What a Junior } should know

0 core skills, 55 in total. Expectations per skill, and what changes at the next level.

This page lists what a Junior } is expected to know and do, skill by skill. Core skills are the ones a manager and peers assess in a review cycle; the rest count only in self-assessment. Main areas: .

0core skills

55additional skills

0skill areas

0%at Advanced or Expert

Assess myself as Junior Full role matrix

Core skills for a Junior

Grouped by area. The label on the right is the expected depth: Awareness, Working, Advanced or Expert.

Additional skills

Not assessed by the team, but part of the self-assessment and the development plan.

Algorithms & Complexity Apache Kafka API Documentation Async Programming AWS BLE & Wireless: Zigbee, LoRa, WiFi C for Embedded C++ for Embedded ChatGPT / Claude Code Quality & Refactoring Code Review Cursor IDE Data Structures Database Indexing Design Patterns DNS Deep Dive Docker Edge Computing for IoT Embedded CI/CD Embedded Debugging: JTAG, SWD Git Advanced GitHub Actions / GitLab CI GitHub Copilot GPIO, ADC, DAC GraphQL Design HTTP/2 & HTTP/3 QUIC Integration Testing IoT Cloud Platforms: AWS IoT, Azure IoT IoT Security Kubernetes Core Memory Management MicroPython / CircuitPython MQTT Protocol Multithreading Network Fundamentals OOP & SOLID Principles OpenTelemetry OWASP & Application Security PostgreSQL Prometheus & Grafana Prompt Engineering for Code Redis REST API Design RTOS Fundamentals: FreeRTOS, Zephyr Secure Coding Practices SLI / SLO / SLA SPI / I2C / UART Protocols Structured Logging System Design Fundamentals TCP/IP Deep Dive Terraform Type Safety & Type Systems Unit Testing Webhooks & Integrations WebSocket API Design

What changes at Mid-level

55 skills get a higher expectation or become core when moving from Junior to Mid-level. The biggest jumps first.

Algorithms & Complexity: Awareness → Working
Apache Kafka: Awareness → Working
API Documentation: Awareness → Working
Async Programming: Awareness → Working
AWS: Awareness → Working
BLE & Wireless: Zigbee, LoRa, WiFi: Awareness → Working
C for Embedded: Awareness → Working
C++ for Embedded: Awareness → Working
ChatGPT / Claude: Awareness → Working
Code Quality & Refactoring: Awareness → Working

See the Mid-level page →

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} in the open competency matrix: 55 skills across 5 levels. The matrix is free for individuals and stays free.