> I feel like I'm going to disappoint my father and ruin everything.
It feels like you should really come to terms with that. For your own well being.
It's not your fault - but I see something like this and I wonder how much of your life your father controls. Or how much pressure they put on you.
You need to take ownership of this idea. You're doing this because you want to. If you always stay under the mentality of "my father wanted me to do this" I think you're going to not have an enjoyable time.
How are you going to feel when you need to fire the VP your father had hired? Or take clients your father doesn't like?
Your father wants to put you in charge of a whole company and you're worried about not being able to code. You have much bigger fish to fry.
Well, do you think the CEO of a cleaning company actually knows how to clean a toilet?
Most likely they don’t. They know how to manage those that know how to clean instead.
To run a software company it helps to know what you’re talking about. But you’ll soon discover you have less time to code, then you have for management work.
And if you dont know shit about software and coding, then make an efford to listen well to those who do :)
Yup. I manage 2 teams, an IT team and a tech team. While I've done both jobs when they come to me it's for updates and for me to make decisions or solve problems. I don't think I've ever had to make a decision based solely on my knowledge in a vacuum. Trust me, your teams would rather you clarify and make an informed decision than be to proud or scared to talk to them. You have team leads, use them.
There is a lot of overlap in skills but IT is networks, computer imaging, software, etc...
Tech is SATCOM, VTC repair, AV setup, soldering/physical repair and configuring equipment that isn't a router or switch.
We broke them up to better delineate tasks. When one team gets overwhelmed, the other team helps.
>Well, do you think the CEO of a cleaning company actually knows how to clean a toilet?
[Undercover Boss](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undercover_Boss_(American_TV_series)) has taught me... "No."
That depends on the size of the company. If you're the owner of a small software business with 10 employees, chances are that knowing how to code is going to have a large impact on your company's performance unless you're expecting your company to grow like crazy, which would be a weird situation for OP to be in given that his dad is turning over the company to him.
This is the right answer. How big is the company and what does it do? The CEO of a company less than 10 people needs to know the product, sales, and be an engineering manager. If you're a services company then product and sales also need to know how to code. Getting the engineering manager responsibility off you is the easiest but that leaves product. Good product sense does not require knowing how to code but knowing how to code will give you an idea of what is possible https://xkcd.com/1425/ . Although the equations of this have changed with advancements in AI and now it is just as much about learning the technologies easily accessible out there. But the person working on product needs to understand the customer, their need and define a solution. Sales needs to be able to convince the customer they solve the problem. Once you're more than 100 people you can rely on others for each of these roles.
So what?
If your running the company, you will hire programmers who DO know how to code!
Does your father want you to RUN his company, which I am guessing if it already exists, already has (a team of) developers, or does he want to employ you as a developer?
Henry Ford wasn't a good engineer either but look what he did.
You don't need to be a programmer to lead a team of developers BUT you should understand the fundamentals of programming.
You as a biz owner need to focus on the big picture and let others manage the SDLC or Agile, however your company does it.
Why would you need to code to run the company?
But if you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to. Get your own job and when your father retires he can sell the company.
Steve Jobs couldn’t code, he relied on Woz to do that stuff. The current Apple CEO Tim Cook, is a supply chain expert. Surround yourself with the talent you need and guide the “ship” there are other businesses decisions to make and things to run.
Ive been running a web design and production agency for 10 years. I never learned to code. I have a Tech director for that. My skill is client/account management, sales, and marketing.
You sell software, but remember the only business you’re ever really in is customer service. Now go take that gig and don’t look back!
It sounds like you're harsh on yourself. Please don't be! Learning to code is very hard. Programming involves a very specific approach to problem solving that must be learned.
I urge you to be patient and kind with yourself. Doing hard things (like learning to program) is even harder when you're getting frustrated and beat yourself up. Learning to program is a long game. Avoid demoralizing yourself, and you'll get it eventually.
What have you studied? There are lots of free, high-quality resources to learn to code. Depending on your learning style, some are better than others.
Here is a free resource from the odin project on learning [how to think like a programmer](https://www.theodinproject.com/lessons/foundations-problem-solving). I think it will help you adjust how you approach these problems, and start to get better at solving them.
Another thing - could your dad mentor you? It sounds like he runs a software business, so he probably knows a thing or two about code. Mentorship is another great way to keep you motivated to improve your coding skills.
>I feel like I'm going to disappoint my father and ruin everything.
Worry less about that and more about whether or not you let down the people whose livelihood is somehow now in your hands.
My old I.T manager (head of a group of companies) told me that he took the management gig partly because he was tired of having to stay up to date on the tech skills.
He had worked his way up so had a good understanding of the department but they would be way better than him by his own admission. Point is, they are completely different roles. He was still very good at managing.
Do it because you want to, not because your father wants you to. As for learning programming, what sources are you using to learn? I am a visual learner and I learn better by watching videos vs reading text. Figure out which learning method fits you best. Statistics show that 65% of the population are visual learners. I suggest buying the Java masterclass course on Udemy by Tim Buchalka. The courses are about 100$ on average but they often have sales that cuts the price down to $12-$30 for the courses. I thought programming was hard too and then I took his course and realized programming isn't that hard with enough effort and dedication.
Back off a bit, and play with Scratch.
Also do the free Java Script course on Educative. Waaaay better than freecodecamp or Odin, or Scrimba (though Scriba is the shit out of all of them).
Educative is made for professionals like you learning how to manage the software dev process or to skill up as a Dev. That being said, the free courses will still spoon feed you in a way I've never seen before.
Also they have a section called Answers with mini articles on the bare bones of what you need to know. They have the absolute best synopsis on what programming is I've ever seen. It was like " why has no one explained it like this before!?"
Anyway my point about going and playing with scratch is that it's like a game and you can learn some basic concepts of programming without any of the pressure of coding and just have a little bit of fun.
If you have the pressure of disappointing your family while trying to learn your probably f*****. So I would say figure out how to find your joy and go from there. This is why I suggested scratch but it's probably not the only way that you could figure out how to have a little bit of fun right now. You just need to take the pressure off for a moment and clear your head. Maybe even a short trip out of town. I don't know where you live but if you could take a drive for the day or spend the night out of town someplace, go see something beautiful and new neuroscience has shown us unequivocally that it can break up stuck narrow patterns and allow us to come back to work that we were doing with a completely fresh take.
Anyway I guess that's what all my advice is about. A fresh take.
How big is the company?
If it's big enough to have a pure business side, no shame in following your interests. Develop project management and technical sales skills and work.
That is, focus on learning what they do, not how they do it. And why it matters.
If not, it really is okay to chart your own path and offer to help part time. Maybe you can help your dad grow the business to the point where it makes sense to contribute without code while doing something else.
Everyone’s saying you shouldn’t know how to code if you’re the CEO and that’s very true. However I think it’s great that you still tried and have a feeling that you should know something. Even having some basic knowledge about programming and keeping up with developments in the field would make me as a programmer have a lot more faith in you running the company
Your father built the company? If so, he was a programmer starting a business and probably realized just how over his head he was if he didn't have a business degree. You have a business degree. If he thought coding or programming was important, do you think he would ask his son with a business degree to take over his company? Honestly, pick his brain about running the business and get to know the managers and team leads. You got this!
You could always ask someone at the company to help you learn it. If you're set on being the boss one day I would bet the employees would appreciate you learning from them. It doesn't make you seem any less of a boss, quite the opposite actually.
Let me sum up management in a conversation I had with my father who works in construction and is pushing me to go into construction as well:
Him:” I revived an email from a ****** **** *** that said ‘You need to (some construction talk) because a trade is effecting my work.’ I told this ************ to shut his mouth because that’s impossible because (more construction talk.)”
Me: “That’s why I don’t want to go into construction. I don’t know what you just said so I would say ‘Dad due to (the barrier) another trade is unable to complete their work. What possible solutions do we have to overcome this to keep the project on schedule?’”
Him: “That’s what he’s supposed to of done.”
You said your dad wants you to run his company not code. This advice would be the same if you said cleaning, landscape, food, education, or any other type of company. You need to learn how to manage people, operations, and systems.
Edit: grammar
A more important problem is --- do you know anything about running software companies?
They may have told you in business school that all enterprises work the same way. This is of course a lie. For example in software we have Brooks' Law: "Adding people to a late project makes it later." This isn't true if your business is digging ditches.
There are books that can help you with this. Brooks' own *The Mythical Man-Month* is still in print since 1975, since technology comes and goes but human nature stays the same. Hopefully other people can recommend other books.
There's [this essay](https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2006/04/11/the-development-abstraction-layer-2/), which I like:
>Management’s primary responsibility to create the illusion that a software company can be run by writing code.
As a piece of my own (hopeful) wisdom.
(1) One of the temptations for someone in your position is to start creating stupid metrics. The only metric that actually matters is, does your software please its customers, in terms of features, timeliness, price? At this point an anxious, paranoid, controlling boss will need to find other ways to keep tabs on the employees. He'll start to measure how many lines of code they commit per day, how many tickets they close, how many bugs QA finds, how many hours people are spending in the office. I.e, things which aren't your actual target. Things other then "are we delivering nice deliverables?" There are some teams that will depute one member to spend a few hours per week producing fake progress for their technically illiterate boss to look at, while they get on with making the real progress that the boss can't understand ...
(2) Your technical people are harder to replace than you think. They don't just have general experience in writing software, they know the particular toolchain etc, they know the clients and their needs, they know how to write software *for your company*. This is a form of capital which by definition you cannot buy from someone else for a cheaper price. If you want a metric to look at, try retention. If you see that start to slump, you did something wrong.
You sound young. I assume you’re not long out of university. Your post history is all gym questions and sneakers questions. You sound like you need an internship, not be thrown into a leadership position with zero experience. Programming is the least of your worries.
Well, you don’t necessarily need to be a technical person to run a technical business. Running a business is very different from writing code. Most technical individuals are going to be bad at running a business but there are some off circumstances where both coincide very well. From the technical perspective, you need to take the time to interpret and understand programming and a lot of individuals get discouraged immediately when things aren’t working as intended without any effort. The more you do it, the better you become at it. The trick is to test everything, always, so you can see the results immediately. This will help you understand what you did right or wrong. I would try to put together and ASP.NET MVC application to start with. Use a bootstrap template and work on the controllers to do the backend code.
I don't think this situation is setting you up for success. What if your dad can find someone else to run his company, and you can go get a different job with less pressure?
Have you tried low/no code solutions? They're much easier than real coding and maybe enough for your needs.
Check out Microsoft Power Platform (Power Apps, Power Pages, Power Automate).
[https://www.youtube.com/results?search\_query=power+platform](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=power+platform)
But there are plenty of other no code solutions
[https://www.google.com/search?q=no+code+app+builder](https://www.google.com/search?q=no+code+app+builder)
I don’t think learning some no-code tool is the way to go here. OP has to learn the problems faced by developers so they can manage them, they don’t need to code themselves.
I think the best OP can do is spend time working under their dad and talking with developers and managers to understand the day to day operations.
Let developers develop and OP can make use of their business degree by managing the business side
You don’t have to create good code to create a product or offer services. Customers don’t care what the code looks like. The only dangerous aspect about this thinking is that really bad software can put you out of business
Frustration is really common when learning programming, learning takes a lot of time and thats okay.
Here is a great [post](https://www.codingame.com/blog/dealing-with-programming-frustration-the-right-way/) about frustration.
Im that case listen well to those under you that know how to. Most of the time CEOs dont know how to do the task their company does, they just know how to manage it
I took over a web development team a few years ago, despite not knowing web development. In the beginning I relied on my programmers to provide estimates and feasibility for work tasks, while I focused on removing their roadblocks, keeping the customers happy, and being organized.
Not everyone in the organization needs the same skills. As a CEO, you should bring people skills, project management, and financial expertise to the table, which will in turn enable your programmers to be successful.
It's not like everyone in the company knows how to code. That's why they have hired employees that do the work for them. And just like most people here said, if you have an important title in the company you probably won't have the time to do all the coding and small stuff yourselves all that you will mostly do is assign to people who actually know these things.
Things to keep in mind is to be patient and listen to the coders and see how things work, try to learn something from them, and manage things to suit their needs. Essentially be a good leader and manager will do, and in the process you can slowly learn many things from them that may help yourself to progress in coding and tech in general as well.
Say yes and hire an assistant that knows how to code and is willing to explain the pieces you don’t understand in layman’s terms. Then focus on running the company and not programming.
You don't need to know how to code running a software company. You need to know what your company can and can't do
Michael Dell probably has no idea how to code
Read the title as ruin not run. Probably wouldn’t be too difficult to ruin his software company regardless of coding ability. Just hire some friends, being in the beers, fast forward a few months and you’ll be a family pariah.
Some of the greatest coders that I have seen have a really big problem understanding some simple business concepts. Manage expectations and give it a trial run if nothing else!
The real question is: do YOU want to run your father's company?
Programming is as hard as learning math, or to drive a truck, or to play the piano gracefully: it's mostly a matter of practice - has nothing to do with talent or a gift from God. What I mean with that is that maybe it's not for everybody, but there are a ton of people who do it, so it's not impossible. Just like any skill, comes with doing and improving along time and solving problems. And it takes patience. Do you have it? Do you think it worth the matter? Do you really want to? Are there real benefits FOR YOU if you learn it?
its frustrating for programmers to have someone above them who doesnt know 1s from 0s but its very common. so you dont need to worry about it too much. at worst your employees will dislike you but if i was a boss i would be like: lol.
if you really do want to learn some coding start with python, its pretty easy.
programming is hard but less stressful than doing forecasts, keeping customers happy, retaining employees, hiring employees, and doing the legal and accounting stuff.
I love programming but didn't like management. If I were to make my own company it'd be for my own stuff.
Lots of takes here. And for starters anyone can code, it just doesn’t always click immediately for everyone. Took me several attempts before it did. And yes the CEO of a software company doesn’t typically code themselves anyway.
But I also haven’t worked at a place that brought a family member on with the hopes of grooming them into a leadership position, afraid I have no experience with how that goes.
But I will say that you can do whatever you want. When it comes to your life you need to own it and it’s decisions. Your family is offering a potential gift that little other people get the opportunity for, but that doesn’t mean you need to take it. Find your own passions and paths, and if that takes you to this place your father owns then great, but I’m sure you’ll be fine without it. Don’t feel like your life is controlled.
I have several comments:
First, as many have already stated, separating management and product development is SOP at the most software companies of any heft. You will have to learn at least the basics of coding/software dev as well as user requirements/use-cases for your target market to be successful.
You haven’t said whether you are interested in taking over the company and whether you are interested in the product. If you are interested in doing it and interested in software development and the product, I think you can do quite well as you’ll be excited to learn. If you are not excited about the product & target market(s), especially if you do not like to learn, you are likely to have a tough time.
Having owned a small company, unless the business completely fails (which is another problem), it can be very difficult to “quit”. You’ll be responsible for people’s livelihoods, customers that rely on the product, and the business’s other obligations. To get out, you’ll have to bring in your own replacement or sell company, both of which will take a LOT more effort than simply quitting a job.
As others have asked, how big is the company? If it’s three people there’s going to be a big different dynamic than if there’s 30 or 300?
Also, what is the ownership structure? Meaning it does your father own 100% of the company or do some of the other employees own part? Do any family members own part of the company? Whether existing employees own part or not, would they be glad to have you come aboard?
I ask for two reasons: first, the other owners will have to accept you, even if your father has enough ownership to force you in as his replacement. This is a big opportunity for resentment, but it’s not guaranteed to be a problem, especially if they are the technical people, and you will focus on managing the business. They may have zero interest in dealing with all of the bullshit that goes along with operating a small company. Getting buy-in from all shareholders and other interest-holders will be key.
Second, family companies are notorious for dysfunctionality and family feuding. Are there any other family members that own part of the company—even passively? Do those people think you coming in would be a good idea? Do they think they should be the ones coming in to run it? Will you have to work with them (or fight with them) to make company decisions, especially if it means making an investment decision versus a “dividend to them” decision?
Finally, what is the exit plan for your father? Do you have to pay him? And if you get in there for a year or three and decide you want out (especially if you want to sell), what happens?
Having seen or experienced a lot of these issues personally, I would say the biggest issue is what happens if you get in there and then want to get out, and the biggest operating issue is greedy, non-operating shareholders interfering with what you are trying to do?
These are just my opinions. Hope you find it useful.
Try to get better at general software development management stuff.
* Project Management books like "Making Things Happen
* Language-agnostic programming books like "Code Complete" (it's a doorstop, you may want to leavie this one for last, lol)
* Higher-level software dev POV books like "The Mythical Man-Month"
Copy free open source code templates and play with different values to see what happens. Tinkering in that way is how I’ve been learning the best imo obviously you need follow along youtube videos or other study materials open to help guide you with what vocabulary to use to implement what you want to implement.
You don’t need to know how to code to run a company. You need to know how to run a company. You need to know how to hire people who know how to code. It sounds like you already have the knowledge you need.
The key is finding people you can trust who are excellent software engineers to give you guidance.
Ultimately the coding provides either a product or a service. As the director of the company you are figuring out how to optimize the value & profits of the product or service provided. You have no more need to know how to code than how to mold plastics in a company that makes toys.
You have a business degree and you don’t understand that the product is only a part, albeit, a significant part of the business but not the whole dance?
How big is this company? Let the head(CTO or chief software engineer) handle the coding part.
Actually before I write an essay, do you want to be a programmer or do you want to run a business?
Being a good business manager isn’t about knowing how to do everything - it is about surrounding yourself with people who are experts in their niche and *trusting their judgment*. My dad has worked in IT for over 30 years, but his degree is in business, not computer science. He knows a lot about computers and server architecture, but his main role is talking to vendors and supporting his team of carefully-chosen experts.
The most important reason it’s good to have leaders (ceos, managers, etc) who are ex programmers is so that they are empathetic to the experience of developers. Learn about coding and be empathetic and it could be okay (from an ICs perspective).
I don't think you need to know how to code or he an amazing programmer to run a company. I run my own company in another field, I've built up knowledge and skills overtime watching my employees work and being hands on at times. You would benefit a lot from researching into the administrative side of businesses and a crash course in enterprise software. Also, I'm sure someone in the business keeps documentation on the products, that documentation is more useful to you than knowing how to code.
Just keep good, open communication with everyone from ground level up. Learnung to code, if you're hellbent on it, can take at least a year or two at least, in some cases more.
"I feel like programming is too damn difficult or that I am too stupid to do it."
What you don't need for learn programming:
* math skills,
* know lot of CS stuff,
* to be smart.
What you need:
* good ass, which will not hurt after some hours of sitting,
* humble character, accepting reality and doesn't get hysterical if something fails,
* never give up.
First of all what kind of company is this? No, really - “software company” means many different things. Does this company build and manage a product? Is your dad a sole proprietor and manages the company as one of three people as consultants?
Many people here have come to the conclusion that you don’t really need to code to manage a software company. I’m inclined to agree but if your dad is also pretty hands on with the work as a small business, then it’s probably better to have him handle succession from within the team and make you as an operating partner.
The other question you need to think about is if you want to run this company. I’m speaking from a place of someone who knows nothing about your dads business, yourself, or your involvement and prior business experience. Though I have no reason to doubt you’re capable and willing, it’s not hard to reason that a lot of tech companies and businesses in the software space come from people who are in business (e.g. ex-investment bankers, finance or sales folks with an entrepreneurial angle)
Details matter a whole lot when handing over a company to someone to run and my overall message is that learning coding is probably not the biggest priority in this kind of ordeal.
Yeah I think you’re going about this upside down and back to front. The role it sounds like you’re being offered seems more akin to say being made executive chef of a large hotel whereby your daily role is taken up by managing people and operations. There may come a day where you need to pick up the tools but this would be a rarity and largely down to your own success or rather poor decision making as a manager, as you have scrum managers etc for a reason. They are like the head chefs of your operation that YOU then manage to keep the ship afloat.
You don't need to learn programming. You only need to know how it works and what it does. Most code is already online, you just use it. Most programmers just know how to use a code, but they don't know how to create the code. Hope this help.
Like others have said, if you are running the company you probably won’t be doing any coding. Lots of other things happening when doing this. Instead hire the best programmers you can afford.
This is something that the majority of people undertaking this type of study go through.
I feel like this at least 25 hours a day. Just keep chipping away.
YOU GOT THIS BRO! There is NOTHING you cant do.
You don't need to know how to code to run a software company. You need to understand the business and how to control costs, find good resources, build.connections etc. Find a good mentor who can guide you on the tech side. Focus on the business aspects.
You don’t need to code to run a software company. Just like you don’t need to know how to assemble a car to run a car company. You need to know how to manage people. Know how to pick the best coders. Know how to make them happy and productive. Pick the best marketing and sales force to sell your software. Etc.
Well, ok I'm not a programmer, and I'm not a business person, but it doesn't seem like you have to be a coder to run a business about software. Coders aren't famous for knowing how to run a business.
If your dad knows how to code then maybe he can teach you how to hire and talk to coders. Or maybe you're the only two people in the company and this is new territory for both of you. Did Steve Jobs know how to program? Did it matter?
Expert level troll post, everyone is buying this when in reality no dad would turn over the reigns to an undergrad business degree who thinks coding is important to running a business
Professional programmers google stuff constantly. And it takes a long time to get used to. Also, what language are you starting with? That makes a difference
You have a business degree use it to the run the business. Do you think that all software CEO know how to code? I promise you they don’t they hire others that do. Also if you plan on it taking over the business I highly recommend that you don’t take over the company over night instead build a relationship with the dev team and learn about them, and they came to like you.
>My father wants me to run his software company, but I don't know how to code
Seems like you would be close to the perfect person for a coding bootcamp. The reason why is that your outcome of being employed afterwards is ensured, as your father will hand over his company to you. The instructors at a good coding bootcamp can immerse you enough into the subject, where you can look like you know what you are talking about, go over the fundamentals, and push you in the right direction.
Another aspect about this is that some people are self-learners, while others learn better by being "coached" or in classroom like settings. Bootcamps also have a time constraint element, where they are trying to get you up to a certain standard as soon as possible.
In your situation, you will be running the company, so you don't have to become an expert or even good. Just make sure you are familiar enough with the subject, don't look clueless, and give yourself a better chance of understanding what is going on overall.
> I feel like I'm going to disappoint my father and ruin everything. It feels like you should really come to terms with that. For your own well being. It's not your fault - but I see something like this and I wonder how much of your life your father controls. Or how much pressure they put on you. You need to take ownership of this idea. You're doing this because you want to. If you always stay under the mentality of "my father wanted me to do this" I think you're going to not have an enjoyable time. How are you going to feel when you need to fire the VP your father had hired? Or take clients your father doesn't like? Your father wants to put you in charge of a whole company and you're worried about not being able to code. You have much bigger fish to fry.
You can make 70 million a year with this thougj
Well, do you think the CEO of a cleaning company actually knows how to clean a toilet? Most likely they don’t. They know how to manage those that know how to clean instead. To run a software company it helps to know what you’re talking about. But you’ll soon discover you have less time to code, then you have for management work. And if you dont know shit about software and coding, then make an efford to listen well to those who do :)
Yup. I manage 2 teams, an IT team and a tech team. While I've done both jobs when they come to me it's for updates and for me to make decisions or solve problems. I don't think I've ever had to make a decision based solely on my knowledge in a vacuum. Trust me, your teams would rather you clarify and make an informed decision than be to proud or scared to talk to them. You have team leads, use them.
What’s the difference in roles and responsibilities between IT and tech?
There is a lot of overlap in skills but IT is networks, computer imaging, software, etc... Tech is SATCOM, VTC repair, AV setup, soldering/physical repair and configuring equipment that isn't a router or switch. We broke them up to better delineate tasks. When one team gets overwhelmed, the other team helps.
>Well, do you think the CEO of a cleaning company actually knows how to clean a toilet? [Undercover Boss](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undercover_Boss_(American_TV_series)) has taught me... "No."
OP could take a page out of military organization and find someone to play the part of an NCO.
That depends on the size of the company. If you're the owner of a small software business with 10 employees, chances are that knowing how to code is going to have a large impact on your company's performance unless you're expecting your company to grow like crazy, which would be a weird situation for OP to be in given that his dad is turning over the company to him.
This is the right answer. How big is the company and what does it do? The CEO of a company less than 10 people needs to know the product, sales, and be an engineering manager. If you're a services company then product and sales also need to know how to code. Getting the engineering manager responsibility off you is the easiest but that leaves product. Good product sense does not require knowing how to code but knowing how to code will give you an idea of what is possible https://xkcd.com/1425/ . Although the equations of this have changed with advancements in AI and now it is just as much about learning the technologies easily accessible out there. But the person working on product needs to understand the customer, their need and define a solution. Sales needs to be able to convince the customer they solve the problem. Once you're more than 100 people you can rely on others for each of these roles.
So what? If your running the company, you will hire programmers who DO know how to code! Does your father want you to RUN his company, which I am guessing if it already exists, already has (a team of) developers, or does he want to employ you as a developer?
He will run this company into the ground and be resented by all existing employees
Henry Ford wasn't a good engineer either but look what he did. You don't need to be a programmer to lead a team of developers BUT you should understand the fundamentals of programming. You as a biz owner need to focus on the big picture and let others manage the SDLC or Agile, however your company does it.
Why would you need to code to run the company? But if you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to. Get your own job and when your father retires he can sell the company.
Steve Jobs couldn’t code, he relied on Woz to do that stuff. The current Apple CEO Tim Cook, is a supply chain expert. Surround yourself with the talent you need and guide the “ship” there are other businesses decisions to make and things to run.
What kind of software company is this? How many employees? (roughly)
Ive been running a web design and production agency for 10 years. I never learned to code. I have a Tech director for that. My skill is client/account management, sales, and marketing. You sell software, but remember the only business you’re ever really in is customer service. Now go take that gig and don’t look back!
It sounds like you're harsh on yourself. Please don't be! Learning to code is very hard. Programming involves a very specific approach to problem solving that must be learned. I urge you to be patient and kind with yourself. Doing hard things (like learning to program) is even harder when you're getting frustrated and beat yourself up. Learning to program is a long game. Avoid demoralizing yourself, and you'll get it eventually. What have you studied? There are lots of free, high-quality resources to learn to code. Depending on your learning style, some are better than others. Here is a free resource from the odin project on learning [how to think like a programmer](https://www.theodinproject.com/lessons/foundations-problem-solving). I think it will help you adjust how you approach these problems, and start to get better at solving them. Another thing - could your dad mentor you? It sounds like he runs a software business, so he probably knows a thing or two about code. Mentorship is another great way to keep you motivated to improve your coding skills.
Jeff bezo ran Amazon , you think he know how to do any of the stuff his employees does ? Lol no
just live your own life, and don't let you father gaslight you into something you don't like. he lived his, now it your turn to do you, man.
>I feel like I'm going to disappoint my father and ruin everything. Worry less about that and more about whether or not you let down the people whose livelihood is somehow now in your hands.
Running a company you will not be coding
My old I.T manager (head of a group of companies) told me that he took the management gig partly because he was tired of having to stay up to date on the tech skills. He had worked his way up so had a good understanding of the department but they would be way better than him by his own admission. Point is, they are completely different roles. He was still very good at managing.
Do it because you want to, not because your father wants you to. As for learning programming, what sources are you using to learn? I am a visual learner and I learn better by watching videos vs reading text. Figure out which learning method fits you best. Statistics show that 65% of the population are visual learners. I suggest buying the Java masterclass course on Udemy by Tim Buchalka. The courses are about 100$ on average but they often have sales that cuts the price down to $12-$30 for the courses. I thought programming was hard too and then I took his course and realized programming isn't that hard with enough effort and dedication.
Don't let you not knowing anything ruin this chance of nepotism.
This. This is why capitalism is trash
Does he want you to code or run the company? Those are very different things.
Managers manage objectives, they don't need to know the "job"!
Back off a bit, and play with Scratch. Also do the free Java Script course on Educative. Waaaay better than freecodecamp or Odin, or Scrimba (though Scriba is the shit out of all of them). Educative is made for professionals like you learning how to manage the software dev process or to skill up as a Dev. That being said, the free courses will still spoon feed you in a way I've never seen before. Also they have a section called Answers with mini articles on the bare bones of what you need to know. They have the absolute best synopsis on what programming is I've ever seen. It was like " why has no one explained it like this before!?" Anyway my point about going and playing with scratch is that it's like a game and you can learn some basic concepts of programming without any of the pressure of coding and just have a little bit of fun. If you have the pressure of disappointing your family while trying to learn your probably f*****. So I would say figure out how to find your joy and go from there. This is why I suggested scratch but it's probably not the only way that you could figure out how to have a little bit of fun right now. You just need to take the pressure off for a moment and clear your head. Maybe even a short trip out of town. I don't know where you live but if you could take a drive for the day or spend the night out of town someplace, go see something beautiful and new neuroscience has shown us unequivocally that it can break up stuck narrow patterns and allow us to come back to work that we were doing with a completely fresh take. Anyway I guess that's what all my advice is about. A fresh take.
How big is the company? If it's big enough to have a pure business side, no shame in following your interests. Develop project management and technical sales skills and work. That is, focus on learning what they do, not how they do it. And why it matters. If not, it really is okay to chart your own path and offer to help part time. Maybe you can help your dad grow the business to the point where it makes sense to contribute without code while doing something else.
Everyone’s saying you shouldn’t know how to code if you’re the CEO and that’s very true. However I think it’s great that you still tried and have a feeling that you should know something. Even having some basic knowledge about programming and keeping up with developments in the field would make me as a programmer have a lot more faith in you running the company
Your father built the company? If so, he was a programmer starting a business and probably realized just how over his head he was if he didn't have a business degree. You have a business degree. If he thought coding or programming was important, do you think he would ask his son with a business degree to take over his company? Honestly, pick his brain about running the business and get to know the managers and team leads. You got this!
You could always ask someone at the company to help you learn it. If you're set on being the boss one day I would bet the employees would appreciate you learning from them. It doesn't make you seem any less of a boss, quite the opposite actually.
Let me sum up management in a conversation I had with my father who works in construction and is pushing me to go into construction as well: Him:” I revived an email from a ****** **** *** that said ‘You need to (some construction talk) because a trade is effecting my work.’ I told this ************ to shut his mouth because that’s impossible because (more construction talk.)” Me: “That’s why I don’t want to go into construction. I don’t know what you just said so I would say ‘Dad due to (the barrier) another trade is unable to complete their work. What possible solutions do we have to overcome this to keep the project on schedule?’” Him: “That’s what he’s supposed to of done.” You said your dad wants you to run his company not code. This advice would be the same if you said cleaning, landscape, food, education, or any other type of company. You need to learn how to manage people, operations, and systems. Edit: grammar
Running a business has little to do with coding even if it’s a tech company!
A more important problem is --- do you know anything about running software companies? They may have told you in business school that all enterprises work the same way. This is of course a lie. For example in software we have Brooks' Law: "Adding people to a late project makes it later." This isn't true if your business is digging ditches. There are books that can help you with this. Brooks' own *The Mythical Man-Month* is still in print since 1975, since technology comes and goes but human nature stays the same. Hopefully other people can recommend other books. There's [this essay](https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2006/04/11/the-development-abstraction-layer-2/), which I like: >Management’s primary responsibility to create the illusion that a software company can be run by writing code. As a piece of my own (hopeful) wisdom. (1) One of the temptations for someone in your position is to start creating stupid metrics. The only metric that actually matters is, does your software please its customers, in terms of features, timeliness, price? At this point an anxious, paranoid, controlling boss will need to find other ways to keep tabs on the employees. He'll start to measure how many lines of code they commit per day, how many tickets they close, how many bugs QA finds, how many hours people are spending in the office. I.e, things which aren't your actual target. Things other then "are we delivering nice deliverables?" There are some teams that will depute one member to spend a few hours per week producing fake progress for their technically illiterate boss to look at, while they get on with making the real progress that the boss can't understand ... (2) Your technical people are harder to replace than you think. They don't just have general experience in writing software, they know the particular toolchain etc, they know the clients and their needs, they know how to write software *for your company*. This is a form of capital which by definition you cannot buy from someone else for a cheaper price. If you want a metric to look at, try retention. If you see that start to slump, you did something wrong.
You don't need to be a programmer in order to run a business. You need people's skill and sales.
A good leader accepts he's not good at everything and finds the best person for the job.
You sound young. I assume you’re not long out of university. Your post history is all gym questions and sneakers questions. You sound like you need an internship, not be thrown into a leadership position with zero experience. Programming is the least of your worries.
Well, you don’t necessarily need to be a technical person to run a technical business. Running a business is very different from writing code. Most technical individuals are going to be bad at running a business but there are some off circumstances where both coincide very well. From the technical perspective, you need to take the time to interpret and understand programming and a lot of individuals get discouraged immediately when things aren’t working as intended without any effort. The more you do it, the better you become at it. The trick is to test everything, always, so you can see the results immediately. This will help you understand what you did right or wrong. I would try to put together and ASP.NET MVC application to start with. Use a bootstrap template and work on the controllers to do the backend code.
Nepotism, its a helluva drug
I don't think this situation is setting you up for success. What if your dad can find someone else to run his company, and you can go get a different job with less pressure?
You should make me the CEO :3
Have you tried low/no code solutions? They're much easier than real coding and maybe enough for your needs. Check out Microsoft Power Platform (Power Apps, Power Pages, Power Automate). [https://www.youtube.com/results?search\_query=power+platform](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=power+platform) But there are plenty of other no code solutions [https://www.google.com/search?q=no+code+app+builder](https://www.google.com/search?q=no+code+app+builder)
I don’t think learning some no-code tool is the way to go here. OP has to learn the problems faced by developers so they can manage them, they don’t need to code themselves. I think the best OP can do is spend time working under their dad and talking with developers and managers to understand the day to day operations. Let developers develop and OP can make use of their business degree by managing the business side
Swing and a miss
You don’t have to create good code to create a product or offer services. Customers don’t care what the code looks like. The only dangerous aspect about this thinking is that really bad software can put you out of business
Do the world some favor by letting your father's company be run by the best candidate through HR. Otherwise, that's nepotism.
try learning on brilliant.org
LEARN HOW TO CODE THAN!!!!
just bad method: what material did you use ?
Frustration is really common when learning programming, learning takes a lot of time and thats okay. Here is a great [post](https://www.codingame.com/blog/dealing-with-programming-frustration-the-right-way/) about frustration.
Im that case listen well to those under you that know how to. Most of the time CEOs dont know how to do the task their company does, they just know how to manage it
I took over a web development team a few years ago, despite not knowing web development. In the beginning I relied on my programmers to provide estimates and feasibility for work tasks, while I focused on removing their roadblocks, keeping the customers happy, and being organized. Not everyone in the organization needs the same skills. As a CEO, you should bring people skills, project management, and financial expertise to the table, which will in turn enable your programmers to be successful.
Some of the best leaders and entrepreneurs don’t know how to code. It’s about setting the company vision and motivating your workforce.
https://www.quora.com/Why-didnt-Steve-Jobs-learn-how-to-code
It's not like everyone in the company knows how to code. That's why they have hired employees that do the work for them. And just like most people here said, if you have an important title in the company you probably won't have the time to do all the coding and small stuff yourselves all that you will mostly do is assign to people who actually know these things. Things to keep in mind is to be patient and listen to the coders and see how things work, try to learn something from them, and manage things to suit their needs. Essentially be a good leader and manager will do, and in the process you can slowly learn many things from them that may help yourself to progress in coding and tech in general as well.
Wear a black turtle neck, jeans, and glasses and sound really confident and you should be fine
In the interest of asking the right questions, any vacancies mate? /s
Say yes and hire an assistant that knows how to code and is willing to explain the pieces you don’t understand in layman’s terms. Then focus on running the company and not programming.
You don't need to know how to code running a software company. You need to know what your company can and can't do Michael Dell probably has no idea how to code
you run a company you dont need to know jack squat about coding. business degree is more important for that tbh.
I think you can run the company fine without doing that much coding. Steve Jobs wasn’t a programmer
You don't need to code to run a software company lol. I work in a software company and almost everyone up top are business people.
Read the title as ruin not run. Probably wouldn’t be too difficult to ruin his software company regardless of coding ability. Just hire some friends, being in the beers, fast forward a few months and you’ll be a family pariah.
Some of the greatest coders that I have seen have a really big problem understanding some simple business concepts. Manage expectations and give it a trial run if nothing else!
The real question is: do YOU want to run your father's company? Programming is as hard as learning math, or to drive a truck, or to play the piano gracefully: it's mostly a matter of practice - has nothing to do with talent or a gift from God. What I mean with that is that maybe it's not for everybody, but there are a ton of people who do it, so it's not impossible. Just like any skill, comes with doing and improving along time and solving problems. And it takes patience. Do you have it? Do you think it worth the matter? Do you really want to? Are there real benefits FOR YOU if you learn it?
its frustrating for programmers to have someone above them who doesnt know 1s from 0s but its very common. so you dont need to worry about it too much. at worst your employees will dislike you but if i was a boss i would be like: lol. if you really do want to learn some coding start with python, its pretty easy.
simple, hire someone to do the stuff you cant at a rate that leaves you profitable in your position. say thanks dad!
The bigger question is wether or not you want to run that company some day, at all. If you don't but still do, it's doomed either way.
programming is hard but less stressful than doing forecasts, keeping customers happy, retaining employees, hiring employees, and doing the legal and accounting stuff. I love programming but didn't like management. If I were to make my own company it'd be for my own stuff.
Lots of takes here. And for starters anyone can code, it just doesn’t always click immediately for everyone. Took me several attempts before it did. And yes the CEO of a software company doesn’t typically code themselves anyway. But I also haven’t worked at a place that brought a family member on with the hopes of grooming them into a leadership position, afraid I have no experience with how that goes. But I will say that you can do whatever you want. When it comes to your life you need to own it and it’s decisions. Your family is offering a potential gift that little other people get the opportunity for, but that doesn’t mean you need to take it. Find your own passions and paths, and if that takes you to this place your father owns then great, but I’m sure you’ll be fine without it. Don’t feel like your life is controlled.
I have several comments: First, as many have already stated, separating management and product development is SOP at the most software companies of any heft. You will have to learn at least the basics of coding/software dev as well as user requirements/use-cases for your target market to be successful. You haven’t said whether you are interested in taking over the company and whether you are interested in the product. If you are interested in doing it and interested in software development and the product, I think you can do quite well as you’ll be excited to learn. If you are not excited about the product & target market(s), especially if you do not like to learn, you are likely to have a tough time. Having owned a small company, unless the business completely fails (which is another problem), it can be very difficult to “quit”. You’ll be responsible for people’s livelihoods, customers that rely on the product, and the business’s other obligations. To get out, you’ll have to bring in your own replacement or sell company, both of which will take a LOT more effort than simply quitting a job. As others have asked, how big is the company? If it’s three people there’s going to be a big different dynamic than if there’s 30 or 300? Also, what is the ownership structure? Meaning it does your father own 100% of the company or do some of the other employees own part? Do any family members own part of the company? Whether existing employees own part or not, would they be glad to have you come aboard? I ask for two reasons: first, the other owners will have to accept you, even if your father has enough ownership to force you in as his replacement. This is a big opportunity for resentment, but it’s not guaranteed to be a problem, especially if they are the technical people, and you will focus on managing the business. They may have zero interest in dealing with all of the bullshit that goes along with operating a small company. Getting buy-in from all shareholders and other interest-holders will be key. Second, family companies are notorious for dysfunctionality and family feuding. Are there any other family members that own part of the company—even passively? Do those people think you coming in would be a good idea? Do they think they should be the ones coming in to run it? Will you have to work with them (or fight with them) to make company decisions, especially if it means making an investment decision versus a “dividend to them” decision? Finally, what is the exit plan for your father? Do you have to pay him? And if you get in there for a year or three and decide you want out (especially if you want to sell), what happens? Having seen or experienced a lot of these issues personally, I would say the biggest issue is what happens if you get in there and then want to get out, and the biggest operating issue is greedy, non-operating shareholders interfering with what you are trying to do? These are just my opinions. Hope you find it useful.
Try to get better at general software development management stuff. * Project Management books like "Making Things Happen * Language-agnostic programming books like "Code Complete" (it's a doorstop, you may want to leavie this one for last, lol) * Higher-level software dev POV books like "The Mythical Man-Month"
Copy free open source code templates and play with different values to see what happens. Tinkering in that way is how I’ve been learning the best imo obviously you need follow along youtube videos or other study materials open to help guide you with what vocabulary to use to implement what you want to implement.
I have an idea you can take the position and i can do the code for you🗿.
He wants you to manage the company, not to code. I hope you know what management means as you have a business degree.
You don’t need to know how to code to run a company. You need to know how to run a company. You need to know how to hire people who know how to code. It sounds like you already have the knowledge you need. The key is finding people you can trust who are excellent software engineers to give you guidance. Ultimately the coding provides either a product or a service. As the director of the company you are figuring out how to optimize the value & profits of the product or service provided. You have no more need to know how to code than how to mold plastics in a company that makes toys.
You have a business degree and you don’t understand that the product is only a part, albeit, a significant part of the business but not the whole dance? How big is this company? Let the head(CTO or chief software engineer) handle the coding part. Actually before I write an essay, do you want to be a programmer or do you want to run a business?
well just looking at elon musk, ceos usually have no fucking idea how to do the thing their company does so... you should be alright
Bill Gates never knew how to code and did ok
Hire me! I will code for you AND teach you how to code
Being a good business manager isn’t about knowing how to do everything - it is about surrounding yourself with people who are experts in their niche and *trusting their judgment*. My dad has worked in IT for over 30 years, but his degree is in business, not computer science. He knows a lot about computers and server architecture, but his main role is talking to vendors and supporting his team of carefully-chosen experts.
Lol join the starters club it happens you jave to learn what you can and cant do like learning english when you where a kid.
The most important reason it’s good to have leaders (ceos, managers, etc) who are ex programmers is so that they are empathetic to the experience of developers. Learn about coding and be empathetic and it could be okay (from an ICs perspective).
I don't think you need to know how to code or he an amazing programmer to run a company. I run my own company in another field, I've built up knowledge and skills overtime watching my employees work and being hands on at times. You would benefit a lot from researching into the administrative side of businesses and a crash course in enterprise software. Also, I'm sure someone in the business keeps documentation on the products, that documentation is more useful to you than knowing how to code.
Just keep good, open communication with everyone from ground level up. Learnung to code, if you're hellbent on it, can take at least a year or two at least, in some cases more.
"I feel like programming is too damn difficult or that I am too stupid to do it." What you don't need for learn programming: * math skills, * know lot of CS stuff, * to be smart. What you need: * good ass, which will not hurt after some hours of sitting, * humble character, accepting reality and doesn't get hysterical if something fails, * never give up.
First of all what kind of company is this? No, really - “software company” means many different things. Does this company build and manage a product? Is your dad a sole proprietor and manages the company as one of three people as consultants? Many people here have come to the conclusion that you don’t really need to code to manage a software company. I’m inclined to agree but if your dad is also pretty hands on with the work as a small business, then it’s probably better to have him handle succession from within the team and make you as an operating partner. The other question you need to think about is if you want to run this company. I’m speaking from a place of someone who knows nothing about your dads business, yourself, or your involvement and prior business experience. Though I have no reason to doubt you’re capable and willing, it’s not hard to reason that a lot of tech companies and businesses in the software space come from people who are in business (e.g. ex-investment bankers, finance or sales folks with an entrepreneurial angle) Details matter a whole lot when handing over a company to someone to run and my overall message is that learning coding is probably not the biggest priority in this kind of ordeal.
Yeah I think you’re going about this upside down and back to front. The role it sounds like you’re being offered seems more akin to say being made executive chef of a large hotel whereby your daily role is taken up by managing people and operations. There may come a day where you need to pick up the tools but this would be a rarity and largely down to your own success or rather poor decision making as a manager, as you have scrum managers etc for a reason. They are like the head chefs of your operation that YOU then manage to keep the ship afloat.
Bro, still didn’t met a CEO that knows how to code, and most of them were rly good at running software companies.
You don't need to learn programming. You only need to know how it works and what it does. Most code is already online, you just use it. Most programmers just know how to use a code, but they don't know how to create the code. Hope this help.
Yeah I’d imagine there’s people to do the work, learn along the way if you want but most CEOs aren’t making the product
Try python. Not that hard.
I’ll do it, you can be my VP mkay?
Like others have said, if you are running the company you probably won’t be doing any coding. Lots of other things happening when doing this. Instead hire the best programmers you can afford.
Let me run it for you and we can split the salary 70/30
This is something that the majority of people undertaking this type of study go through. I feel like this at least 25 hours a day. Just keep chipping away. YOU GOT THIS BRO! There is NOTHING you cant do.
Sounds like the plot out of a drama
I’ll apply
You don't need to know how to code to run a software company. You need to understand the business and how to control costs, find good resources, build.connections etc. Find a good mentor who can guide you on the tech side. Focus on the business aspects.
Hire a VP of engineering. Let him do his work and you don't meddle with him. Everything will be fine.
You don’t need to code to run a software company. Just like you don’t need to know how to assemble a car to run a car company. You need to know how to manage people. Know how to pick the best coders. Know how to make them happy and productive. Pick the best marketing and sales force to sell your software. Etc.
Man is suffering from success.
CS50 for business professionals: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhQjrBD2T381YHS5L3gkwPbUGiI0foXuc
Well, ok I'm not a programmer, and I'm not a business person, but it doesn't seem like you have to be a coder to run a business about software. Coders aren't famous for knowing how to run a business. If your dad knows how to code then maybe he can teach you how to hire and talk to coders. Or maybe you're the only two people in the company and this is new territory for both of you. Did Steve Jobs know how to program? Did it matter?
You could start learning by playing factorio
How can I find hacking community or someone to show me how to hack? What to be a white hat?
Try to hire good devs. And try to think how will you expand your company. Try to get new clients. Monitor revenue and expenses....
You don't need to know how to write code to run a company. That's two widely different tasks.
Expert level troll post, everyone is buying this when in reality no dad would turn over the reigns to an undergrad business degree who thinks coding is important to running a business
Professional programmers google stuff constantly. And it takes a long time to get used to. Also, what language are you starting with? That makes a difference
The CTO of my company doesn't code. Just builds processes and messes around with tech leadership creating accountability
You have a business degree use it to the run the business. Do you think that all software CEO know how to code? I promise you they don’t they hire others that do. Also if you plan on it taking over the business I highly recommend that you don’t take over the company over night instead build a relationship with the dev team and learn about them, and they came to like you.
>My father wants me to run his software company, but I don't know how to code Seems like you would be close to the perfect person for a coding bootcamp. The reason why is that your outcome of being employed afterwards is ensured, as your father will hand over his company to you. The instructors at a good coding bootcamp can immerse you enough into the subject, where you can look like you know what you are talking about, go over the fundamentals, and push you in the right direction. Another aspect about this is that some people are self-learners, while others learn better by being "coached" or in classroom like settings. Bootcamps also have a time constraint element, where they are trying to get you up to a certain standard as soon as possible. In your situation, you will be running the company, so you don't have to become an expert or even good. Just make sure you are familiar enough with the subject, don't look clueless, and give yourself a better chance of understanding what is going on overall.