How to Build a Successful Career in App Development
As our mobile devices become the centre of our work and communication, the mobile app development industry continues to grow rapidly. Over the past few years, both technological and business development has accelerated at a rapid rate, which has led to an increase in demand for good mobile app developers.
Developing an app is a highly sought-after skill and requires much more than computer savviness.
If you want to take your career in this industry to the next level, here are some of the main skills you should focus on improving:
1. Mobile UI Design
- Building a high-quality user interface (UI) is one of the most important aspect of developing a mobile app.
- With so many apps that are now available for users to download, the more attractive and easy to use an app is, the better.
- The app’s UI is responsible for all the interaction between an app and its users. Just having good backend functionality is not enough.
2. Cross-Platform App Development
- For today’s app developers, it’s crucial to know about the various operating programs that are popular in the industry.
- There are three major mobile platforms that all good app developers should have a good knowledge of, which are iPhone, Android, and Windows phones.
- Skilled app developers are versatile enough to create apps across different platforms and various devices.
- Various factors such as database management, security, hardware interaction, memory allocation, etc., have to be kept in mind.
3. Programming Skills
- Being knowledgeable and skilled at programming, using modern programming languages, is also essential.
- Programming may include several different aspects, including training in web development languages like CSS and HTML5.
- Also experience in commonly used programming languages like Java or C#, the ability to implement the use of cross-platform mobile suites, and familiarity with mobile platform Application Programming Interfaces is recommended.
4. Business Acumen
- While this tends to be an overlooked skill in the industry, business skills play a critical role.
- When it comes to building, valuing, and selling the apps that you create, you need strong business skills and expertise to win over your competition and successfully pitch your app.
- Whether you are pitching clients as a freelance app developer, or are going into employment developing apps, good business skills will help you know the value of your contributions and avoid under-selling.
5. Communication Skills
- To get the most success from your career as a mobile app developer you will also need to focus on building some key transferable skills, particularly communication skills.
- If people cannot understand what you are explaining about your app, then you’re not going to get what the app is worth.
- As a developer, it’s easy to get used to talking in tech terms all day long but to be successful in this career, you also need to switch that off when pitching.
- It is important to know when and how to communicate the value the app will provide to users.
