#CareerChange #TechIndustry #Programming #CodingBootcamp
Hey everyone! 👋 I’m diving into the world of programming at 39 years old after a decade in marketing and a Masters in Business & Economics. I’m currently knee-deep in CS50, and I’m loving the challenge (even the hair-pulling parts 😅).
I’m considering a career change to software engineering/programming and thinking of doing a coding bootcamp after finishing CS50. But I’m torn – is a Masters necessary or is a bootcamp enough to land a job in tech? If you’ve made a similar switch, I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Here are a few key questions I have:
– How is a career change viewed by employers in the tech industry?
– Is a coding bootcamp enough to gain the necessary skills?
– Is another Masters degree worth it if I already have one in a different field?
Looking forward to hearing your experiences and advice! 🌟
My possible solution: Given your background and the foundational knowledge from CS50, a coding bootcamp could be a great next step to quickly acquire the technical skills needed for a career change into tech. Pairing that with personal projects and networking can also boost your chances in the job market.
I wouldn’t bother with a bootcamp, they never really have very good reputations. A degree is good, but it takes a long time and you’re already starting late in this career.
Certainly employers don’t care about career changes. Where I work, we tend to have better luck with older developers (I’m 45, my colleagues are around the same age). We’d probably prefer to hire a 40 year old junior than a 20 year old junior, it’s just how it’s worked out better in the past.
Complete CS50, and look around the job ads to see what people are looking for in your area, and consider learning that. Think outside the box a bit, every beginner and their dog is learning Python and/or JavaScript/CSS/HTML, I strongly feel many beginners should be learning something else, really *anything* else that isn’t totally saturated like Python and JS both are.
Bootcamps are rarely very good, it’s nothing you can’t teach yourself with Google.
If you are going for programming for the sake of mohnay, then I would say no,
But If you are really into programming and problem solving and good with logic and this is it for you no matter what age, there are lot of YouTube channel.
Now first thing would be what language to choose people usually go for python and would suggest the same. But could also go for java. Create your own projects for practice with data bases, initially you just need one entry point towards programming rest you could see yourself what’s out there
The best way to transition in is via a job training program like an internship. Many of these are affiliated with traditional universities. Coding boot camps that can guarantee you an internship after… maybe are worth it, but I’ve heard so many terrible stories.
First time jobs are by far the hardest to get as a programmer. Lots of entry level competition out there and you are at the point in your career where you have the least to show for it.
Get at least an undergraduate degree or some kind of certificates from a reputable university.
All of my managers who you wouldn’t even think have technical backgrounds all have technical degrees of some sorts.
“How is it view by the employers”?
It’s most of the time show me what you got, what do you know? what did you did ? a demo reel, girhub, or web page showing your programming skills.
You don’t need masters. In general having some related degree is best, but, if you csn secure interview it becomes less relevant. Interview is vibes based and knowledge based, you seem to love coding, which is good. You would be surprised how many seemingly don’t. If you can talk well about it, answer questions, it will be fine.
But, problem is how to get interview, you don’t want to be filtered out based on no qualification. You will need to have some projects yourself, soem rleavant experience.
Who am I, I did not go to college or university. I work now in the field, but, only because I started in this when I was a child, and I knew people, knowing people obviously is really important. And now I am working and even involved in the employment process here for new junior
And for me is refreshing to have a person who is clearly enamoured about this field and having a desire to learn
You could probably even doing CS accredited degree online, this will depend your country
There are a lot of jobs in tech that are not directly doing programming, where somebody with other experience could provide a lot of value. So don’t narrow your options too much until you explore them.
UI/UX testing,
Requirement definition and gathering,
Project management,
Product management,
Customer success engineering,
Making documentation and user guides / videos,
Application performance monitoring,
Customer usage monitoring,
Lots of infrastructure/devops roles too.
With your existing education I would look to satisfy your programming bug by looking into data analytics. In the business world there are an infinite number of questions needing answers and a limited supply of resources who can extract answers from the data that already exists at most companies or in the wild. Most computer science education tracks include programming in various languages but also get into lots of areas you probably won’t use to make a living with your past experience and new knowledge. What I think may make you most marketable in terms of programming are being able to write SQL queries, understand relational and document databases, data warehouses etc. You could quickly find yourself in a management position over a team of developers who mine data to show trends or other useful business information. Just thinking out loud after forty years developing software.
i’ve switched from system administrator to developer, my path was to learn and get microsoft certification
[https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/credentials/browse/?credential_types=certification](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/credentials/browse/?credential_types=certification)
I’ve seen some people have success in migrating into a dev role within their current company.
One particular case was a Project manager who, got approval to start working closely with QA, test automation and scripted UI testing. During this time they demonstrated desire and aptitude for bigger coding challenges while learning version control and system configuration (running tests on different OSs and software versions). Having a business oriented mindset was also beneficial to the company because process efficiency and inter-team communication was improved, having someone with a foot in both worlds.
Through their QA work they were exposed to different levels of the stack, and were able to confidently say they enjoyed backend dev work over front end, SQL or dev-ops and thus define a career path they were excited about.
Shortly before I moved to another company they had successfully changed roles from project management to junior back-end developer, with the comfort of staying in the same company, where they already had an history of product knowledge and a solid reputation, along with uninterrupted health care and accrued PTO. Management was involved in, and supportive of their transition and helped budget schedule.
If your company has the right mentality, they should invest in you and leverage the tribal knowledge you possess. Good luck.
I was in your position, albeit I’m in my mid-30s. I spent over a decade in marketing. I made great money but never enjoyed the work. I was always interested in computers but thought I wasn’t smart enough to code.
I spent years trying to self teach myself. I did various Python tutorials, the Odin Project, and CS50, among other things, but could never fully stick with it. I was stuck in tutorial hell.
I ended up going back to school for my MSCS, and I fell in love. It turns out I needed the structure of an academic environment to reach that next level. I now feel confident in my abilities.
It paid off. I am finalizing an offer with a Fortune 500 company to be a software engineer. My previous work and interview experience helped me standout from the crowd.
I wouldn’t change a thing, but it’s not all rainbows and butterflies. You can’t have an ego. You are starting over and will likely be making less than half your old salary. Your manager may also be younger than you. My offer is around 80k, which I am gladly accepting given there state of the entry level market, however it’s less the 180K range I was making in my old career. Money has never been a motivating factor, so this isn’t really a problem for me.
Going back to school will also take a toll on your on your social and family life, even more so if you have kids. If you have a spouse, be sure to discuss it at length with them.
Happy to answer more questions. I’m biased, but I say go for the degree if you are truly passionate. Don’t waste money on the bootcamp. It was hard enough to get interviews even with the graduate degree.
While you are learning to code, start looking for Meetups that are tech related. Whatever they are talking about will likely be over your head at first, but you’re there to meet people at first.