[mohammadfaalfard]

Hi Mark,

Thank you so much for the warm welcome and for taking the time to write such a detailed and insightful response — I really appreciate it. 🙏

Your point about my wife potentially being the stronger primary applicant makes a lot of sense. She does have solid qualifications and experience in education, and we’ll definitely look more closely into the 190 and 491 visas. We hadn’t considered making her the lead applicant before, so that’s extremely valuable advice.

Regarding my own background — you’re right that many IT roles in Australia expect a higher level of English proficiency and commercial experience. I’m actively working on improving my English and plan to take the IELTS or PTE soon, aiming for at least band 7 in each area as you suggested.

Also, I realized after posting that I didn’t mention a few relevant parts of my skillset. I’ve worked extensively with Docker and REST APIs, and while I tried to keep the post less technical for the forum, those are definitely core to my backend experience. The main skill I’m still working to add is AWS, which I now realize is quite important in the Australian market. I’ve already completed over 20 professional certificates on Coursera, including ones in cloud computing, but not specifically AWS — so that’s something I’ll be prioritizing moving forward.

Thanks again for the helpful breakdown and encouragement. We feel more confident now in exploring the right strategy and pathways. I’ll be sure to update this thread as we progress and may reach out with a few more questions soon! 🙂

Best regards,
Mohammad