Hello! My name is George Vuxton. I began my coding journey two years ago after a particularly challenging interview question. Upon hearing me brag about my Excel prowess (“I can do anything in Excel,” I brashly boasted), my interviewer (an Excel pro in his own right) asked me “Do you know VBA?” I cringed. “I know everything except VBA.”
Somehow I still got the job, but one thing kept nagging at me: If I wanted to excel (pun not intended) at my job, I needed to learn VBA. I began my coding journey with WiseOwlTutorial’s excellent VBA course on YouTube. I began to fall in love with coding and even though I didn’t create anything which saved me hours at a time, I was proud of every script I wrote. I got a little bit of satisfaction every time I executed a script and it worked flawlessly. It was my child. It was the house I built (or at least the shed), which I got to proudly look upon every time I drove past. I was addicted.
It was around this time I began realizing I would be much happier as a software engineer than in my current function as a financial analyst. I found Oregon State University’s online computer science post-bacc program and instantly knew it was the right fit.
I am in my last semester of school now. I still work at the same company, but now with the goal of working as a software engineer with my company in the near future. I have had conversations with the software manager about this goal for several months now, and I am cautiously optimistic that it will lead to a position.
I am at the point in my life where I am confident in my own abilities. I have had many pitfalls through the years, but one consistent thing is if I really want something, I will put in the work to make it happen. I believe something will materialize at my current job. If not, I am fully capable of finding an excellent software role at any number of other companies. I am an excellent candidate and anywhere would be lucky to have me. If I don’t hear anything from my current company by the time I graduate in a few months, I will begin applying to other jobs.
Truth be told, I could apply to other positions now while I am waiting for a position to open up at my current company. But although I don’t doubt my own ambitions, my attention can only be focused in so many directions at once. I need to continue to be productive in my current (full-time) job function so my current manager continues to support my goal of switching to software. I need to excel in my last semester of school, in which I am taking two classes. Additionally, I have no idea how much time the capstone course will take up (more on this later when I find out my capstone project). And on top of my career goals, I have been working out semi-regularly for the first time in years, in addition to going out and having a social life.
Could I technically find time in a week to apply for jobs? Perhaps. But I want to do a good job in everything I do. As Ron Swanson said, “Never half ass two things. Whole ass one thing.” I don’t want my work, or school, or even fitness to suffer because I am also making time to apply to jobs. I will crush this last semester. Then, if I am still in need of a job, I will crush that goal as well. Stay tuned.
