Photoed by Ru Yang, Fall 2022
Hi, There!
My name is Ru. I used to work in the logistics industry for around three years before starting the Post Bacc Computer Science program at OSU. I started this program in the Fall of 2020 and it took me around two and half years to arrive at the final course – Capstone. After graduation, I will start my first full-time Software Developer job. I feel it is time to talk a bit about my career switch.
About the Switch
Not like people who already have a specific career plan in school, I did not think too much about my career after getting my previous degree. I was referred by one of my friends to the logistics industry. I would say it is not a bad choice. Because it is stable, less-pressure, and has a work-life balance.
There are usually a lot of different factors that drive the decision. For me, the most important one is that I want more challenges. At the beginning of my previous job, I did learn a lot. However, as time passes, I started doing the same work every day following the operation procedure. It forced me to start thinking if that was what I want to do.
A career switch is a big decision for everyone. It did not occur smoothly and quickly for me as well. It took me half year to make the final decision. In the first stage, I did a lot of research on major selection and narrow it down to computer science, finance, and data science. After that, I took several online intro courses in those three areas separately to make sure which one I am interested in most. Finally, I consulted several friends who are software developers and want to have a basic concept of this industry.
About the Future
Last Fall, I started my job hunting. I got a lot of tips and inspiration about interview preparation from the discussion board in the course CS 361 Software Engineering. After several months of stressful but interesting interviews, I finally got a new grad offer in my target area. It is an end, but also a start.
Being new to my professional career, I believe that there will be so many things that I have to learn. It makes me feel excited! I set a three years goal for myself. In the first two years, I want to enrich myself and make up the gap between school and industry. In three years, I see myself having the capability to lead and own multiple projects from end to end. Till that time, I will have a more comprehensive understanding of my work area. Then, I want to go deep into this technical area to see how far I can reach.
