  The traditional path to a software engineering career involves a
post-secondary diploma in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or a related
field. However, many software engineers take a non-traditional path to their
career, starting from other industries or fields of study. This paper proposes
a study on barriers faced by software engineers with non-traditional
educational and occupational backgrounds, and possible mitigation strategies
for those barriers. We propose a two-stage methodology, consisting of an
exploratory study, followed by a validation study. The exploratory study will
involve a grounded-theory-based qualitative analysis of relevant Reddit data to
yield a framework around the barriers and possible mitigation strategies. These
findings will then be validated using a survey in the validation study. Making
software engineering more accessible to those with non-traditional backgrounds
will not only bring about the benefits of functional diversity, but also serves
as a method of filling in the labour shortages of the software engineering
industry.
