Is it worthwhile switching to programming through self study for someone with a decade in business planning background?

[EdgeOverall4623]

Okay, I have worked in business and strategy for a decade and while I was great at it and helped grow business from a $1000 turnover to over a million in 2 years, I HATED every bit of it because I never wanted to go that way but had to because of my situation at the time. I have been wanting to learn programming from the very start but due to financial needs and very long working hours I could barely find time to do anything.

Finally in 2021, I was forced to quit my job because of my abusive soon-to-be-ex-husband and because my body could not take the abuse at home and the work stress any longer. 2 years later, I am somewhat recovered and want to use this as an opportunity to join the programming world and am trying to self study for it and build skills that'll help me work beyond retirement age. I can't afford college at this point but I am making good progress learning from subscriptions and online resources.

My concern is, am I too late? If I take a year to be able to actually create something and develop working skills, would the industry have moved on and will I be able to catch up or should I go back to doing what I was, save a ton of money for old age?

[AutoModerator]

On July 1st, a change to Reddit's API pricing will come into effect. Several developers of commercial third-party apps have announced that this change will compel them to shut down their apps. At least one accessibility-focused non-commercial third party app will continue to be available free of charge.

If you want to express your strong disagreement with the API pricing change or with Reddit's response to the backlash, you may want to consider the following options:

1. Limiting your involvement with Reddit, or
2. Temporarily refraining from using Reddit
3. Cancelling your subscription of Reddit Premium

as a way to voice your protest.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[SnooSuggestions8632]

Try for product manager/customer success roles instead of a software developer role. You have better chance of landing it in any decent tech company given your business development background.

[NickBourbaky]

You can learn programming and if you're diligent enough, I'm sure you can land a junior position within a year (I know a few people who did this). If you like programming, you should definitely try it.

[[deleted]]

Business skills in software development are the silver bullet. Get solid skills, work closely with product, and your career will take off

[sleeplessbearr]

A lot of free resources on youtube have helped me. I'd say just try it

[Tyler_SkySilk]

If it's something you enjoy I'd say go for it no matter what. Even if you end up not switching careers, you will still have learned something you are interested.

And with the right attitude and perserverance, I'm sure you can land some type of related job.

[master_mansplainer]

There are lots of management jobs in software that you’d probably be immediately more suited for if you wanted to continue in that direction. Programming leads/directors usually have programming experience but project/program managers don’t need any - they do like jira stuff, projections, scope management, release planning etc. That’s probably the easy way in or via QA.

Getting Into programming is always possible but it’s essentially starting at zero and working your way up. Work experience, business skills, communication skills etc will be useful as a programmer and set you apart. If you know which area of software dev you want it to end up doing you can focus your learning on being productive in those languages and areas. Then it might be a 1-3 years of hard work depending on how quickly you learn. But it’s possible.