What do developers think?

Everyone’s talking about innovation this and digitalization that. But discussions like these are often interwoven with marketing speak, exaggeration, and the creative (mis-)use of adjectives. Yet beyond the hype, something real is happening – experts are devising effective solutions to specific problems.

As our experience tells us, software developers often have a different take on the current IT trends. And this perspective is vital, because coders are usually the driving force behind any innovation. They also boast in-depth knowledge unfamiliar to their less techy peers.

One example is the importance of choosing the right programming languages, platforms, and frameworks – and continually adapting these as needed. That might seem like a mere detail to non-techies, but it’s crucial if you want to find, inspire, and retain good developers. After all, gifted coders are just as hard to find as they are to replace – there’s just such a wide range of specializations, languages, and technologies.

That’s why we were initially surprised that there hadn’t yet been any surveys about this among developers in Switzerland. Considering the widely known shortage of skilled workers, semantic data on this matter should be of great interest to employers.

The swiss developer survey has therefore been designed to present the views of software developers in Switzerland. At the same time, it should stimulate productive dialogue within the Swiss IT community.

The survey is also intended to act as a tool – one that takes domestic nuances into account while also providing a basis for international comparisons.

Again, we compiled this second survey just as any good developer would – going through multiple iterations until we had a product ready for release. Gratefully, we received substantial critical and helpful feedback from friends, associates, and colleagues in the software development community.

Two key outcomes show the success of this approach: Firstly, the number of participants increased by 10 percent to over 1,000 people. Secondly, despite the broad range of opinions in the software development world, there was very little criticism of the survey itself (all feedback is currently being collated and will be considered carefully next time around - just like last time).

But let’s get to the point. We’re delighted to publish the results today. The data provides a snapshot of many as yet undiscovered correlations and unexposed insights. With that in mind, we are open to further suggestions and questions from the community. We’ll be glad to re-examine the data based on your suggestions.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of those who supported us in the development and promotion of the swiss developer survey 2020. None of this would have been possible without you. We’d also like to thank all our swiss made partners and friends who actively promoted the survey within your networks. We mustn’t forget our sponsors, either, who made this project viable with their support. A big thanks to Abacus, AdNovum, approppo and Opacc. But the greatest thanks of all go to all the developers who took the time to complete the swiss developer survey. You’re the best. Thank you! We will do our utmost to learn as much as possible from this survey, derive more fascinating findings from the data, and use all of this to generate an even better survey next year.
 
We hope you enjoy the read.
Christian Walter + Jonas Felix