I'm in this boat. Finally started programming in 2018 at age 38 after a lifetime of playing around with computers as a hobby (thanks, dad!) and a first career in a completely unrelated field, as an attorney.
The linked article is about learning for pleasure, but there are also challenges associated with trying to enter the field as a second career. The technical complexity, of course, and the scale of what needs to be learned, can sometimes be overwhelming. It helps to bring as much humility to the process as you can muster. But peoples' perceptions can also be a challenge - no one quite knows what to make of you!
I like to think it's an opportunity. If you're able to combine domain expertise from your first career with a solid grasp of CS fundamentals and a good day-to-day working knowledge of your toolchain, that can make you a pretty rare interdisciplinary candidate. Perhaps that then informs how you market yourself and to whom.
Best of luck to anyone coming at this as a second career!
I thought for a moment I blacked out and posted to HN without knowing it. I too am a 38 years old attorney who learned CS/Programming late in life. I haven’t had any success in finding relevant job openings for my particular coding knowledge, but I keep looking.
Just knowing you exist gives me hope I may still be able to break into tech, at some level. And given that Hurricane Laura just decimated my city ( and my home and my office) I need some hope right now.
I think there's a lot of room for programmers with deep domain knowledge about some topic. If writing software for lawyers or law-related issues, I'm pretty sure experience as a lawyer can be very useful.
Just interviewing other lawyers for their “if it existed I would buy it” software would show there’s a lot of opportunity. A friend of mine has been looking for a service that emails her whenever a local municipality does something with easements/property access.
This actually took me down a long rabbit hole of how local government software is horrible and someone could crush this area — my only concern would be lack of traction as local governments seem to prefer operating in obscurity/making it difficult to hold them accountable.
Funny, I know a guy doing just that, former roommate He was mostly writing code for things that handle municipal water supplies and other water monitoring stuff. He worked for a code shop that built the original system and after he left he kept doing maintenance work on the side until he went (mostly) full time at it.
OTOH, he's basically a one-man show, and has implied that if he had to scale -- e.g. add 3+ people -- then the $$$ wouldn't go as far. By himself it's a decent paycheck, though.
The problem is municipalities are all different, with different state/local requirements, and they often don't have the money or operational depth to support deeply customized software. I grew up near a park that had to shutdown for several months because they couldn't get enough funds together to have people mow the lawns; where would they find the money for custom code?
Well, being an attorney you could dig yourself a nice rabbit hole with Lucene, a Java library for text indexing and analysis at the foundation of many Java based search engines (for example Solr, Elastichsearch.) Combine it then with your expertise to analyze documents from your business domain for example
I am guessing this is one of the situations where you might need to make that niche for yourself.
Take on contracts to do something that is traditionally done with hand -> write scripts to automate it -> take on more contracts.
At that point you would probably be paid for 20 people's worth for 20 people's work....but automating it will allow you to pocket all of it due to zero (low) costs.
Our startup tried doing this with automated 3D map creation for drone use surveying. It is incredibly easy to undercut traditional competition at a technical level. Convincing corporate to trust in your experiment tho, kinda hard. It is the classic: 'No one has been fired for hiring IBM' conundrum.
Have you had any eDiscovery experience in the past? I was an analyst for 15 years and AI is really coming on strong now. I've seen, in my job search, a few places where a JD coupled with a little CS knowledge could be useful. A buddy of mine is a patent attorney and quit his firm job to start his own shop doing natural language processing against the US and foreign patent databases. He didn't get his hands into writing the software but he's had to develop a reasonable understanding to guide his process and sell it.
Knowing people in both the legal and software world, law is a tough profession with old world business expectations. Almost everything is “last minute” due to either court deadlines or your client dropping everything on you because something happened and it has to be fixed now.
In-house counsel jobs can be a bit more relaxing, as you might be working on longer term projects rather than the latest disaster that fell into your lap.
Exactly, I would try to find something in-house. And choose some very narrow field I can be an expert on (GDPR, tech laws, tax etc).
Not saying it's easy though.
Lawyering is not really the problem, I have a quite successful career. I am mostly content to just program in my spare time and programming/automating those areas of my practice where there is value. But, and it’s probably more specific to my situation, but I do almost exclusively criminal defense work and it can be tiring, I’ve been at it long enough that I could use a change of focus.
Biggest problem for me is that my areas of knowledge/interest for CS/programming is limits solely focused on low level, performance oriented domains, programming language theory And type theory. That is not the most marketable skill set, but I love doing it.
It is, but you have to be quite the expert. It's not like app development where even limited experience can be enough to get by.
However if you like that sort of stuff you can try to become a web develoepr (pick say Python or Ruby) and then become an expert in backendy / performence issues.
Can't speak for the OPs reasons, but some evidence suggests that law schools have created an oversupply of people with law degrees, which impacts career possibilities.
I started at 39. I had been looking for a new career to transition from video editing. After the third time my employer restructured my role, I took a voluntary redundancy (basically volunteering to be laid-off) and started programming full-time. I did an online bootcamp and never looked back. Five years later I'm a Senior Software Engineer, and hoping to upgrade to principle engineer by end of the year.
Sometimes I suddenly feel like a fraud, especially when I realize I'm in a meeting where everyone in the room has a CS degree or higher, but overall I feel like I bring a lot of value to what we do and most of all, I really love doing it.
I remember anonymously asking on Quora if people thought I was too old to learn how to program. The amount of support and stories that were shared with me were positively overwhelming. Probably the best answer I received was, "do you enjoy doing this thing?, if so, the answer is you should just do it."
I feel this way sometimes too, despite having a traditional CS degree and being in the software industry my entire professional life. Apparently impostor syndrome is more common than we think.
Personally I've come to believe there are very few people who "fit like a glove", and everyone else has varying degrees of this.
Edit: On rereading this it might appear that I am trying to diminish/dismiss your experiences. I apologize if it came across that way - my intention was more to share that I've heard this same sentiment for different reasons from many different people.
"feeling like a fraud" is pretty common, it is formally called "imposter syndrome".
It is usually just your mind playing tricks on you; there is a delta between your internal picture of what a "real" programmer (or senior manager, or whatever position) looks like and your internal image of yourself.
One solution is to duck type yourself until the feeling goes away. Another is to start to recognize that some of your internal definitions might not be shared by others.
I'll leave it as homework to decide which internal definitions matter the most here.
I got my first tech job later in life, as well. I’m now in a similar position as you, except that I don’t think I’ll be trying for principle/staff level for another couple years yet.
I definitely feel like I’m able to bring significant value, and I’m on a team where almost half of us have masters degrees in CS, while I have just a BA in math and a couple years clocked in grad school (math again).
I tell you what, though: I live for those times when I can make something work easily because I’m able to leverage my math background. It certainly makes understanding recursion fairly easy (many math definitions are recursive), and my graph theory courses help on occasion. I was once even able to help solve a problem that involved calculating the area of a general polygon specified by coordinates, which nobody on the team at the time really knew how to approach.
And yet I find what my employer's prize are the most basic of concepts, having actually nothing to do with programming. Things like, attention to detail, admitting fault (ownership ties into this), regular updates and communication.
I also own code-bases simply because no one else was willing to or interested in doing so. Many times I've been out of my depth, but I've surrounded myself with an incredible team. I've found that in conversations where I was totally out my depth, I was able to contribute simply by asking basic questions or acting as a rubber duck.
Maybe Principle Engineer is a little but of a stretch I'll admit. But I'll still shoot for it and if I don't get it this year, it'll happen next year or the year after that. That's how I made senior after all, and probably why I find myself in roles like interim manager presently.
I'm 38 and just started my first developer job 3 months ago after practicing law for 13 years and hating it. I started learning JavaScript/HTML/CSS about a year ago.
It's the best thing I've ever done for myself and my only regret is not doing it sooner.
I have a friend who is an attorney that's fairly technical - he can't write code but he understands how it works when reading it. He does combine his interdisciplinary skill - started a company in his main domain using software as a tool. I'm constantly impressed by him.
Knowing the problems to solve is HUGE. If you know enough programming to identify 10X developers and point them in the right direction, you can create a ton of value.
> I like to think it's an opportunity. If you're able to combine domain expertise from your first career with a solid grasp of CS fundamentals and a good day-to-day working knowledge of your toolchain, that can make you a pretty rare interdisciplinary candidate. Perhaps that then informs how you market yourself and to whom.
Indeed, you're in the best position to solve attorney problems with programming.
But another approach to consider is augmenting or skipping the candidate part and build it yourself. Identity a problem you had, solve it and sell the solution/tool to other attorneys. Even if the selling part doesn't do well enough, you'll learn a lot and have a valuable resume booster.
If you don't mind me asking, why would one give up a cushy, well paid attorney career and choose software engineering? Software engineering compensation _tops out_ below where an experienced attorney compensation _begins_. The least I've ever paid a lawyer was $250/hr.
In the U.S. only a very small percentage of lawyers ever get to the point where they make $250 an hour, and even if they do they only have a certain amount of years they can earn that much then if they don't make partner at whatever firm they're at they get put out to pasture.
During the time they're making that much money they're basically trapped working insane hours at one firm. Most lawyers don't even make six figures. Also, they can get disbarred if they make a mistake.
Software engineering allows for higher earnings for your entire career (though the ceiling might be lower on earnings), is less stressful and doesn't demand as many hours (in general) doesn't have a regulatory body that can take away your right to work if you get in trouble.
I'm not sure how likely disbarring is for an innocent mistake.
But I agree with your basic premise. Sure, making partner at a white shoe New York law firm is not a bad gig if you're into it and have been OK with the insane hours to get there. I did some work for one of those firms once and got pretty well paid for it (expert witness work).
But, you could also say that being an English professor can be a pretty good gig--if you're tenured at an Ivy League college. Which doesn't mean it's actually a great career choice given you're more likely to be teaching as an adjunct at a couple different community colleges or in a public high school with your expensive PhD.
Yes, but it's always there as an option if the lawyer doesn't do what they want them to. Also, you can get in this kind of trouble for criminal charges unrelated to work done at your day job. I've known lawyers who got into trouble with the bar over getting a DUI or drug charges.
That kind of risk just doesn't really exist in software engineering beyond regular criminal background checks.
I started as a lawyer then switched to programming. Law is cushy in the sense that you work in a nice office. But the constant stress, endless "emergency" deadlines, missed anniversaries and celebrations, unreasonable clients, pressure to bill bill bill, then to earn earn earn...
Then there's the work itself. I was in litigation, handling lawsuits between enormous corporations. The first few years of my career were spent in doc review 'dungeons', going through millions of pages of documents to find 'relevant' and 'hot' docs. Then as I became more senior, I was bombarded with one discovery motion after that were often filled with toxic attacks against the other side ("those bastards hid these documents! blah blah blah"). It didn't change much once I began doing 'substantial' work: litigation, by its nature, is intellectual combat. Being immersed in that kind of knife-fighting 24/7, week after week, wore me down.
Now I'm a software engineer and I love it. Work is interesting, hours are humane, and I genuinely enjoy collaborating with my colleagues to build new things.
Sure, I don't make as much as I did in law. But the evenings and weekends I can spend with my family, my mind at rest, are priceless. Plus, software engineers make plenty of money.
Damn, I always felt like a failure for not going into medicine or lawyer and now I feel like I may have chosen the right path. I did well in school but didn't have the 13 years for medicine or the $300,000 for law school... instead I got my little Computer Science bachelors.
If you're early on in your career, I'd recommend the free only Computer Science degree (DIY route -> https://github.com/ossu/computer-science) and eventually getting a Master's if you want to go into management (or alternatively just load up on certs)
To be fair lawyers are worth more than senior software developers, but not too much more. That $250-$750 per hour is the business rate not the profit that goes to the attorney. If an attorney works at a large firm most of that goes back to the firm. If the attorney goes out of their own they have personal business expenses to account for.
As a software developer I bring home more than some attorneys I have met. I am not working a FAANG making buckets of cash either.
I mean, you can say the same about plumbers, to an extent. Many charge $100-200 an hour, more for the first hour, plus travel fee and service charge, and may skim a profit on the parts they use as well.
Either you're an entrepreneur, and your hourly wage has to pay for all kinds of costs, including time not spent working, getting clients, equipment, training blablabla. Or you're an employee and your take-home pay can be completely detached from the pricing to your clients.
When I started my career in a legal/financial firm as a junior my hourly rate was $200 and my hourly pay was about $15, for example.
In those days I also worked a lot of overtime and chargeability requirements will drive you mad. Also in many firms you quickly specialise leading to sometimes boring work. On the one hand every legal matter is different and has its own quirks, challenges and interesting unique aspects. On the other hand, when you specialise in a certain field, you also constantly work on similar cases with similar references and jurisprudence, and you indeed often end up filling in templates for standard letters, contracts, motions etc, because the bulk of the substance will be the same over and over. Point being, the $15 an hour also came with mind-numbing work with unhealthy workhours and poor work/life balance.
That's just one of many stories, of course and all jobs have their issues. Some lawyers have a great job/life. But there's also plenty of people who may enjoy programming much more.
- Sounds about right. Few friends (Engineering/Tree Lawyers) say you can get a bit more depending on your niche.
- Many Lawyers under bill for fear of losing/surrendering their license [1] or squeeze in their Model Rule 6.1 hours [2]
- I'm seeing more lawyers amass some wealth, get burnt out, and then jump over to more creative or altruistic endeavours with less stress; can't blame them.
And keep in mind there are a lot of people who enter fields like law because it's the "default" thing to do if you're a good student who doesn't know what they want out of life yet.
Lots of lawyers out there who are at best bored, and at worst filled with revulsion about their day job. That's not a dig on law, but societal expectations.
$250 is generic "business contract review" lawyer. Not any kind of distinguished legal scholar. And I had to look pretty hard to find a decent one that didn't cost twice that.
I'm studying law now and considering this path. I would be really appreciative to hear your advice on moving from law to computer science. If you could send me an email to the address in my profile, I would be very grateful. Thanks!
Please elaborate! I just turned 30 and made it a goal to attempt a serious career change. Currently I’m 4 months in clocking 3+/hrs a day of (html,css,js) study. How long did it take before you felt comfortable throwing your hat into the career ring? I have tons of questions, but I would love to hear your story first. Thanks!
I switched careers too and I can tell you that the first job is the hardest to get. Build a portfolio and network hard. Take contract jobs. Do whatever it takes to get your foot in the door.
I learned to code at 28 and have been doing it professionally for 10 years now. Coding is easier than it used to be. I don't think an age limit applies.
If someone goes to grad school, especially if they had 2-3 years of full-time work mixed in there, they can easily be pushing 30. I basically did a career change at about that age into the computer field as a product manager.
my initial couple jobs were as a software engineer so yes. these days I do a blend of coding and marketing, as a developer advocate at AWS. good luck to your gf, pls feel free to send more qtns I think my email is in my profile.
The linked article is about learning for pleasure, but there are also challenges associated with trying to enter the field as a second career. The technical complexity, of course, and the scale of what needs to be learned, can sometimes be overwhelming. It helps to bring as much humility to the process as you can muster. But peoples' perceptions can also be a challenge - no one quite knows what to make of you!
I like to think it's an opportunity. If you're able to combine domain expertise from your first career with a solid grasp of CS fundamentals and a good day-to-day working knowledge of your toolchain, that can make you a pretty rare interdisciplinary candidate. Perhaps that then informs how you market yourself and to whom.
Best of luck to anyone coming at this as a second career!