I've been lucky to have worked on and have built what I consider both 'meaningful' and 'impactful' software throughout my now 25+ year career. I wrote code to h

I've been lucky to have worked on and have built what I consider both 'meaningful' and 'impactful' software throughout my now 25+ year career. I wrote code to help detect and analyze cracks within nuclear reactor steam generator tubing, code that allows US Army battlefield commanders to communicate intent and plans, and most recently code that is democratizing access to adaptive learning tools for higher ed. How did I learn to program? I learned how to write code starting in second grade, learned how to write production code as a member of team in my first couple of real world jobs. How did I learn how to build 'meaningful' things? Beyond coding skills, I had to learn how to communicate effectively with people. I had to learn how to present my ideas in group settings, I had to learn how to listen to folks when they talked about their needs and wants, and how to dig in and really understand what was needed, coding-wise, to meet their actual real use cases.