 Thanks for coming out. My name is Scott Stahl, software developer at OnShift in Cleveland. That's my Twitter, website, email address. Feel free to get in touch with me. Ask any questions you want. Cool. So, I'm gonna hear to talk about my career transition. I used to work in the lumber industry. That was a year and a half ago. Now I work writing Python. How did that happen, you might ask. So, I'm gonna step back a little bit. When I was a kid, I'm sure like most of you, I loved computers, loved playing video games. I loved writing code. I wrote my first block of code when I was in sixth grade. So, I had, you know, when I was young, I kind of had a connection with thinking that way, you know, a mindset that matched up with that way. I took computer science classes in high school. I had two or three semesters of it. So I had a little bit of an inkling that I wanted to do this. Was started thinking about, you know, I think I might go into, you know, being a software developer for a career. And then I went to college for wood products engineering. So, to explain how that happened, we had a family business in my family. That was a Rochester lumber company. And my dad worked there, his dad worked there, his dad before him started it. So it's kind of expected that I would go into it as well. And so, I did. And I worked in lumber and building materials for eight years after graduating, wouldn't my degree. Was an estimator, was a manager. I did all sorts of things related to the lumber world, which was very interesting and fun. I still found ways though, while I was there to continue working with computers, we had an inventory system that we had an inventory system that we had an old one that we had to transition over to a new one. So I was like, oh, that sounds like a fun project. I'll take that on. You know, we had, any time, again, I'm sure like most of you, if you're working in non-software companies, anytime some computer issue came up, they said, hey, you're the young guy who seems to like computers. Why don't you help out? So I kept finding ways to get involved with that. But at the same time, I learned a lot about the sales side of the business. I learned a lot about management. I learned a lot about business in general. So that eight years that I spent was time where I was not developing software skills, but I was developing business skills. So it ended up being useful. Now a couple of pictures, lumber, doors. And here's me happily managing my coworkers. It's a caricature drawn by one of them with me and there was me trying to live it out. So despite all the flannel I got to wear, I wasn't happy. So I had thought for years about wanting to switch careers, wanting to work as a software developer. But returning to college felt like a huge investment of time and money that I couldn't afford. It was hard to think about stepping back from earning a paycheck to having debt, again. To going back and spending, I didn't know what was involved in it. So is it two years? Is it four years? It felt scary. So I knew I wanted to make a change, but didn't know how to get there. So after some research, I decided to go to a software bootcamp, which I'm sure many of you, how many here have heard of software bootcamps? Yeah, cool. All right, so what is it? A lot of people ask, because this is something that's really just come up in the past several years. The goal of a software bootcamp is to take someone from being a complete novice to having enough skills to get a job. So there were a lot of people there who had, I took two semesters of high school computer science. There were some people who came in with none. So it was a 12-week period that was supposed to take you from whatever skill level to be able to get a job. So the reason that these are now currently coming up and being successful is that in the current job market, employers are looking for more practical development skills over people with computer science degrees. Having a computer science degree is good. Having any degree is good, but it's more important, people are finding it more important that you know how to work in an environment where, you know, that you've actually written code and in an environment where you've written code and worked with teams to create code and a bootcamp put you in a place where you could do that. Like I said, it was typically a 12-week program that's on site. There's a variety of languages, locations, costs and quality levels. I was doing some research in the past few weeks as I was preparing for this and finding that there's a lot of more options now too. I say it's typically a 12-week program. There are some places that do, you know, this was a intensive on-site program. There are places that are doing part-time programs. There are places that are doing, you know, just take a four-week chunk and learn this specific project or language. And so it's becoming a bit more flexible. But for me, it was really, you know, a more intense experience. So there's, you know, locations. There was some in New York. There's some in San Francisco. There's some right here in Ohio. And costs can range as well. And like I said, quality levels. Do your research. As I was trying to decide where to go, there was a lot of horror stories that I read. There were some places that were basically rip-offs. Like people paid their money and showed up and then like they just got abandoned after a couple days. So be sure if you're considering doing this that you look into reviews. So the experience, being there when I was actually being there. So the 60 plus hour weeks that we're warned about are really not a joke. Sorry. So the 60 plus hour weeks are for real. We were there from, you know, nine to four every day. Then we had work to take home with us. Yeah, I didn't think that it was going to be as much work as it was. And then it ended up being probably more work than I thought it would be. So it's all right. The first two, those two semesters of high school computer science that I took, we covered within the first week. So I thought I was gonna have a leg up. I was worried it was gonna even maybe be a little bit slow, but that was not anything that I should have been afraid of. Went quite fast. So we talked about having a two week rule. If you can understand what was being taught two weeks ago, you're in good shape. And there's logic behind that. The reasoning was that if we can't stop for everyone who has a question, we've got to kind of barrel through because we've got a place we need to get to. So trust us, we're gonna throw you in the deep end and you'll learn to swim eventually. So it felt like drinking from a fire hose. That was actually part of the way they described it at the start. So it really was like, here's a ton of information. Do with it, make with it as much as you can. Work with other people around you. Try to learn from them. In that way though, it really was a replication of what I found when I became a junior developer. There really is, for those of you who are working in the industry now, your first week was probably intense. Your first month was probably incredibly intense. You didn't know what people were talking about. So it really felt like a good preparation for that. Here's a picture of us. Looks fancy, doesn't it? Sorry. So yeah, that's actually the only picture I have from being there. I didn't think to take many pictures. So that's why it's not a great picture. But during our final project, some people giving presentations. So then there's the process of actually getting a job. So now I've been through about 10 weeks of the boot camp. So they set us up with several interviews before we even left, which was really helpful. At the place I went to, they set us up with people to work on getting our resume in place. They set us up with many practice interviews that ended up being actual job offers. So they had a network that, again, the idea is to get everyone into a career in the industry. So how do we get you there? For myself, again, my personal story, I had two job offers within a week of graduating the program, which was better than I expected. One was a corporate job in Rochester, where I was living, and the other one was a startup in Cleveland. What I ended up, one of the things that I thought about, and one of the things I think that's important to think about when you're going into a place where you're gonna be working is are you going to be a profit center or a cost center? Are the developers profit for the company, or are they a cost to the company that can be cut as soon as they don't need you anymore? I ended up taking the job in Cleveland, as you might have guessed, but the other company I found ended up, I saw a news piece six months later that they had massive layoffs in the place that I would have taken a job, and I'm sure I would have been right out, because that was the place that I would have been there to support some other business. But the company I'm working at now, we are the business, so what can you do for us? We'll keep that going. So, junior developer status. So now I've got a job, right? I've got a job, I am gainfully employed, it's great. Moving to Cleveland was fun. I did decide to take the startup job, as I said, and moved to Ohio. The nice thing I found going in, you might ask, going in without a computer science background, again working in the lumber industry six months previous to this. Everyone else who worked there was very happy to help out. You know, they knew that the software industry I've found, as I've experienced it over the past year and a half, people have been very willing to take the time to teach you things. People have been very willing to, you know, spend time with you, pair with you. It's really a culture of learning that we have here, and I think it's excellent. I think that's really one of the reasons why transitioning from another career into software can really go well, because you've got a lot of people here who wanna help. There were other people at my company who also came from some non-traditional backgrounds. We have some people who, you know, went to college later in life. We have some people who were changing from different careers, so it was not crazy. Most important part I found for my success was being willing to learn, being willing to jump in on new projects, and trying to find my own place within the team and where I could help. So, and like I said before, I felt that I was prepared well for this by the boot camp experience. I feel like when, by throwing us in and saying, here's some new technology, you're on a team, figure out how you guys are gonna make it work, felt very realistic to what my career has felt like so far. So, but that's a good thing. I think that's been good, and I think, yeah, I think it's been really beneficial. So, and the benefit, again, of being at a startup has been that we've had plenty of real projects that have needed to get done, and there's been plenty of opportunity for new guys like myself to get involved and make a difference. So, this is a little picture from work. Cleveland is not always this dirty, but in, all right, well, differing opinions. Late, late winter it is very dirty. So, ah, and another nice benefit is on the weekend I get to code with my friends, and then this is one of my favorite pictures of me and some of my coworkers that illustrates how fun it is to work with us. I call Millennials in the Workplace. Picnic, I don't know, I thought it was fun. Okay, bottom line, when it came around about a year later, everyone in our cohort ended up getting a job in the software industry. So, ended up working out well for us. For myself, I was very lucky. I had the background in computer science. I had an interest in learning. I had the ability to quit a job for three months and take this on full time. Yeah, I was lucky, I'm not gonna say I'm not, but a lot of other people have been too. There's a lot of success stories out there of people changing careers, going through boot camps, and having success, ending up with good jobs in the industry. So, to echo that again, there are risks. Anytime you make a major change, a major life change like this, there's a lot of risks that go into it, but rewards exist too. I'm incredibly happy now that I'm working here, working, doing the job I'm doing, working in the industry I'm working, and I'm glad that I didn't decide two years ago to just stick it out and work in the lumber business. I would be very unhappy now if I made that decision. And it's a great time to join the software industry. There's a lot of opportunities. There are a lot of jobs available for people who are transitioning from other jobs or don't have the ideal background of a four year computer science degree from whatever university. And the last benefit is I can still all wear all the flannel I want. However, I choose not to. That's fine. And basically, I could have skipped everything and just shown you that. So, really I just wanted to stay cool. Just wanted to stay the cool dude, so. All right, so some further reading. I got into it by Googling. I just started searching boot camps and it led me down a rabbit hole. There's a couple of great sites that do reviews if it's something you might be interested in doing. And just a plug for that final site. It's called the Practical Developer and I found it to be a great learning resource for people at my skill level and people who are juniors coming in. It's really great practical learning for, yeah, developers. So, I guess we've got a little bit of time. If anyone has any questions, yeah. So, in my particular circumstance, oh sorry, the question was, how did the boot camp prepare me for actually getting into the job market? What steps did, you know, how did I go from boot camp to step job market? They did help. We had the boot camp I went to had a hiring network of about 12 companies that they'd worked with. They'd placed people who graduated from the boot camp there into these companies and so they said, wow, that worked out pretty well. Who else you got? And so, we had kind of a speed dating round where you bring all these companies in and we would schedule these 20 minute interviews and then some people would get follow ups and but either it was experience or it was an actual opportunity to get a job. So, some people landed jobs from there. For myself, actually my instructor ended up working at one of the companies and said, hey, you should also come work at this company. So, networking, that's another benefit. The other offer I got though back in Rochester was actually I was mostly, again, networking. I had a friend back there who worked and I just reached out to all my friends I knew who worked in the software industry and I said, what have you got? And he said, actually, we're hiring and that's how I got in to find out about that. So, they helped but reaching out on your own and reaching out to your network, that helps as well. Yeah. Yes, yeah. So, that's one of the guys who interviewed me and allowed me to get a job so that's pretty great. But I actually had and this is one of the things that I wouldn't have had probably if I hadn't gone through the boot camp is I had something published. I had something I could say, go to this website and you can see an application that I've written. And I sent it to him. I don't know if it entirely worked as well as it should have but he was like, hey, you tried. That's pretty nice. Yeah. So, I mean, there's, you know, get something there. Get an app out there. Yes, sir. What were the commonalities amongst people in my cohort? Actually, you wanna know what one of the funniest ones was was that I think there were three of us who were all coming from family businesses we weren't happy in. Three of the 15 or so of us. But there was, you know, it was people who were either, who were looking to get into the industry and either they felt, some people had gone through college and felt that it didn't prepare them enough for it. Some people were looking to get, you know, into the hiring network or to get into the networking part of this. So, yeah, I think it was, it was people, most people who were just looking who are coming from one career and going into another but I don't know that there was a huge crossover in terms of background. Yes. So, my interest in computers, the question was, is that, was that a common thread? I do think so. There was a, so the one that I went to and I think most reputable boot camps, they have a pre-screen for people. They don't just take anyone who can pay. They wanna make sure that you're actually successful because they get ranked based on how many people they place into jobs eventually. So, they, you gotta have some familiarity with it. You're not finding people who have, who are saying, you know, where's the any key sort of thing? You know, that's, you've weeded those people out previously to that. Yeah. What kind of code do I write as a junior developer? Yeah. I'm not gonna repeat that. So, no, so, like I said, we were given real projects. So, we work in an agile environment and they gave us, they said, here's the stories we've got to work on. I, here's, here, what, what looks good to you? I don't know, this one, I guess. Okay, figure it out. And it's like, okay, well, how, someone help me. And then I'm just pulling on people's, you know, their, yeah, exactly. Yeah, what? Sorry? Cotail. Pulling on Cotail, I was thinking more of the apron strings. That's what I was going for. So, reaching out, yeah, trying to get help. Yes, sir? Yeah, it was, we, it was split into like a back end and then a front end course, end of the front end. So, yeah, it was, it was in the end web development, but we started with Java and just had to teach people what, if else, statements were. And, you know, for loops and things like that. So, both. Yes. The hours I'm currently working is my boss here. No, I mean, we typically do, you know, about a 40 hour week. It's, it was demanding, I mean, it is demanding because you're constantly expanding the scope of what you're working on. The work that I was doing my first month would not be as demanding now, but if you are successful at doing your work, you're going to get more. So, it continues to be demanding. Yes, sir? You're going to be this far away for a while. Yeah. But, it's an excellent opportunity. Yeah. Just a thought, I don't, because it's not something that everyone is here and thinks about. Yes. If you have a job, it is an option. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah, I think we've got to, yeah, I've got to cut it off. So, sorry, I'm happy to answer any other questions anyone has, but we do have to cut off so we can move on. So, thank you all for listening. I really appreciate your time.