I’m four months into my first dev job and I still feel like I have no idea what I’m doing. My team is great, but every task feels like a huge struggle. Is it normal to still feel this lost? I thought I’d understand things better by now.

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I’ve led engineering teams for over 15 years and it’s pretty normal. I experienced it myself when I came out of college to begin my software engineering role 27 years ago. The real world isnt like school. But you need to get a good mentor that cares about your growth and be transparent with them about your struggles and do all you can to accelerate your growth. Use AI tools to help you learn or even to guide you on how to accelerate in areas where you feel you are lagging behind. AI tools are wrong sometimes but you can usually tell when they are wrong. Don’t let discouragement paralyze you. You’ve got to be aggressive and push through, then the switch will flip and you’ll just get it. If you are passionate about your job, you’ll pick it up soon and be fine. If it’s just a job to make ends meet, it will be a lot more of an uphill climb. Hope this helps. Good luck.

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Take your time to get to know the code and the tools, try to figure out who knows their stuff and who is all talk.

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Completely normal to still be figuring it out a few months in. Ask questions and seek guidance. Chances are, there is somebody experienced who wants to help around you. Just need to find them.

That is completely normal — you’re definitely not alone. I remember feeling lost during my entire first year on the job, and everyone reassured me that it was normal. Over time, as you learn more, you’ll get the hang of things and start feeling increasingly confident.

Completely completely normal. You’re building your solutioning framework. Hopefully by six months you find at least one problem where you can reference a past solution to help solve. By a year you will find multiple

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