Work on a certification. I have 3 years of experience in VB.NET and SQL Server, so I'm a beginner. I'm currently unemployed, so I'm working on getting an MCPD: ASP.NET Developer 3.5. I'm almost done with the first Self-Paced Training Kit, the one for the 70-536 exam. Out of the 16 chapters there was only one where I could say, "Yeah, I already know this stuff." There are a few where I said "When will I ever need this?" The rest of the chapters filled in a lot of blanks that I didn't know I had. All of them gave me the vocabulary I need to search for answers. A certification will not make you an expert, but it will show you the gaps in your knowledge. It is especially good for me because I didn't really have senior developers' code to look at. (At my last job, we were all dumped off a mainframe into .NET. I survived the first cut because I had taken VB.NET and ASP.NET at the local community college.)