Recently, I had a conversation with another musician who turned software engineer. We ended up running into each other at a party and ended up talking for the better part of an hour about how we made the transition. Surprisingly, the more software engineers I have met, the more I felt like there was a majority that had some sort of music experience. Maybe this is my own bias, but I feel like having a background with music has a lot of skills that transfer directly and indirectly to being a developer.
For direct skills, being a musician and engineer have one big thing in common: determination to not let your craft get the best of you. I’m sure all of you reading this with developer experience have had days (or multiple days in a row) of not having the solution to a problem that resulted in you banging your head against the wall trying to shake the answer out of it. But, in some way or another, you pushed through and found the solution.
I first discovered this grind-until-you-come-out-clean-on-the-other-side mentality through music. Most of my experience learning an instrument is failing, forcing yourself to learn a new and uncomfortable muscle memory, and then practicing it until it becomes second nature. This process is very similar to learning how to code. As you have more and more hours under your belt, the things that used to give you problems become second nature. You learn to memorize for loops and syntax instead of having to look up documentation every other line of code. It was really beneficial to come into a new career with this mentality instead of having to learn the discipline from the ground up.
Musicians also have to work well in teams. Just like developers, there are plenty of lone wolves that do a fantastic job on their own (looking at you Beck), but for an overwhelming majority, teamwork is essential. Being able to disagree and argue in a healthy way that is conducive to team growth is a skill that has to be developed, and one that few of us are just born with. Having to manage and work with other musicians has been a helpful transfer to this new field because it is the same skill set, just with a different project type.
While we both enjoyed our past careers, my friend and I both enjoyed our new direction, and felt surprisingly comfortable making such a large change. Maybe there is something more to it that I can’t put my finger on; like having an outlook for creativity benefits you in more ways than one. Either way, we are both excited to see where this new career path takes us!
Комментарии