I recently answered this question on Quora – namely “What advice can you give me on starting my first job as a software developer?”
I’ll relist the key points here and if it strikes a chord, you can maybe read the full article.
- Communication is different in the workplace than university projects
- Learning how the business works is something CTO’s want, but universities don’t teach.
- Invest in yourself -because no-one looks out for you.
- Self awareness is vital to both grow and progress yourself
The far bigger problem is preparing for the work environments – the team skills and parts of the agile skills (namely around customer collaboration) that you mentioned -it’s not exposure you necessarily get at university.
I’d reckon if you could go in with a customer focus from day 1 (but not neglect your technical skills) you’d be at an advantage to new starters.