Andrew Heins

books

So You Want To Be A Developer

Becoming a Self-Taught Developer 1

This post is the first in a series about Teaching Yourself Web Development. You should see more in the coming days. Feel free to write in the comments about what you’d like to see or questions I should answer and I’ll get to them.

This first post is going to be a bit long. I’ve got to get a few things out of the way first. Sorry in advance.

The Day I Decided

About 5 years ago, I realized that I wanted to program computers for a living. I had already finished school, had an arts degree and an entry-level job in sales, and although I’d always loved playing around with computers (mostly playing computer games), I thought I was going to be a journalist.

I’d maintained my own website for a few years. Written in Dreamweaver, using HTML4, it was awful, but then most of the web was in those days. In terms of a web development background, I’d read a book on C when I was 15, and never got past chapter 3. I’d tried again with PHP when I was 18, and failed at that as well. So we’re not talking about a huge amount of technical knowledge here.

Right out of school I got a job at a non-profit. While there, I built them a web-based newsletter called “The Beacon”. It was a webpage written in HTML tables that we would update and email out a link to it. It was pretty awful, but it worked.

On my resume, when later interviewing for my sales position, I’d mentioned I had some skill with computers and HTML. They were apparently intrigued. I got the job, possibly because of my interest in the web, or possibly because I low-balled my salary requirements to try to get the job. .

It was in this role that I really decided to become a developer. Today, I make my living managing and writing code for web projects.

If you want it, it can be done.

What I Do Now

Ok, so first let’s get one thing off the table. I’m not a self-made Google Engineer (at least not yet). When I say I manage web projects, here’s what my day job actually entails:

  • 33% Project Management (project plans, meetings, more meetings)
  • 33% UX Design (Mock-ups, user testing, intuition)
  • 33% Front-end Development (HTML, CSS, JavaScript)

Most of this isn’t “writing software”. Ideally someday soon I’ll start to get paid as a more traditional developer. That’s my end goal, but I’m not there yet. It’s a work in progress. You’re coming along for the ride.

Why I Chose This Route

The road from Sales to Web Development wasn’t a straight path for me. In many ways, it couldn’t be:

I Needed a Job

I couldn’t afford to stop working and focus on just coding. I’d already finished school, had gotten married, and had to make money. I couldn’t go back to college. Unsurprisingly, very few people will pay you to learn software development, and of those few, I didn’t meet any of them.

I Needed a Reasonable Learning Curve

With limited technical background, I couldn’t get a job as a developer. I needed the time and an environment that would allow me to learn as I went.

How I Did It

Short answer: I stopped making sales calls and started coding.

My employer had a location finder on their website. 70 locations across Canada, and the only way to find out which one was closest was a dropdown list.

In an industry where you want people to go to the local store, that wasn’t very good, so I walked into the Director of Marketing’s office (my boss, the Sales Lead’s boss) and offered to make a webpage where you could drill down on a map and find the closest store.

He took a chance, said yes, and gave me 2 weeks to build it. He also made me promise that I’d meet my sales quotas at the same time. I was still on my initial probation. If I missed my sales quota, I’d be fired.

I bought a book called HTML, XHTML and CSS Visual Quickstart Guide and started building. I worked 60-65 hours both weeks. I took the book (and the code) home with me each night and worked on it before bed.

Two weeks later, it was demo day. Present in the room:

  • The Director of Marketing
  • The Sales Lead
  • The Director of Software Development

I loaded up the website and gave my little presentation. The site worked.

The Software Director, having never even heard of the project, and having final say over the website content, was angry that an untested kid from sales was writing software for his servers.

The Director of Marketing thought it was too simple and didn’t POP enough.

The Sales Lead was pissed because I hadn’t made a single sales call in two weeks.

While they yelled at each other, I packed up the laptop, went back, and sat at my desk.

And then there was this lull…

 

In the next part of this series, I’ll discuss the three basics skills you need for that first web development job, and some learning strategies.

Photo by Travelin’ Librarian

14 Comments

Join the Conversation!