How to start a career as an embedded developer?

Question

Electronics

Good day.
I am a student (3rd year), I plan to start my career as an embedded developer. I study on the profile "Systems and technical means of automation", I have experience in programming microcontrollers AVR (Atmega16, Atmega 128), PIC (PIC18), stm32 (F103, F411), development environments: Keil, MplabX, Avr studio. I know how to work with MK interfaces and peripherals: spi, uart, i2c, DMA, GPIO, timers. Mastered the TCP/IP network protocol stack. I also had a little experience in programming for a PC in c++ (QT, VS), once upon a time I wrote in PHP (maybe it will come in handy somewhere). I have theoretical knowledge of analog and power electronics (at the level of reading, modeling and calculation of circuits), control theory (I know what a PID controller is and how it works), PCB layout skills (in Altium). I know how to work with a soldering iron and an oscilloscope.
And now the questions.
1. How about starting a career in this field if you had no work experience before and wrote only for educational purposes or for the sake of interest? How to get experience in real development, if vacancies on a well-known site already require 1-3 years of experience (for starters, you can work for food)?
2. In what direction should we continue to develop and what technologies should we master?
3. It is worth looking towards automated process control systems and PLC development (this area is also interesting), if "yes", then what is the best way to start a career in this area?
PS: city of St. Petersburg

Answer 1

Judging by what you know, you have already started your career)
1.1 How should an employer treat an employee who is not very experienced? Or they will see you as an "asterisk" and take you into serious development. Or get a job in a sharashkontor.
1.2 Probably go to a sharash office / freelance. Or show that already now you are not inferior with an experience of 1-3 years.
2. Interesting! Really, why look for yourself in digital if you are interested in analogue? You can even make money on lamps. But to engage in not interesting, a maximum of 3 years
3. Maybe it's worth it. But what do you mean by "PLC development"?
Make your own PLC? - for academic purposes only (or look towards Beremiz/OpenPLC)
Write PLC code (IEC61131-3)? Perhaps a little more money can be found, but boring (for me).
See projects that are interesting for you. Post it on github. Get blogs, you can do so for now on your_domen.wo..p..s.com Well, you understand where?))
Promising directions? Probably embedded linux. How much does a "10 MHz" processor cost today? And how many 5 years? Soon the processors on which you can roll linux will be at the price of
2-3 arduins. But you have to wait, but for now get ready)) This is my IMHO!
Good luck!

Answer 2

How to get a job as an embedded developer? - during the training, you probably had course projects that you documented in a report, graphs, pictures and all that. If you really made these courses and they are your personal developments, then this is your ticket to work. You just show them, they are surprised at your potential and invite you to work).
In my real experience, there was an LPC1765 MK on the Cortex M3 core, and to put it mildly, I was not lucky in this regard. This MK, although a powerful pebble, is quite difficult to set up. But still, there is a high probability that you will work with PIC and STM32. Cortex M3 is in fashion now.
English is very much needed. Datasheet, stackoverflow and foreign books are the main sources of information.
You need to be able to program like a god. The C language in particular. Understanding how the code is related to the address space in the memory of the MK, as well as the principles of OOP, state machine, design patterns and UML.
The salary at first will probably be a penny, 15-20 thousand per month with a schedule of 5/2, then it may become more (I did not have time to check it personally).
Literature on the topic:
1) Stephen Prata "Programming language C. Lectures and exercises"
2) Digital circuitry and computer architecture. ARM Architecture Supplement | Harris David M., Harris Sarah L.
3) "Dive into Design Patterns" by Alexander Shvets

Answer 3

Yes, embedded has already started.
Keep your eyes and ears open. Profile firms can sit right in the building of the university. "Merchants" can go to the department or regularly visit the university. Electronic cards can sometimes give a tip to a company not far from home / university (so as not to run far).
Private traders - more interesting and profitable, gossy - can give experience in "paper" work (norm control and all that) or become a "vaccination" from themselves or a good line in a resume.
Something like this...