Now is the Time to Code
Making a case for why you should learn to code over the next year
Please spend the next three minutes watching this video. There’s a small chance it changes your life.
McKay tells his computer what to do in simple English, and the AI writes all the code. He doesn't need to type any of it. What seemed like sci-fi two years ago is now real. The future is here. (Yes, you can try it yourself.)
In this piece, I will make a case for why you should learn to code over the next six to twelve months. I’ll cover how coding unlocks a distinct form of freedom, opens up opportunities you wouldn’t otherwise get, and attunes your thinking to a world that is changing rapidly.
And why now? Because it has never been easier to learn.
A way of thinking
Coding means giving the computer a bunch of instructions to perform a set of tasks. But computers are robots. Unlike humans, they don’t understand ambiguity. So, you have to be precise.
You're in your room, the door's shut, and a friend knocks. You yell "Come in," and they open the door and enter. No big deal, right?
Now picture a robot knocking. You say "Come in," but the robot could do anything from breaking the door to using the window. You have to program it to know exactly what you mean, which is to turn the knob and open the door. Computers are, at the same time, extremely smart and extremely dumb. Your instructions have to be clear, concise, and extremely precise.
Turns out that these three traits - clarity, brevity, and precision - are not just coding skills but essential for great thinking, writing, and communication. Each of these leads to becoming a better problem solver, which is what all jobs essentially are.
Programming rewires your brain. In a good way.
Unlocking Freedom
Coding is permissionless. With just a laptop and internet connection, you can build whatever you want to - a tic-tac-toe game, a personal website, or the next billion-dollar startup. No educational credentials or permission needed. This unlocks a powerful form of freedom in the modern world.
First, you can solve a lot of your problems with technology.
Want to ensure that you never miss someone’s birthday again? Build a bot that sends you automated email reminders
Want to know when a specific product goes on sale? Create a web scraper that alerts you when the price drops
Want to automate a data entry task at work? Write a script that populates databases based on predefined rules.
Without knowing how to code, you either have to rely on an existing solution (which may not meet your exact needs), pay someone to do the work for you, or simply endure the problem.
Second, over the course of a career, a coder has the freedom to explore many different domains. This is because the underlying skills, thinking, and patterns that go into building a product remain constant irrespective of industry. A coder can be building a healthcare product one week and an entertainment product the next.
On the other hand, most non-coders are tied to one field because what they bring to the table is specific knowledge or domain expertise, making it hard to switch industries.
The same holds if you want to start your own company. As a coder, you can spend a few days turning a potentially promising idea into a prototype and validate it. If you can’t code, you have to pay someone to do this or find a technical cofounder. It’s just more difficult.
Demand
Today, computers are part of the fabric of our existence. Software has already eaten the world. This makes coders, the folks who make software, key members of society. They make the world tick. With everything becoming more digitized by the day, their value (and demand) will only increase.
If you’re just starting your career or are at a junction where you want to begin again or pivot, it is prudent to consider programming as a profession.
If you’re in a non-technical domain, full-time coding may not be your end goal, but understanding code is still a career multiplier. From understanding how a product works to communicating with technical folks, it's an edge you'll have that other colleagues or candidates won't.
Why now?
All the benefits I’ve outlined have been true for decades. So why learn to code now? Because it’s never been easier and the payoff has never been higher.
Generative AI tools benefit programmers more than any other profession. If you understand how code works and have a clear vision of what you want to build, you can ask the computer to write the code for you and it will. Did you come across an error in your codebase? Again, the computer will diagnose it and give you a solution.
Coders that leverage these tools are already 5-100x more productive. That number is no joke. Already valuable members of society, they can now produce exponentially more work. It’s difficult to predict the second-order effects of this profound leap in humanity but you want to ensure you’re on the right side of the change.
Finally, tools like ChatGPT not only help you code but are also great for learning how to code. Programmers have always been self-learners, picking up skills from documentation, blogs, and forums on the internet. Now, they don’t have to spend time combing through information. It’s all at their fingertips.
Believing in anon accounts on the internet is risky business but I’m certain there are thousands around the world with similar trajectories over the past few months:
But it’s too late
Even if you’re convinced that learning to code is helpful and that now is the right time, there is one final barrier to cross - getting stuck in some variant of “surely, it’s too late.”
Perhaps you've spent eight years in marketing. Maybe you're just starting with your master's in psychology. Or, like me, you could be an engineer who has spent the last few years away from the technical stuff.
This is a classic case of falling into the sunk cost fallacy. It’s scary to start over. Picking up a new skill later in life is daunting, especially when you've invested so much in another field. The fear of not having a head start, of not being as good as those that started much earlier, is very real.
But it's not too late. It will never be too late. The average human career spans 40 years. If you're reading this, you're likely in the first half of your career. A six-to-twelve-month investment is insignificant in the grand scheme of things, especially when it can positively alter the trajectory of your career.
Remember, sunk cost is sunk cost.
How to start
Start with FreeCodeCamp, an excellent free online school that takes you through the basics. In ChatGPT, you have an infinitely patient personal assistant who is great at both coding and teaching. Use it to clarify doubts, understand concepts, and eventually, give you the code. Once familiar with the basics, begin tackling small problems and coding your solutions.
Go from there.