We talk about:

• How at her first developer job at IBM, Emma's boss told her: "You need to get your stuff together or you won't make it in this industry." And the transformation that followed.

• Emma's thoughts on Computer Science degrees. "Going to college gives you credibility and a network. You can get opportunities that way."

• How Emma hires software engineers. (Hint: she tries to disregard degrees completely.)

• How Emma intentionally procrastinates some big tasks to give her mind time to figure out the puzzle pieces

Can you guess what song I'm playing on my bass during the intro? It's from a 1979 punk song.

Also, I want to thank the 10,776 kind people who support our charity each month, and who make this podcast possible. You can join them and support our mission at: https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate

You can watch the interview on YouTube:

Or you can listen to the podcast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Be sure to follow the freeCodeCamp Podcast there so you'll get new episodes each Friday.

Links we talk about during our conversation:

• Emma on Twitter: https://x.com/emmabostian

• The Ladybug Podcast about women in tech that Emma helped host for several years: https://www.ladybug.dev/

Among her many accomplishments, Jessica created the Electron team at GitHub. Electron is a library for building desktop apps using browser technologies. If you've used the desktop version of Slack, Figma, or VS Code, you've used Electron.

I recorded this podcast live and I haven't edited it at all. I want to capture the feel of a real live conversation, with all the human quirks that entails. As with all my podcast episodes, I start by performing a classic bass line. Can you guess what song this bass line is from? It's a "cult" hit from 1990.

You can watch the interview on YouTube:

Or you can listen to the podcast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. You can also listen to the podcast below, right in your browser:

Be sure to follow The freeCodeCamp podcast in your favorite podcast app. And share this podcast with a friend. Let's inspire more folks to learn to code and build careers for themselves in tech.

Also, I want to thank the 8,427 kind people who support our charity each month, and who make this podcast possible. You can join them and support our mission at: https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate

Links we talk about during the interview:

GitIt, Jessica's interactive Git course on Node School

Jessica's old craft blog (you may get an HTTPS warning from your browser but the site is just an old Blogspot site)

JSBin founder Remy Sharp's blog about JSBin and how he "lost his love of his side project"

Subdivisions song by Rush that Quincy mentions. Great early morning listening.

Jessica on Twitter

Phoebe worked from age 12 at her parent's Chinese take-out restaurant. She was able to study history at the London School of Economics, before working in higher ed.

She left her job to raise two kids due to the high cost of childcare in the UK. After two years of teaching herself to code using freeCodeCamp, she got her first job as a software developer.

I recorded this podcast live and I haven't edited it at all. I want to capture the feel of a real live conversation, with all the human quirks that entails. As with all my podcast episodes, I start by performing a classic bass line. Can you guess what song this bass line is from? It's from 1989.

Phoebe has earned multiple certifications from freeCodeCamp, and also published a number of articles on our publication.

How Phoebe went from stay-at-home mom to Front End Web Developer at age 36

• Phoebe's review of Harvard CS50
• The BBC Take-away Kids documentary, which Phoebe said is what her childhood was like, working from age 12
• Phoebe's website, with her portfolio and links to her socials

You can watch a video version of my interview with Phoebe here:

Or you can listen to the podcast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. You can also listen to the podcast below, right in your browser:

If you've read this far, consider supporting our 501(c)(3) public charity, and aiding us in our mission to create more free learning resources for everyone: https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate

Arian grew up in New York and studied at MIT. She worked in finance for a few years, then built her own ecommerce Marketplace startup with a friend.

Along the way, Arian went through the South Park Commons startup accelerator, and she now leads their New York City branch as a partner.

We talk about technology, startups, and her journey from finance to building products.

Be sure to follow The freeCodeCamp podcast in your favorite podcast app. And share this podcast with a friend. Let's inspire more folks to learn to code and build careers for themselves in tech.

You can listen to the podcast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. You can also listen to the podcast below, right in your browser:

Me hanging out at the NYC South Park Commons with Arian Agrawal, the startup founder who now runs the NYC branch of the accelerator.

Some links relevant to our discussion:

Arian on Twitter

Arian on LinkedIn

South Park Commons

"What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?" - George Eliot

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit and many people started losing their jobs, I wanted to help in any way I could. And mentoring other women trying to get into tech was one way.

I had just landed a new job after having been laid off, so my experience being a female interviewing for engineering roles was fresh.

By personally sharing this and my prior experiences, I provided these women hope while they navigated their job search, college, and new roles. My biggest realization mentoring this year was that I didn’t need to have it all figured out myself to start helping others.

I hope that by sharing the little ways I was able to help, it encourages someone to lend a helping hand. I truly believe mentoring is a small step forward towards gaining and retaining women in tech.

Why I Started Mentoring

I started mentoring in 2019, a couple of months after landing my first software engineering role, because I wanted to help others.

Getting into tech was a long journey for me and the people that helped me along the way were invaluable. I wanted to be that person for someone else.

I want to lift others up as I advance in my career. My long term goal is to build an organization that helps underrepresented women find a career they will love.

How to Start Mentoring

You don’t need years of experience to start helping someone. I started mentoring a few months after landing my first dev role.

I don’t always have the answers, but I can share my experiences, what has worked for me, and what hasn’t. It's never too early or late to start helping.

Here’s how I started mentoring and how others might to:

• I created a profile on CodingCoach.io
• A friend asked if I wanted to give career advice to someone in their network
• I answered thoughtful emails from students who had read my blog posts
• At work, I communicated with my boss that I was interested in mentoring

How I Supported My Mentees

“A mentor empowers a person to see a possible future, and believe it can be obtained.” – Shawn Hitchcock

Support came in many ways. It was easy to empathize with them because I had just finished going through the job interview process and started a new role remotely.

I supported my mentees by:

• Giving them career advice from the perspective of a female minority in tech
• Sharing tech resources (like upcoming virtual conferences, events, books, and so on)
• Offering words of encouragement
• Doing résumé reviews for them
• Doing practice mock interviews to help them prepare for actual interviews

I continue to meet with most of them biweekly for 30 minutes during my lunch breaks.

The Need to Shift Negatives to Positives

Many of my mentees had negative thoughts and feelings which seemed pretty natural given the nature of this year.

I didn’t want to let the negativity overtake my mentorship experience so I shifted the negatives to positives:

2020

How we shifted our perspectives

Here are some tips to help you turn negativity into positivity:

How Mentoring Has Been Valuable to Me

Mentoring has been valuable to me in so many ways. It has:

• Helped me understand what others who have a similar background are struggling with
• Kept me in the loop of how new engineers are being onboarded at other companies
• Reminded me where I’ve come from especially as a woman in tech
• Allowed me to give back to the tech community
• Helped me manage my time and energy
• Kept me humble

A Warm Welcome to These Resilient Women

"Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being. “ -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Finally, I want to share what my mentees were able to accomplish at the start of the pandemic. I hope they have been able to celebrate because we are raising a toast and are excited to have them join the world of tech.

These women were dealing with the extra uncertainty that the pandemic caused, and the constant chaos around us hasn't seemed promising.

Through their hard work and resilience they were able to land their first full time developer roles or continue their education through this tough job market and drastic life changes.

Stephanie Aurelio - (Frontend Developer) Recent Bootcamp grad

Stephanie graduated from the UCLA Extension bootcamp in March and started job searching during the pandemic.

New to the world of tech and its interview process, she asked me for some guidance on what to expect and how to possibly prepare.

She studied extremely hard, worked on side projects, and kept pushing through the interviews to land her first frontend developer role soon after graduating!

Kaya Chou - (Software Engineer) Recent Computer Science grad

Kaya graduated from undergrad this spring from Simmons University. She asked for my help to review her résumé and wanted to learn about my experience with job interviewing.

I remember one early Saturday morning when we reviewed her résumé and she was quick to update it. She even designed and built her own template and shared it with me! Kaya immediately landed her first full time software engineering role.

Maitri Shah - (Software Engineer) NerdWallet new college grad employee

Maitri started her first full time software engineer role at NerdWallet after graduating from UC Berkeley this spring. I had the pleasure of onboarding her in May.

She has been extremely adaptive, focused, and proactive. It's been exciting seeing her excel at work during her first couple of months at NerdWallet and she's already taking leadership in so many different ways.

Yesenia Galindo - Computer Science student

Yesenia recently transferred to California State University - Dominguez Hills from a community college. The transition this year of going virtual was challenging but she has been resilient and staying proactive in getting prepared for the job search once she graduates next spring.

She has been working on her personal website, keeping up with her résumé, and we have been doing mock interviews to get her familiar with the new grad interview process.

What's Next

I am so grateful to have been able to mentor these women in 2020. And I just used the extra time I gained from not having to commute to work with them.

Next year my focus will be on:

• Learning from my mentees. How has mentorship helped them? What hasn’t been working?
• Exploring ways I can expand my mentorship to a larger audience
• Mentoring a new engineer at work
• Mentoring people from different backgrounds outside of work

Let’s Continue Leading the Way

As women in tech, we still have work to do to continue building the path for future generations. Even mentoring one person can make all the difference in the world.

We’re on our way to gender equality. To see Kamala Harris become the first woman and woman of color as vice president in 2020 is something to remember and fuel us.

Just as we all have something to learn, we all have something to teach.

Let’s be friends on Twitter. Happy Coding :)

“There is strength in numbers and the numbers representing women in tech are not currently in our favor—yet. Every unique challenge brings an opportunity to do something about it. Being a woman in tech is a badge of honor. Wear it proud, loud and continue to do the hard work to help lead the way for others." Even if you're uncomfortable inciting change at your own company, there are plenty of ways to make a difference.’ - Michelle Wingard

It’s been 8 weeks since we started experiencing the dramatic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. In that time, we’ve all borne witness to how this virus can impact our families, our communities, and our livelihood.

Unemployment is on the rise – the labor department reported that another 6.6 million people filed for unemployment benefits last week. Most city dwellers were not prepared for this kind of catastrophic event.

So this article is my way of doing a public service for my fellow developers and designers.

There are plethora of articles about computer programming languages and technologies for web and mobile application development. But there are few that talk about the elephant in the room: the real-life struggle of web developers and designers.

Whenever I go to hackathons, I meet people who are either unemployed or freelancing. I also meet aspiring coders who just graduated from coding bootcamps and are looking for jobs. Sadly, some go to this event for the free food and temporary shelter because they can sleep at the venue.

Many designer and developer jobs are dispensable. Doomsday does not require an event of biblical proportion – all it takes is to lose a client, or get laid off from your current job.

If you live in California, our state has labor law called “At-will employment.” It is a term for contractual relationships in which an employee can be dismissed by an employer for any reason (that is, without having to establish “just cause” for termination), and without warning, as long as the reason is not illegal (for example, firing a person because of their race or religion).

The employers can outsource web and software development to programmers from another country for a fraction of the price. For companies who’d rather hire someone still based locally inside United States (whether on or offsite), some would prefer to hire you as an individual contractor. This means no company benefits (paid sick leave or vacation), no health insurance, 401K, and perks that a permanent employee gets.

Here are some things freelancers can do in order to survive in this uncertain time while waiting for their big break or permanent employment.

Health Insurance

This is at the very top of my list. I learned this the hard way.

My appendix ruptured years ago, and since I didn't have medical insurance the doctor did not want to perform surgery.

His exact words were, “You've got no money to pay me. Just go home!”

I was in so much pain the nurse gave me a shot of morphine. It made me so dizzy that I vomited.

If it wasn't for the good Samaritan who fought for me and my rights as a patient, I would not have gotten my operation.

I tell you all of this to emphasize how important it is to have health insurance here in the United States. Make this your priority whether you have a job or not.

Even if you need to go out of your way to visit different clinics and do research about how to get free or low cost insurance, do it. Do not procrastinate on this.

It will cost you nothing to figure out how to obtain health coverage, but it will cost you and your family so much more if you end up in a hospital bed.

Some basic ways to save money

Need vs want

Some of you might say your money is just enough to pay the bills and there is no more left to put aside for savings. I hear you, I’ve been there too.

How about cutting down unnecessary expenses? In my case, I cut down on junk foods. I like to eat something crunchy while I am working, but I changed it to banana with almond butter. For me it works because the combination of the two is delicious and it fills me up easily and curbs my craving for junk foods.

One banana costs 10–29 cents, and the almond butter will last me for two weeks if I consume it daily. I also tried to snack on celery sticks and carrots – I never thought I would like them, it gave me the same effect (crunchy) I get from eating chips. Now I enjoy eating beets and fruits for snacks whenever I am craving something sweet.

When I go shopping, I ask myself this question before making a purchase: “Is this a need or a want?” If the answer is need, I will buy it. If not, I will pass.

Smart memberships

What do I get from this anyway? One time my tire got punctured by a big nail because I parked next to a construction site. If I hadn't cut down on the unnecessary things, I wouldn't have had the money to buy two new front tires.

I asked my dad to give me a AAA Auto Club membership as a birthday gift instead of a purse or clothes. So it did not cost me a penny to get my car towed all the way to the car mechanic’s shop. A towing company charges around $200–$300 depending on the location, so I saved a good deal of money by getting a AAA card and the savings from affiliate stores discount that comes with it.

Prepaid cellphone

Switch to a prepaid cellphone. I used to pay $100/month on my cellphone bill, so I switched to prepaid and it saved me 40%. Plus I am not tied up in a 2-year contract which will can gravely affect your credit score if you can't afford to pay the bill and the cellphone provider puts your account in collection.

A low FICO score may affect your employment opportunities at big companies when they run your credit. You will also have to pay higher interest when you buy a car or make any other large purchase. And more often than not, if you decide to get your own place, you will be charged a higher rent.

Your chance of purchasing a home will be negatively affected as well, as debt delinquency is a red flag to banks and mortgage brokers. Even if you are paying cash in full, it's quite risky because they will report you to the FBI for possessing hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash.

Did I go too far? I think that's a good thing to know right? They don't teach that in computer science school.

Extra services

If you are subscribed to Netlifx, Amazon Prime, Hulu, or YouTube Red, how much time do you have on your hands to watch movies from all these platforms? Unless they are required to do your work, think about which one(s) you use less often and de-activate them until you are making more money.

There are numerous ways to save. The key ingredient here is to seek for other options and to cut down your excess.

Be prepared

After my surgery, it took me 6 months to recover. As I mentioned before, my job is dispensable. I got replaced one week after my surgery because I was working on a project that had a strict due date.

I was working at that job for only a couple of months before my medical emergency. The money I was able to save from my two months of freelance work went towards my rent while I was recuperating. My friends from church gave me food that lasted for one week. But I did not want to abuse their kind gesture since they also have their own families to support. I did what I had to do — I went to food banks.

I lined up there for some months. The thing with food banks is you do not have that much of a choice when it comes to creating a recipe. The first one I went to gave me a can of apple sauce, green beans, one box of oatmeal, pickled jalapeño, and peanut butter. So I bought a box of crackers from the dollar store and ate peanut butter and crackers the first few days.

The second time I went there, I was able to talk to other people falling in line. They told me that in one day, they would usually visit 3–4 food banks to come up with a good recipe.

I had a car so I volunteered to drive them around because they were senior citizens and I sympathized with the ordeal they were going through every week to get food. They couldn't find work because they were considered unemployable because of their age and limited capacity for hard labor. They had to live with their children who were also struggling.

What I learned from this experience was to do food prep during times of plenty. Every time I go to the grocery now, I will buy extra canned and dry goods that have a long shelf life. I do not buy in excess because it will only be wasted when the expiration date comes and I was not able to eat them or forgot about them.

For example, I will get 2 cans of tuna, something not superfluous. One is for immediate consumption, the other for a rainy day. If you go to the market every week, then in one month you will be able to save four cans. In one year, you will be able to save up 48 items. That means if you lose your job or income, you know for sure you have food to eat for 48 days. This is what I call a life line – it will gave you sustenance until you find another job.

One item is a base number or something to start with. To make it more realistic, get 3 items extra to cover for three meals a day. If you have free time, cut some coupons or shop at the place where they have a promo. This is doable if you work at it a a bit.

Try fasting

Fasting has a number of benefits – it promotes blood sugar control by reducing insulin resistance, it helps fight inflammation, and it improves blood pressure. You will have healthy skin and will loose weight as well.

Fasting also made me realize that I was not going to die if I didn't eat solid food for three days or more. That will get rid of your anxiety about not having food on your table. So you will have the clarity of mind to think about a new game plan in this time of famine.

When your food supply is running low, you should slow down your consumption as well. Once you've experienced fasting, you will acquire a discipline to tame your food cravings.

If you are not ready to do a three day fast, you can do intermittent fasting instead. I tried it while I was on a ketogenic diet and I lost 5 lbs in two weeks. It also gave me more energy to spend on important things that I need to take care of.

Get a bus pass

Finding a new job means you need to go to employment agencies or job interviews. Based on my experience, parking fees are common specially if the office is located inside a building with nearby restaurants and shops.

Depending on the location, the cheapest parking is usually $2/hr by meter, while inside a parking lot it may cost from $10 to $30. Not all companies provide parking validation.

There was a time I only had twenty dollars left and I spent it all by paying a parking fee during a job interview. But I did not get the job. It was painful, it is hard to explain if you have not been into the same situation.

So get a bus pass and load it up when you have extra money. Even though I have a car, I will only use it to go to places that are not accessible via public transportation. I am saving my gas for something more important.

One year I hinted to my friends that I wanted a bus pass for Christmas and not things that shine and glitter. What I was asking for was practical and essential. This is applicable if you live in a place that has this type of transportation system.

My point here is to prioritize what is pragmatic.

If you need to, you can sleep in your car

This may sound ridiculous, but training pays. If you own a car, empty the trunk and fold down the back seat (if you can). See if you will fit in there. If not, fold back the front seat as well until you feel the most comfortable. But it is not going to be that comfortable unless you have a truck, van, or SUV.

Depending on the size of your car, get a low height airbed, foam mattress, pillows or anything that will serve as a cushion to protect your back from the hard surfaces.

Your car will be twice as cold or hot compared to your bedroom. So get your thickest blanket if it is winter. Get a small luggage or any bag that will fit one week's worth of clothes that you will wear on a daily basis, especially if you go to work. I know people who go to work every day after sleeping in their cars. I was one of them.

Sleep in your car as long as it is parked inside a home or private property. Do not sleep in your car if you are parked in the street without checking the ordinances where you live. Your car could be confiscated and it will cost you an arm and a leg to retrieve it at the compound. Sleeping inside a car on public property is illegal in California.

So ask your church or neighbor if you can park your car inside their property. Look online where homeless people park to sleep. You may not need the information today, but it is golden when that time comes that your landlord kicks you out or changes the lock on your door.

These are basic necessities provided that you have the resources to start with. Your situation could be more complex. Some people sleep at homeless shelters, in tents, parks, and anywhere possible.

I stayed at a transitional home or sober housing at one point in my life (even though I do not drink). The social worker recommended it to me because it was a house and a safe place. It was not free though. I paid my rent and bills every month.

The only upside is you do not have to come up with a deposit which adds to your moving expenses. The not so good thing is I had zero knowledge and experience living with people rehabilitating from drugs, crime, mental health, and physical abuse. So it was a challenging and chaotic environment that I had to endure to survive. This chapter of my life was one great story of redemption, and you can read it here if you are interested.

Knowing you will be able to survive in a financial crisis will help mitigate your fears. Because fear block us from pursuing our dreams and cripples our ability to thrive. Remember, the main topic of this article is "survival".

I wish the rainy days would not come, but there is no security in any type of job. I do understand why you chose this freelancer's life.

• You want a less stressful job.
• You want time for yourself and your family.
• You want stay away from office politics.
• You are exhausted from long hours of commute
• And most of all, you are sick and tired of toxic people at work sucking the life out of you.

But life sometimes throws us a curve ball. We are here to learn from each other's experiences and to be prepared for our own share of ups and downs.

Stay home, stay safe, and level up

The company that I joined recently ceased their operation due to the COVID-19 pandemic. So I am using this free time to learn WordPress REST API at Lynda.com and APIs and Microservices at freeCodeCamp.org.

I use freeCodeCamp's curriculum for my Coffee and Code meetups and coding boot camp. My students (kids and adults) likes the Responsive Web Design course. You get praise and kudos every time you complete the code correctly, and it is motivating.

What I like about freeCodeCamp is that you learn to build real-life projects that you can add to your portfolio. You also earn certifications, and it helps you prepare for coding interviews. Thousands of coders around the world are using freeCodeCamp and I recommend that you give it a try too.

freeCodeCamp Courses

Read books

The book Soft Skills: The software developer's life manual offers techniques and practices for a more satisfying life as a professional software developer. In it, developer and life coach John Sonmez addresses a wide range of important "soft" topics, from career and productivity to personal finance and investing, and even fitness and relationships, all from a developer-centric viewpoint.

In The Clean Coder: A Code of Conduct for Professional Programmers, legendary software expert Robert C. Martin introduces the disciplines, techniques, tools, and practices of true software craftsmanship. Martin shows how to approach software development with honor, self-respect, and pride. He talks about how to work well and work clean, communicate and estimate faithfully, face difficult decisions with clarity and honesty, and understand that deep knowledge comes with a responsibility to act.

One last thing I'd like to share is that reading helped me during my dark times. Aside from programming books, I also read about existentialism, stoicism, and psychology.

Recently, I've read The Plague by Albert Camus, Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, and Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. For the past two years, I spent hundred of hours reading the Collected Works of C.G. Jung. If you work in a creative industry like design or film making, his books will tap into your psyche and unconscious. And my favorite is Liber Novus, The Red Book.

And lastly, I think one of the best things you can do to survive and thrive as a human being is to practice being brave.

Thank you for reading, I hope this story inspires you.

[Top photo: Me and my team at the NASA Space Apps hackathon]

After going to a number of meetups and looking around online for various free resources, she stumbled upon freeCodeCamp. Over the course of a couple years, she got her full-stack certification while sharing videos of herself learning various concepts.

When she started looking for a job, she experienced what so many new developers experience: rejection and frustration. She had to adapt, learn how to learn, and keep trying.

But one day, after attending a random meetup, someone drew her attention to a role at GitHub that seemed tailor-made for her skill set. Doubting that she'd get through the interview process, she applied anyway - and got the job. She identifies a few of the skills that helped her get the job:

"On the one hand, it was the actual skills I learned [before working at GitHub]. But on the other hand it was the mindset. Because even if I'd learned everything perfectly 2-3 years ago, it was such a different ecosystem out there now. Knowing how to search the documentation or find the answer or Google to get what you need - I don't think that will ever go out of style."

Three and a half years later, she's worked her way up through a couple different roles at GitHub and couldn't be happier with her job. She's learned how work with a diverse and passionate team, she's learned how to stand up for herself, and she's come to appreciate how much soft skills matter.

"Anything that's a technical thing can be learned. But working with a bunch of really smart, passionate people can be challenging because they're so passionate. And I think navigating that and trying to meet people where they are while still getting the best work done that I can is something I'll be working on for the rest of my life."

One thing she emphasizes again and again throughout our chat was not being afraid to ask questions and have confidence in yourself:

"Ask questions even if you think it's gonna make you look dumb. Sometimes no one else is asking because they want to look smart. But on the other hand, trust yourself - don't let anyone convince you that you don't know something if you've done your research. You can be the person who asks dumb questions and the person who's an expert on something at the same time."

In this episode, we discuss how she transitioned into tech, how she learned all the skills she needed to work at GitHub - and how she continues to learn, what she does to support diversity in her tech community, and how she stays fueled up and motivated day to day.

She's gained a lot of insight on creativity, and shared her perspective on staying creative:

"Creativity is like a body of water. And if you let yourself become like a pond, where nothing's coming in, then nothing's gonna go out. If you want something to go out, you have to have new experiences, new things going in."

Briana also offers advice on learning to code, asking questions, achieving balance in your life, and being a good team member, among many other things.

This interview is a 1 hour listen in your favorite podcast player app - just search for "freecodecamp" and you should find it.

If you have an Amazon Echo, you can just say "Alexa - play the freeCodeCamp podcast."

Or you can listen to it right here in your browser.

You can connect with Briana on Twitter here.

In 2016 I was looking for an online coding bootcamp. I wanted on that would allow me to keep my full-time job at the time as a Web Developer and Designer, but at the same time help me bring my skills as a Full Stack Developer up to date.

Diving into the tech community

After a lot of research, I found freeCodeCamp, an online coding program, and I started to work on the Curriculum and projects for the Certifications.

This exciting adventure helped me, in 2018, make the decision to start my remote freelance career and dedicate more time to completing the projects for the last certifications on freeCodeCamp.

I started to attend local Meetups to meet other developers and share the same passion for coding. But there was something more that I wanted to peruse: a Hackathon. When FreeCodeCamp announced the online Hackathon in 2018, I just jumped in. Although that was my first experience and my team didn’t win any prizes, I decided to find other Hackathons in my area to repeat the experience.

Hackathons give you that kind of energy that you can’t explain to others. You get to work for 24 hours with a team you met a few minutes before and get to create wonderful projects.

When I found that there was Hack Upstate XIII organized in my area, I didn’t think twice and I signed up right away. I waited impatiently every day for the big day to come.

Hack Upstate XIII (Source: Jesse Peplinski, 2019)

In the meantime, the more you look around the more you see stuff you never saw before. I discovered Albany Can Code, a local coding bootcamp that has Front End and Back End Developer classes. I joined to fulfill my dream to go back to college at least in a different sort of way.

I remember that everything happened so fast in my life that in no time I was doing everything I loved. I had a remote career that allowed me to work my own hours and study to get my certifications. I got the chance to work with a team of classmates in projects using Scrum as an Agile environment. The first projects for graduation were individual projects but the last projects were team projects.

During the class, we went from React Hooks — a hot topic — to React Native just a few weeks before the Hackathon. We worked on a few small projects, nothing fancy. Our instructors introduced us to Expo.io and the particulars of React Native that differentiate it from React.

Time was going by so fast, and I got involved more and more in coding meetups. One situation brings another one, and I was asked to teach Flutter at Google Developer Group of Capital Region. Shortly after I got nominated as a Women Techmakers Ambassador for the same chapter (Capital Region).

In the meantime, my freelance business started to grow. I was working on a few projects that gave me time to attend my coding bootcamp and organize the Google Developer Group CodeLabs and StudyJams though the Meetup Group.

I started to find myself so busy in all kind of activities that I found it difficult to take in more.

The Hackathon

The day before my Hackathon I just had time to pack some stuff I needed for the 48 hours I would be away from home. My husband supported every single decision of mine and made it easier on me to be part of all this craziness.

I arrived at the Hackathon and I had to find a team to join. I hoped to find a project that I could contribute to.

Finding a team

I only knew one girl that I met few weeks before that was going to go to the Hackathon. I was hoping to make a team with her, but when we came in I couldn’t find her in the crowd. The opening ceremony started and I was getting nervous because I didn’t have a team yet and they were already presenting the projects.

I had few chances to find a team before the ceremony, when I heard someone saying that they needed a Graphic and Web Designer. So I introduced myself and suggested that we could form a team. I found out that they were companies looking for talent and they asked me to contact them after the competition. That was nice because I am always open to joining a remote team to work as a Full Stack Developer no matter if in the Front End or the Back-End.

Listening to all the great ideas the groups were putting on the table I was thinking that I might need to work alone on a project. I figured I’d better start to coming up with some ideas.

All of a sudden I heard one of the last groups presenting say that they were looking for a Designer, since they had all the other parts of the team already formed. I didn’t even hear very well what they were going to work on, and everyone started to walk away from the room to find a spot to start to code.

I ran after the two guys that presented their project and introduced myself and told them that I was a Designer and I could join their team. We agreed and we headed to the office area to find a spot for us. We started all to talk about the project we would develop and which of the API’s in the competition we would use.

The tech

I was really hoping to work on a React project since I had some experience with projects I worked on for freeCodeCamp and the Albany Can Code bootcamp. I got hit by a hammer when I heard we would be working on a React Native project — but no one knew React Native. Some guys knew React like I did, and they decided to take care of the Front End functionality that I was hoping to work on. Some other guys knew Python and they were taking care of the Back End using Heroku and a Raspberry Pi to host the server and connect it to the API.

We were going to build an app called Parking Assistant that makes parking easier for drivers in the city by solving two types of problems: 1) managing long-term street parking and 2) addressing crime risks in the immediate area of the parking location.

Demo of “Parking Assistant” that help you know where it’s safe to park your car. (Source: STAE, 2019)

Learning on the fly

I felt like I couldn’t breathe when I found out that I was supposed to take care of the React Native part. I didn’t know what to say. I proposed to the team that we use Expo.io to test our mobile app since I had some experience with it.

A few minutes later I was in front of a whiteboard making sketches of an app that I didn’t have any idea how to build. My team was making plans on how to break the process down into steps and distribute the work to be done between us.

Inside me, I was getting very nervous and found it difficult to concentrate. We finished making plans and deciding what everyone would do. We then started our own adventures and research. Somehow I didn’t pull myself out of this team and project — but I didn’t want to disappoint them and create a disaster.

The clock was ticking I was talking with the team asking questions and answering others to see how to coordinate our work. All the code I was writing was not working and I was not able to make much progress. I was reading the documentation because I knew that React Native is different than React. I was not using HTML and CSS for the Design part but had a different kind of approach that I needed first to get familiar with.

I got to build a very simple home page for our app with a title and a button and customize it. I made it answer the gestures using the React code that I was more familiar with. React Native was for sure a challenge and the 24 hours we had in our hands to build our app was not enough to get to know all the ins and outs of the language.

That was the first step and gave me more confidence in me. In class, we did some staff in React Native but nothing I needed for my app, so I was on my own.

Now I had to build a compass feature to use in the next component when clicking the button on the homepage. It was not easy, and even though it was getting late into the night we continued our work. After a while, I got to work the Compass and the complexity behind it. We integrated the code step by step one with another and moved over to the next step so we got to see progress and the app taking shape. I felt much better after completing this part of the mission.

Next on my list, I had to build a timer that would show to the user the time left until they needed to move their car to avoid a ticket. I found a library to use but it took me some time to figure out how to customize it. And even though I was following their instructions, it was not working the way I wanted it to work. At least I had the functionality we needed for the app, but I didn’t have too much time to play with it — we needed to add the component to the app so we could test the Compass and get the timer to work and get alerts as a result of using the API.

We started to test the app in the office by choosing points on the map near us and trying to point the compass the way it made sense to make the app work. But it didn’t work correctly.

We had to go out of the building on the street in the night to test the app. There were many things to overcome and work on after our testing. Other research and code debugging and so on. We were getting there and it was almost morning when all of us got some sleep in our sleeping bags on the floors all over the offices. Some people were from the area went home to sleep, lucky them! You couldn’t really sleep but just lying down and trying to close your eyes made you feel a little bit less exhausted. Our minds for sure would not shut off and would keep thinking of ideas to better our project.

After a while, all of our team got together and got to prepare a presentation. We made some slides, a video demo, and so on.

The hosts and the sponsors got us food and drinks for the whole time to get us to concentrate on our mission to deliver innovative projects.

How our hard work paid off

Everyone got ready to present the projects and we started to feel very good about our project and proud somehow. I was hoping in my heart to win at least a prize. The projects were one more innovative than the other, one more interesting than the other. It was not easy for the judges to decide and I got to like some of the projects in the competition myself. But I didn’t lose my focus. I came with the hope to build something but now I was confident and looking to win something.

The judges made their decision and silence came back in my mind and soul, my heart was beating slowly. All of the sudden I heard our app name: Parking Assistant won the Best Use of Stae’s API using a Syracuse Dataset prize. I was screaming inside my brain and threw my hands in the air and congratulated my team. As the list of prizes was getting smaller and smaller and nearer to the top and the Gran Prize, I heard again our app name. We won the First Runner-up prize! This time I started to scream from real from happiness.

It was not for the money, because we were a 7-person team — unusual for this kind of competition were the teams are between 2–5 or so people. The 2 prizes put together we had to divide between us, but we got to bring home $100 each. That was nice to have in our wallets, but the real joy was the fact that others appreciated our project.

The Parking Assistant hack team (Source: Jesse Peplinski, 2019)

How the Hackathon changed my life

When I got home I started to share our success with relatives, friends, colleagues and social networks. The feeling was great, and I saw people start to react to my posts not only on Facebook but on LinkedIn and Twitter also, which are more professional networks.

I turned back to my normal life to organize what I started before the Hackathon: a monthly Flutter Meetup Study Jam. I also celebrated International Women’s Day’19 with a fantastic group of women speakers and a conference room full of almost 50 women and men.

International Women’s Day Celebration (IWD’19) — Women Techmakers and GDG Capital Region

A few days later after the Hackathon, we got contacted by the Stae API staff to interview us about our experience working together on the project. It was nice to meet my team again, this time online. Everyone shared their experiences and future intentions related to our project.

The outcome of the Hackathon was that all of the sudden I got to talk with people more and I become more interested in the experience and my team winning a project at the Hackathon. Not to mention that I got to talk with businesses interested in working on great projects who wanted to get me involved.

I think all of us should consider participating at Hackathons online and in person. It gives you the opportunity to show the world the skills you’ve gained as a self-taught Developer, and your ability to work with a team that you just met to create fully functional and innovative products. Even for those that didn’t win a prize, they still created very interesting apps. We all interacted with them and had fun together, and we connected to work on new projects or open new startup businesses.

Also, before I finished writing this article for you, I got my invitation to the North America GDG Academy at the Google Boulder Office on July 12–13th.

Going out there to attend Meetups and organizing Codelabs and events dedicated to tech put me in contact with many businesses and developers in my community. All of this made my business grow, which would not have happened if I was sitting at my desk in my home office looking for new projects to work on. You get recommendations from people around you that you just met about new projects you can join. Things start to happen to you just by being in the right place at the right time.

So to all of you, I would like to say: get out there and change the world! Even if you think you can’t do it now, if you don’t try it you will never know the outcome. The whole world is waiting for your change and innovation!

Happy Hacking!

Over the past few months I’ve had quite a few inquiries from young black women who are starting their careers in tech. They’ve been asking for advice related to working in the industry, navigating through corporate, and flourishing in the workplace.

Out of the belief that black women can learn from each other and can support each other in our professional aspirations, I reached out to black women in tech and asked them three questions:

(1) If you could go back in time to the beginning of your career in tech and give yourself a piece of advice, what would you say?

(2) What’s one piece of advice you would give to black women entering the tech industry?

(3) If you could change one thing about your current work place to make it a better experience for black women, what would it be?

The advice in this piece comes from black women who work in design, research, advertising, engineering, IT, and product/program management; they work across major cities in the U.S. and most respondents were 25 to 45 years old.

This is their advice.

If you could go back in time to the beginning of your career in tech and give yourself a piece of advice, what would you say?

Themes: don’t be fearful, believe in yourself, secure the bag, be vocal about your aspirations, seek out wisdom and support.

“People will sometimes be trash towards you. They’ll tell you that you don’t know enough, or that your knowledge isn’t technical enough. Don’t listen to them. They’re going on some impossible standard that even they themselves could not fulfill. You simply loving technology is enough.”

“Just go for it! Stop making excuses for reasons not to go after something you really want.”

“Build a network of other black women in tech who have been in the industry. You’ll need them during difficult and discouraging times at work. More importantly, they’ll be able to give you advice on how to navigate corporate life, especially because you’ll find yourself in spaces where (more times than not) you’ll be one of the only black women there.”

“Prioritize self-care in your hustle. Don’t let relationships fall to the wayside just because you’re busy. Find the time and make the time for those close to you and prioritize your well-being.”

“I would say that even though the road aheads looks lonely, you are not alone. I would say to lean on the women who you have known and seen pave the way ahead of you, both inside and outside of the tech industry, and don’t be afraid that you will be a ‘bother’ by asking for help and admitting you are having a hard time. My greatest advice would be to extend grace and pride to myself for having the courage to move outside of a comfort zone to pursue a path that was not yet fully determined, but would ultimately lead me to swim in the depths of my own possibility and to not fear or doubt those depths.”

“Be more confident. Take the steps that will foster trust in your knowledge, expertise, and skills. For example, thoroughly prepare before each meeting, regardless of the meeting’s level of importance, reading key documents, annotating the documents, etc.. Confidence is nothing more than preparation. Build a reputation of being on top of your stuff.”

“You are the main character in your life, it’s your world, enjoy your journey, indulge in your passions, love yourself fiercely, you’ll make it.”

“Go for the money and also take heed of companies’ reputations. Seek out others’ insights about what the company is like to work at before accepting an offer, as well as meet your team.”

“Don’t be afraid to articulate what your interests and career goals are and stick to them. Don’t be afraid to counter offer.”

“Have faith in yourself. You forging your own way is a strength, not a weakness. I pivoted from working in the non-profit sector with a non-technical education and I felt so much like a fish out of water in Silicon Valley. However, as I gained more experience as a designer I realized that my background was an asset that set me apart.”

“Start to advocate for yourself earlier, you are your own best cheerleader.”

What’s one piece of advice you would give to black women entering the tech industry?

_Themes: sponsors > mentors, take risks, don’t give up on your career aspirations, be confident in what you have to offer, your thoughts and ideas have val_ue.

“Getting a sponsor is more important than a mentor. A sponsor is someone who can speak to the quality of your work/work ethic and will go to bat for your during performance reviews or in landing your next project/gig. In essence, they are willing to risk their social & professional capital in order to increase yours. That is not the same as a mentor. A mentor’s only risk and expenditure is their time.”

“If a job looks interesting, apply for it. Ignore the urge to fit 100% of the qualifications. Studies show that men only look at and fulfill maybe 25% of them. Imagine a woman who has 75% applying for the same job. You’d be a shoe-in.”

“Have confidence that your perspective, no matter how different, is worth being heard. Be bold in sharing the ways you think and experience things differently, because it could have a strong impact on the direction of a product or business that may not have had diverse perspectives without you. Know that your voice is of value, even if there is no one else that supports you or if there are others who try to tell you otherwise. Often when you lean into those moments and speak up, you will find that there are others who have felt the same but have felt as though they didn’t have the space or confidence to say it.”

“Network, you’ll realize later how important connections are.”

“Don’t stay at a company or team if you don’t like it or them, there is someone else willing to pay you more and be happy.”

“Write down your vision and make a plan. Find trusty mentors and sponsors that you can meet with for sound meaningful feedback.”

“Don’t be fooled into thinking that all ‘mainstream’ women will be your sponsor or allies in the workplace. I have been surprised by the people who have gone to bat for me or defended my reputation when things go wrong (which they inevitably will). Many of those people have included white men on my team. In fact, white men have been equally — if not more — supportive of me than white women.”

“In the majority of work team environments you will be the only black female. Be intentional in your decisions, speak up and never be afraid to make mistakes. That is how you will learn. Also, always have a goal that is targeted towards career growth that you are actively working towards.”

“Don’t give up. We need your thoughts options and ideas. Also relationships matter so get ready to network to help you get in and keep networking to move up.”

“Build together. Ask for help. Seek community wherever you can to support you. Even if that just means joining a Slack group for WoC.”

“Be confident in your value and skills others might doubt, but never doubt yourself — you are unlimited. Haters are immature.”

If you could change one thing about your current work place to make it a better experience for black women, what would it be?

Themes: increase representation by hiring more black women, safety to acknowledge white privilege and racism, white co-workers leading the conversation on diversity & inclusion.

“I would have encouraged black women even more than ever to apply for positions they think would be out of their realm. We need a lot of black women in management. And to stop looking for mentors after a certain point and start looking for sponsors. You need someone to drop your name in the decision room when the time comes. Start building those early (and never think you DON’T deserve the accolades).”

“MORE BLACK WOMEN! The worlds need you.”

“I’m the only black woman in our software company of (10000+ employees, Italian-based company). I’ve asked HR to improve our cultural diversity training as it’s affecting my comfortability at work (e.g. comments about hair, people trying to use ‘slang’ with me, assuming I’m ‘aggressive’ because I’m tall, black, and played basketball, being asked why I don’t make friends or eat with anyone when everyone groups together based on nationalities/cultures/race).”

“More black women. I work at a large, well-known tech company and even though we have several office buildings, I’m the ONLY black woman in my building. It can feel really lonely and like I always have to be crushing it in order to prove that I belong here.”

“To have white people own their whiteness and racist ideologies so we can have courageous conversations about race and why in 2019, I am the first African American to obtain promotion and tenure in my department. Also, why no one in the department wants to acknowledge it.”

“More of us! There is so few black women in design-tech jobs.”

“Provide more education on white privilege and white feminism. As the only black woman in my building, I find it difficult to join in conversations that my white women co-workers are having about equality because, well, the only perspective they’re talking about is what it means to be a woman. Whereas for me, it’s about also being a black woman. It’s a privilege to only see your gender as being a barrier to equality and not have to take into account your ethnicity and/or race.”

“I work in a remote and fully-distributed team that seems resistant to meeting in person. To me, I see this as a negative because relationship building happens in-person. No amount of Slack messages or video conferencing can replace in-person networking. For remote workers, have more opportunities for building relationships in order to foster social bonding and team trust.”

“Hire more of us! Be intentional and transparent about your hiring process when it is time for the team to grow and don’t leave inclusion out of the discussion when seeking candidates.”

“Just one thing? Unconscious bias training for management.”

“I would create more visibility of the black female leaders here … I would still like to have a solid network or space for black women specifically to lean into.”

“Please stop forcing black women into being the Diversity & Inclusion Champion. We’re tired and shouldn’t need to take on the responsibility to educating you on privilege, racism, and your own bias. No, we don’t want to talk about this all the time. I often feel like I have to talk about Diversity and Inclusion because no one else in the office is championing it or even discussing it. And as the only black women, that’s discouraging AF.”

“More internal groups targeted to mentoring and advancing career growth for women of color in the company.”

“I don’t have any other black women on my team. It would be nice to have more people that looked like me in the office.”

If you liked what you read, please increase the chances of this piece being read by others by sharing it on social media! Thanks!

An #InternationalWomensDay reflection

I entered the tech industry in 2015, when I was unexpectedly let go from my job at a mobile POS app startup. I stood outside on the corner, genuinely unsure of what my next steps would be.

I had attempted a major in Computer Science at Wellesley, but was ultimately discouraged because I just couldn’t keep up with the abstract information I was expected to retain.

Getting started

After being let go, I decided to teach myself to code. I’d always loved dinking around on the web. I built my first online blog at 14 or something, and was over the moon when some random blog rating account gave me a 10/10. Ah, simpler times.

I decided to use a platform I’d heard of, based in Portland where I was, called Treehouse. They told me that I could learn the skills to get a job in web development, and I believed them. I had no real solid goal, but I knew I had to take action SOON.

I flew through the material, because Treehouse’s video-based learning platform allowed me to pause, go back, speed up, slow down—all features I’d never had available to me in a classroom setting.

I started a little blog called La Vie en Code. I wrote random things in it—what I was working on, thoughts on a particular technology. My early posts are hilarious. I was so damn happy just to be learning.

About a month later, I discovered a Facebook group called Ladies Storm Hackathons.

I was 30 years old by this time, but still so freaking excited to be in tech that I flung myself into this group of college students posting primarily about hackathons and tech I was nowhere near knowledgable (yet) enough to comprehend.

LSH was thrilling to me, because it showed that there truly were women in tech. Seriously—when you enter this industry and pretty much everyone you see online is a white dude, it’s overwhelming as a woman of color.

As a Black and Native woman, I had no idea where to even begin locating a community that looked like me. They were out there, though.

And after participating in (and winning!) my first hackathon, the We Code Women’s Hackathon hosted by Nike at Puppet Labs in Portland, less than 3 months after starting to code—it began to materialize before my eyes.

These women were not only here, but they were loud (seriously, the hackathon meeting rooms were ERUPTING with laughter every few minutes!), proud, and fun.

In fall of 2015, I was taken by surprise when I learned I’d been chosen off the waitlist for the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Technology. I lamented the fact that I couldn’t afford it (still an issue, but a topic for another post), and the Wellesley alum community rushed to my aid, covering not only the flight and ticket, but a place to stay.

The experience was life-changing, but it wasn’t easy. There were lots of Computer Science students there, and I felt out of place as a newbie, self-taught coder. Imposter syndrome kicked in, hard.

My 2015 GHC name tag. I have it on my fridge, and it cracks me up every time I look at it. ?

At one point, I was kind of throwing around my resume in the exhibition hall. A woman at IBM looked at it, then back at me, then kind of turned around like she wasn’t sure if someone could help her with this.

My resume pretty clearly showed that I was self-taught. However, I was a front-end developer and there really didn’t seem to be any opportunities for self-taught FE devs there. Plus, I was really shaky in my confidence.

After talking to her, I slinked off to an area behind a drape, and cried. I wanted to feel included so badly, but I just wasn’t feeling that confidence yet.

Building up not just my skills, but my confidence, became my #1 goal from that day forward. I had so much trauma to overcome, and rejection felt like I was being pushed out of the tech circles—even though the whole damn conference was a celebration of women in tech.

I went back, and worked even harder. I started talking to my new communities about my experience, and I was met with understanding and compassion. I even met several people I didn’t know were self-taught, and now had software engineering roles.

These women helped me to realize that there was a place for me in tech. Just by seeking it out, I was finding home. Bit by bit, I felt like there was hope for me yet.

But I made it into tech in one piece, and I’m so grateful that I did. After 10 months of hard work and perseverance, I made it through to the other side, and got my first web development job.

It was all dudes there, but I didn’t even care. My communities of women in tech online were beginning to truly flourish, and that was good enough for me.

Finding my home

After the hackathon, my world of women in tech became clearer and clearer.

I sought out women’s groups, and then eventually just started following prominent women in tech because they were what I wanted to be—and they knew people like them.

The newbie coder communities I joined, like #CodeNewbie, were one of my first exposures to actual women of color in tech.

I had to look back and realized that most of the women I’d gotten to know so far had been white. I hadn’t even really thought about it—I was just so happy and proud to be around women, period.

Since then, I’ve focused in on women of color in particular, and paid special attention to their experiences. I realized that they resonated more with me than anything else I’d read. I found Indigenous communities like Native American Women in Tech and AISES. It felt like I was home.

With their knowledge in so many different areas, they have helped me build that little blog, La Vie en Code, to new heights. I started the La Vie en Code Podcast in September 2016.

Podcasting was a challenge I made for myself: to get my actual voice out there, because as well as I could communicate via text… I had a lot of thoughts about tech, and people deserved more.

After my first developer job, I decided to freelance for a while. My communities of women provided my first jobs. However, I was still feeling like a square peg trying to cram myself into round holes.

Building

I decided on entrepreneurship — I wanted to share what I learned with others, and learn alongside them.

I wanted to focus on the people who were looking to follow the same path I did.

I wanted to ensure they got to the other side, and didn’t give up.

I wanted to help them develop the same grit and passion that drove me when things got tough.

See, as much as my communities of women helped me, there were just some things they couldn’t help with. I had to do a lot of it on my own, and it was hard.

We are busy. We are focused on our own careers. As women, we’re already up against the wall and fighting hard. For some, it’s more of a struggle than others. We need to earn money, and not just our 70 cents (or often, far less).

For nearly a year and a half, I worked on my online course + coaching program, 30 Days to Web Development. It’s been one of the most challenging things I’ve ever loved. I poured my heart and soul into it. When I finally launched (mostly to crickets haha), I felt so damn proud of myself.

Welcome to 30 Days to Web Development!
_Learn how to learn, solve programming problems-and get your first web development job_www.30daystowebdevelopment.com

Since then, my base of students has slowly grown. I’ve worked with amazing people who have dreams they don’t realize are totally achievable. I learn from them as much as they learn from me. What they carry forward will help them for the rest of their lives as a developer, no matter what language they end up building with.

Getting to know myself

In early 2018, while in the midst of my course creation, I was focused in on entrepreneurship, which takes a lot out of you.

I had to address the issue of why my energy levels and mood fluctuated so much, creating issues with consistency for me. This had been an issue for me since my school years, and it’s been nothing but problematic.

I was diagnosed with Bipolar 2 Disorder in late 2017. I wasn’t surprised at all—my father is Bipolar. I was mostly like, ok ??‍♀️ let’s get meds going then so I can get on with my life.

With this knowledge in my pocket, I could now start the process of moving forward and adapting with this new knowledge of how my brain worked. It seemed to affect me mostly in terms of my energy, which of course in turn affects mood.

But still, I had so many questions about my persisting learning difficulties. Why was I still so anxious about showing my true self to people out there? Why did I feel self-conscious of my communication style? Why would I bore people by rambling on about tech, causing me to feel weird about writing?

I was diagnosed on the Autism Spectrum (formerly known as Asperger’s Syndrome) with a non-verbal learning disability at 32 years old.

Extremely gifted… but with a major non-verbal difficulty that had made it particularly challenging to understand complex, abstract topics.

I realized that my neurodivergence had provided me with an intense, complex mind that was going to approach virtually everything differently from other people. I felt things differently from other people, and responded them to them differently.

And it turns out women express their Autism much differently, and often mask our individual Autistic behaviors to fit in with society. I had no idea what Asperger’s looked like in women… but I realized quickly that it looked like me.

This was why workplaces had been awful for me. Why my social relationships were so important to me, and I felt crushed if anything went awry with them. Why I was so self-conscious around other people. Why I could focus intensely on my special interests for hours on end… namely, programming.

This is why I had so much damn anxiety holding me back from true excellence.

Things began to fall into place. I damn near skipped home. Once again, my career and life were going to change — but this time for the better.

Where I’m going

While pushing through my entrepreneurship and the learning required to stay relevant, my non-verbal learning disability has made things hell. It takes me a long time to solve problems, the further I wade into the world of web development. I’ve had to work harder to understand and overcome.

Every day is going to be a battle, and that’s never going to change. This is going to be the rest of my life, and I’m a damn warrior for it.

My ultimate goal has always been to create a safe, healthy space for people to learn the fundamentals of programming—including problem solving and autodidactic skills—then build the skills they need to get their first job. With my support, they could prepare for the world of web development, and leverage my coaching calls to apply what they were learning.

Now, recognizing my superpowers of communication and vulnerability, I was able to see ways that I could help people with my own story. I can’t tell you how many folks have reached out to me with understanding and support. Tech is full of people with mental illness.

The women I admire most are the ones out there doing the hard work of helping people take care of themselves. Leveraging their compassion for others to help them avoid burnout. Giving tough love—but overall, love.

Even with a non-verbal learning disability and Autism Spectrum diagnoses, I had created something that made the world a better place.

I owe my success not only to my own hard work and determination, but also the support of powerful, intelligent, brave, courageous, passionate women who pushed me along.

The people who have never judged me, and have even reached out to connect, when I share my story with love and compassion.

To those women who have inspired and been there for me… my goal is not just to find a way to provide equal support to you, but to carry your mission forward. Because if I have you in my circles, I appreciate you and your mission, whatever it may be.

This list is by NO means comprehensive, but I have some shout-outs I absolutely need to give.

? KimCrayton1 ? ?? (Twitter), you are a force to be reckoned with. I admire your bravery, your strength, and your eloquence while displaying such deep conviction and passion.

? Saron Yitbarek (Twitter): you inspired me to become a community leader. Your ability to draw people toward you is incredible. I deeply love and appreciate the #CodeNewbie community, and have made lifelong connections through it.

? Scooter Phoenix (Twitter): I appreciate you so much. Having met you at conferences, you are the ultimate definition of Cool Black Girl in Tech™️.

? Ali Spittel, you aren’t on Medium, but you’re literally everywhere else. ?For real, how many conference have you done? You speak your mind, and share your knowledge freely. You’re seriously inspiring me to throw in my hat at lots of conferences in 2019!

? Sarah EchoHawk: You are a powerhouse. Your spirit is beautiful. Seeing you on stage setting GHC straight about Native Americans gave me goosebumps. I can’t wait to hang out with you at AISES!

? Andrea Delgado-Olson (Twitter): You are my auntie-mama! ? I love you so much. Thank you for offering me a home in Native American Women in Tech, and a stage on which to share my voice. I can’t wait to speak alongside you again this year!

? ♚ Digital Empress: You’ve helped me be myself. I see you, even if you don’t see me. I love to have fun, and tech cannot be serious. Plus, you’ve pulled together a community of bad Black women in CyberSec! ??

? Emma Wedekind (Twitter): You’re such a supportive member of the tech community. You’ve created super valuable content over the years that helped me better understand both tech and the communities in it!

I know I missed people, I just know it. So I will probably be going back in here to update the list, but damn I know a lot of women in tech. ?

I’m looking forward to spending 2019 surrounded by healthy, supportive people in tech. Women have been such an integral part to my career success, and I look forward to being able to amplify y’all’s power. ?

Nicole Archambault is the creator of La Vie en Code, a blog, podcast, and online course brand dedicated to the unique experience of self-taught web developers. She has built her business around the intersection of technology, education, psychology, and the ways they affect self-educated web developers.

And, of course, she is a proud neurodivergent woman helping others find their own path. :)

Two years ago, I was right where you are today.

I wanted to become a professional programmer. But I had no idea how to make it happen.

I had no college degree, no previous coding experience, and I sucked at math.

And there was the nagging doubt: Can someone like me become a developer?

Well, I made it happen. I have my dream job. I’m a software developer.

I often get asked how I did it.

Here are the three vital actions I took that helped me go from a complete beginner to a software developer.

1. Build your Roadmap

The biggest mistake aspiring developers make is that they have no plan.

No roadmap.

When you have no plan, you feel lost. You take coding tutorials, maybe build a project or two. Then months pass. You think, will I ever become a developer? This is all so confusing. You have no idea what path to take.

The solution? Build a roadmap - right now. Create a plan for exactly how you’ll become a developer.

Your first step: Decide if you’re going to do a coding bootcamp or take online courses.

For me, I decided not to attend a bootcamp. I created my curriculum and taught myself…everything.

Because I was homeschooled growing up, I was comfortable learning on my own, so I decided to teach myself to code using various online courses ranging from freeCodeCamp to Udacity.

This approach costs far less than a bootcamp but it had a downside: I had no coding mentors or coding curriculum to follow. Learning from online resources means you do pay nothing or very little, but as I discovered, you don’t have much support. And you will struggle on your own as I did.

People are drawn to learning to code from online resources as I did, but it is not always the best way. The low cost is a big benefit, but make sure you are able to learn well on your own and can hold yourself accountable - without a lot of mentorship or support.

Bootcamps are expensive but they often come with much more support and accountability.

Carefully decide which path is best for you.

If you do learn to code without a bootcamp, I suggest picking an affordable online program that has at least some mentorship and a curriculum to follow. Doing so will ensure you struggle less and get the feedback you need. Udacity’s nanodegrees and Treehouses techdegrees offer some mentorship and code reviews.

If you decide to learn to code for free, freeCodeCamp’s curriculum is fantastic, and if you get involved in their community, you will excel.

Once you’ve chosen your path, complete your roadmap by answering these questions:

• Do I want to become a full-stack, frontend or backend developer? Decide what you’ll focus on learning. Know what language and libraries you’ll need to learn.
• How many hours per week will I study, and when? Carve out the times of the week you’ll practice coding and never miss those study times.
• What date will I start applying for jobs? Set a deadline for when you’ll apply.
• What will I give up? It’s awesome to picture yourself working as a developer, but the road to get there means early mornings, weekends and late nights of hard work.

Be realistic: Look at what you spend time on each week, and give one thing up. For me, I was not willing to give up time with my family, but I decided to give up hanging out with friends. On most Saturdays, instead of spending time with friends as I usually did, I stayed home and programmed.

When building your roadmap, keep in mind: contrary to a lot of the marketing hype you’ve seen, there is no magical coding course, no magical program, no magical bootcamp that will ‘make you’ a developer. A lot of people ask me what online course I used to learn to code as if there’s one “golden ticket” that will turn you into a developer.

There’s not.

Only you can make yourself a developer.

Your grit and determination will get you there. But I also used a game-changing method to learn to code to become a developer.

What was it?

2. Train your focus.

There are a million free coding courses available to everyone.

If it’s so easy to access free coding courses, why is it so dang hard to learn how to code? Why is it so hard to become a developer?

Because many of us do not know the vital skill needed to learn and master programming languages. This skill is called Deep Work popularized by computer scientist, Cal Newport.

TL;DR: In order to learn hard things, you must focus intensely for long periods. That’s deep work.

But most of us are actively killing off our ability to focus, and few people do deep work.

Think about that last time you stood in a line. How much time elapses before you feel compelled to grab your phone and check notifications? Or what about this article itself - have you switched to a new tab while reading? Checked your Twitter account? ?

Today, it’s the norm to have the attention span of a goldfish. And this is why it is so hard for us to learn complex things like coding. Once I figured this out, I realized that if I committed to doing deep work, I could learn the hard things I needed to know to become a developer.

When you sit down to code, set a timer for 90 minutes. For that entire time, focus on the app you’re building or the coding problem you’re trying to solve. Do not check your notifications. Do not open a new tab. When you find yourself daydreaming, quickly bring your attention back to coding.

Train your focus like your future career depends on it - because it does.

Without practicing deep work, I would not be a developer today.

3. Chase your curiosity.

When most people set out to learn to code, they start a curriculum of things they are “supposed” to know.

Then they get bored. Just like in school, when you’re learning new things only because you’re supposed to learn them, but you don’t know why you need to learn them or why you even care. Losing interest is easy.

To learn to code, find one thing about programming that’s fascinating to you. Find the thing that makes you curious enough to learn about it on a Saturday night - because you’ll need to do that at times.

There’s a line from Alice In Wonderland that’s stuck with me:

She had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and, burning with curiosity, she ran after it.

As I’ve worked with more senior developers in my career, I’ve realized: the best programmers don’t have to force themselves always to be learning more. They are always learning because, like Alice, they are burning with curiosity.

Some try coding in one language and hate it, then pick up another language and love it. Make sure you try different programming languages and learn about different fields within programming to discover what fires up your curiosity.

If you’ve tried learning to code several times from different angles and you still feel like you’re forcing yourself, then coding may not be for you. Contrary to the marketing material of most bootcamps, learning to code in three months and landing a $100K job offer right after, is not the reality for most. Coding is not a get rich quick scheme. Don’t learn to code if you are bored by it, because you’ll miss out on finding what your real curiosity in life is. However, if you are interested in tech but not coding, there are many other incredible and in-demand skills you can learn: design, data analytics, and more.

If you have a curiosity about programming, chase it. The more you go after your curiosity, the more of it you have. And while you’re chasing your curiosity, don’t worry about where you are coming from. Don’t worry about your lack of a CS degree or what’s behind you.

Regardless of your age, lack of a degree or previous experience, if you love to code, practice deep work and make learning a priority in your life you can become a professional developer.

Even if you’re a complete beginner.

Start now.

If you enjoyed this story, please hold down the ? button! To keep in touch with me, sign up for my newsletter where I share tips on learning how to code and give away a free coding course.

Picture this: I’m at work, on a typical Portland Tuesday morning. Unlike the weather outside, the office is bright and warm, and I’ve got my fancy desk set to “standing” (It moves up and down. When you push buttons. Fancy).

I’ve got my Spotify coding playlist going and am tapping my foot as I work.

Yup, that’s basically me

I’m in our app, doing something completely unrelated when I spot a bug that’s currently in production. Not an app-crashing bug, but a priority nonetheless.

I file a ticket. Then, I have a realization I haven’t had before: I can fix this. Without needing to bother anyone else, without raising a general alarm, I can go into our codebase and figure out what’s going on and actually FIX it.

At that moment, this song comes on:

The universe is concurring, it seems. I switch to my console and get to work trying to figure out what’s going on.

To further the mood, this is the next track:

Oh, I’ve totally got this.

Minutes pass.

Hmmm, the error seems to be in our API. A 401, huh? It’s in our backend, which isn’t really my strong suit (I mean, technically, none of this is my strong suit).

That’s OK, I’ve still got this. I think.

And so morning turns to afternoon, as I drill further down and follow the breadcrumbs to find the culprit. I get as close to it as I can: the one function that’s causing all the fuss. The one function that works in every other case but the case I hit.

The one function, which I didn’t write, and can’t quite figure out on my own.

I might not have this.

By this point, my fancy desk is firmly in the “sit” position, as I slouch down, then sit up, hoping that viewing angle is a key component of properly understanding the code in front of me.

This is where, if the Spotify AI was as god-like as I’ve been envisioning it, some slow, sappy violin music should come on. Alas, the music stays upbeat as my mood sinks further down: I have to ask for help.

As much as I wanted to solve this puzzle all on my own, the reality is that I’m a recent code school grad six months into an awesome job where I spend 90% of my day learning, as there’s still so much I don’t know.

I’m also lucky enough to work in an environment where asking for help is never frowned upon when needed. I know I can’t fix most bugs on my own, though I seem to be getting closer to the answer than when I started.

I also realized at that moment that over the past six months I had become a real, capital-D Developer.

I hit a bug. I logged it. I tried to tackle it on my own. I narrowed down the problem to one function in one file. I asked a coworker more familiar with that code for help, and he quickly pointed out that I needed to pass in a single Boolean as a parameter to keep the error from happening.

Half a day of work, and adding one word as a param un-broke the function:

true

At the end of the day, I have a fix PRed (sent the fix pull request), and though it took long to get there, I contributed something to the codebase while learning several dozen new things in the process.

I’m a Developer.

It’s pretty sweet (queue the epic music).

My actual desk. I like it even better.

As a female technical founder who is heavily involved in recruiting efforts, diversity in hiring is an issue I think about every day. A growing body of research shows that diverse teams perform better, and as that research becomes common knowledge, companies of all sizes are prioritizing diversity efforts.

Though larger tech companies like Facebook and Google are making steady progress towards their diversity goals, the metrics for technical teams at startups remain dismal. I find it encouraging that so many startup hiring managers and recruiters have recognized this as a serious problem, but there are a few areas that are routinely overlooked. This article focuses on five points that I have found effective in helping our startup recruit women. While there are many different facets of diversity and inclusion, this post will specifically focus on gender diversity.

1. Recruit at least one female founder, investor, advisor, or leadership team member.

Hiring at early-stage startups is difficult and largely network-based. A diverse founding team will have a more diverse network from which to hire early employees, whereas a founding team who is entirely male can unintentionally recruit an all-male team.

Having no female leadership, no female investors, and no female advisors is signal that a startup doesn’t truly value diversity, and could influence female candidates against joining. Even if your founding team isn’t diverse, you can reverse the trend by recruiting a woman onto your leadership team. Female leaders often add a diverse network to the candidate pool, and their presence in an organization indicates less bias against promoting women into management.

While searching for the right hires, also put effort into finding a diverse set of company mentors. The right female advisor or investor can help recruit female candidates and serve as a role model for people at the company. There are so many accomplished women who would make incredible assets as advisors to startups relevant to their area of expertise.

2. Prioritize pipeline diversity at the top of the recruiting funnel.

Companies with women can more easily recruit other women, and the best place to start is at the beginning. Early diversity problems can compound down the road, when candidates may view a lack of women as indicators of systemic bias or a toxic culture.

To systematically focus on diversity from the beginning, constantly monitor your candidate pipeline. At our company’s outset, our engineering hiring pipeline was around 50% women. While we benefitted from the network effects of having a female founder (myself), we filled the pipeline by pushing ourselves to brainstorm a diverse set of candidates from our networks, looking at LinkedIn and Facebook to spark our memories. However, over the next few months, we noticed that our pipeline gradually became less and less diverse, and flagged this as an issue.

To fix the problem, we focused on balancing the top of the recruiting funnel. Early startup hiring tends to bias strongly towards in-network referrals, and team members often think of people to refer in an ad-hoc way, which is an opportunity for bias to seep into the process.

To improve diversity among referrals, hold one-on-one meetings with members of your team and ask them to systematically search their networks for female and minority engineers they have worked with in the past, even if they are unsure about their technical skill. Create an internal system for tracking referrals, and make sure to check in to see whether team members have reached out. Many people don’t realize that they subconsciously tend to only refer white and asian males, but by verbally acknowledging that common bias, the team can start to work against it.

3. Incorporate diversity efforts into every external company event.

“Women in engineering” events seem disingenuous when other company events are not ordinarily inclusive. Integrate diversity and inclusion into every event by aiming for a better gender balance at all office events (e.g. board game nights and dinners). Ask the team to conscientiously invite both male and female friends, with the explicit goal of reaching a 50/50 gender ratio at the event.

The benefits of making every engineering event inclusive go farther than helping the women who attend such events feel more comfortable. Often, the burden of throwing diversity-oriented events disproportionately falls on women and minorities, when in reality, it should be the responsibility of the whole team. Ultimately, the most progress happens when the men on the team participate in diversity and inclusion efforts as much as the women.

4. Encourage the team to actively reach out to and mentor women.

Men and women who have made it a priority to mentor women will have more diverse networks. Because there are fewer senior women than senior men in tech, it’s important that those who are able to provide mentorship go out of their way to do so for both the men and the women in their lives.

Good mentorship goes a long way, both inside and outside of your immediate work environment. Within a company, mentorship builds internal role models and helps teammates grow more quickly. However, not every person you mentor needs to be a current coworker, or even a potential hire.

I personally go out of my way to provide guidance to anyone who reaches out, regardless of if I know them or if they are a potential candidate. This involves assisting with interview practice, connecting people with companies that match their interests, helping others deal with workplace conflicts, and even providing advice over the phone to someone who cold-emailed me after reading one of my blog posts.

Providing guidance to a diverse set of mentees helps move the needle on an industry-wide problem. Besides, you might find that your help comes back around in unexpected ways; maybe you can’t recruit that mentee today, but you may be able to recruit them years down the line, or recruit someone else from their network. By consistently and conscientiously offering career advice to both men and women, anyone at your company can establish themselves as a role model for others, and role models are a powerful incentive for someone to join your company. Many people join startups because they’re following a mentor — myself included.

5. Focus more on the system than the statistics.

Often, startups focus too much on diversity metrics, seeming to forget that metrics are merely a symptom of systematic problems in sourcing, interviewing, hiring, and retaining diverse team members.

Lack of diversity is not a problem for which deployed solutions reap immediate results. There is no way for a startup to implement perfect hiring systems and see the metrics start improving the next day; often, results take years to manifest. By rewarding only the results and not the process, leadership may slow gradual improvement towards a better culture and a fairer system.

Instead, create internal metrics that focus on bite-sized issues that can be addressed through day-to-day actions. Reward team members who refer diverse sets of people. Reward those who come up with ways to make company events feel more inclusive. When performance and compensation reviews come around, reward employees who went out of their way to move the needle on diversity initiatives, especially those who are neither hiring managers nor recruiters. Improving diversity is a team-wide effort; to generate change, every person at your company should be aligned on its importance.

The press has placed a lot of emphasis on company-wide statistics — the percentage of women and minorities in leadership or technical roles. However, the companies who have most successfully fostered change didn’t simply discover a previously-unknown source of female candidates. Instead, they invested years into building an inclusive culture, and those years of investment eventually proved fruitful.

Long before working together on Impira, Ankur and I would discuss at length the bleak state of diversity at small startups. We wanted to make sure that, at minimum, we would build a company with an inclusive culture, following the guidelines set by organizations such as Project Include.

Our technical team is currently 30% women, and this number will soon be higher. By continuing to reflect on the successes and failures of our diversity efforts, reinforce diversity as a core value, and improve our hiring processes, I believe that that number can continue to grow in the future. If this is something you’re also passionate about, we would love to work together!

Thank you to Ankur Goyal, Sashko Stubailo, Carl Grennes, and Richard Ni for edits and feedback on this post.

Fatimat Gbajabiamila talks about challenging stereotypes, her love for pair programming, and why she’s committed to giving back

I sat down with Fatimat Gbajabiamila at the end of her first week at 27Partners, a software development and consultancy in London. Though the average Founders and Coders applicant is in their late twenties, Fatimat, who was born in Nigeria and came to the UK as a child, completed the peer-led training programme in full-stack JavaScript when she was just 22.

Fatimat during her first week at 27Partners

Rebecca: Fatimat, thank you so much for making time to chat with me. How was your first week on the job?

Fatimat: To be honest, it’s hard to believe I’m getting paid to code. It’s been quite the journey.

Rebecca: A journey you’ve undertaken without a university degree, as I understand.

Fatimat: Yeah, I left school after finishing my A levels, where I studied economics, business, and maths.

Rebecca: What were you doing before you heard about Founders and Coders?

Fatimat: I was working with a charity called Futureversity as a project coordinator, organizing summer programmes for young people and recruiting volunteers. I loved my colleagues, but I knew it wasn’t something I wanted to do as a career.

Rebecca: How did you figure out you wanted to pursue a career as a software developer?

Fatimat: Well, when I was younger, I had my heart set on pursuing a career in business and finance. I remember visiting Bloomberg on a trip as part of the Brokerage Citylink programme during Year 10 and deciding right then and there that I wanted to work there one day.

Rebecca: Really? Right then and there, as a teenager? It’s hard for me to imagine a fifteen-year-old falling in love with financial services.

Fatimat: Honestly, I think the host just did a fantastic job of selling the company to us and inspiring us to aim high. They took us into the newsroom, where the trading numbers lined the walls, and then to an office, which was full of gadgets. That visit probably influenced my decision to study maths and economics, as I wanted to learn accounting so I could work for them.

Anyway, you grow up, life happens, dreams change and one day like me you start to ask yourselves important questions like, “What am I going to do with my life?” I was 21 and had no idea what I wanted to do with my life after Futureversity.

Rebecca: So how’d you land on coding?

Fatimat: It was a process of trial and error. I tried a few online courses, including G-suite administration and Salesforce Trailhead, but found that none of these programmes challenged me in the way that I wanted. In that kind of work, there’s a lot of fixed ways of doing things, and doing well is about trying to follow those ways. There was little room for me to be creative, to think for myself.

I was doing this experimentation while working with young people, which got me thinking a lot about improving access to education in Nigeria, which is where I’m from and where I spent my early years. Nigeria has the highest rate of out-of-school children in the world. I wanted to learn how to build a platform that would allow kids who can’t physically get to school to follow the curriculum online and still be able to take their exams.

Rebecca: This population of children who aren’t in school, do they have access to computers? To the internet?

Fatimat: Most of them wouldn’t, but I had a plan for sponsorship to address that. I never did build that application, because I got fixated on the idea of building something that could solve a big problem, like education for a very disadvantaged population, and got so caught up in exploring the options for building things, like Wordpress and other CMS, that before I knew it, I was obsessed with learning to code.

I wanted to hear from people in the industry so I did some googling and came across Codebar, a non-profit initiative that facilitates the growth of a diverse tech community by running regular programming workshops. I attended a session and realised, hey, I could make a career out of this.

At this point I hit a roadblock, because I didn’t have a laptop, so I couldn’t teach myself coding at home. I got lucky, though, because Mohammed (a colleague at Futureversity) found me a Windows laptop.

Fatimat at Space4, the Finsbury Park home of Founders and Coders

Rebecca: Tell me about your introduction to coding.

Fatimat: Once I got a laptop, I started going to Codebar every week. In one of the first sessions I attended, I was paired with a developer called Ben Scott, and his mentoring style really clicked with me. We were working on CSS, and when I got confused about the box model, he drew things out using pen and paper, which cleared things up for me right away. I actually asked Codebar to pair me up with him every time, as I found it so much more productive to stick with the same mentor instead of introducing myself to someone new every time. I learnt a lot of the fundamentals from him.

Rebecca: How did you hear about Founders and Coders?

Fatimat: After a few months of teaching myself to code in my very limited free time, I decided I needed to go all-in. But I had no money, so a paid bootcamp was not really an option for me.

I found out about Founders and Coders from an alumni at Codebar. She had me at “it’s free and it’s collaborative.” I went to the website, which explained the application process, and decided that before I went down that road, I should make sure it was really the right fit for me.

So I called the number on the website and, to my surprise, Dan (founder and executive director of Founders and Coders) picked up. He was really encouraging and spoke to me in depth about the application process and the course. I remember thinking to myself, “how can he be so nice when he doesn’t even know me?” After that phone call all my doubts went away and I threw myself into the application process.

Rebecca: Tell me about your experience on the course.

Fatimat: From the course content, to the teaching and learning methods, to the environment and the people…just, everything. Founders and Coders was such a great experience for me. For the first time in my life, I had no problem waking up early, even though I was often up late working, because I looked forward to every day on the course.

Rebecca: Any specific highlights?

Fatimat: Honestly, it was just good to be in an environment where I was challenged everyday and didn’t feel pressured to be less myself.

Rebecca: How do you mean?

Fatimat: People often have misconceptions or stereotypes of how you’re supposed to behave when you’re from a certain background. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk The danger of a single story sums it up perfectly. For me, when I enter a new environment, especially a professional one, I behave as you’d expect any young professional to behave but someone usually questions whether I’m being genuine. Like they expect me to be the loudest one in the room or act outrageous in some way, because it’s the only story they’ve heard about black women. So it can often take longer for me to build relationships, which has at times hindered my progress.

Also, as I said earlier, I didn’t go university after A levels. Even though most of my cohort went to university, I never felt judged or less than them for having not gone to uni. What mattered was what we did on the course, and I always felt respected by my peers for what I brought to the table.

Rebecca: What do you think it is about the environment at Founders and Coders that lets you be yourself?

Fatimat: Well, on first day of the course at Founders and Coders, Dan gave a talk about what the programme and community are all about, and from the way everyone responded and the vibes in the room, I felt I could be myself. I think the idea that we’re all in it together, that it’s not a competition…it eased the pressure I usually feel and helped me focus with a clear head.

I didn’t feel self-conscious asking questions, because I knew that our mentors were people who had just been through the programme, and that they understood what it was like to be confused. Knowing our mentors had finished the course, and were working in the industry, helped me keep the faith that eventually I’d get there too.

On my laptop, I have a sticker with the quote,

“Trust that the dots will somehow connect,”

and almost every time someone paired with me they would joke,

“Have the dots connected yet?”

Fatimat’s laptop, with her note-to-self about connecting the dots on the top right-hand corner

Rebecca: Tell me more about your experience with peer-led learning at Founders and Coders.

Fatimat: I had experience pair programming from Codebar, but at Founders and Coders it is mostly pairing from ten in the morning til six at night. That’s a lot of time to spend next to someone! After the first project, when we worked as a team of four to build a one-page website, I couldn’t imagine working in any other way though.

I guess you could say my experience at Founders and Coders spoiled me!

Rebecca: How so?

Fatimat: Well, when I interviewed for jobs, I was clear about not wanting to code alone all the time. I truly believe that in this field, two heads are better than one.

Also, at Founders and Coders, your cohort is like a family. It’s not one of those places that claim to be a family but their actions prove otherwise. We make decisions about the organisation together, we code together and best of all we party together. I am no longer worried about going to meetups/tech events alone because I know when I get there I will most likely meet an alumnus of Founders and Coders and even though they might not have been from my cohort, we will be buddies.

So when I started interviewing I knew I wanted to work somewhere that it really felt like a community.

Rebecca: During the second half of the course, you worked on two longer projects. I’d love to hear about the apps you built.

Fatimat: For the first project, we pitched app ideas to each other. My idea was for a web app called HomeSafe, which would allow parents to notify their child’s school if someone other than the regular guardian would be collecting the child, and three of my fellow students chose to work on it with me.

We got off to a slow start, because we spent a lot of time talking about how to spend the two weeks allocated to build all of the features we wanted. Finally, I was assertive with the team about starting with something small, and working from there, adding one feature at a time to the MVP. In the end we built a beautiful web app that had an impressive number of features for a two-week build.

Fatimat explaining how to pronounce her last name before a presentation

Rebecca: What about your client project? Tell me about who you worked with and the development process.

Fatimat: During the final month of the course we built an application for the Courtauld Institute of Art, the world’s leading centre for the study of history and conservation of art and architecture. They had been working with volunteers to catalogue and digitise a huge collection of photographs and art for their Courtauld Connects initiative, and at the time were preparing to more than triple the current number of volunteers in order to accelerate the multi-year project.

Initially they wanted us to help with the digitisation, but after we did a design day with them we realised that was too big of a project for us to accomplish in three weeks. Instead we decided to focus on improving the volunteer experience. We spoke with volunteers and learned they wanted to feel like a community as well as to get regular progress updates to see their impact on the organisation as a whole.

Rebecca: How did it turn out? Have the volunteers been using it?

Fatimat: In the end we built an app with a volunteer directory that enables volunteers to share interesting pictures with each other, and staff/volunteers to post regular updates on the project, and the app is still in use today.

Rebecca: When you finished the course, you spent a week mentoring the next cohort. I’d love to hear about your experience as a mentor. Did the dots finally connect?

Fatimat: I actually chose to mentor on week two, test driven development, which I originally found really difficult, because I wanted to spend more time with the material. I hoped that by explaining the content to the new students it might click for me. I was a bit intimidated, to be honest. Before mentoring the new cohort, I’d met a few of them and seen their personal websites, and it seemed to me like they knew more before starting the course than I did after completing it. I wasn’t really sure if I’d be able to teach them anything.

We pair up to mentor, and I found the whole process of preparing with a partner so valuable — in fact, by the time we had finished planning I was already feeling more capable and confident I’d have something useful to share with the new cohort. In the end I really enjoyed mentoring and to my relief, the dots finally did connect on the topic of testing for me!

Rebecca: You’re known around Founders and Coders for your sense of humour. Any particularly silly moments you’d like to share?

Fatimat: I was the DJ at our “End of Founders and Coders” party. I got good feedback; so who knows, if coding doesn’t work out, DJ Fatz might be another option. I should probably start taking lessons now.

Fatimat with her cohort at Founders and Coders

Rebecca: You joked earlier that Founders and Coders spoiled you for your interviews. Could you tell me more about your experience looking for work?

Fatimat: Joe, our commercial manager, was supportive during and after Founders and Coders. Everybody’s situation is different, which Joe recognises and takes it into account when advising us. After completing the bootcamp, I had some things I had to sort out so I could not look for work straight away, Joe would message me often just to see how I was doing and asked if he could be of help in any way. When I was ready to look for work, he listened to my concerns about working in the industry and paid attention to the kind of environment I wanted to work in, which helped him place me with my current employer, 27Partners. He also bought me food during our one-to-one chats so this might be the free food talking. I’m joking — Joe really is great at what he does.

Rebecca: What is your role at 27Partners? What kind of projects will you be working on?

Fatimat: It’s a junior JavaScript developer role. I will be working on the company’s client products and its own platform StoryShare. The company is looking to grow soon so it seems like an exciting time to be joining them and hopefully I can be a part of that for a while. So far, I’ve had the freedom to get on with contributing to their project with the option to ask for help if I need it. We’ve had conversations about how we can be more collaborative and I will be teaching the team some of the things I’ve learnt from Founders and Coders, including pair programming, of course!

Rebecca: Look towards the future for me. What are your goals?

Fatimat: For now, I’m just focused on getting through my first year as a professional developer! But I am definitely still keen on building the learning platform I told you about earlier.

I’m also a big believer in giving back. It would be selfish of me to go forward in life and not give back to the community who gave so much to me. Growing up, a lot of people worked with me, through charitable organisations and empowerment schemes. I did Prince’s Trust Team Programme, Uprising Leadership Programme, Career Ready, Allen & Overy Smart Start Experience, and FutureVersity summer courses. I am committed to helping others build themselves up, especially young people— starting with my siblings—and being a role model.

Learning to code, I got support from Codebar, Nodegirls, Rob from Thoughtbot through the Thoughtbot Mentoring Scheme, and Fabio from YLD through Recwork Meet a Mentor scheme and Peter Rhodes at Founders and Coders meetups.

So this summer, I ran two Introduction to Coding (HTML and CSS) workshops for teenagers. I did one at WAC Arts College, which was through Founders and Coders, and the other at Futureversity. I am definitely interested in running more workshops in future, as well as mentoring at Codebar and CodeYourFuture.

Rebecca: I’m inspired by your commitment to connecting the dots for the next generation!

Fatimat: What can I say, it’s just important to me that I do for others what many people have done for me, and y’know pay it forward.

Rebecca: Thanks again for the chat, Fatimat.

Fatimat: It’s cool. Thank you!

To learn more about the tuition-free training programme, visit www.foundersandcoders.com.