Here at SheCanCode, we believe (obviously!) in the importance of equality, diversity, inclusion and representation. We’re always pushing to showcase the many, varied voices of women in tech.
In celebration of Black History Month, we’ve pulled together a handful of some of our favourite blogs from black women in tech over the last few months.
SHECANCODE INTERVIEWS:
Mariama Kamanda, Applied Data Scientist
Mariama shared with us her journey into tech, the work she is contributing to their Multicultural Network and her experiences as a young black woman in tech.
“So far in my 4-year career, the highlight has been leading dunnhumby’s Multicultural Network. I have been the lead for around a year now, and I’ve worked with over 70 colleagues in 4 markets, and I’ve worked to nurture a space where all members – Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) and non-BIPOC feel safe, visible and, most importantly, empowered to be themselves. It’s been truly fulfilling seeing the impact that the sense of community has on members.”
Charlene Hunter, Lead Software Engineer at Made Tech & Founder of Coding Black Females
Blog: Meet Charlene Hunter
Charlene gave us an insight into what it’s like to be a black woman in the tech industry, what she loves about tech and what drove her to create Coding Black Females.
“One evening I went to the cinema and watched Hidden Figures: the story of a team of female African-American mathematicians who served a vital role in NASA during the early years of the U.S. space program. Afterwards, I went straight home and created Coding Black Females!
I wanted to be in spaces where I felt comfortable being myself and I wanted to feel less isolated. I started going to meet other black women in tech. I wanted to understand their experiences. The more I did, the more I realised we shared many experiences of being a black woman in tech.
So, I started building a community and developing skills within it.”
TECH BLOGS:
Funmilayo Adewodu, iOS Engineer at Spotify
Blog: Interviewing for an iOS Design System Engineer role at Spotify
Funmi shared her experience of the “humane and thoughtful” interview process at Spotify as well as how she prepared for the interviews and resources that might be useful for anyone preparing for an iOS interview.
“Glassdoor and Google search is your friend when interviewing, use it for additional research when preparing for an interview and use it to gather more details on the interview process.
Having at least 1 personal project to showcase your skills can help you land a job. I don’t think it needs to be overly complex but something that shows how you structure code and what you care about when building an app goes a long way. Working on your own app and maintaining it can also be quite rewarding to see how your skills progress over time, especially if you use version control.
Having a good understanding of the fundamentals will always help and you should also be able to explain them to someone else.”
Fatimat Gbajabiamila, Software Engineer at Apolitical
Blog: How a front-end developer can build a full-stack web app
Fatimat shared her advice and guidance for front front end developers, on how they can build a full-stack web app. She also introduced a platform that allows you to build your website without having to learn a backend language or database.
“Most people looking to get into web development usually start off with front-end (HTML, CSS and JavaScript), at least that’s what I’d advise if you are considering it. The problem is people learning front-end often don’t get enough experience interacting with APIs and doing things like saving and handling data, which is actually a huge part of the job.”
Faith Ege, Software Developer at Sky
Blog: Six things I’ve learned in my first year as a Software Developer
Faith shared 6 of her greatest learnings from her first year as a Software Developer. She changed career, industry, and location and her piece served as a reflection on what she’d learnt about software development as her 1 year anniversary as a developer approached.
“It’s almost been a year since I career-switched into Tech and I definitely feel like I made the right decision. It’s challenging, the learning is endless, and I’m constantly building things to destroy them and re-build them again, but that’s the fun of it! I have a job where I get to problem solve all day and I feel very fulfilled doing so.”
