I stuffed up my education for one reason and another and never got a degree. When I eventually had to do work I started out de-stapling things so that they coul

I stuffed up my education for one reason and another and never got a degree. When I eventually had to do work I started out de-stapling things so that they could be scanned in. I did this for about 9 months - after 3 months my boss actually got me a destapler so I didn't have to use my fingers. BUT, I saw that he had an Issues list in Excel that he would spend hours fiddling with. I wrote a bunch of VBA for him to make it easier to deal with and he was ecstatic. I managed to use this as a sort of portfolio and got a job that was all Excel and MS Access. I convinced those guys to let me do their website, and used that as my next portfolio to get into an actual software shop. I worked my way up the ranks there until I was the highest paid guy, before moving to where I am now as head of development. All you need to do is: - work hard, which is easy if you're actually interested in it. - continually think, "how does this benefit me in getting my next job / further my career?" This is a constant exercise.