My view of being a Software Engineer
TLDR
- Started coding 13 years ago, struggled with basics but stayed determined.
- First success automating SAP exports, igniting my love for coding.
- Consulting role led to Open UI expertise and rapid career growth.
- Freelanced, shifting to full-stack and gaining global experience.
- Tried YouTube and a Flutter travel app, but plans changed due to COVID.
- Worked on EV tech at Sono Motors, gaining real-world integration skills.
- Now thriving on a Flutter team at Sevdesk with strong leadership.
- Evolved from coder to solution designer, focused on impactful solutions.
From Struggle to Breakthrough
I would now call myself Software Engineer after around 13 years. I started like everyone else and struggled with even the easiest tasks, and I really felt doomed that I would never be able to code a proper program. Even the easiest methods and function calls nearly killed me and made me think I would never achieve anything. After my first project, I realized that, with a lot of help from my former developer buddies, I felt like I did not really do it by myself. I tried to improve at home but hit so many roadblocks that I thought that’s it.
I will never forget how it was when I had the task of reading an Excel export in a certain way. Likewise, I needed to order the local “Wisdom Database” and should remove all folders that did not contain anything. I started as I did as a PC user, click on the folder to delete… Until I found out there are several thousands of folders. If I had continued like that, I would have continued like that and deleted folders even today. But during my first student year as a developer, it did not even strike me to create a script for that.
After some conversation, a coworker helped me get back on track, but this showcases how bad my problem-solving skills have been. There was a solution, but I would not come over the first hurdle to identify the problem as a programming problem. My friend supported me to finish the script, but I felt like I still knew nothing.
After that, I fought myself through 3 years of SAP ABAP, SAP Systems, Java SE (with Java Beans), and JSP without the slightest chance of understanding what I was doing there. I was not prolonged in the company, and I still do not know if it really was about my performance or because they did not need another dev, but that gave me two weeks at the end of the student time when I was able to search my own projects.
First Taste of Success
I was talking a lot at that time a lot with our product people, and found out that they had an issue with a SAP export that needed to be exported in a certain way. First, I did it manually, but I thought if the PM would need that regularly, maybe I could automate it. It was an epiphany for me at that time. Not only did I understand the problem, but I was also able to conclude that we can easily automate that. And I had two weeks to complete it, so I sat down. Every day as long as I had time, and for the first time ever, I enjoyed my time writing code. Reading through the CSV package helped me understand how to get data from an Excel spreadsheet and reorganize it into a new file the way I wanted it. I felt great!
But the best part was that the product manager took the tool, used it and said something that was like knighthood.
You are also such a hacker, right?
I was so surprised, because it really did not feel that way. I was just coding, enjoying my time and creating something useful. Somehow, after that day, programming never felt like a burden again. I was able to create stuff, understand how to Google things, and learn how to read Stack Overflow. Documentation became clear, understandable and manageable. Still, there have been problems I did not understand, but hey, great that it works for me.
Growing Through Professional Challenges
My next big step was to join a consulting company, and oh boy, that was quite tough. I was a Frontend developer and had no idea what people would expect from me. In the interview, I got tortured with MySQL Database Query questions. Databases was the only subject I had really screwed up during university, and I even got a second chance for the interview because I did not wear a suit during the interview. And in the second interview, they again tortured me with SQL, but somehow I got the job anyway. I heard later that I was really close to not getting in from HR.
From here, I learned a lot of strange things in the beginning. I needed to make a certificate for the Oracle SOA Suite A tool that was just a pain to use, it crashed all the time, was huge to install, and had a manual that was just massive. So I did what every good consultant did and got me a Cheat sheet with all the answers and tried to learn only that and make my certification. After the second attempt, I really got it. Which surprised me quite a lot, but that was great. Luckily, there was a change of plans.
We got a new contract in Switzerland, and they needed someone who works with [Oracle Siebel CRM] in a brand-new technology. The new technology was Open UI and was a UI update that was super important because Siebel at that time still relied on ActiveX Elements in Internet Explorer 8, and Oracle paid a massive amount of money to just keep the IE8 support up for their customers. It allowed you to use JavaScript inside the browser and write scripts that were executed on Web Forms you defined. So they invented that new Open UI, which was quite nice, and today, when I understand a bit more, is actually a nice abstraction of the stuff they do in the background.
Discovering My Technical Identity
So they showed me a screenshot, gave me a short intro into how Siebel CRM works, and with my limited knowledge, I scripted away. I did not really know how this Siebel was working, just that the old forms needed to go away, so I just quickly removed everything on the screen. I wrote everything new - the whole view. There was nothing left from the old form, only hidden elements I needed to press under specific circumstances. Today, I know that was not really intended by the creator. But hey, for the project, I was fantastic with the time plan. After two days and a lot of jQuery (which is included in Open UI), I was able to recreate the whole screenshot, which pushed me from a guy who does not know anything to THE EXPERT in the company about Open UI.
Suddenly I got contracts, traveled a lot and supported and helped tons of customers about the topic. I had the chance to even launch the new UI for one of the biggest companies in Switzerland. I also created my first library and was invited to the Oracle Open World in San Francisco, my very first public talk that I held. Not only that, but I was quickly moving up the career ranks from Junior Consultant to Senior Consultant within three years. In the last year, I switched my focus from Open UI to a real Full Stack development project because I gained some skills during that time as an Angular Developer. Here, I switched my focus from pure Frontend development to being a Full Stack developer after a college told me:
You cannot run away from the responsibility, it is our tool, and it needs to work. Backend or frontend, we need to fix it, and you should also know how it works.
That was again a key moment in my life, because it made me realize that it does not matter if my stuff is working, it all needs to work. UI Elements, API calls, Smoke Tests, Pipelines but also Meetings, Project Management, Company Politics. One of my friends who was a freelancer told me that she hates the term “Developer” she is a “Solution Designer” and that stuck with me. I am a Solution Designer, finding problems, seeing how to automate them, and then trying my best to execute. That does not only mean to develop but also to convince people of my solutions, unblock my team from impediments, make a SCRUM master if it is necessary, and so much more. People would call me the girl for everything, and they would probably be right.
Embracing the Freelance Journey
After a while, I started to freelance and left the company. Which got me in huge trouble and got sentences to hear from my bosses like “I will crush you with my network”… I was really, really happy to leave the company after that, and I started to travel. Which led me to a year in New Zealand, where I was able to work for an American company. Here, I could really flourish. I started as an Angular developer but was able to support and work on an anti-corruption layer. I learned how to code in C# and understood that programming languages are way more similar than I thought. One of the most valuable lessons I learned here is that work is not everything. Because the team was fantastic, and they had a massive integration of their external workers like me as a freelancer.
But also I was also involved knee-deep in everything surrounding the company, from CI / CD processes to release tasks, organizing meetings, and writing documentation. Besides delivering code and writing Angular at that time, I loved it there and even got a job offer, which I nearly took but decided against for my family. Which let to a cumbersome time. In that time I thought it would be a great idea to start my YouTube Career, not only teaching my wife every day some new tricks on Flutter, but also explain it to a wider audience was the goal.
Pursuing Entrepreneurial Dreams Together
Back home, everything took again quite a turn. My wife and I wanted to become freelancing and create our own app, “World Travel Companion”, but as always, fate had some other ideas. We started to develop the app, but it was in late 2019, which was the year of the Coronavirus, and we were not crazy enough to just create an app that would not be used for the unforeseeable future. Even though we had some money on the side, we had real struggles to get a flat in Germany because security is everything here. No job, → No house, … very bad living here. And YouTube did not get me any money we could live from.
So we started the job hunt, and I found a fantastic project at a finance company in Germany, which led to one of the weirdest issues ever. I had too many different industries in my portfolio. I was working for Telco, Health, Finance and even insurance companies. They created a new project and hired consultants to support them by architecting the newest company software architecture, which was quite an impressive step for me and a really great learning experience. After a while, I thought to let them hire me. When considering the finance company role, I realized that while the technical aspects excited me, I hadn’t yet developed a deep connection to the finance industry’s impact.
Finding Purpose Through Technology
So I searched for something meaningful that I could support. And there was a company that I heard a lot about, and that I felt like I wanted to support their mission, Sono Motors, an electric vehicle that should drive with the power of the sun. And it was a blast of a project, it was a startup, so they searched people in every direction with all skills. Whatever you can do, you should do it. I was able to work with React Native on the mobile app, but I also had the chance to create Vehicle Integration stuff. That was my first project where I could see a real-world application of the stuff I am writing, pressing a button in my app opens the door. WOW!
But sadly, the dream busted, and the company went bankrupt.
Landing at My Current Home
During my time as a freelancer and while I was working on Flutter Explained, I needed to somehow do my taxes. Therefore, I used a tool called sevdesk a friend of mine told me that they are currently creating a Flutter Team, and I would be a perfect fit, so I decided to apply for the job. And voilà, now I am here. I love to work here at the moment. There are a lot of things I need to learn and even more things we need to improve, but it feels fantastic to be here at the moment. The leadership so far looks promising, and my coworkers are fantastic. I will keep you up-to-date on what my future journey will look like :).
Reflections and Future Outlook
I still love programming, I still enjoy it. Even though there are voices saying that AI will take it away and abstract it, I still have a blast discussing with ChatGPT better solutions. I am also finding an incredible joy in working with pipelines and pushing the running times as low as possible. I learned that being a Software Engineer is more than just writing code. Teaching others, finding problems to solve, and explaining why your tasks are important are really as important. I really hope that this short story about my career path will give you some insights and maybe help you in your way.
Thank you for reading, stay curious and if you have time consider supporting me on Patreon.