What made you decide to work in tech? Before I even knew what I was getting into, I picked up on some knowledge during middle school that engineers make a lot of money! {laughs} I was always good at math and science, but before it was a desire it was: What do my skills tell me I should do? As I got into high school, I think I had a soft pulse on the evolution of technology, and where it would be by the time I was a young adult. I
Senior Product Designer & Culture Ambassador at Neo damian.is Designer of experiences at TheGlint. Founder of Hunie, a 500 Startups company. Product designer at Neo. Tell us about your experience at 500 Startups? It was great. ‘500’ is an awesome program, with a great community. It makes a lot of sense if you’re looking for traction with an existing product (having achieved product-market fit). Unfortunately I was more in the idea stage, and I was also a single founder, so that carried a few disadvantages. How did you
What made you decide to work in tech? I’ve just liked computers for as long as I can remember. What’s your earliest programming memory? I didn’t start programming until I was in high school. I took a computer science course. We used JavaSwing to draw things, and it was really awesome! What was an obstacle you faced ? Oh yeah. In college, I had a project based class. My professor made me lead developer. I was normally the only girl developer in my class, and I was the only girl
What made you decide to work in tech? Working in tech was something that I fell into; it wasn’t exactly a conscious decision. As a teenager I ended up teaching myself how to code and fell in love with it. From there, it turned into a career. What was an obstacle you faced and how did you overcome that obstacle? I think the biggest obstacle I faced was ageism in the industry. Being a young person of color, it was tough for people to take me seriously at first. I still
Iheanyi Ekechukwu is a Software Engineer in IBM Watson, a cognitive system that enables a partnership between people and computers. Check him out on his podcast Two Black Nerds, where he and his friend tackle topics such as diversity in the tech industry, current events, and life after college. What made you decide to work in tech? I didn’t start coding until college. I got into tech, as I was always into video games when I was younger, and wanted to be a games developer. But once I got into
