Career Aspiration - From inspector to programmer

FYI: 11 years ago, I interviewed at my current employer for another position. They asked me if I knew what a CMM was, and I said, "No, but I am willing to learn." So, based on my extensive experience in everything NOT CMM, they hired me. ZERO experience. ZERO training. I stumbled a few times, but picked it up. After I was here, they sent me to a few Hexagon/PC-DMIS training classes. In those 11 years, whenever we have been trying to hire another CMM person, we have NEVER been able to hire someone with experience, and have hired people that are smart, motivated to do this stuff, and appear to be dependable. After that, we teach them. So.... there are employers out there that hire untrained CMM people - it sounds like you already have a leg up on those people. Beware, there are companies that have programmers and then operators - two different job descriptions - and often the programmers are more like engineers, or IT people, than on-the-floor workers, and the operators are button-pushers. So... you SHOULD be able to find a job with your current experience, and then use your employer's wallet to get further training. Make sure you are interviewing for a position that can at least morph into a programming position! Good luck! What you are trying to achieve is very reasonable.

Thank you very much for sharing that. It certainly gives me confidence to hear that there are companies out there who are willing to train the right person.

Thank you very much for sharing that. It certainly gives me confidence to hear that there are companies out there who are willing to train the right person.