How do I transition from teaching into tech in the UK?

From placing dozens of teachers into tech roles over the last five years: the pivot is genuinely possible, but the route has changed. The 'teach yourself to code in 6 months and become a software engineer' route was credible in 2018-2021. It's much harder in 2026 because junior coding roles have compressed (AI tools have absorbed much of the work). The pivots that consistently work now leverage existing teaching skills into tech-adjacent roles.

The roles that work for ex-teachers. UX research — teachers are good at structured listening, empathy mapping, and synthesising what users actually do versus what they say. Instructional design and L&D — corporate training is essentially classroom teaching for adults, and the pay is meaningfully better than teaching. Customer success — handles the relationship and outcomes side of B2B SaaS, which maps onto pastoral care and learning outcomes. Technical writing — documentation, runbooks, internal training materials — this is curriculum design with different content. EdTech product management — building products for schools or teachers benefits from someone who has actually been a teacher.

What to skip. Direct routes into junior software engineering unless you have specific aptitude and 12+ months of disciplined building (real projects, public GitHub, contributing to open source). Bootcamps that promise 'become a software engineer in 12 weeks' — most graduates from these in 2026 are struggling with the soft hiring market. Generic 'tech' roles that don't have a specific function — without specialism, you're competing with people who've spent years building toward that specific role.

The 6-12 month runway. The successful teacher-to-tech pivots I've seen typically run 6-12 months from decision to first tech role. Months 1-3: research the specific roles, talk to 15-20 people in the target field (informational interviews), pick one specific role to target. Months 3-6: build relevant evidence — a portfolio of UX research projects, a corporate training case study, technical writing samples on your own blog, etc. Months 6-9: start applying alongside continued evidence-building. Months 9-12: usually when offers start landing.

Salary expectations. Honest expectation: a 10-25% pay cut on your first tech role compared to your final teaching salary. Senior teaching salaries in the UK (£40-50k) often map to junior or mid-tech-adjacent roles (£35-45k initially). The compensation recovers within 18-36 months as you accumulate domain experience — the second tech role is usually 20-40% above the first. Don't make the move if the first-role pay cut isn't survivable.

What teachers genuinely bring that tech needs. Stakeholder management at scale (you've managed 30 8-year-olds; senior PMs manage 30 stakeholders). Pedagogy (corporate L&D struggles to teach adults effectively, and tech companies have under-invested in this for years). Public speaking and explanation (most engineers can't explain complex topics to non-technical audiences; teachers can). Patience and emotional regulation under pressure (genuinely rare in tech, valued where it appears). The teacher CV that wins articulates these specifically — not 'I'm great with people' but 'I've designed and delivered training programmes for 60+ adult learners across 4 different skill areas, with measurable competency improvements'.