Today I am going to be talking about my most recent developer challenge which is the Andela Developer Challenge (Part 1 & 2) and how I demonstrated a growth mindset.
I got the Andela mail for the challenge and going through it, I froze by the mere sight of the specifications required to be met within a short period of time. The project entailed:
Building a UI template with no use of any CSS frameworks.
Building an API backend with node, express and implementing Test Driven Development (TDD).
Utilization of Pivotal Tracker, Git branching
… amongst other requirements.
Although I was quite good working with pure HTML and CSS, I had been building User Interfaces (UI) with CSS Frameworks (Bootstrap, Material Design Bootstrap) and building without them seemed like a mountain to climb, as I did not focus much on Frontend and considered myself a “Backend Developer”.
The most frightening of the specifications was the implementation of Test Driven Development. Coming from a background where what I was used to is to writing code first, then try to see if it works, and keep correcting it until it works, and then pray it never malfunction again. And seeing that I work from 9-5, and get home by 8 in the evening, I had some sort of doubt as to whether I would finish up the challenge in time.
I was determined not to give any excuses and refused to let the fear of the unknown make me chicken out. Instead, I saw it as an avenue to test my capabilities. I hooked up on one of my favourite quotes from “Mark Zuckerberg” which was:
Ideas don’t come out fully formed. They only become clear as you work on them. You just have to get started.
I got started, I had to do some sleepless nights, did many types of research, I also contacted some like minds that also offered great advice and feedback, but overall and surprisingly I finished the project a day to the deadline.
Conclusion
All I had to do really was to get started and have that belief that I could learn anything and accomplish anything if I put my mind to it.
This article was originally posted on Medium Thank you for reading.
