Is there a space/niche for someone who knows a LOT about front end and can't be fullstack on top?
Posted by AfricanTurtles@reddit | ExperiencedDevs | View on Reddit | 30 comments
I have been working at my company for around 4 years now. I would say I know enough Java + Springboot to make API's, error handling, etc. But primarily I am a front end specialist. By that I mean, I know more about accessibility, UI/UX, HTML semantics, CSS, etc than almost anyone else on my team. Because we are a government agency, this is important because all of our work has to be 100% accessible and secure.
I've seen some of the code our team writes for front end and it's completely abysmal in terms of accessibility, has a ton of weird hacks/buggy/looks like crap/inline CSS in the template.
Recently the word has come down that "they don't want anyone doing just one or the other". I see this as a massive mistake given that our backend people totally suck at front end, and I wouldn't say I'm great at backend either. Yes you can learn, but then you're taking away from keeping on top of your skills on either side of the fence.
If you're a public facing application that needs to be accessible and have good UI/UX, why would you force your front end developer(s) to try and juggle even more? People seriously underestimate the complexity of modern web apps I think.
We've had so many successful projects and our team has actually won some awards and been praised for the excellent work while having this split between front and back end.
I do actually want to learn some backend, but I feel like "everyone does everything all at once" is an absolutely horrible idea.
I'm interested to hear what are your thoughts?
Thanks :)
ijblack@reddit
i'm a full stack SWE and i have huge respect for front end specialists. they pull off custom animations and design implementations that honestly boggle me from a perf standpoint. stuff that looks impossible, yet works. there's absolutely a niche for deep FE expertise. a lot of FE specialists work at design agencies.
Decent_Perception676@reddit
Companies like to get 2 for 1 and people who are “cross-functional”. You can always pair FE with design skills. Design systems, design engineering, rapid prototyping.
chesterjosiah@reddit
This post might get removed because it seems close to "general career advice". But yes, there is a niche for someone who knows a lot of front end and not enough backend to be full stack. It's called a front end engineer.
If your company doesn't want FE SWEs, either change companies or learn more backend and stay there.
There are many companies that hire FE SWEs.
I've spent my ENTIRE 20-year career as a front end engineer. Haven't written a single line of backend code for my employers. I've written plenty for personal projects, but even then all my services are node typescript. Even as an L6 (Staff) at Google, I was a front end SWE.
badboyzpwns@reddit
Would you say that you would done things differently and also pivot to fullstack?
chesterjosiah@reddit
If I could go back in time? No, I've loved every minute of this ride ✊✊✊ (vanilla, jQuery, angular, react; css, less, styled, tailwind), and it's actually kind of rare to have this depth of front end understanding. I don't know how many L6 FE SWEs we had at Google, but I'm pretty sure I was among the highest paid FE engineers at $650k/yr TC.
the-code-father@reddit
Yea but did you have to write jslayout?
AfricanTurtles@reddit (OP)
I think they SAY they don't want front end specialists or backend specialists without realizing what either side does. These are not tech people making the decision but instead managers and CIEIOS and PMs.
They maybe don't realize the disaster awaiting them by forcing everyone to be everything.
I appreciate the input 🙏
Any-Ring6621@reddit
Just my $0.02 but I think referring to it as a “disaster awaiting them” is a bit dramatic.
New_Firefighter1683@reddit
The classic "this place would go down without me"!
Everyone's replaceable. Especially frontend (lol)
kbielefe@reddit
Usually changes like this are in response to a perceived impending disaster. You may not be senior enough yet to have been involved in those sorts of discussions, but usually a choice like this is due to conditions like:
Typically you will have some chaos for a while then reach a new equilibrium. If the change was made to clear a backlog on one side, that backlog eventually clears. Doing some work on the other side of the API helps clear some inefficiences and coordination issues.
People who were wanting a change end up taking on most of the new work. People who were not wanting a change end up negotiating with their peers to minimize the shared misery. Specializations naturally reform, but along different lines.
Tacos314@reddit
A lot of people are perfectly competent at doing both.
New_Firefighter1683@reddit
Everyone and their mom does frontend these days. You're in a good position to expand your knowledge. You should.... really take this opportunity.
Fidodo@reddit
There's a limit to how much frontend you can know without knowing backend. Eventually optimizing frontend means understanding not just what goes on on the client, but also the interplay between the client and the backend.
halting_problems@reddit
AppSec specializing in web application security although you do have kind of have to be everything stack
Mountain_Sandwich126@reddit
Cannot have cross functional teams if no one is willing to learn and get better
atheliens@reddit
I'm personally a frontend engineer, and have been for 10 years now. I've never been on a team that expected me to contribute full stack work. I just completed a job search and can confirm that there's still a need out there for frontend specialists.
That being said, the job market is definitely more narrow for people without full stack experience. In particular, you're generally going to be limited to either larger companies, or startups that have complex web applications.
You're in a fortunate situation where you can get backend experience. If it's something you enjoy at all, I would lean into it.
badboyzpwns@reddit
Do you plant o pivot to fulls tack because of it?
atheliens@reddit
Nah, I haven't felt the need to diversify yet, just letting OP know that it would probably be smart to.
Tacos314@reddit
IF you can create good designs or UX the no, there is no space. UI Designers or UX Engineers are needed, but just not very much, one company may need 1 or 2. But the consulting and freelance market is always active for these positions.
If you just know how to code react and lack any design or UX skills, your just a less valuable full stack engineer.
vherus@reddit
I’m a front end tech lead and the only frontend specialist on my team. Everyone else is full stack with a bias toward backend, and there’s a backend tech lead as well.
The roles certainly exist but I would say we’re not a majority.
jake_morrison@reddit
The value in full stack comes from two areas: less coordination overhead and better understanding of the big picture. If a company has separate teams for front and back end, then every feature requires meetings and delays. If developers only understand one side or the other, then they build systems that don’t work as well, resulting in e.g., performance or testing problems.
I prefer “full stack teams” to “full stack developers”. Everyone needs to understand a bit about what everyone else does, but they specialize. The team owns the whole system and can optimize it.
PuldakSarang@reddit
From a dev pov no one wants to do the work of two people and still get paid for 1.
AfricanTurtles@reddit (OP)
Right and I totally agree with you. I've even written a little backend code myself, so I'd like to say I understand how both sides work, but I wouldn't be great at backend at the moment since there's quite enough work to do on the front end for our team. We have far more people who are mostly backend.
nicolas_06@reddit
Both strategies make sense. The benefit of everybody being able to do it all, is that it's easier to manage the team. If you are off for vacation, ill or leave, somebody can just take over. Same if it happen to your backend colleagues.
The benefit to be specialized is that you can work faster and provider better quality.
Depending of the company circonstances or even the boss mood they may favor one or the other.
DeterminedQuokka@reddit
This 100% absolutely exists but it’s a smaller pool of jobs than either fullstack or backend jobs.
Unfortunately a lot of people suffer under the assumption that frontend is super easy and doesn’t require a lot of thought. So there is an issue a lot of places in vaping front end work.
But even in places where that isn’t the case most of the complex part of front end actually gets really condensed into a dev experience/tools kind of team.
I worked at a really large finance company with more than 200 developers. We had 2 front end focused teams. One that built components and one that build a specific complex ui. And I mean teams like 5 or 6 people not pillars. The rest of the ui was built by “fullstack” engineers who basically copy and pasted out of the component documentation. I believe both those teams had a staff.
I was talking to a friend about the large craft company he works at the other day and they told me that I wouldn’t like how they treat frontend developers. Because they also have a couple important teams like components and accessibility and then anyone else write front end is basically just using those components to they think front end has less value.
Basically at places where frontend is done really well people value it less because it feels easy.
Even when that’s not the case frontend is usually highly extractable so you don’t need as many super smart people doing it.
jake_morrison@reddit
There is a lot more to development than just “front end” and “back end”, e.g.: * Graphical design * HTML/CSS * Usability * Accessibility * Internationalization * Front end coding * Front end performance * Networking * Communication protocols * Back end coding * Database optimization * Kubernetes development * Kubernetes administration * Authentication and authorization * Security * Microservices integration * Third party API integration * Observability * Split testing optimization * Machine learning * Kafka * Revenue optimization * Supply chain management * …
How can you call yourself a full stack engineer if you can’t make an Ethernet cable?
Empanatacion@reddit
I wouldn't even call it a "niche". The more tech focused a company is, the more they tend to use developers specifically focused on each.
In order of average pay, full stack devs make a little less than front end devs, who make a little less than back end devs. But the underlying cause is that higher paying companies hire fewer full stack devs.
In the worst case, going all in on full stack is "cost cutting disguised as organizational strategy."
AfricanTurtles@reddit (OP)
That's what it feels like. How can we squeeze more work out of these people that are "just" (I say that with sarcasm) doing one or the other or mostly one thing and a bit of the other. WE WANT EVERYTHING FROM EVERYONE!
YahenP@reddit
Specialization is a good thing, but how are you going to look for a job today if you are a narrow specialist?
Today, it is not enough to just be a full stack. You also need to have DevOps skills, be able to design architectures, and have good management skills. And even in this case, finding a job is not a trivial matter.
And a narrow specialist in the field of frontend ... and even with work experience, the chances of finding a job tend to zero.
lambda-lord26@reddit
I'm a full stack dev and I feel I have an exceptional understanding of FE and BE. To each their own. Some companies like it to be separate, some like it to be together. I think there's a big benefit in building a vertical slice of a feature, all the way up the stack