t plan to open a separate office in each country, but rather to expand our activities here.

Why is it great to work at SMP Solutions? What is your company like as a workplace?

What’s good about working for us is that we are a “small” Hungarian company. We are now more than 250 people, which is no longer considered small, but culturally we try to keep the small company atmosphere.

We keep the best operating principles from multinational companies – because many colleagues come from this kind of company background and have a lot of experience with that type of work – and leave the ones out that are just holding us back.

We can decide how we want to operate and what is important to us. Every colleague can have an impact on their work and an even broader scale. We encourage everyone at SMP Solutions to share ideas and to take the initiative.

Can you mention some examples where colleagues took the initiative and affected how the company worked?

From day-to-day operations to technological solutions and implementations, we have many examples. Some colleagues start learning technologies independently and share the knowledge with others. One of them, for instance, has immersed themselves in Microsoft Azure and started making tutorial videos for other colleagues entirely on their initiative.

But if someone brings in a suggestion for improving efficiency, we are always open to ideas like that.

Could you please talk about developers at your company? What are they working on, and in what kind of teams?

We have two delivery organisations – one of them focuses on solutions that are closer to hardware. The other team works more on software-related stuff that is less related to hardware sales. Here we have CRM system development, DevOps, data management, big data, and several classic software development teams. Both delivery organisations consist of about 60-70 people.

Colleagues that came to our company from Codecool are working on a key front-end system development project for a large bank.

Are they working in the bank’s office?

Yes, they do. The plan was to work at least one day a week in our office, but now with the pandemic and hybrid working, these plans are constantly changing

We organise internal programmes, get-togethers, barbecues and other activities, so all the colleagues from SMP Solutions who do most of their day-to-day work at the bank’s premises can feel that they’re part of the SMP team too. Also, the two offices are really close to each other.

You can hear about the growing digital talent gap everywhere. What’s your opinion about it? How hard is it for you to find the right people nowadays?

It’s hard to find people nowadays, especially people that are pros at specific technologies. There’s a big gap now between education and job expectations. I mean that very different things are expected of students in university courses than what will be needed for work later.

Even those who graduate from a degree course may not be able to get a job right away. This is a big problem because there is a massive global shortage of technological skills.

At SMP Solutions, we have a career orientation program where our colleagues go to high schools and discuss IT career paths. This is crucial because it’s hard to find a university course that will lead you right to a developer career. And we want to help young people decide in time if IT could be a potential career path for them.

What global and local trends do you see impacting your industry?

What impacts us a lot is hybrid work. Nowadays, it doesn’t matter where your colleagues sit; they could be in London or Los Angeles. We see more and more developers take jobs at companies overseas, too.

This changed a lot for us because If you care about the company you work for and you care about your team, you’ll feel comfortable with us. We try to build a great community and office environment for our colleagues here in Hungary.

But now we need to find something extra to make it fun to work for us. We put together an online chat roulette, randomly drawing colleagues together for a casual chat. We also did game clubs and virtual Christmas celebrations. But there are challenges in bringing the office vibe to hybrid workers at home.

How do you see your cooperation with Codecool? Why is it valuable for you? And what do you think of Codecoolers?

The speed and the quality that Codecool provides are precious, and we know exactly what to expect from someone who comes to us from Codecool. There is a basis, an absolute certainty of quality that we don’t have to assess or test, that we can count on. 

People who come from Codecool are always motivated, enthusiastic, and work well in a team. Generally speaking, their personality is always excellent, and they can collaborate well. They also have a piece of solid core knowledge in their approach and software development mindset.

When we interview a Codecooler, it’s usually not a classic interview per se; we tend to focus on what the person wants to do later and what motivates them in the long run.

We assess how they’d feel at a job where a lot of communication is involved instead of their skills. We try to find out more if they find the work they’ll do later at the bank promising. If they’re enthusiastic, it’s going to work out, and we know we don’t have to test their capabilities. We know Codecoolers have what it takes to do the job well.

What do you think about the communication skills of Codecoolers?

I can see that they are powerful communicators, great in interviews, and always give good answers. They are used to working in a team and don’t have the “nerd mentality” of doing a great job technically but not being able to talk about the process.

What’s your long-term digital vision for your company? What are your most important projects right now?

Our long-term plan is to help customers with their digital transformation. It’s all related to the fact that customers do most of their transactions, activities, and interactions in the digital space, especially in the banking world.

There’s vast potential to improve the traditional banks and to help them move into the digital era.

In terms of significant projects, I’d mention some innovative ones, like a smart office automation product called Soffie, that aims to connect smart solutions from different manufacturers in a vast office building. For example, a smart parking system in an office building cannot be directly integrated into the company’s internal IT system, and this product can provide a solution.

How do you see our shared digital future?

There’s a lot of talk about Metaverse, NFTs and cryptocurrencies these days, and I’m interested in these things. Still, I don’t think that they’re necessarily going to be universally used in the future. The most significant typical digital speciality will be hybrid work and “hybrid” life.

It’s going to be more of this casual, flexible working that you can’t classically separate from your personal life. I think that’s where we’re heading. 

You mentioned more developers working remotely, even for companies overseas. Do you think this will mean that the wages will rise here as well, to compensate for these opportunities?

This trend drives wages upward, but I don’t think companies should get involved in this wage competition. You have to find the people who want to work for you and care about your community and company and give them a fair compensation package.

Inspired by SMP Solutions’ example?

Reach out if you need great junior tech professionals or best-in-class training for your organisation.

Hope to talk to you soon!

5 reasons why women should go into IT

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We know that girls can code and we’re big on inviting more women into IT. With 9 speakers from 3 European countries, our Women’s Day event shone a light on the value and importance of women in tech. Check out the insights and immerse yourself in the topic.

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Looking at the digital world today, we see a strange combination of amazing progress and prolonged change.

On one hand, digitalisation happens at an impressive rate everywhere we look, especially since the pandemic hit.

On the other hand, we still have fewer women in tech training and IT jobs than men. Though it’s clear as day that women make amazing programmers, the gender gap is still very real.

On 8 March 2022 we’ve  sat down with a group of inspiring people to discuss hard facts, top trends and their personal stories:

  • Christine Antlanger-Winter, Country Director of Google Austria 
  • Tanja Sternbauer, Co-Founder & Head of Community at the female factor in Austria
  • Hauke Hinrichs, CEO of SMATRICS in Austria
  • Claudia Tamasi, Country Manager at Codecool Romania
  • Lydia Jeschko, Business Development Manager at Codecool Austria
  • Iulia Iacob, Head of Mentors at Codecool Romania
  • Dalma Csernok, Full-stack Developer Student & CoderGirl at Codecool Hungary
  • Eva Szalai, ex-Codecool Student &Test Automation Engineer at Cap Gemini

Let’s recap this uplifting discussion and explore the key takeaways, along with the 5 main reasons for women considering IT as a career option.

The moderator of the event was Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner, Country Manager at Codecool Austria.

1. You can learn to code

Dalma Csernok, current Full-Stack Developer Student & CoderGirl at Codecool Hungary recalled her first experience with coding: “After I graduated university and studied theatre, I was unsure what to do, so I started working as a receptionist at a hotel. It was quite fun for a short period, but I soon lost motivation and started to look for other challenges. One of my colleagues mentioned a website where I could learn basic coding. A few lessons later I realised that I was writing code that worked, and I enjoyed it. After 2 or 3 months, I decided to switch career paths.” 

It seems that Dalma is not alone with her insecurities. When it comes to tech, women can be quite unsure of their capabilities. And it seems that these insecurities are mostly rooted in childhood experiences.

“Female applicants usually have more questions about the basic abilities needed for coding, the requirements for the school, and the job market in general.” – confirmed Lydia Jeschko, Business Development Manager at Codecool Austria. “Studies on gender differences show that young girls already judge their competencies in domains such as mathematics lower than boys. Likewise, studies on the self-efficacy theory have shown that boys are more confident about their performance in maths and science.

Hauke Hinrichs, CEO of SMARTRICS added his thoughts. “The problem starts in kindergarten where we start to socialise girls differently than boys, destining them for a different career path. I’d love my daughter to become an engineer or scientist. We should start treating girls in a way that allows them to live out their fullest potentials, without any type of discrimination or predestination.”

Eva Szalai, Codecool graduate mentioned the one skill you’ll still need to be successful in tech. “You still need to have abstract thinking. That is a must. But if you have that, the field is wide open. Companies are very happy to have female developers.”

2. Your previous experience will not be lost

Claudia Tamasi, Country Manager at Codecool Romania mentioned a key insight. “When a woman decides to take a new path, there is always the thought that she must start again from zero. But it’s not true. We had a student, who had 10 years of experience in a bank’s back office. She was worried that she would have to start from zero, too, but her experience became a great advantage. She now develops banking applications, making good use of her previous experience every day. Everything we do adds to our personality and our skillset. Our experience will not be lost, we just add new things to it.”

Tanja Sternbauer, Co-Founder & Head of Community at the female factor in Austria continued the thought. “With coding, you will gain a new skill set and you’ll have a brand new combination that will open doors for you. Also, you won’t have to code 12 hours straight every day. Coding doesn’t even have to become your career path because you’ll probably need this skill for different types of jobs in the future. If you can code, nothing will stop you in the next couple of years, no matter what type of job you take.”

Another option is to transform your previous job into a side-activity and pursue it next to your new, flexible job.

Eva Szalai used to be a professional musician and music teacher before starting Codecool. Today she is a Test Automation Engineer at Cap Gemini in Hungary, but she hasn’t given up her previous career either. “I’m a pianist and I still give concerts… I can work from home with flexible working hours, which is a great help. Sometimes I have a rehearsal in the middle of the day, and it’s okay, I can do it, and still keep up with deadlines.”

women in tech 2

3. Diverse teams are more effective and fun

Eva enjoys working in her new team at Cap Gemini. “In my team of 8 there are 3 women, so the gender ratio is quite good. There is mutual respect. Advancement is knowledge-based, and it’s measurable, which is a great advantage in comparison to art. We can learn from each other. The most productive teams have been the most diverse ones at Codecool, too. Men and women in tech have different approaches and different affinities. And men appreciate having women on their team for a varied approach and new perspectives.

Claudia Tamasi added her thoughts. “We’re built differently by nature, but when we’re collaborating, we complete each other.”

Hauke opened the topic of diversity and continued with his insights. “Not just gender diversity, but all kinds of diversity are important in teams, for example religious, racial, social-economic, and age diversity, too.”

women in tech 6

4. Companies desperately need more IT professionals

Discussing the topic of career prospects for women in tech, Claudia Tamasi mentions the following: “When women decide to work in IT, they can pursue whichever field they’d like, there are no barriers anymore. Front-end, back-end, full-stack development. Project management. There’s a new world out there. At Codecool Romania, we have young ladies and mothers learning development, too. This sector is expected to grow around 20% in the next decade so it’s lucrative to enter now, no matter your background or gender. You just gotta have the courage to start.”

Hauke Hinrichs adds that the demand for women developers is quite high today: “We’re searching for 20 new additions to our IT department this year. The lack of qualified labour is quite a challenge, and there are a lot of companies fighting for the best talent – especially for young, talented women.

According to our speakers, it’s important to have women where products are born and to involve both genders in business decisions.

“50% of the global population is female. If you serve women, you have to have women in your management too, to drive business decisions.” – says Tanja Sternbauer. – “Your business will do better financially too. I wonder how this aspect can still be overlooked sometimes.

“Diverse skills are needed to build great things. The mix of voices, ideas, cultures and skills leads to better discussions, better decisions and better results for everyone. Teams work and perform better when they are gender diverse.” – says Christine Antlanger-Winter, Country Director of Google Austria. 

5. A tech job could be your dream job

Some women miss out on a fitting role or their dream jobs just because of preconceptions or a lack of support.

“Women tend to value different sides of the programming profession such as the independence and freedom that a programming job offers, as opposed to the high salary.” – said Lydia Jeschko, Business Development Manager at Codecool Austria.

Working in tech is a fast-paced road and some of the highest-paid professions can be found here, so it’s super lucrative to start. And there’s an opportunity to have a real impact with these professions; you can move to roles that deliver on a purpose. And women in tech tend to value this aspect a lot.

“Women aren’t driven by status or a fancy office location. They’re more interested in fulfilling a purpose and making an impact. They want to contribute to society and give back. What is the impact I can make here and how can I contribute? These are the questions women often ask when considering a job. – says Tanja Sternbauer

women in tech 4

How to get started in the world of IT

Starting fresh in IT isn’t easy, but our speakers had great insights for all young women who’re considering an IT career. The number one factor is confidence according to the panel members.

“Be confident, and just write an application. The worst thing that can happen is that you’re not ready for it and learn from it. But be confident and give it a go. Apply to jobs, go to a programming school like Codecool, and start a great career.“ –  says Hauke.

“To extend your knowledge you have to get out of your comfort zone. I learned later on that staying in that zone won’t help you. So don’t overcomplicate things and try to leave behind your insecurities” – adds Dalma Csernok

The second most important factor would be to have a mentor you can rely on.

“Unfortunately, I didn’t have a mentor when I started. That’s exactly why I wanted to become one for others. To share my knowledge and experience to make it easier for others than it was for me.” – says Iulia Iacob, Head of Mentors at Codecool Romania. – “ My advice to women seeking roles in the IT domain is to be confident, self-aware, and to find a mentor who will support them. They can share valuable past experiences and insights about navigating the tech industry.”

Last but not least, staying curious and open to new things is also key to succeeding for women in tech.

“Be open to everything. If you learn a lot you can have different solutions for the same problem. There was a lady who was resisting alternative solutions often, and she got hired several months later than she expected. You must ask questions because it’s okay not to know everything first. The biggest difference between senior and junior colleagues is often that seniors already know that they don’t have an answer. They are always searching for the answers.” said Eva.

codecool berufsbegleteind

Why Codecool?

Our speakers have discussed what sets Codecool apart and why it’s worth learning to code at Codecool’s Full-Stack Development course. Eva mentions the Full-Stack Development course’s length: 

“What sets Codecool apart for me is the duration. Some other schools are too intense, fast-paced and heavily condensed into a couple of months. As an active musician, I couldn’t have done that type of course. ”

Still, with such an ideal length, there’s a wide palette of knowledge being taught at Codecool, not just frontend or backend.

“It gives you more confidence for the job interviews and more options afterwards since you get a complete set of skills. I could have applied for test automation, Java development or even frontend jobs, too.” – Eva adds.

The flipped classroom method has also added a lot of value according to Dalma and Eva: “I really enjoyed it and it makes total sense since I used to be a teacher. The first thing is that you get a task. And then you get the background materials that you can study. But it’s not set in stone how you have to handle a task. If you can find the solution some other way, then you’re done. There is never one universal solution to a problem at Codecool.”

On this note, Claudia adds: “We’re practically teaching our students how to learn because being a developer means to be in a lifelong learning process. We’re serious about quality, too. Our job is only done when we found you a job that you like. And you can also come and try us without paying for the first 10 weeks.”

Looking for the next addition to your developer team?

It’s never too late to add talented women developers to your teams. If you want Codecool to help you find the next female developer who can start to work right away in your IT team, get in touch!

We’re looking forward to helping you build a more diverse team.

Meet cool leaders: Miklós Beöthy, CM@ Codecool Hungary

Miklos Beothy

In this blog post series, we’re sitting down for a chat with people making the Codecool vision happen. Please meet Miklós Beöthy, Country Manager of Codecool Hungary.

Miklos Beothy

If you want to meet inspiring people, Codecool is a great place to be. Every day we meet hundreds of smart, ambitious and cool students that study with us to change their careers and our shared digital future. And we meet innovative, great leaders with a vision from hiring companies that employ our students to build a digital future.

But it’s not only our students and partner company leaders who inspire us. We also make sure to work with colleagues that are equally amazing and make the Codecool mission and vision come to life.

We had the chance to sit down with one of our colleagues to talk about his current goals, challenges and outlook on the future. Please meet Miklós Beöthy, Country Manager of Codecool Hungary.

Miki, how would you introduce yourself, if you were not allowed to mention your work?

My name is Miki, I am 40 years old, I have a two-year-old son, Bazsi, and I love mountain biking. 

I started to bike 5 or 6 years ago. At first, it was just a leisure activity, then I began to participate in amateur competitions. Last year, after loads of training, I completed the Salzkammergut Trophy B distance, which is 120 kilometres long with almost 4000 metres increase in level. I am not planning to stop here, my aim is to complete the A distance as well, which is about twice as long as the B one. 

And I can’t wait for Bazsi to be old enough for us to bike together in the woods.

What is your work now actually? What are you responsible for?

I’m the Country Manager at Codecool Hungary. As the operating manager of the Budapest campus, the online courses and the corporate business here I’m basically responsible for the success of these.

What did you do before?

I studied computer science and engineering at Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME) and as a sophomore I was a full-time programmer. I have quite a versatile experience, I worked at small IT companies, media outlets and agencies as well. 

For about 8 years I worked at Digital Natives, a startup company. I arrived a few months after its formation, later I became a co-owner, and I was the leader of a developer team with 12-15 members. It was an extremely exciting period for me, but in 2014 the inevitable career crisis that everyone experiences from time to time, hit me. 

A couple of years after the financial crisis of 2008 all of a sudden IT was blooming, and everyone had an “excellent” idea for a startup. At DiNa we were implementing such ideas of the clients through consultation, development and operation. Of course, there were many challenging tasks, but I often felt even during the first discussions with the partners, that it will be another project that lands in a drawer written on a DVD, because it is not going to be a huge success.

One day I woke up and said to myself: “I don’t want to do this anymore.” So, I left the company to look for new adventures.

Meet cool leaders I Miklos Beothy

Why did you decide to join Codecool?

After I broke off from DiNa, I had a one-year sabbatical. I didn’t really work except for a few side jobs, I was travelling for a while in Southeast Asia, and I started to think about what to do next career-wise. 

I loved developing. It is one of the few activities during which I can often be in a flow, and it can really pull me in. Technology was always my cup of tea. However, in the meantime I wanted to get closer to people. 

In the summer of 2015, I was a volunteer at Skool, where I worked as a mentor throughout the summer camp, and I was teaching programming to 8-14-year-old girls. It was an amazing experience. I still remember biking to the Grund (where the camp was held) with a smile on my face every morning, despite the fact that I was exhausted by the end of every day. It occurred to me during that summer that maybe I could do this as a job, not just as a volunteer thing. 

I don’t really believe in destiny, but strangely enough a few weeks later Tomi Tompa, who was my colleague at DiNa, reached out to me saying that there is an IT school in Miskolc, called Codecool, and they would like to expand, and open a campus in Budapest, which is why they are looking for mentors. We sat down with the founders, and a few meetings were enough to convince me that this can be something awesome, and I didn’t want to miss the opportunity, so we started to build the school in Budapest with Tomi. 

When we launched the first class in 2016, we had 4-5 team members at Codecool Budapest. Today we have more than 50 colleagues. Since 2020 I have supported the growth of the school as a Country Manager.

What do you like most about Codecool?

No matter what position I hold, it is always the mission of the school that matters to me. 

Throughout the years I have worked with several hundreds of students, and I ran into amazing stories. Many students eventually find their career path after completing Codecool, and they thrive as IT specialists at renowned companies. While I was a mentor, I loved when students had “eureka” moments with my help, and I managed to get them through situations where they were stuck. It is great to see the spark in their eyes, and suddenly they are just soaring.

My mentor colleagues have similar experiences, who hold training sessions for our partners in our corporate business. As a mentor this can be a challenging task, since the participants are often not too motivated at the beginning, because they need to find time for learning besides their job. But at the end of the courses, they give really positive feedback about our work and the outcome.

What's the biggest goal that you set out for yourself in Codecool?

As a Country Manager obviously my main goal is to make the school more and more successful, but I also treat it as a priority to have a professional team at Codecool Hungary. Our recruitment process is excellent, all of my colleagues are competent at their fields, and we have an incredible community culturally and personally. 

I’m striving to keep this vibe. In a community and team like that it is easier to reach our goals: to connect the best juniors of the market with the greatest companies, and take corporate tech training to the next level.

What do you see as your biggest challenge currently?

I think the biggest challenge nowadays is to grow our online full-stack development course by the end of 2022 similar in size to our offline full-stack course. This is key for us to be able to source our partners the best juniors who match their exact needs always in a matter of days. We want to encourage people to give programming a try and convince them that they should learn it at our school. 

I trust that we can reach our goals, because I believe that those who choose us make a good decision, and now anyone can study with us from anywhere in the country.

What global and local trends do you see in the world that impact your work at Codecool most?

In the past two years the pandemic accelerated certain processes that probably would have happened over the next 10 years otherwise anyway. Everyone needed to react to these unexpected changes quickly. 

Many people work from home now, they manage their whole lives online, like shopping, food ordering, official businesses, communication with friends, and everything else. Tons of IT tools are required to support these social needs, therefore you need tons of professionals as well.

Where do you think Codecool is going in the short and long term?

In the short term, we would like to expand, make our courses available to more people even by introducing courses in new forms, and launching completely new courses – including corporate programs and courses offered for individuals as well.

In the long term, our main goal is world domination, but we would settle for Central and Eastern Europe in the next couple of years. We would like to become the biggest and best programming school and corporate technological HR partner in the region.

Miklos Beothy

Why do you think hiring companies should partner up with Codecool?

All of our founders and mentors work in this field. We gathered plenty of experience as managers, IT managers and senior developers, therefore we know what kind of skillset a junior IT specialist needs to get a project delivered quickly and efficiently. 

We also strongly believe that nowadays a programmer needs to be confident not only with tech, but with a team, too. You can be the best programmer in the world, but if you cannot communicate well, you do not manage your time efficiently, you cannot prioritise tasks and deal with clients, then maybe you will not be a perfect fit for a certain position. 

No matter which course we talk about, our top priority is providing up-to-date, relevant hard skills and strengthening the soft skills. Codecoolers don’t have as much theoretical knowledge about programming as university students, but they have much more project experience instead, having worked more in a team and used the newest technologies during our courses.

We have more than 200 partners in Hungary only, and based on their feedback I think we’ve reached our goals. Codecoolers are really among the best juniors on the market, and they can easily compete with university students for the same jobs.

One last question: How do you see our shared digital future?

Incredibly exciting things are going on in the digital world. 

Artificial intelligence is one of the fields, which will be game-changing in the next 10 years. Technology has tremendous advantages, but besides climate change, I am personally concerned about AI, too: I’m afraid that it will have a negative influence on our lives, if we use its potential for the wrong purposes.

Also, I can’t even imagine how dramatically the emergence of blockchain will change certain areas. It’s enough to look at the spreading of cryptocurrencies to realise that there is a huge potential in the underlying technology. 

I think the present is thrilling, I’m looking forward to the future, and I really hope that we’ll be able to make the best of the opportunities the digital world still has to offer us.

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Twice as many students and the best IT education

How could Codecool continue a steep growth in 2021? What’s in the plans for 2022? Jozsef Boda, CEO of Codecool shares the details.

When you think about just for a moment how we expected 2021 to look like in 2020 … Well, things haven’t turned out quite as we expected then, have they?

Back then, we thought that by the end of 2021 the pandemic will be long over. After the first and then several more shocks, after the first and the second wave, with the help of the vaccines our lives can get back to some kind of a new “normal”, but at least a more stable state. Well, it didn’t quite happen like that. 

Due to waves 3 and then 4 in 2021 we were “in and out” of our school in Hungary, changing from on-campus to online education several times. In Romania, it was online with minimal breaks. While in Austria, just after opening our school and our very first group of Codecoolers starting in November, we had to switch to online classes in line with restrictions. 

But there was one big difference compared to 2020: however unexpected these sudden changes were, we were already prepared for them. We have successfully overcome unexpected challenges in 2020, too, but we weren’t even surprised in 2021. And we managed to turn them to our advantage even more efficiently – for example with further improving the online version of our flagship, full-stack programmer course, reaching much more aspiring students with it then with the offline version, available only for those living close to our schools. Who would have thought in 2019 or even 2020 that we’d get there? Not us for sure.

We have never thought we’d hire new colleagues fully online, not to mention senior managers, but we solved this, too, with no problem. Obviously, most of our graduates were hired by our partners in a fully online process, too. We grew up to the new challenges together.

In the meantime, we haven’t even noticed that we’ve entered the “new normal” we’ve been waiting for – probably because it looked a little different than what we expected. It was clear in 2020 already that things will never go back to how they were before, but we were not sure what they would end up like. By today, one thing stands out as the main characteristic of our new, post-breakout world: constant, significant change. What’s also apparent is that those who are agile enough to adapt and build on change will succeed. One simply can’t afford to wait for things to stabilise. That’s a waste of time, a losing strategy.

We’re so lucky and proud to have achieved so much in 2021, too. Let me mention just a few things:

  • We’ve placed our 2000th Codecooler at one of our hiring partners. Our first students graduated 6 years ago. We’re so happy that 80% of them are still with their first employer, the one we found for them. It’s a true confirmation of our shared success.
  • We’ve launched our very first scholarship programme, the CoderGirl Scholarship. Together with our corporate partners we want to invite and motivate many more women to start tech careers. The most talented and motivated girls and women from those applying to Codecool can now get a chance to study completely for free with us.
  • We’ve opened our very first school in Western Europe, in Austria. Together with Hungary, Poland and Romania, now we’re present in 4 countries already. Another step closer to becoming a leading IT education institute in Central Europe in 1 or 2 years, and later in the wider region. 
  • We’ve launched new open courses. The one-week “Intro to IT” Course was first introduced in Vienna, while the six-month Cyber Security Specialist Course in Budapest. We’ve launched the fully online version of our Full-Stack Developer Course in all the Codecool countries, and helped more than 300 Hungarians to new, future-proof tech careers taking our short courses, fully financed by the local government. 
  • We’ve further developed our corporate re-skilling and up-skilling training services, and launched comprehensive, tailor-made digital academies at some of our corporate partners.
  • Numbers taken out of context can only tell a part of the whole story. Still, the fact that we’ve managed to grow our revenue by 40% year-on-year in 2021, might mean something. It definitely means that we’re a stable partner for our students choosing us to help them switch to a new career, and also to our corporate partners, counting on us to boost the digital skillset of their organisation in the short and long term.

What we see is that digital transformation at companies is speeding up, now in departments and functions previously requiring only non-tech, business-side competencies. More and more capacities and skills are needed in IT, as well as in newly forming, business-side digital roles, and we can’t even come  close to meeting the market demand, due to the limited number of our graduates. We’ve managed to place each and every Codecool graduate last year who chose to take our job guarantee, while developing and delivering more fully tailor-made corporate training programs than ever before.

We would like twice as many students to  start studying with us in 2022 than in 2021. But we accept no compromise on quality, what’s more, we will further improve our courses and services, just like ourselves. 

Our Full-Stack Development Course is more than a bootcamp, and better than a university. A one-year, comprehensive programming course with a job guarantee and post-payment options not only providing a wide and deep knowledge of software development, but also a real job at one of our corporate partners. We would like to make this offer to even more ambitious and committed career-changes in 2022, so we’re extending our job guarantee to the online version of our Full-Stack Development Course in every Codecool country.

We can only be efficient and authentic at the same in what we do, if we are efficient and authentic ourselves. If all our colleagues truly believe in the mission, values and methodology of Codecool, and if they can also represent them and share them with others. The way to achieve this was different 6 years ago, when we were a young, promising start-up venture, and it is different today, when we are a mature, internationally present, and still dynamically growing scale-up company.

To increase our flexibility and innovation power despite the sudden growth of our own organisation, too, we’ve started a comprehensive mid-management development programme. And to keep up with the demand for our corporate services, a dedicated professional team will be responsible for the development and delivery of our corporate training programs and internal academy solutions from 2022.

And now that I’ve mentioned our organisation and my colleagues – let me say thank you to them for their valuable work all year in 2021. Because the thing is that it wasn’t about getting lucky. Whatever we’ve achieved as Codecool is the result of their hard work. Each and every of my Codecool colleagues has contributed to our successes with their enthusiasm, perseverance and skills, and I’m personally really grateful that I have the chance to have been working on shared goals together with them every day.

As a final conclusion, I have to say that after 2020, 2021 was another year full of challenges. The successes we’ve achieved haven’t come easy. We’ve worked for them really hard together. I admit, I got quite tired by the end of the year. I needed the holidays to recharge my batteries. 

But I’m starting the new year full of new energy and motivation, I hope you feel the same. I trust that we’ll have an as exciting and fruitful year in 2022, as we had in 2021. 

I wish a happy and successful new year to all of us, and that we make even more dreams come true, by helping even more successful, future-proof, tech careers to start, together.

Meet cool leaders: Olga Zelent, CM @Codecool Poland

Olga Zelent

In this blog post series we’re sitting down for a chat with people making the Codecool vision happen. Please meet Olga Zelent, Country Manager of Codecool Poland.

Olga Zelent

If you want to meet inspiring people, Codecool is a great place to be. Everyday we meet hundreds of smart, ambitious and cool students that study with us to change their careers and our shared digital future. And we meet innovative, great leaders with a vision from hiring companies, that employ our students to build a digital future. But it’s not only our students and partner company leaders who inspire us. We also make sure to work with colleagues that are equally amazing, and make the Codecool mission and vision come to life.

Last time we talked to Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner, Country Manager of Codecool Austria. Missed the article? Make sure to catch up now.

This time we had the chance to sit down with another inspiring Codecool leader about her current goals, challenges and outlook on the future. We’re super excited and proud to introduce you Olga Zelent, Country Manager of Codecool Poland!

Olga, how would you introduce yourself, if you were not allowed to mention your work? 🙂

I’m a bookworm, a sports-addict, a theatre junkie and a yogini :heart: I respect all beings, and strongly support equality, especially equality of women in all walks of life (and also in business, IT and boards). I am totally in love with Italy, especially the southern part of this stunning “paese”. I am super happy to be a mom of almost adult teenager Hubi, and sweet doggie Chico. 

What is your work now actually? What are you responsible for?

As a country manager, I’m responsible for the general management of the local business activities of Codecool in Poland. My main duties include scaling up the Polish branch. As always, people are the most important for me so I strongly focus on my team’s wellbeing. Motivating the team and working together is crucial to meet our ambitious targets. 

My job in the end is to make sure we attract more and more talented students, and partner up with more and more corporate partners in Poland, who focus on innovation and digitalisation, looking to either grow or re-skill their teams.

What did you do before?

Originally I’m coming from a totally different area: I am a lawyer by education and I have a background in the pharmacy market. After learning everything I could about the field in sales, operational and general management positions for 10 years, I felt I needed a change. I found information technology and the idea of taking part in shaping our digital future super exciting, so I decided to start anew in this new area. And I never looked back since. 

Why did you decide to come work for Codecool?

Before joining Codecool, I already gained experience in IT at a big digital service provider, and also as a scaling-up expert. I spent some years working for one of our competitors, another Polish programming school as well. I made my decision to join Codecool in July because I saw that my experience could come just at the right time for the local business, and also because the Codecool mission really impressed me.  

I wanted to be part of changing people’s lives for the better by providing them quality, accessible IT education and helping them land their first tech jobs. I already knew the market, I knew what it meant to grow the company from a start-up to a scale-up, and I was excited that I could contribute to closing the digital skill gap in Poland.

Olga Zelent Codecool
What's the biggest goal that you set out for yourself in Codecool?

We’re working on making Codecool the first choice for people who want to learn coding really well, but without having to study for long years. Codecool is more than a bootcamp and better than a university, and we want to grow it bigger to bring this ground-breaking type of programming education closer to even more people and companies. 

I couldn’t do all this without a great team, so my first task here was to strengthen the stability and motivation of the local team. Our next, shared goal is to make Codecool a leader in the alternative tech education market in Poland.

What do you see as your biggest challenge currently?

Our biggest challenge on the market today is to show that our offers are not empty promises, but true propositions. We offer a real job guarantee, actual post-payment options, and high quality, project-based education for our students.  And we offer quality candidates with agile project experience and advanced programming and soft skills for our partner companies. Our competitors are fast to repeat all our promises, but they fail delivering on them. The result is a loss of trust impacting the whole market, and Codecool, too, obviously. 

We are doing our best to show Polish people and companies that we can be trusted to deliver on all our promises and make no compromises about keeping our end of a learning or partnership agreement. I know it all sounds too good to be true, but we really managed to come up with a unique business model that works, and when we promise something, then we truly mean what we say.

What trends do you see in the world that impact your work at Codecool most?

We see that the pandemic brought a significant change of attitude in big companies. They’ve started to see more value in re-skilling and up-skilling their existing workforce instead of letting go employees and hiring new ones to grow the digital skillset of their organisations. They are now trying to build stable, loyal, strong in-house digital teams by retaining and  motivating their best people, as well as enriching their skillsets through quality tech training. 

Codecool is not only about open trainings, we can be valuable allies in building digital skills in-house. We have a solid track record of quality corporate re-skilling and up-skilling training programs, as well as full-scale internal academy solutions. Our courses are always tailor-made to the exact business needs of our partners, because every organisation and every digital strategy is different.

Why do you think hiring companies should partner up with Codecool?

We’re quick, flexible and effective. We offer great junior programmers that we ourselves would be happy to work with. Who have the motivation and skills to deliver value in the jobs from day one as proactive members of any team. The hiring process of Codecoolers is fast and painless, too, while our corporate solutions are tailored to our partner’s specific needs and exact requirements. Internal academies powered by Codecool have a proven track record of re-skilling and up-skilling existing employees to work together in highly effective digital teams. 

Where do you think Codecool is going in the short and long term?

In the short term, we’re becoming the first choice for more and more people thinking about a career change to IT, and for more and more companies with ambitious digital strategies and a mature approach to tech talent recruitment and digital skill development. 

In the long term, we’re growing into being the leading programming school, and digital educational and hiring partner in Europe.

How do you see our shared digital future?

I see a bright future with our lives, economy and markets entirely built on digital solutions. And I see teams of digitally skilled people building these solutions in cooperation, using not only advanced technology, but also strong soft skills for a better, fairer, more inclusive digital future.

Your top 5 favourite Codecool blog posts from 2021

man reading blog post on mobile

Read again and get new inspiration from your favourite articles by Codecool about training, recruitment and management from last year.

man reading blog post on mobile

It’s almost the end of the year, a great time for some nostalgia. We thought we’d look back and see which of our articles you enjoyed the most last year, which ones generated the most heated discussions, and which ones inspired you most. It was great reading back all your thoughts in comments on LinkedIn under some of them, or just see how many likes and other emojis each got. 

Here goes the top 5 of your favourites. Enjoy (re)reading them!

1. 7 reasons why the IT talent gap is still growing

This was by far your number one favourite post this year. It’s about what we found to be the biggest obstacles to closing the ever growing IT talent gap. The fact that it was so popular shows how important the topic today is, and how many companies struggle with the gap.

4 of the 7 main reasons we found about why it’s still there were:

  1.  Going digital beyond IT, or the fact that more and more digital positions are opening outside of IT, too, in business departments
  2.  COVID-driven digitalisation of not just those innovation areas in previously defined digital strategies, but also forced, quick digitalisation of further, business-as-usual processes
  3. Inflating prices in some countries raising salaries of anyway-not-cheap tech professionals, too
  4. Growing EU and VC funding creating more-and-more IT jobs to fill, especially from 2014 on
Curios about the remaining three? Read the article now, and get inspired about the complex background of this global challenge.

2. Still hiring tech people for a degree? Think again

We found that quite an intense discussion started under this post on LinkedIn. It seemed that everyone has an opinion about this controversial topic, and loved seeing your arguments and examples.

Our view,  explained in the post in detail, is that university education has many values, and there are positions where it’s absolutely necessary to have as a background, but there are many more, where it is not. We looked into some statistics from a related research, looked at reasons why we’re biased towards university graduates, and how it can be harmful. We also gave practical advice on how to adjust your selection criteria, if you decide to drop the university degree from your list of primary filters for a candidate.

The article was posted last January, but it still does have its relevance. Open to consider its facts and arguments? Read it (again) here.  

3. 3 IT recruitment challenges in 2021 – and why they are great opportunities

Have you seen the meme, where a woman jumps from a burning building with a sign saying “2020” down into a huge round sheet stretched out by firefighters, only to bounce back and fly into another burning building through the window, with a sign saying “2021”? Well, let’s just say, 2021 didn’t really bring the relief of the pandemic situation and it’s effects that everyone hoped for in the beginning of 2020. 

Recruitment faced its own challenges, after the initial freeze in 2020 through gradual revival, but complete overturn to online and remote operation. The difficult part of writing this article wasn’t the collecting of the challenges, it was to show the opportunities. But we managed, and this became one of your favourites from our blog posts this year.

Wonder how the impersonal, tech-dependent online recruitment process can bring advantages? How the insecurity of jobs in 2020 resulting in lower number of candidate open for a change could work for you? How the digital skills gap can shake your HR strategy up in a good way? Give the article another go, and collect fresh inspiration.

4. Get more women into tech with us – learn about our new CoderGirl Scholarship

Besides closing the tech talent gap in general, getting more women into tech has been a major focus for companies all over the world in the past years. Since we wanted to do something, too, we created the CoderGirl Scholarship in Q3 2021. The scholarship allows talented and determined women and girls to learn tech for free with us with a guaranteed position in the end,  matching their new skills . We even started a whole new Cyber Security Specialist Course solely for women, with scholarship places only, in November.

In the article, we brought you some facts and figures about the gender gap, as well as some interesting examples when digital product launches went bad only because there were no women involved in the development. We also asked you be part of the change and join us in inviting more women into tech. 

Doesn’t ring a bell? (Re)read the article and be inspired.  

5. Starting the new year stronger and more mature than ever before

This las one on our (your) list was actually our very first post in 2021. It was a very personal look back at 2020 and look ahead at 2021 by Jozsef Boda, global CEO of Codecool.  It’s quite interesting to reread it and see how we realised our plans (like our series B expectations and the opening of our newest campus in Austria). 

How does he evaluate 2021 and what are his expectations for 2022? You can soon find out from another similar post to come early next year. 

Until then, read (again) this article for a bigger context and some nostalgia.

The above are just a few examples, of course. There were quite a few other blog posts you really liked, like our collection of inspiring podcasts, a success story of one of our graduates featured in a BBC StoryWorks video about our school, and a behind the scenes guide to how we put our company values into practice in tech training.

If you’ve enjoyed reading our blog posts this year,  make sure to subscribe to our Codecool Business newsletter for more.

Stay with us and keep getting inspired for a better digital future in 2022, too.

Meet cool leaders: Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner, CM @Codecool Austria

Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner

In this new blog post series we’re sitting down for a chat with people making the Codecool vision happen. Please meet Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner, Country Manager of Codecool Austria.

Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner

If you want to meet inspiring people, Codecool is a great place to be. Everyday we meet hundreds of smart, ambitious and cool students that study with us to change their careers and our shared digital future. And we meet innovative, great leaders with a vision from hiring companies, that employ our students to build a digital future.

But it’s not only our students and partners that inspire us. We also make sure to work with colleagues that are equally amazing, and make the Codecool mission and vision come to life.

We had a chat with one of these colleagues about her current goals, challenges and outlook on the future. We’re super excited and proud to introduce her to you finally. Please meet Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner, Country Manager of our newest school, Codecool Austria.

Sigrid, how would you introduce yourself, if you were not allowed to mention your work? 🙂

I am a family person who is constantly looking for new experiences, and enjoys adventure and action with family and friends. I love nature, and prefer to be outside in the mountains to hike, climb, bike or ski.

What is your work now actually? What are you responsible for?

As Country Manager, I am currently responsible for getting the Vienna location up and running. I try to pay particular attention to what can work well in Vienna and combine those approaches with the successful existing experiences from the other countries.

In addition to the business aspects, it is particularly important to me to create a good team structure and a cool workplace. Also, to enable the students to receive the best possible training.

What did you do before?

For the last 10 years I was sales and marketing manager at a digital learning solutions provider. Before that, I had many years of experience in sales of e-recruiting and software solutions.

During my studies, I focused on knowledge management and eLearning, which prepared me well for a job in education.

Why did you decide to come work for Codecool? What do you like most about your new workplace?

The Codecool business model immediately convinced me: the market needs IT specialists now and in the coming years, and we help people to gain new qualifications.

Personally, of course, I was intrigued by the challenge of setting up a location here in Vienna. And most of all: I like the people at Codecool 🙂 

Sigrid Hantusch-Taferner 2
What's the biggest goal that you set out for yourself in Codecool?

My biggest goal is to continuously improve over the next 3 years, and become a well-known and renowned training institution here in Austria.

What do you see as your biggest challenge currently?

Our biggest task today is to reach our potential students with the right message. We want them to see Codecool positively, as a great place to start a future-proof career.

What trends do you see in the world that impact your work at Codecool most?

The most important trend impacting us today is the growing talent gap. The baby boomers are now retiring, while, of course, everything will be digitally controlled in the future – from city administration to our cars and our stoves.

Where do you think Codecool is going on the short and long term?

I believe that re- and up-skilling people who are already employed is becoming more and more important.

In the long term this means that we are becoming more and more the corporate partner to offer tailor-made training and further education for special needs.

Why do you think hiring companies should partner up with Codecool?

Hiring companies can get great junior talents from us. Talents, who really want to change their lives, and who are enthusiastic, and well-prepared for their first tech job.

How do you see our shared digital future?

Together we will manage to solve social, economic and ecological problems through digital transformation.

It’s our chance to make the world we live in an even better place.