Engineer Your Career – Details, episodes & analysis

Tina Wright is an Area Tech Lead at Grammarly, and has worked as a software engineer at Coursera, TRI, and Google.

In this episode we discuss:

What is an area tech lead?

Technical leadership as a generalist, rather than a specialist

How to get the best from your team through a service leadership style

The advice she would give her younger self

Resources mentioned:

Staff Engineer: Leadership Beyond the Management Track by Will Larson https://staffeng.com/book

The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work by Shawn Achor https://www.shawnachor.com/books/happiness-advantage/

In Praise of Idleness by Bertrand Russell https://www.amazon.com/Praise-Idleness-Routledge-Classics-46/dp/0415325064

The QCon 2024 "The Path to Staff+ and Beyond" track Tina mentioned has passed, but you can purchase a Video Pass on the conference website to view the recordings. https://qconsf.com/track/nov2024/path-staff-and-beyond

Where to find Tina Wright:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinaewright/

Brought to you by WEST:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.joinwest.org⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Heidi Williams:

LinkedIn:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1⁠⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Karen Ko:

LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26

Jumoke Dada is a dynamic, visionary and technology leader whose sweet spot lies at the intersection of innovation, entrepreneurship, security, and education. With over 15 years of experience in corporate IT, and as the owner of Signature Red, she provides technology consulting services and has created platforms for women in tech.

Two of her creations include the Tech Women Network, an online community and career development platform for diverse technical women, and the HUE Tech Summit for Women of Color Technologists. Additionally, she's an international speaker and former tech contributor to Forbes. Jumoke holds a Master's in Cybersecurity from Georgia Tech.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Authenticity and overcoming cultural norms 

• The importance and joy of building community

• Pivotal moments that pushed her out of her comfort zone

• Her decision to pursue a Master’s degree in Cybersecurity

• Setting boundaries and self-care 

• Becoming an international public speaker 

Where to find Jumoke Dada:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jumokedada/

Brought to you by WEST:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.joinwest.org⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Heidi Williams:

LinkedIn:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1⁠⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Karen Ko:

LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26

Smita Ojha is the Senior Vice President of Engineering at Mindtickle, a market leader in enterprise sales software. Over the last two decades, Smita has led engineering teams at some of the largest tech companies - Microsoft, Meta, and Google.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How to say yes to new opportunities outside of your comfort zone
• The importance of developing a diverse skillset to become a well-rounded leader
• Adopting a fearless approach by identifying the excitement in challenges
• The key differences between leading engineering at a large company vs. a startup
• Leveraging sponsorship from unexpected places: team members, peers, and leadership
• How to build psychological safety on teams

Where to find Smita Ojha:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/smitao/

Where to find Heidi Williams:

• LinkedIn:⁠ ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1/⁠⁠
• Website:⁠ ⁠https://www.joinwest.org/⁠

Where to find Karen Ko:

• LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26/⁠

Tamar Bercovici is the VP of Engineering at Box where she leads the Core Platform team in scaling the foundational platform for the Box Content Cloud. In her 13 years at Box, she scaled the cloud content management and file-sharing service to handle millions of queries per second searching hundreds of billions of records. Named one of Forbes Top 50 Women in Tech 2018, Tamar also ranked #1 on Okta and Business Insider's Tech Up and Comers list 2019. She holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Technion Israel Institute of Technology and a technology patent for updating data in cloud computing systems. 

In this episode we discuss:

• The scope and responsibilities expected from a manager to a vice president 

• The pros & cons of having a long history at one company

• How to create space for new voices on a team and influence team culture 

• The parallels between managing and parenting 

• Leading ambiguous, complex projects and managing risk 

• How to be ready for opportunities when they arise 

Additional Resources:

• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team By Patrick Lencioni

Where to find Tamar Bercovici:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamarbercovici/ 

Where to find Heidi Williams:

• LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1/⁠
• Website: ⁠https://www.joinwest.org/

Where to find Karen Ko:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26/

A. J. Oxendine is the Tech Lead and Staff Software Engineer for the Home Feed product at Pinterest. She enjoys the creative process of building new things, figuring out how they work, and how she can make them better. This passion has led her to study music composition, art, graphic design. and now, software engineering.

In this episode, we discuss:

• AJ's nontraditional path from design to engineering 
• Thoughts on IC vs management 
• Skills and mindset shifts from Senior to Staff Engineer 
• Tips on gaining visibility for your work
• Expanding and refining your brand as your role evolves
• Thoughts on navigating diversity, intersectionality, and tech
• Maintaining mentoring relationships 

Additional Resources:

• Pinterest Apprenticeship Programs

Where to find A.J. Oxendine:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amirahoxendine/

Where to find Karen Ko:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26/

Joy Ebertz is a Principal Software Engineer, prolific blogger, avid ultrarunner, and an advocate for increasing the number of women and minorities in Computer Science. At Split, Joy establishes technical direction for their backend team. Prior to Split, she worked at Box. At both Split and Box, Joy lead efforts around splitting monoliths into microservices, revamping authentication and authorization frameworks, creating REST API standards, audit logging and more. In addition to designing software and writing code, Joy shares her learnings through her blog (which has 2.7k followers on Medium), and is often invited to speak at conferences such as LeadDev and WWCode. In her free time, she does a lot of traveling, reading, and running ridiculously long distances (mostly on trails).

In this episode, we discuss:

• How different size companies played a factor in Joy's career journey
• The value of understanding your workstyle and motivations
• Why she left people management
• The power of written and spoken communication
• What most people get wrong about influencing others
• Networking tips for introverts

Additional Resources:

• There and Back Again: Why I Entered & Left Management - Presentation by Joy Ebertz
• Why It's So Hard to Become a Staff Engineer - Medium blog post by Joy Ebertz

Where to find Joy Ebertz:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joyebertz/

Medium: https://jkebertz.medium.com/

Where to find Heidi Williams:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1/

Website: https://www.joinwest.org/

Welcome to the trailer episode of Engineer Your Career, brought to you by WEST, a learning community that empowers women technologists through mentorship. Through this podcast, we’ll explore the different paths leaders have taken to grow their tech leadership, develop their influence, and gain insights from top women leaders  in the field. Hosted by Karen Ko and Heidi Williams.

Po Linn (Fo) Chia is a Principal Software Engineer at Mindbody/Classpass, working primarily in the intersection of backend and DevOps. She graduated university with a degree in Japanese history, but pivoted to doing a coding bootcamp and the rest is history.

In this episode we discuss:

• Fo’s journey from Humanities major to Staff Engineer

• The importance of mentorship and having a good manager

• Handling stress and mental health in the workplace

• The best way to build new skills

• Advice she’d give her younger self

  
  

Where to find Po Linn (Fo) Chia:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chiapl/

Brought to you by WEST:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.joinwest.org⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Heidi Williams:

LinkedIn:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1⁠⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Karen Ko:

LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26

Josie Daw is a British full-stack developer and app developer actively contributing to South Korea's tech scene. She leverages technology to build impactful projects and especially loves to work on projects, whether as a developer or organizer, to create social impact.

In this episode we discuss:

• Josie’s unconventional path to becoming a full-stack developer 

• How she gives back to the community through coding workshops and hackathons

• Her passion for encouraging more people to feel comfortable with coding

• Her current open-source project and how you can get involved

• Advice she’d give her younger self

  
  

Resources mentioned:

Josie’s open-source project on GitHub:https://github.com/JosDaw

Where to find Josie Daw:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/josiedaw/

Brought to you by WEST:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.joinwest.org⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Heidi Williams:

LinkedIn:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1⁠⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Karen Ko:

LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26

Remy Schor is the talent recruiter at Voxel51. With two decades of talent acquisition experience, both in agencies and as an internal recruiter, Remy brings extensive knowledge of what recruiters are looking for and what job seekers should expect from a good recruiter.

In this episode we discuss:

• Practical advice on how to stand out among thousands of other applicants

• Remy’s journey to her current role

• How to optimize your resume

• How to handle salary negotiations

• Remy’s take on interviewing “for practice” when you’re not looking for a new job

Resources mentioned:

Remy’s 2022 talk on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNjHP-6gtCw

Where to find Remy Schor:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/remyschor/

Brought to you by WEST:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.joinwest.org⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Heidi Williams:

LinkedIn:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidiwilliams1⁠⁠⁠⁠

Where to find Karen Ko:

LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenko26