We’ve all been there. Unemployed, confused, and looking for the next step in one’s career. That was me for the past year. As a graduate from York University (Digital Media BA with honors), I thought my programming skills and portfolio would be good enough for me to score the job of my dreams. I kept hearing how Toronto was booming with tech jobs, surely I’d be swimming in job offers, right?

Well… I had a different experience…

Months were spent applying for jobs, scanning the job search websites for an opportunity. I lost count of the amount of rejections I faced. Typically I was left with a 'You do not have enough relevant experience' or I'd be ghosted with no reply at all.

Things became worse as the gap between jobs appeared larger and larger in my resume, which made it even harder to apply for jobs. Recruiters would reach out, but the unkept promises of helping me out left me even more jaded. The buildup of rejections made me incredibly demotivated, as I thought I had wasted all that time studying programming, and was even considering going into a different career path.

That’s when Hatchways came in. Initially I was skeptical, as they appeared like any other recruitment company, but I was pleasantly surprised!

Firstly, the platform started with an assessment to test my skills, rather than a predetermined checklist to see if I had the relevant experience on my resume. Then I had an in person interview where I was able to see that Hatchways was a group of people trying to help one another break into the tech industry, and not a recruiter looking to make a profit off me.

Hatchways understood my skillset and needs for a job. They were able to see what I was lacking and helped sculpt me into a lean mean web development machine!

The most useful was the Project Based Development Program. I worked alongside other programmers to create a fully functional web app, with Hatchways overseeing and providing support. It was immensely helpful and became an excellent portfolio piece.

This eventually led me to scoring a job! Shortly after the course, I got a contract for a JavaScript web development role at a marketing based AI startup, which I really enjoy so far.

In the dark tunnel of job hunting, Hatchways was the light that led me out.