With over 13 years of experience in various marketing roles, Chelsea is a multi skilled and versatile professional, specialising in social media and community building.
Currently, she is the Social Media and PR Manager at Fasthosts, a leading web hosting and cloud services provider. As a CIPR member, Chelsea adheres to the highest standards of ethical and professional practice in public relations.
Besides her marketing career, Chelsea is also an avid off-road racer and co-driver, participating in the UK/EU Ultra4 and Extreme Off Road Racing circuit. She manages the social media, sponsorship outreach, team logistics, and video production for her racing team, as well as navigating in one of the vehicles. Her love of gaming and motorsports, combined with an adrenaline-seeking spirit, leads Chelsea to seek new challenges and push boundaries in both her personal and professional endeavours.
There is more to tech than just hard skills.
Although we may overlook this sometimes, many highly recruited job roles in the tech industry don’t involve coding or learning huge amounts of computer science.
Unlike certain other industries, tech is ever-changing. You’re constantly taking on new information and developing your interest in new technologies. It is a space that encourages creativity and innovation, so you find yourself aiming to reach your highest potential, which makes it in my opinion, one of the most exciting industries to work in.
My first step into the tech industry was when I became the Social Media and PR Manager for domain and hosting company Fasthosts. Although I have always had an interest in tech, it wasn’t where I started out. In fact, I started by studying art. Like many, I had no formal technical knowledge, but what I did have was extensive experience working on creative events, arts, automotive, social media, and public sector PR campaigns. Since joining Fasthosts, I’ve played an active role in the development of a forward-thinking business driving the future of cloud hosting, yet I can contribute from my unique mixture of experiences, using my strong points to offer a new viewpoint. It’s a running joke in the team that we have ‘numbers’ people and ‘vibes’ people, and I’m definitely a ‘vibes’ person!
With that said, as such a forward-thinking industry, it is still lacking in certain areas; women make up a smaller percentage of workers, and we are still battling the gender pay gap. This is why I encourage all interested women to join in using their current skill set, no matter what that is. Although the general idea around tech jobs is that they are all centred around coding and data learning style jobs, a large percentage of the tech industry is made up of non-technical job roles. We have to support those engineers and coders somehow! More importantly, there is a huge demand for women to take up these roles as businesses look to tackle the imbalance. Here are some examples of what you could do:
- PR and Communications
- Various Marketing Roles
- Social Media
- Project Management
- Content Writing
- Service Design
- Accounts Management
- UX Designer
- Business Development
- Operations
- Product Manager
- Test Engineering
- Customer Service
- HR
Whether you are just starting out or considering a career change and don’t know where to start. Here are some tips that have helped me along the way:
Transferable Skills
If you’re looking to get into tech and already have a decent amount of work experience, look at what transferable skills you have to apply for roles you think you would be good at. Don’t get put off from applying for roles where you may not tick all the requirements. But if you’re lacking work experience, try and gain some volunteer experience, even for short periods of time, which can show determination and teach you valuable skills needed for your next job role.
Learn on The Job
Once in a company, it is easier to develop your skills and understanding of certain roles and sectors. Make sure to pick people’s brains, find opportunities for learning, and ask questions. More often than not, higher-uppers are happy to help. As well as this, your company might offer training budgets, seminars, or workshops – so make sure to get involved.
Level Up
What has helped me was undertaking online courses which can teach you a lot and look great on your CV. You can upscale your knowledge and skills with short courses, which could just be enough to get you into an entry-level position. I also have a few hobbies that I often use my day job skills in. I learned YouTube and video editing this way, and a lot of my current social media top tips are from trial and error on my own personal accounts.
Finally, transitioning into tech doesn’t have to be seen as a huge mountain to climb. The key is to find your transferable skills and run with them. Not all relevant experience comes from employment, so let your strengths and personal accomplishments shine through.
If you’re looking for further support and learning opportunities, there are enormous amounts of initiatives in place to help equip women, especially underrepresented women, with the tools to pursue a rewarding tech career. With a few right steps, you can be climbing up the ladder in no time.
