How I became a software engineer in a Tokyo startup

Are you thinking about a career change to software development?

Or are you considering to move to Japan? Or maybe even both?

Then you should read this interview.

I had the honor to sit down with Matthew Nguyen, Software Engineer at Attuned to talk about his unique career. In part 1 Matt shared how he transitioned from a financial analyst to a software developer; and writing a 600 page fantasy novel in between. In part 2 we talked about how he moved to Japan from New York City.

Matt, thank you for your time today. Could you briefly introduce yourself to our audience?

Sure. I’m Matt, Front-end Engineer at Attuned, a SaaS business based in Tokyo that belongs to the same group company as Wahl+Case. I came to Japan in September 2018 to work for Attuned. 

Before coming to Japan I worked for two startups in New York City; as a full stack developer at a small FinTech startup called Pre-Rec and then as a front end developer for HelloFresh, a meal kit provider.

And before that I was working in the financial industry as a financial analyst. 

you started your career in Finance. Can you tell us a little bit about your early career?

I actually studied Finance in university. To be completely honest, I wasn’t super interested in Finance but I had to pick a major and I heard from my peers that there is good money in Finance. That’s how I got into Finance in the first place.

Consequently my first couple of jobs were in the financial services industry. I started as an IT Consultant at PwC, then became an Internal Auditor at Prudential and after that worked as a Financial Analyst at Wells Fargo.

Those are some big names. What made you leave the financial industry and start a new career from scratch in software development?

I don’t know if it was the financial industry itself or just my experience in working for very large corporations. Probably both, but it might have been different if I worked for a smaller company in the financial industry. In those huge financial institutions I didn’t feel like I was contributing. I was doing what thousands of other people were doing as well, basically just moving money around. A lot of the work just involved going through legal documents and analyzing data in excel sheets. Most of the models have already been created, so I was just entering numbers and checking if they were above or below a certain threshold. 

It wasn’t really exciting and every day was pretty similar. I was just going through the motions, doing what have been done a million times before and I felt like I was not really making an impact. 

I can completely understand that. And then one day you just decided to quit and become an engineer?

To be honest, I had no plans to become an engineer at that time. That came a bit later. What I wanted to do was to become a full time author. I had been writing a fantasy novel for a few years and I wanted to focus on it 100% to finish it. That was the initial plan. 

So in the winter of 2016 I quit my job at Wells Fargo and spent the next 6 months writing full time. I finished the novel and was trying to find a literary agent who would pitch my novel to potential publishers but I was told it was way too long and I should cut it in half basically.

However, as you can imagine, I was running out of money after months without a real job. Then a friend of mine recommended this coding school called App Academy, where you don’t pay any tuition until you find a job. That seemed like a low risk solution for me at that time, so I decided to give it a hot.

It was pretty challenging to get in because they have a technical test and require some prior knowledge and skills. So, before I applied I was self studying for about 4 months to prepare for the application. Luckily I passed.

Then, in the beginning of 2017 I started the bootcamp and learned the fundamentals of coding. I learned both front-end and back-end. Basically every student is a full-stack engineer when they graduate after 3 months. I finished the bootcamp with two projects, one was a Spotify clone and the other was a game.

Then I started applying for jobs. That’s how I got into software development.

How hard was it to find a job as a coding boot camp graduate without any work experience in software development?

It was a pretty stressful time. The coding school puts a good amount of pressure on you because they get paid once I find a job. So it’s in their interest that you find a job ASAP. I think I was required to send out 40 applications per week, it’s actually in the agreement when you enroll to that coding school.

But 40 applications is kind of impossible to keep up. I ended up sending about 15 applications per week and it took me roughly 2 months to find my first job. 

I was in New York back then and there are a bunch of startups, so the pool of potential employers is huge. I used platforms like AngelList, LinkedIn, Indeed where you can find thousands of jobs and I’ve worked with a recruiter or two as well. 

So how was your new life as a professional software engineer?

After applying to 120 companies or so I found my first gig on AngelList. It was this tiny FinTech startup and the office looked like someone’s apartment. I think my background in Finance actually helped me land this job, because I knew the industry. There was only one other engineer there at that time so I was working on everything. I didn’t stay there for too long though, less than half a year. 

I got an offer to join HelloFresh, which was a well-funded startup with a cool office. They had free beer, snacks, all that kind of stuff you see in Silicon Valley shows, so I decided to join them and focus more on front-end engineering. That’s where my front end career started.

What’s your advice for people who think about changing their career to become an engineer?

You have to really want it and enjoy it. Otherwise it will be tough to learn a completely new skill set.

Other than that, there is a ton of online free resources that can help you learn exactly what you need to learn. In my case, someone created the whole curriculum of the coding school online. So I could use that to prepare for the application to get in. I think you don’t even have to go to a bootcamp to learn everything, but for me it gave me extra motivation and I was able to study together with other people which helped me a lot.

This is only my opinion but I think if you really want to change jobs into an engineering role, it’s a full time transition. You need complete commitment and shouldn’t study coding on the side while still doing your main job. At least for me that wouldn’t have worked.

Also, this goes without saying but when applying for engineering jobs you need a Github. Companies want to see what you are building, so you should have legitimate projects up there, not just stuff that looks like copy and paste. If someone technical is interviewing you they will look into the files to see how you code.

It’s also good to have some sample apps, mobile or web, deployed and actually running. This way potential employers can look at it and it usually really impresses non-technical people.

In part 2 we will talk about why and how Matt ended up in Japan.

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Anju Kajihara
Manager | Marketing

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