Why did I leave a career in civil engineering for a new career in tech?
How It Started
Figuring out what I wanted to do for the next 40 years of my life always seemed like a daunting task. While I was rarely ever focused on one particular interest I was always enthusiastic about learning and trying new things.
I came into college undeclared and unsure about what I wanted to do. I always figured I would be engaged in a field that specialized in science or math. Having grown up in New York City surrounded by concrete and steel infrastructure, I was naturally led to the civil engineering field. In 2016 I graduated with wide eyes and eagerly looking to contribute on whatever was ahead.
I had the wonderful opportunity of working the next 5 years at an architecture/engineering firm specializing in the rehabilitation of structures in the greater metropolitan region. I was usually either hanging from the side of buildings performing facade inspections or brainstorming localized repairs for a structure over 100 years old. I gained more exposure working with people than I would’ve expected and developed a great sense of project management skills. Though I was promoted and recognized for my contributions within those 5 years, I realized I did not develop a sense of fulfillment from the work I was doing.
A Pandemic & A Passion
Then came 2020, or the year COVID-19 changed everyone’s lives. Businesses had to adapt to the way we had to work remotely and people had to find a way to keep their sanity during the unprecedented time. Like many others, I had all this spare time and couldn’t even go to the gym to workout! Rather than work on myself physically, I found myself working on something different and pursuing other interests and hobbies.
As a passionate fan of sports and all things baseball, I would frequently pull up a sport player’s statistics. Based on those numbers, I’d then try to make sense and tell a story about that player’s performance and abilities. I decided to enroll in an online class in sabermetrics (originally SABRmetrics). At its core, sabermetrics asks questions about how baseball is played, the most efficient ways to succeed, and then goes about trying to answer them through empirical research. Made popular by the book Moneyball, the field of sabermetrics and baseball analytics was a relatively new field I wanted to learn more about.
I entered not knowing anything about programming languages and came out with new knowledge in SQL. I was able to pull up queries for the top 5 home run hitters on the New York Yankees since 2004 just by learning a new skill. This honestly felt great and I ended up with a great sense of accomplishment for something so simple yet so gratifying.
The 2020 pandemic was a wake-up call. I came to realize that I had a sustained passion for sports data and statistics and that there was a field where I could build a career around this passion. What originally started as a hobby, lead me to a self-reflection and how I wanted to translate my passion into something I wanted to do for the rest of my life. This is how I found data science.
Pivoting
The decision to pivot into a new career in data science did not come overnight. To be honest, it was a truly daunting decision but a decision I felt was necessary. I’ve had uncertainties about the future and whether I could really make this transition since I had basically little to no experience. However, what I knew was that I loved what I was learning and each day I felt a sense of gratification having learned something new.
I knew this new journey would not be easy. I started researching the market and trying to figure out what exactly a data scientist or data analyst actually does. I made an effort to schedule a few hours every night to learn something new and take the small victories when I could.
I began self-teaching myself the skills necessary to succeed in the data science field. Determined, I started learning new skills such as how to code in Python, utilizing pivot tables in Excel, creating data visualizations in Tableau Public, and pushing my own projects into GitHub. I particularly enjoyed creating visualizations and making visually appealing dashboards.
To be honest, learning these new skills came with a few bumps and bruises along the way (eg. Google was exhausted with many “how to — ” prompts). What I found along this journey was a tremendous community of young professionals offering support and people with similar stories like my own. I never truly felt like I was lost even if I didn’t know where to start.
Finding Flatiron School
While I was making good progress, I knew I needed to devote 100% of my time to data science. Keep in mind, I was essentially “free-styling” a lot of what I was working on and I really didn’t know what I didn’t know (if that makes sense?) I was getting input from multiple sources and online courses when I felt what I really needed was a structured learning environment. On top of it all, I was balancing the self-teaching process with my full-time job.
This is when I found the Flatiron School. It checked all the boxes for someone like myself who wanted to build a strong background in data science. I was fully committed to pursuing this new path in my life. I quit my job and it was a bittersweet moment but I was super excited to take on this change with confidence.
While I’d like to call myself a data science expert after this 15-week program, I know there’s always something new to learn in this field. Maybe I’ll even learn a few new things about myself along the way. But ultimately, I’m determined to work on passion projects to secure a position where I can grow and develop a career in data science. More importantly, I’m looking to contribute on projects and making relevant business decisions.
Though this path has been difficult, the journey has definitely been rewarding and I look forward to what the future has in store.
