| First of all: Can we please stop pretending that your professional life is over and your skills and abilities are set in stone when you turn 30? I really can't hear this anymore and I think it's as far from the truth as can be. So, first of all: NO, IT's NEVER TOO LATE for you to learn something new, even at the biblical age of 31 :D For a more detailed answer let's first have a look at the facts: You're 31. You have a University degree in Philosophy. You have several years (?) of work experience in a startup. You're passionate about programming. You're based in Germany. Should you go study CS to land a job as a programmer? It depends. In Germany, I think it's always beneficial if you can show some formal certificate or University degree in CS or a related field if you apply to a position as programmer: The lack of IT talent is not as big here as in the US, so most companies have a larger pool of candidates to select from and will actually care about degrees and relevant prior experience as a programmer, especially if they're big corporations. So if you want to go work at BigCorp, a CS degree will open many doors for you. Startups might be more pragmatic when it comes to hiring programmers without formal education in CS, although salaries tend to be much lower there (especially in places like Berlin where there's a large influx of programmers from abroad). I think a good strategy for you could be to keep working in a field were you can use your prior experience to make enough money, but where you can progressively add more and more programming and technical tasks to your job (e.g. working as a technical project manager could be interesting). Concerning CS degrees I would have a look at part-time programmes offered by Fachhochschulen (FHs), since most of them have an excellent reputation in the industry, offer very pragmatic and relevant curricula (as opposed to some academic CS programmes) will even allow you to work on your degree part-time, or at least give you the opportunity to already work in a company during your studies. |