Let me come clean right away—I’ve been working as a software engineer for years, and honestly, I think we’ve all been bamboozled. Not because engineering isn’t valuable or the work isn’t real, but because of what they don’t tell you when you sign up for this career path.
The Great Education Myth
Remember those sleepless nights in college, cramming abstract data structures, algorithm complexity, and compiler design? Yeah, me too. I spent four years convinced that mastering dynamic programming would land me my dream job at Google.
Then I started working.
“Can you fix the navbar alignment?” my manager asked on day three.
Four years of education, thousands in tuition fees, and I was Googling “CSS flexbox center div” like every other developer. The dirty secret? Most of us use maybe 10% of what we learned in college. The rest is either too theoretical or completely irrelevant in real-world software development.
The College Curriculum Time Machine
Let’s talk about what Indian universities teach in computer science programs. Or rather, what they were teaching in 2005 and somehow still haven’t updated.
Many colleges still focus heavily on C and C++ without practical exposure to modern development tools. They teach assembly language programming as if we’re all going to be writing kernel code for ISRO. Meanwhile, ask a fresher to deploy a web app on AWS, and you’ll likely get a blank stare.
My professor, who could explain the intricacies of AVL trees but had never worked with Git. When I asked about Docker, he thought I meant “Doctor.” That’s how outdated our education system is.
Meanwhile, the actual job market? It's looking for React developers, cloud engineers, and full-stack devs with experience in Next.js, Firebase, and DevOps. Guess where colleges stand on teaching these? Nowhere.
The "Meritocracy" Facade
The Indian tech industry loves the idea of meritocracy. “It’s all about skills,” they say.
Then why do so many job postings still say: “Only Tier-1 college graduates can apply”?
I’ve seen brilliant developers from lesser-known colleges struggle to land interviews, while someone from an IIT/NIT gets hired despite writing spaghetti code. The reality? Networking, referrals, and branding matter more than skills in many cases.
And let’s not even talk about campus placements. Most companies prioritize a handful of institutes and ignore thousands of skilled engineers from private universities. If you don’t get placed through campus, your best bet is to apply off-campus, network aggressively, and ace your coding interviews.
(Pro tip: Platforms like PrepVerse↗ can help you practice interviews and find off-campus opportunities, so you're not entirely dependent on college placements.)
The Tool Treadmill
Every six months, a new framework becomes “mandatory.”
I started with jQuery. Then Angular. Then React. Now, everyone’s hyping Solid.js and Astro. Meanwhile, in college, they’re still teaching html 5 like it’s cutting-edge tech.
Last month, my team debated for hours whether to migrate our codebase to a new framework. Nobody mentioned that we had the exact same discussion last year about our current “hot new framework” that we now desperately want to replace.
The Self-Teaching Paradox
If I’ve taught myself everything I actually use at work—be it React, Next.js, Docker, or system design—then what exactly was the point of my expensive degree?
I recently mentored a bootcamp graduate who learned more practical skills in 12 weeks than I did in four years of university. She deployed a full-stack web app within a month. Meanwhile, a CS graduate with an 9+ CGPA struggled to set up a local development environment.
The truth? Your ability to learn independently matters more than your degree.
The Work-Life Balance Illusion
"We offer great work-life balance!"
Translation: You won’t be forced to work on weekends. But you will be guilt-tripped into it.
Indian tech companies love to promote “flexible hours.” But somehow, that flexibility only goes one way. You may not have strict clock-in times, but when there’s a last-minute client request, expect late-night Slack messages.
And if you’re in a service-based company? Get ready for insane deadlines and weekend deployments. The product-based scene is slightly better, but unless you’re at a big tech firm, true work-life balance is still a myth.
The Truth: It’s Worth It Anyway
Here’s where my "scam" theory falls apart: despite all this, I still love being a developer.
Yes, I’ve spent hours debugging a missing semicolon. Yes, I’ve had to learn and immediately unlearn technologies. Yes, I’ve worked late nights on ridiculous deadlines.
But I’ve also built products that people use every day. I’ve solved problems that seemed impossible at first. I’ve met incredibly smart people who challenge my thinking.
Engineering isn’t a scam because it’s fake. It’s a "scam" because the reality is vastly different from what we’re sold.
So, is engineering worth it? Absolutely. But only if you’re ready to learn beyond college, network beyond your campus, and accept that the real world runs on Stack Overflow, not textbooks.
If you’re looking for off-campus job opportunities or just want to upskill for real-world interviews, check out PrepVerse↗. Because waiting for your college placement cell to do the work is the real scam.
What’s your take? Has your engineering experience been similar to mine, or am I just particularly jaded? Drop a comment below—I’d love to hear your thoughts!