[Discere]

I would definitely agree with this comment too. I work at a large law firm, now managing a team of developers. I've been in the industry for ~6 years. HN is not what the majority of programmers do.

I started off in IT procurement and worked my way up by showing how I can add value to doing things like you said with the tools around me (Excel, VBA).

If you can demonstrate that you want to solve their problems that's far more important than being a language\framework specialist.

Stability, reduced risk, maintainability, solid track record are more valuable to companies than just using new technologies - these come in and out of fashion - good developers solve problems not just use technologies