Anyone can be a software engineer, you just need grit - codeSage

In 2018, I completed my second year of school, earning a National Diploma in Computer Engineering. As polytechnic students, we typically have a year set out for a student internship before returning to school for a Higher National Diploma.

Based on the expectations of companies and internship programs, I realized that what I had learned over the past two years wasn't up to industry standard. So, I made a decision to level up my skills and become more competitive for future opportunities. One of the first skill sets I focused on was HTML and CSS, and that's how my journey as a developer truly began.

This story contains a brief dive into my developer journey and how serving in the military positively impacted it, things i learnt, and soft skills that may help you in your developer journey too.

Key Takeaways:

What every developer needs to be successful
Soft skills every developer needs
Military and developers' lives correlate from my point of view
Programming is not hard!

Fast forward to 2019, I began applying for internship roles at several places - marine companies, oil companies, even local cyber cafés. After many attempts, a breakthrough came through a kind referral from a lady in my neighborhood. She told me about an opening at the Nigerian Navy Ships Port Harcourt Logistic Depot. That same day, I applied - and thankfully, I got in.
I started the following Monday as a computer operator (typist), working as a civilian staff member.

While i worked as a computer operator, i understood a lot of things about the military and learned a lot from the officers i was serving, but i never dreamt of working as a military officer because i wanted to freely explore software engineering, but then nothing in the developers world made sense to me at this point i was dumb.
While i was in school, i struggled through C++ or any other programming Lecture, sleeping most of the time, i never had any carryover except for C++ in my first year. But wait, why will i still want to be a software engineer when clearly i was already failing at it from entry level?

Pitch Black

After six months working with the Nigerian Navy ship, everything changed; the road became even more blurry, more like pitch black. In the Nigerian Navy, even as a civilian staff, I'm expected to act, speak, and deliver on jobs like a regular rating. I used to take courses on YouTube as i was barely getting by, and i couldn't pay for Udemy courses.

In the first six months, i studied most time when i had less typing job to do, but in the next six months, the work schedule changed. There was a new Acting Commander, and the job became more demanding. Remember, i was just an intern, but after some time, i was treated as an all-out military member.

Usually i close from work by 2 pm or 4 pm based on the workloads, but this time i started working overtime, i mean more like "overkill" because imagine resuming at 8 am and closing from work by 9 pm! Not every day, but mostly days when we have monthly returns or urgent document preparations from Navy Headquarters, and at the end of the day, having a military vehicle drop you off at your house. What i never thought about was, why?

Why did they not let me go home by closing hour and have another military computer operator take over the job from there? Besides, it's just typing. I had little work experience before that time, and i wanted to work because i needed to save up some money for the following school year, so i never complained, but the work-life i knew beforehand had a different meaning than what i was experiencing.

Somedays were cool because based on how hard working i was, polite and never complained i ended up getting tiped and rewarded most times which fired me up, but at this point i have drifted from learning to code to a full time Military Computer Operator, I learnt all the military jargons and writing formats just to be compactible with my current job and in return having little time or energy to write code!
But regardless, i still wanted to be a developer, i mean, as a student worker, i said to myself, "my salary will pay the bills for now, but 3 years from now this will not be enough".

So i resumed my learning even with the high wave of workloads as it seemed like the more time i spend in the military zone the more they saw me as one of them and treated me as such, no emotions, hardwork daily, patterned behavior to submit to superior command, working overtime more frequently, and ended up sleeping at the office some days and oh even getting yelled or abused verbally if a single mistake was made, it's a military thing you get that every once in a while, infact our commander will say to me "you are one of us now get used to all this".

On some public holidays, i don't get the day off, because the military in my country doesn't observe all public holidays, we still work, and as the office computer operator, i have to be there to do the job.

The simple reason why other military computer operators never work in my place was simple, they are not always available, they always go on locations, or sea, or on a mission, and definitely will not be in sync with what is going on in the office by the time they are back. The latest file structure, letter formats, and so on. For some reason, they are out of sync because a lot is going on outside for them, and this was the sole reason i was hired in the first place, so it's more like you have to be here to do your job. me thinking it was an internship. "Well, it was not just the regular civilian one".

After nine months, i finally concluded as a young adult, i said to myself, "this environment is TOXIC! It doesn't support my dreams, I'm forced to behave in a certain way as not to offend superiors, i work overtime, and I'm always stressed".

So I'm like once my intership period is over, I'll quit and go back to school and my ideal life, i said in my head "four months to go". At this point, some kids my age will go home and never resume the next day. Working there got so bad in my opinion, no work-life balance no nobody cares about your personal or mental health, all that was projected was a job that needs to be done and discipline, no excuses!, but why did i not quit?

I simply needed Tuition fees as my dad was ill and i had taken charge of my fees from my second year at school, so you know what it's like in my head. Not like i loved the job, but you know it is what it is.
As bad as i painted my experience in my head, like it or not, working in the military built my mental fortitude! And this is:

What every developer needs to be successful

I was constantly stressed and pushed beyond my limit. My superiors will not take excuses, because on a day were i plan to close up by 2 pm, i see myself at home by 8 pm! Discipline is the military way. If we have to work four extra hours to meet the deadline, we do that with no excuses. I sat on my computer one day from 8 am till 7 pm just typing and making calculation formulas on Excel, i only had 45 minutes or so to get lunch, and i continued.

This was stressful, but little did i know that this is what every developer needs to be successful: Mental Fortitude and Discipline.
Mental strenght is essential as a developer because programing is a mental exercise you think of a solution you try it, you test, you fix bugs, you ship, you refactor, you maintain, it is similar to solving mathematics you solve on a rough sheet you cancel, you solve again until you get the right answer this is what programing is ( if we take away the AI speedy solutions nowadays ) but unfortunately not everyone has the patient and perciverance to keep solving until the right solution is provided.

I was pushed to the edge, and sometimes i break down mentally and get insomnia due to stress. But in return, i realized that my mental strength and focus had grown. Now, when i return to programming videos that i never understood or even sleep while watching. I started to grasp it better and faster; it turns out that working on intense Excel calculations and typing for hours for an extended period had unlocked my inner genius.

At the eleventh month, it was at my front desk that i built my first React application, and it felt like something. I started to juggle learning to code and work at the time i had picked up JavaScript, not well grounded, but at least i was on the go.

Plottwist

While it remained just one month before i get back to school, a new commander was transferred to the depot and the acting commander was replaced. Before now, i had planned to return to school in a month and had decided to study computer science, because computer engineering is more of hardware engineering, and computer science is more Software Engineering.

On the first day of resuming office, the new commander saw me, he asked why i was working as young as i was, i told him my reasons, "it's my IT period and i want to save up some money as I'm responsible for my fees". He asked me if i would like to retain my position in the office and work while i schooled, since i am already grounded with servicing writing (servicing writing is a way the military formats documents ), and this will aid me with fees while in school.

The offer was good for me, i accepted, and we had a cool arrangement on how i could juggle school and work. I started a new journey, now i have work, school, and i have my developer journey.
I juggled all this, going to school from Monday to Wednesday and traveling over 50km to work every Thursday. Some days i stay back at the office to use the power and internet to take courses, and i go home on Friday.

It was another stress-filled phase, but in a few months, some new military personnel were transferred to the depot, and a few were computer operators. I was tasked with grooming them in this phase, i assumed a leadership role.

I slowly caught up with the pace of the work after a year and six months, I had become the go-to guy, the IT specialist, not just operating computers and machines, now I maintain computers, upgrade networks and infrastructure, recommend other facilities needed in the office; hard drives, backing up documents in the cloud, replacing modems with routers and modern service providers. I was upgrading the military office. I started solving other problems besides just typing, even though it wasn't my official role, everyone saw me as a solution architect around, and every IT problem came through my desk, some i had no solution but to recommend a better engineer, unknown to me that these are the:

Soft skills every developer needs

At the office, everyone will acknowledge my opinion before any change is made to the computers or services; as such, i had no choice but to own up to my responsibilities and expectations. This is one of the many soft skills every developer needs, "leadership", and i was grooming this subconsciously.

As a developer, you need to own whatever product you are working on. Have you ever worked on a UI that was designed and, when implemented at the end, you were blamed for the outcome? It's essential to assess whether a UI design aligns with the intended use case before implementation. This means proactively identifying where a design may fall short in terms of usability or feasibility and communicating those concerns clearly and constructively. Doing so reflects leadership - it shows ownership of the process and a commitment to delivering real, user-centered value.

As a leader, you will also need to possess empathy; you need to put yourself in the designer's shoes to understand why they did what they did, or what they were thinking when they did what they did.
You also need to be able to communicate openly and effectively, so let the designer know why the method will not work, which means you need to explain plainly to both the PM and the product owner in a way they will understand, using diagrams, screenshots, or a flow chart as the case may be.

In this period of time, i have developed both empathy, communication, and leadership skills, taking risks and proactive decisions in a work environment. These are some of the soft skills every developer needs
The years passed, and I completed my degree in Computer Science - but truthfully, I still felt half-baked as a software engineer. I had spent over three years working with the military, where I had earned trust and respect. Everyone expected that once I graduated, I would become a full-time personnel. I had a secure path into the Navy if I chose to take it.

But I was torn.

My journey in software development still felt shaky. I knew that if I left the Navy to chase my dream and failed, I might never get the opportunity to return - at least, that's how it felt at the time. My programming knowledge came partly from my university studies and scattered YouTube tutorials. There was no AI - just a big gap between where I was and where I wanted to be.

Leaving the Navy, a place where I was known, respected, and supported, felt almost like betrayal. But I knew I had to take the risk. So, I met with my commander, explained my reasons, and after graduation, I left.

Before graduating, I had already started sending out applications and managed to secure an internship with a small tech company. Surprisingly, the pay matched what I was already earning in the Nigerian Navy. So in reality, I wasn't taking a financial risk - I was simply transitioning from one path to another with a more long-term risk.

A few months later, I officially began my internship. No more school, no more navy jobs - just one focus: learning how to code professionally. As an intern at CAD Consulting Limited, I started from the ground up as if i were an absolute beginner, as advised by my mentor. I re-learned HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, then progressed to React and eventually Angular. Within six months, I was working as a junior front-end developer, building web apps and shipping websites for the company.

Things were going well, but this phase came with its challenges. The office was far from home, and commuting daily was expensive. To cut costs, I stayed in the company's boys' quarters - just to stay close and save on transportation.

It was an onsite role, and since i already stayed at the office boys quarter soon i started sleeping at the office because at this point i had one goal clear, "this place is a starting point and i only want to be here for as much as i can learn once i'm good enough i will start shooting for bigger companies like google, amazon "
This time, the journey felt different - better. I had a direct programming mentor: the owner of the company himself. He groomed us, guiding and pushing us in the right direction. But after the first six months, he got caught up with other responsibilities and could no longer be as involved. At that point, I had to return to being self-taught, but with a better, solid foundation.

That was when I began staying back late at the office, most nights after my colleagues had gone home. I'd remain behind, building small things, tinkering with code, and working on personal projects. It became my new way of learning - through consistency, experimentation, and long nights.

I did not find doing any of this hard because:

Military life and developer life correlate from my Point of View

While i was working with the military, i had already gotten used to sleeping at the office and coding late at night, i was used to the hard life, the grit, the grind, the mental toughness.
Was it convenient for me? no! But military life and developer life correlate from my point of view. The military personnel were disciplined and worked as hard as they could to get things done. i applied that same mentality as a developer.

They would not accept excuses in the military, so in my journey, i refused to give myself excuses. In the military, a document goes through so many rounds of corrections that a missed comma would result in a re-print of an entire document, so much validation is required to get an excellent outcome. I had gotten used to this rigorous process, and i did the same while writing code because that repetition process is the same as debugging!
Funny enough, much of what I was doing at the tech company, I had already experienced in the Navy, just in a different form. It wasn't code I was writing back then, but the discipline, the work ethic, and the demanding environment had already shaped me. So when challenges came, I wasn't fazed.

The Navy had prepared me for the pressure, the long hours, and the persistence required in tech - I just didn't realize it at the time. So what's more? It's just the same skill set applied in another industry, so my years serving there were not a waste; it was a medium to a greater journey.

I tell you the truth, it is easier to learn programming in this AI Era, so i know what i mean when i say i debug codes all night! Sometimes it's just some little simple fix, but as a "dumb" junior, i will spend time on it. Stack Overflow doesn't help sometimes, you just search through and no results for your particular problem, if you ask a question, it takes a whole day for someone to see your problem, and sometimes another whole day for a messiah to solve it. like, "Who has that time?".

I put in the grind for about 1 year, and after that, I left the company as a confident intermediate web and mobile front-end engineer. I got another job and another, and i kept moving higher till date. I'm currently a front-end rich media developer as of when I'm writing this article!

The big flex is i became what i set out to be! As for the navy, i did not go back, i was still stopping by once in a while to help them with fixes and recommendations, but with time we parted ways, i am still in touch with them to date.

It might not mean so much to you reading this article, but well it means alot to me, i have seen a lot of people set out to be a software developer/engineer but could not keep up, maybe too much noise around them, or some will say programming gives me head ache it's too hard, i'm not sure it's for me well! Anyone can be a software engineer; you just need grit! i mean enough grit!, and for those saying programming is hard.

Programming is not hard! You're just not hard!

There were days when i felt like going home, it was lonely, i wanted to party like some of my friends, but I never gave in, because i had a dream to fulfil something i promised myself, something i would sacrifice every other career path to chase.

If you made it this far, then you are the real MVP. Do good to leave a love if you enjoyed this story. Follow for more Developer stories.
Disclaimer: This story is an authentic story from my real-life work experience, not fiction or exaggeration.