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With International Women’s day (or month for us!) happening in March, we would love to be able to share stories of women in tech, in the hope that it will inspire young women thinking of starting out, or women who are trying to find their way against the odds.
In this blog, Magdalena discusses her experience, from a recruiter’s perspective. Magdalena has been in the technology community for 4 years, and with years of experience, she shares her knowledge and advice with us. She is currently working at Medidata Solutions - a company that develops and markets software as a service for clinical trials.
In one zoom call, we’ve discussed a lot so carry on reading to find out more!
What made Magdalena want to be involved in the tech community?
Magdalena actually found herself in the industry by accident! Once she got the job she said “Okay, this is tech, I have to learn it”. Once she was in-depth in tech recruitment, she realised the importance of being part of the tech community. It allows you to build your network, speak to people, and be present in the community. Even more so, it builds your credibility. Moreover, Magdalena says she shares a lot of the same interests with software engineers, so it was easy for her to build relationships with them.
Any highlight career?
Magdalena’s career highlight was starting a ReactJS and Javascript meet-up in London, before Covid. The meet-up was almost every month, and around 100 people attended each meet-up. This gave her an opportunity to work with different companies, going to different offices, meeting new people. With Covid, the process to bring it back is step-by-step since remote meet-ups just aren’t the same - according to Magdalena, it’s much better to meet face-to-face, go out for pizza, beer etc.
Has Magdalena experienced any issues as a woman working in a tech community?
It took a while to establish herself, and to be confident who she was and what she knows. Magdalena mentions how at first, it’s always challenging to find yourself in a new environment, but you have to trust yourself to build the relationships. That’s whether you are a recruiter, or a software engineer. The relationships may not always start off right as in her instance, but eventually once the trust is there, it does improve.
In her career, Magdalena came across a lot of Junior female engineers, meanwhile all the senior roles were dominated by men. She explains that it could potentially be because there weren’t any opportunities for women 10-15 years ago to get into tech or even think about it, hence a shortage of female software engineers now. Although, she believes that mentality has changed slightly and there’s more encouragement to push women to get into tech careers. “If you like it, just do it”.
According to Magdalena, what can be done to raise awareness and encourage women to work in Tech?
Despite there being several meet-ups and discords to choose from, what’s most important is the representation. Women seeing other women working in tech will make them feel inspired, motivated and encouraged. Similarly, seeing women in a higher position will be beneficial too.
Recently, Magdalena visited a school in Fulham, London to have a chat with sixth formers (17-18 year olds) about their future and their careers. Events like this can help to bridge the gap between the generations, and lead by example what can be done in the future. It’s a great way to show that there are opportunities available. For the younger generation of girls, this is important as it will get them thinking about careers and get rid of the gender stereotypes - where this is for ‘girls’ only or ‘boys’ only.
Best piece of advice?
“Believe in yourself - if you aren’t going to believe in yourself then who will?” and if you have to fake it until you make it then so be it. You have to put yourself in positions that will put you out of your comfort zone, and try to learn as much as possible on the job. You may fake it now, but you will learn how to do it in the future and be more confident.
Magdalena herself started in a completely different industry - in direct sales, so the switch to technology recruitment was completely new - a new opportunity, a different lifestyle. You will learn everything from scratch so just go for it, and believe you can do it.
We’d like to thank Magdalena for her contribution to this blog series. We hope that her story will inspire and motivate many women in tech, or women thinking of joining the tech industry. The advice she shared from her experience regarding what women can do to get started or to even encourage women in tech is very insightful - focusing mainly on grassroot levels.
At UMATR, we encourage diversity in the workplace, and work with tech companies that share the same values as us. We’re happy to say that we’ve placed several female software engineers across many companies, and we continue to do so.
Are you a female engineer looking for a new Scala role, or a tech company looking to hire talent? Get in touch with hello@umatr.io and work with us today. At UMATR, as tech recruiters, we are committed to helping you find your dream role, or finding your ideal talent Because You Matter.