If you do a quick search on LinkedIn for jobs in the world of Sitecore; you will find an endless list of opportunities, especially for Sitecore developers. However, it’s no secret that getting familiar with our platform could be challenging if you don’t work for an agency that might already have Sitecore experience or know someone who can teach them about the platform.

I have put together some learnings I have found in my journey of getting new developers involved with our platform and community. Hope they are helpful!

Find them early

If we are trying to expand the number of people interested in working with Sitecore; we need to reach new engineers who might be interested in working in the world of web development. If we are only trying to reach developers who might already be familiar with Sitecore, we are limiting ourselves to a much smaller pool. A good opportunity to find new talent is to talk with recent grads who might be interested in software development but have never heard about leading class platforms like Sitecore. And you would be surprised how inviting are universities to have speakers talk to their students about real-world experiences in their fields.

This year I had the chance to give a couple of talks to computer science students at UDLA (Universidad de las Americas) in Quito where I went through the very basics of Sitecore development and what they can expect if they decide to join us in this journey.

Practice > Theory

Once a new developer starts going through Sitecore training materials, they will reach a point where they could start to lose interest or get confused with all the amount of information. And, even if those materials include practical exercises, it is always hard for someone new to get his feet wet with the platform. I have found that spending a couple of hours, sitting next to them, showing them the ropes, and going through small practical exercises speeds up their journey. In particular, I have found that showing them how to develop a simple module, step by step, is extremely useful and it gives them a small taste of Sitecore development. I usually show them how to build a simple component like a page hero which might have some text fields, an image, and a CTA, and how they can create the corresponding template, pull the data from Sitecore, and how we can render this info into the page.

Show them the future

Another great tool in our arsenal to get developers excited is to show them all the great things that are in the pipeline with our platform. Perhaps they might not get to work right away with features such as CDP or even Content Hub. But, it’s always a great motivator to show them what it’s upcoming in the world of Sitecore. This was especially apparent when I shared some tidbits I learned from Sitecore Symposium about XM Cloud to new engineers who got very excited about composable DXPs.

Also, it’s always a good idea to show them the possibilities they could achieve in our community like the Sitecore MVP program and all its benefits 

These were just some learnings I have found in my journey to get new developers involved in the world of Sitecore development. It’s no secret that our community is growing faster than ever but it’s always important to get new talent involved. And doing it the right way to make their life easier in their journey is key.