The Top 10 Career Benefits of Open Source (2023)

If you’re here, you must’ve come across at least one of these statements:

“Open source is life-changing...”

“You should get started with open source.”

“Make your first open source contribution today…”

But why?

What’s in it for YOU?

This blog is all about knowing exactly that.

Here are the Top 10 benefits of contributing to Open Source Software:

1. Upskill yourself 🚀

The best way to get started in tech is to (finally) stop reading & watching content — and get your hands on stuff to actually work on. Working on OSS projects gives you real-world experience to develop your technical skills.

In the words of Tech Twitter:
“Break out of tutorial hell with open source”

2. Get visibility and exposure 🤩

Open source is one of the best ways to get noticed — by community members, recruiters, and other influential people in the industry. There’s a world of a difference between working in isolation vs. in public.

“Consistently add value — people notice it.”

3. Get job opportunities 💼

Valuable open source contributions often open doors of job opportunities or freelance gigs. You have an edge over other candidates if you are experienced, have proof of work, and can add value.

4. Build a network 🤝

Being a part of a community helps you find like-minded people and a chance to build connections all around the world. A good network adds immense value to your professional goals.

5. Improve your soft skills 💬

Soft skills are interpersonal skills that reflect your communication style, work ethic and behavior.

Joining a community, reaching out to people, collaboratively working with others, problem-solving, communicating your value, attending events enhance your soft skills.

6. Create content ✍🏻

Learning in public, documenting your journey, being a community member, making contributions, attending events (online & offline) can help you become a content creator/educator and build a personal brand.

The type of content can be blogs, tutorials, social media posts, videos, podcasts etc.

7. Negotiate your salary 💰

While getting a new job, your open source contribution can help you with negotiating your salary offer. You can leverage your real-world experience and proven skillset — offering you a chance to weigh your worth.

8. Build credibility 💙

Trust-building is a non-negotiable factor to form meaningful professional relationships. Consistent contributions help you create credibility (and reliability) in the industry — and get more opportunities.

9. Get referrals 📩

With good connections and value-adding work, you can get referrals from other people to help you get a job, an internship, fellowship and apprenticeship opportunities.

Referrals are one of the best ways to build credibility faster.

10. Become a freelancer 🌴

Working on real-world projects lets you explore codebases, coding styles, get a feel of the landscape, get upskilled, improve your soft skills and gain confidence — preparing you to work with clients on a freelance basis, anywhere in the world.

“The future of hiring is open source and remote work.”
— Kunal Kushwaha, DevRel Manager and Founder

Bonus: Event invitations 🎤

Contributors who consistently add value to huge projects get to travel all over the world to speak at/attend conferences and events to meet & network with industry experts and influential creators.

Note: This is one of the potential perks of building credibility, making remarkable contributions and consistently adding value through your work — long-term.

Once you get into open source — it will open doors to endless opportunities for learning, growing, building relationships, and accelerating your career.

“The open source community is such a wonderful resource for learning, collaboration, and personal growth. There are so many opportunities available for anyone who is willing to step through the doors and get involved.”

— @deveyedeas

Now that you’re convinced…

Get to learn about the different types of code and no-code open source contributions you can get started with.

To learn more about the open source ecosystem — follow us on Twitter, Medium, LinkedIn, Hashnode and dev.to! 🚀

And if you’re new to Scoutflo — here’s all you need to know about us.

Open Source FTW 💙

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