Changing Gears: How I Decided to Study Programming and Change My Life
Changing Gears: How I Decided to Study Programming and Change My Life

I’ve been in tech and worked with developers since 2013, but whenever they talked programming, I felt like I suddenly was on a different planet where people spoke other languages. I had no idea what they were talking about.

It was ironic because I organized multiple developer conferences — droidcon NYC and droidcon SF, among many others.

Imagine this situation — you’ve just organized a successful developer conference and are now enjoying some well-deserved drinks at a conference party. You’re having a nice chat with some speakers about something not code related. Then somebody else joins and brings up one of the conference talks, and the whole group deep dives into the subject, switching from English to code talk.

You’re there smiling and trying to look like you’re not too out of place. Seem familiar?

I kept thinking it’d be nice to learn some code just to have a better idea of what it’s all about, but it never crossed my mind to completely switch gears to becoming a developer. Why would I set myself back and start with something completely new? I’d never be able to catch up with people who’ve been doing it for 10+ years.

Also, frankly, it was a lack of accessible role models. I’ve known women who were developers, but as most of them were speakers at my conference, I never identified myself with them . They were light years away. It never occurred to me that I could be like them — until I met somebody like me at a meetup.

She was a journalist before attending a coding bootcamp and becoming a full-stack engineer. I talked to her about what it was like and was intrigued by her experience. Suddenly, transitioning to be a software engineer seemed possible. So should I do it?

I spent a few weeks thinking about it and came up with these arguments in favor of it:
['Natalie Galligan']
['Flatiron School', 'Programming', 'JavaScript', 'Career', 'Bootcamp']