.png)
SheCanCode's Spilling The T
SheCanCode's Spilling The T
From Flight Attendant to Tech Leader: Embracing Unconventional Paths in the Digital World
Join us as we dive into the inspiring journey of Charne Kotze, Delivery Manager at Mercator Digital. Charne's career began in hospitality and took her across continents as a flight attendant before she found her calling in tech.
Her transition - from managing restaurants to coordinating digital projects -showcases the power of diverse skills and unwavering determination.
Discover how Charne leveraged her experiences in customer service, leadership, and adaptability to thrive as a Scrum Master and now as a leader in the tech industry. This episode is a testament to embracing unconventional paths and trusting oneself to pursue new opportunities in the ever-evolving digital landscape.
SheCanCode is a collaborative community of women in tech working together to tackle the tech gender gap.
Join our community to find a supportive network, opportunities, guidance and jobs, so you can excel in your tech career.
Hello everyone, thank you for tuning in again. I am Katie Batesman, the Managing Director at SheCanCode, and today we are discussing, from flight attendant to tech leader, embracing unconventional paths in the digital world. I've got the incredible Sianate with me today. She's a Delivery Manager at Mercator Digital and she has an impressive squiggling route into tech. So her career began in hospitality, took her across continents as a flight attendant before she found her calling in the tech industry, so she's going to share a little bit about her story with us today. Sharni, thank you so much for coming on Spilling the Tea and chatting with us.
Speaker 2:Hi, kayleigh, it is a pleasure to be here. Thank you for making time to speak with me today.
Speaker 1:Thank you. I know our community are absolutely going to love your story. So can we set the scene for our listeners with a little bit about you, how you got into tech, how you found your way to Mercator, please?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure. So I started off, as you mentioned, in the hospitality industry. I was a restaurant manager for quite some time, followed by moving into being a flight attendant for quite a couple of years. I did more of charter work locally in an airline for an airline in South Africa where I did contract-based. So I spent a lot of time up in Africa doing charters or contract work where I would be based for six weeks in a different country, flying locally as they leased out our crew and our aircraft. So that is where I started and from there I moved to the UK about six years ago and wasn't quite necessarily looking to be in the restaurant industry again, so I decided to try something different.
Speaker 2:Not sure what I wanted to do, I moved into the area of executive assistant for a company in London, Did that for about two years and I was not quite feeling up to my potential and that's where I moved into the tech side of things. I left my job in at the sorry, I left my job how do you happen? As the executive assistant and I then did a certification to become a scrum master, and I then did a certification to become a scrum master, but that's also known as a delivery manager in the public sector.
Speaker 1:So from there on, I have been doing this for the last just over three years and couldn't be happier. Amazing, and what influenced you in the first place to sort of think like even going into a job as a flight attendant or anything like that?
Speaker 2:Did you have someone at home that was doing that, or was there someone that you kind of looked at and thought, actually that's something I'd like to do, so to be honest with you, kayleigh, for me I've always been a little bit unconventional in that sense I've got two older sisters and my parents were very much like you finish school, you go to university, you get your degree, and I watched both my sisters do that. As the youngest I said not me, I'm not doing that. So I wanted to figure out what it was that I wanted to do, because I couldn't figure out going to university where I would even start what choice do you make? And I had friends or family. Their daughter was a flight attendant and she just made it look so luxurious. So I was like that is what I wanted to do and that's how I got into, to become a flight attendant. I did, I did the qualification, but then I had a really hard time getting into it.
Speaker 2:Um, the market was a bit flooded because I mean, what young girl doesn't want to be a flight attendant? Yeah, one thing that they don't tell you is it's definitely not as luxurious as it sounds or seems. People do think that this lady's just here to pass me my snacks and my drink and then actually they call it their safety. But that's a whole different story. And moving on from that, yeah, like I said, just unconventional wasn't going to do what the family said, not going to follow the same parts of my sisters not that either of them currently do what they studied for um, but it just shows you that in life you can plan, but you still don't know where life's going to take you, and that's definitely what I found in my career. If you told me 10 years ago I'd be in tech, I would laugh in your face and tell you you're bloody silly. I don't know if I could say that, by the way, you can um.
Speaker 1:So yeah and I mean probably going to give away my age a bit here, but as someone at the age of 31 playing playstation for the first time, you can see how unconventional being in tech really is for me, yeah, so yeah, it's so interesting that you, how you, were drawn to an industry that, like you say, a lot of young girls and women want to be flight attendants and there's there's a draw there and it's seen as very luxurious and quite glamorous, whereas the tech industry we have such a PR problem and the young girls it's getting better, but it's not like people look in and think that's going to be a fantastic luxurious lifestyle and nobody really shouts about what actually their life working in tech is like.
Speaker 1:And you know things like flexibility and travel and all those things. When you do get to experience them, you don't really think of that when you work in tech. When you went to apply for that job, your first job in tech, did you think that? Did you sort of think I'm not sure what to expect, but this would be a good career move?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was definitely not sure what the day-to-day would look like. I mean, I think that's a question that a lot of people have Once they have a qualification or something. What does that day-to-day look like? What do you wake up? Where does your day start and where does it end? And I think for me, I was definitely uncertain. I knew I was going to be facilitating meetings and I was going to be working with my team. I just didn't know to what extent. And for me that's definitely something that I found interesting because it was quite different to what I expected. But then it's also up to yourself. How involved do you want to be?
Speaker 2:You do have your introverts. You do have your extroverts. Some people come in, they do the job and they go home. That's their prerogative. You get people that get more involved, trying to help other colleagues, and that's also okay, because you need the mix. You need both. You need the best of both worlds, because that is what makes a great team, because some people just naturally lift others.
Speaker 2:And for me, that was one thing that I find surprising in the industry, because you think tech is just a bunch of developers sitting in front of their computers coding. No one looks up from their screens. We're actually like I've had some really great teams and nothing beats a team lunch and getting to know people outside of the office, away from the screens, because that also just shows you that this industry is such a mixed bag of people and all of them are needed. It's from the introverts, the guys, the girls, the young people, the older people. All of that adds the flavor to what you want in a great team. If everybody was the same, it would be so boring and there would be no innovation. Yeah, that's why you need all these different people from all the different walks of life to contribute into delivering greatness.
Speaker 1:Yes, to contribute into delivering greatness. Yes, I love that because I only spoke to. I spoke to three interns yesterday at company and they said something similar where they said you know what I've learned from my internship? I have to work on a team and I have to learn how to communicate as a team, whereas even they had that misconception as coming out of university and thinking I'm just going to be working on of university and thinking I'm just going to be working on my own, probably, and it's just going to be about my code and whether or not my code is good enough. And actually it came down to, um, that was a very tiny part of their day job and the rest was navigating a team and working with lots of different areas of the business to actually get something pushed. Um, so, yeah, even even they were like, oh my gosh, this was not what I was expecting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no for sure. And I mean this is why I say that that is where it helps if you come from a different walk of life, because everything that I've done in the past like a little bit of my time in the hospitality, a little bit of my time in aviation, a little bit of my time as an executive assistant there's little tricks and traits that I learned in every single one of those careers that I apply to my day-to-day at the moment that make the biggest difference. And I mean some of those are communication because I had to tell people that in the biggest difference. And I mean some of those are communication Because, you know, I had to tell people that in the hospitality industry, well, sorry, like this is a situation that you're not happy with, I'm going to need you to deal with it. There's nothing I can do. I had to deal with people that were really upset. Let's just say they didn't get the service that they paid for.
Speaker 2:I was put in that situation. I was put in situations in the aviation industry where I had unruly passengers and I had to deal with it on my own, 30,000 feet in the air, no choice, and that's it. In being an executive assistant I had to plan other people's days, where all these things I apply today. I plan my team's meetings, their structure, I deal with stakeholders, communication, tough delivery deadlines. I have to sometimes go back to these stakeholders and say you know what? We cannot meet the delivery day. Do you know what? That's not an easy conversation to have, but it's for me to have that conversation because I need to protect my team from that.
Speaker 1:So all of these things I learned in different industries, but it's helped me massively today and that's why sometimes it's kind of better to have an unconventional route into tech it is because those those skills, honestly those soft skills that you pick up, our community worry that they are going to be seen as people that um are not going to be seen as invaluable to a company because they don't have that tech experience, that traditional tech experience. But you just said it there, the soft skills that you pick up along the way are actually more important than that technical training that you can do, that a company can show you. But those soft skills like working in hospitality and having to deal with the public and all of that, and the confidence that grows with having to deal with conflict in the workplace and all of those things you can't teach. That that's something that those skills you pick up just from being in work.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and I can see it in so many people I've had on my teams, especially people that come in. This is their first job. You can see how over time, their confidence start to build, whereas people that come in from a different angle they already have confidence, maybe not as much in the role but on a team per se and those things. It doesn't come overnight. You work on a day to day and as you get more comfortable with where you at the team that you're on and the position you're in, naturally that just comes with time. For me I have to look. The delivery manager I am today, compared to when I started, is two very different people.
Speaker 1:Yes, and some of that as well comes down to falling into the right company that allows you to do that and looks at you as somebody that can adjust and soak up new things and that has a great background in in yeah, as we said, lots of soft skills, um, but somebody that trusts as well that you're going to really step into that role and the other things that you might not have had. And lots of ladies as well and we've heard this so many times they don't apply for roles because they don't think they meet the whole criteria, and that is insane, because sometimes you fall into the right company. They just want to know that you're somebody that's going to hit the ground running and they'll train you with the gaps that you have, but they don't know you exist if you don't apply and you know it's amazing that you say that, because that just hit the nail on the head.
Speaker 2:I did not apply for the role I am in today. I got my certification, I updated my LinkedIn and I said you know what? I'm not going to apply this week. I'm going to give myself the time I've just got certified. Let me just take a bit of a breather before I start. And that's and. Makata actually reached out to me. They found me on LinkedIn. They were very aware that I was fresh into the industry. I had been qualified but I had no experience in practice, and they placed me to shadow with a colleague, also a delivery manager, for I think it was four or five months until I felt comfortable enough to then take on my own team. So they actually gave me the opportunity, and here I am still with them still happy because they took the chance on me.
Speaker 2:So, yes, miraculously that just worked out. But it just shows you. You don't need years and years of experience. You can learn on the job.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I was going to say to you, like some of our community, they're so nervous about changing to another job, starting over. They see, as they go back in and they're very junior, so say, you've been in work 10, 15 years already and then you move to another industry. You're going to be starting as very junior, um, but I wanted to ask you about what gave you that confidence to make the leap without traditional background. But it's fantastic that it was because a company reached out to you. And that's when companies come to us and they say where are all the women in TED? There are some really good companies out there that are actually seeking you out instead of just always expecting them to come to you. Because, like we said, if you don't think you've got the right qualifications or training, you're not going to apply.
Speaker 2:Those good companies are going to find you and and this is one of the things where you know, for me having to think about changing into tech like I told you, if you asked me 10 years ago, not a chance. But I do have an amazing partner who at the time, was a web developer, and he was always trying to convince me just get into tech, get into tech. And I was like no, I don't know anything, I will be useless at it, I will be so bad I won't even consider it. And he actually brought the role of scrum master delivery manager to my attention and he was like you know, I think this would be a really great fit for you. And that's when I blew it off. I was like no way, there's no way that I can do this. So I didn't even give it a thought do this. So I didn't even give it a thought and I actually actually tabled the idea for probably two years and he managed to convince me to just just look at it and as I looked at it, I was like, okay. So there's some of the things that I've done in the past past careers that actually fit the skills that I would need, such as managing people, communication, adaptability, and I do quite like to work with people.
Speaker 2:I'm a very people-y person, very peopley person, and for me, thinking about her just being isolated from everyone, it's like no. So as I looked further into it, I was like, okay, maybe I should give it a go. And the rest, like I said, I did the qualification and the rest all just fell into place, which is, I think, the encouragement that I needed that, you know, I did my part, I got qualified and the rest fell in, fell in as it needed, like it was meant to happen. We're really thankful for that, and I don't think it was ever being like about being ready for it. It was just about being open, being open to it and by me being open, and actually getting in into the industry. At the end of the day, I wouldn't be here today if I didn't give that a go. So I'm really grateful for that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that and I love that. It's that visibility as well, that somebody showed you what it's like to to do that job. That's another issue we we have in the tech industry and why we started this podcast as well to talk about all of the different roles in tech and they're not always the traditional roles as well that you think and we talk to people across so many different areas and and also bust those myths. For instance, we talk to data scientists and it's usually apparently your job's really dull and boring and they're like no, actually we make a really big impact, um, with our work. So it's trying to just let people know those jobs are there and actually what your day job would look like. Because you were drawn to that role as scrum master, because you saw it, you saw somebody else doing it and then realize, actually it is something you can do and all those skills, just you are already doing them. It's it's sometimes it's just seeing it and knowing those jobs are actually available.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and I mean, I have to say and I don't know if the girls are listening actually know this, but half my teams generally are girls, females, and that's something that I hadn't realized until I was in the role, because I always thought it's going to be me with a bunch of guys and that's it. But I generally have a team of half girls, half guys. So it's actually a lot more than we tend to realize and it's a good change.
Speaker 1:Yes, exactly, and again, getting that story out there, because it is that misconception. You're right, you're going to work on a team of guys and that's going to be it, but there are some great companies out there that have got such good balance and they're actively seeking I mean Mercator Digital just reaching out to you to make sure that they get that balance right, instead of waiting for people to come to them. Women to come to them is incredible, but it is tough in the tech industry when you're outside looking in, because those of us that work in tech and we know that and we're, like, I mean, our corporate ambassadors we work with some really male-dominated companies in very male-dominated sectors and then a lot of people don't know that actually there's a big women in tech team behind that company. Did anyone know there was a load of women that work on that website that you would think would you know, just really male-dominated, but people don't know that so they don't apply. So we here try and get those stories out so more people can see them and consider that as a career themselves.
Speaker 1:I also spoke with a lot of ladies after COVID who said they noticed in lockdown what their partners and husbands were doing for a living and I spoke with some ladies who retrained because of that reason. And I spoke with some ladies who retrained because of that reason and, yeah, they went on to have brilliant jobs because they saw their husband working at the kitchen table and was like, actually I could do that. This would be really flexible for me. I should do this.
Speaker 2:Definitely and I think maybe it's something to do with television and how it's portrayed to us as a society that whenever you see someone doing coding or anything, techie sat in this dark room with this hoodie over their head and they just type away and in two seconds they've got something hacked. And there they go and you're like what, in reality, that doesn't happen, like things take time and even the best of us in the tech industry, it changes so often. You're just constantly learning new things. So even if you do feel like, oh, I don't know enough, you'll never know it all, so you might as well start somewhere, you know. Yes, I mean. There's days where I'm still like I have developers on my team and they say something and I'm like excuse me, what? I have no idea what you mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's that mindset of when you go into tech. It's continuous learning and people really love that. I mean, you're never going to be bored, You're always going to be learning something new, and I wanted to ask you about that actually, because some people they do find that very intimidating. And once you got into tech, I wanted to ask you about your steepest learning curve. What was that for you and how did you overcome that? Was it the training or something else that you kind of had that moment where you thought that's gonna be tough.
Speaker 2:That's an interesting one for me, wasn't the training, it was the language it's um for for me, when I first joined, I felt like tech had its own vocabulary, like everyone was just speaking so fast and like it's like a dialect. I had not heard of People speaking in abbreviations and I had to just get comfortable saying slow down for a minute, what does that mean? And I had to do it without feeling insecure about myself. So I had to. I had to become curious. Okay, I didn't exactly ask this person what that meant, so I would then make a note and later in my spare time go look into it, for example. And then that's how I learned the the language. But, like I say, it's ever-changing. So up until this day, I still have to be comfortable with saying I do not know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2:I use an example with with my developers a lot where I say explain it to me in English, because I also know I'm going to have to go to stakeholders and they are not going to understand the tech jargon either, so I'm going to have to translate that into plain English for them as well. And by what I mean by saying explain it to me in English is just so take the tech talk and just put it into a plain, simple, understandable language. That translates. Well, let's not speak about backend APIs and this. Let's just say in order for us to do this, it needs to do that so that we can eventually do that, and that's all we need to do. Sometimes it's just slow it down, take a rewind and say okay, how else can we explain this so that we understand? And for me, that was basically what I did and I still do.
Speaker 1:But you have to understand, like you have to be okay with asking these questions and that, for me, was, I think, the steepest learning curve is just being uncomfortable with saying I don't know what you're talking about yes, yeah, and that in turn, that that comes with confidence when it comes with as you're going, throughout your career as well, because you just mentioned another brilliant soft skill there of learning how to manage downwards but also upwards, because you have to go back to your stakeholders and sometimes you're, you know, the management team above you and you have to explain, like, what is happening. They don't understand all of that jargon. And actually, our hackathons, um, so our hackathons are free and they're open to everybody. And we have people come along who, um, they've some of them have never worked in tech, but they work on the tech team. They might be project managers, for instance, and they just want to understand a little bit more about what their team is talking about. So they come along to our hack for the day and, um, there's no pressure to have to be technical, um, but it's just come along and try something new. And we do have a lot of attendees who say I am not technical and work on the tech team.
Speaker 1:I just love to know what everyone's talking about, because it can be, it can sound very intimidating and usually, if you just break it down in our hacks, there's that environment where you can just ask. You can ask your team like what do you mean by this? And everybody works together on different projects throughout the day. Um, and it's just a friendly environment to be able to do that and hopefully in work there is an environment where people can ask questions. But, like you said, you it's uh, it's a balancing act as well, because you do sometimes want to take things away and, and I would say, google them, but we ask chat dmt nowadays.
Speaker 1:What does that mean? What was my colleague saying earlier? Um, so it's a balancing act of trying to navigate your way through the weird and wonderful um acronyms and jargons that come in the tech industry that are forever changing as well. That's the other thing. It's just keeping up with with everything that everybody's saying. Um, yes, that definitely would be a learning curve, for sure. Also, um mckay's digital. It's known for its work in digital transformation. So how does your diverse background influence the way you approach delivering projects and leading teams? Do you?
Speaker 2:think oh, that's a good question pressure customer-facing roles in various countries. I think I bring a strong human element to delivery, because when someone wants something, you always want it now, right yeah. But there's people behind the scenes that need to deliver that. So, for me, I'm always about protecting my team, because if it's an unrealistic deadline, I'm going to tell you it's unrealistic. We need to protect the team, we need to give the team time to, to work on this, to to deliver this increment for you.
Speaker 2:And I understand the change is hard, even in digital transformation. So I try, I try create a space where people feel supported, and it's not always just about the team, it's about the customer also feeling heard, even though they want it now. I'm not saying no, I'm saying let's compromise, let's work on something so that everybody's happy. Um. So at the end of the day, I need to build that trust with both sides, so that emotional intelligence is one of my biggest strengths as a delivery manager and I think that is really important to make sure that the delivery gets done. It's the people before the process.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. And we have a few community members who have said to us about their worry about when they became a parent and they said that they almost felt like taking a career break was going to. You know, you've got a gap in your CV. But a lot of them said when they came back, the skills that they brought with them were things like negotiation, and what you just said was basically negotiating how do we meet in the middle there? And it's again. It's that you haven't quite realized the skills that you built up along the way and how they translate into your day to day work.
Speaker 1:But we have had quite a few parents say that to us your day-to-day work. But we have had quite a few parents say that to us and they're like, actually there were loads of things as a parent that are up for negotiation that you didn't know were up for negotiation but they suddenly are and actually that they take that back into the workplace. But when they do have to work with those um customers and you're you have quite a lot of experience in in negotiating with customers in tricky situations. I do think that anything to do with hospitality, if you do that, especially as a young person. I think that sets you up for life.
Speaker 2:Anything to do with the public, public complaining you are set for life 100% and as someone that got into the restaurant industry at a very young age, it's something that always saw my partner is. I 100% believe that everybody in life should either work retail or in the hospitality industry as soon as you come out of school. Not only as someone that works in the industry, but as a customer, because once you've been on the other side and you know how you've been treated by customers, you also know how you want to treat people with your other customers. So, 100%, I think work in retail and hospitality teaches you a very essential few, a couple of key communication and, I would say, ways of treating people. I think it will change your perspective.
Speaker 1:Yes, definitely yeah. How to just navigate those tricky situations that you see, you know from the other side suddenly how that feels. And it's like I was talking to those interns yesterday. The things that you don't learn at university until you go into work and you're like these things I have to navigate at work and the politics of work and how to keep a team happy, and all of those and it's great they're spending their summer doing that. I don't remember doing that when I was a graduate over my summer, so at least they're getting a head start. But they are things that it's quite a baptism of fire when you do go into the workplace and think I thought I was all set for work, but nope.
Speaker 2:But, on that note, I really think it's important for listeners also to understand that that's going to come throughout your career because as you move, as things change, even though you might stay at a certain company in a certain position, the team around you might change, so you're going to have to adapt to that as well.
Speaker 2:And I mean, I've worked with people on my teams that got along fantastic, and then the project ends and they need to spin up a new team for a new project and let's say, that person moves with me. One person does not move, so now there's a new person joining that team and then there's a clash because now this person doesn't get along with the new person as well as they did with the old person. But you're going to have to adapt because that is now your new team and it's also about keeping that professionalism. This is not high school where we have these clicks oh, I work with this person because this person is my friend. In life and in our careers sometimes we want to work with people that we don't get along with, but we have to act professional and still get the job done while having a smile on your face and delivering what you've promised at the end of the day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're so right that navigating those challenges on a team I found. I found that this out many years ago but how to navigate something as a team when things go wrong really says a lot about people and about the company, because you know what things go wrong, like it's. It's not everything is going to be fantastic and rainbows every day, and things do go wrong and as a leader, you have to answer for why those things have gone wrong. But what you really don't need is team members throwing each other under the bus when something has gone wrong and you learn it's only something you learn throughout your career and how to navigate those situations and how to respond and, like you said, trying to find a way to remain professional whilst those things are happening and how a company responds to a team that has got something wrong as well. And, yes, you have to take responsibility, but it's also a straw line under it. We're going to learn from it and we'll just keep moving forward, but that's something that comes with being in work a while 100%.
Speaker 2:I mean, I've had it where the team on the project did an amazing job, everything was lining up for a perfect delivery. One thing went wrong, just one thing, and we missed the delivery date. Our client was really unhappy and instead of taking it back to the team saying we failed, we I tried to bring the narrative of look what, look at what. We delivered. Everything that went perfectly.
Speaker 2:Let's keep that the focus and let's celebrate that as the win, rather than that one thing that we didn't get across the line, because at the end of the day, that was maybe three, four days delayed. So celebrate the wins, don't look at the negativity. And then, also, for me as a delivery manager, it was myself and the product manager that took the heat from the client for the delay and we tried to shelter the team from that because, at the end of the day, they still delivered what they needed to deliver. Yes, it was delayed, but we got there in the end. So why take months and months of work and bring just a cloud of negativity over that, rather than just, hey, look what we've done?
Speaker 1:Yes, and then you move on to the next one with that enthusiasm and skill and everything that goes into the next project, because you really enjoyed that one and that feeling that you bring to work every day. That is again. It's built every single day. It's not.
Speaker 2:Oh, we did one project and now I feel fantastic absolutely, and trust me, it's like we said earlier there's always something that goes wrong, there's always something that slips through the cracks. And what can we do?
Speaker 1:we can do our best, yes, and deal with that as a team, and and and take responsibility of that. And those are the teams that are successful, the ones that manage to move forward and deliver instead of just, you know, arguing amongst themselves. That that takes a lot to have that bond in a team as well, to be be able to just rise above it, move forward and deliver for the client. That's ultimately what it's for to make sure that your clients are happy.
Speaker 2:And for me as a delivery manager, that's where I feel like it's really important to check in with your team members individually, because when you do that you get a feel for where they are, not just in terms of work, where they are emotionally in the inner space. Either they're happy or they're unhappy, and you can tease out issues with them in those one-to-one settings. So if they, if they do have a negativity around the delivery or a kind of blame culture towards other team members, you can address that and try that it doesn't escape into the wider team, but you try to contain it with that one person and that's when, if you have one negative person, it doesn't affect the rest of the team. So that's also a really important thing as a delivery manager from my perspective to try and make sure that the team is on the same level, cohesive and performing well.
Speaker 1:Yes, and those one-to-ones, you're so right they might share more information there, rather than the odd little snippet of information that sort of slips out.
Speaker 1:That isn't very nice towards someone, when actually they probably just needed a moment to air their views to their manager about they're not happy about something and then you can move on, but without that communication. That's the politics of being in a workplace. And just again it comes back to landing in the right workplace is so important and some companies do so much work to ensure that all of those things they happen in every workplace. But some companies are just very good at creating an environment where, as you said, when you notice those things, you navigate them successfully and making sure that if there is one negative person on the team, how you deal with that. But some companies are not so good at spotting that and then it affects everybody else on the team as well. So, yeah, it's just landing in the right company sometimes can make such a difference to your whole day, your mental health and how you show up at work every day, 100%.
Speaker 2:And that again comes back to me being people before process, because I've worked in those companies. Where it is about the delivery, it is not about the people, and for me, you're not going to get the delivery without the people. So I'm going to use an aviation reference here. But your oxygen mask before everyone else, team members not going to get that delivery without your team members, so we need to take care of them as well. Yes, that's the first thing.
Speaker 1:I love that. I bet you never thought that you'd be bringing that back into your work.
Speaker 2:Definitely not.
Speaker 1:I wanted to ask you one last question about advice. So what advice would you give someone listening who's in a completely different industry but is wondering if tech could be their next move?
Speaker 2:Why not? What's stopping you? I mean, it's like I said, the trickle into tech. The non-conventional way has definitely been beneficial for me and a lot of others that I know. So, referring back to earlier in the podcast, it's we need the unconventional people. You're going to have people from all walks of life and that is what's needed to get people to deliver outside of the box. Because if we all were the same, if we all thought the same, we wouldn't be delivering new initiatives. We would be going nowhere. We'd be going backwards. So why not take the chance? You don't need to make a big impact. All you need to do is make an impact or join.
Speaker 2:Start by identifying what you already do today that you could apply, and I mean it's something simple. Like we said communication that negotiation. As a parent, like, just be curious, take small steps. If you're not sure, find someone that is in the industry and speak to them, find out what their day-to-day looks like, ask questions and see if that intrigues you. And it's also just a reminder that it's never too late to start something new. I mean, there's people out there every day that start new, sometimes not by choice, but sometimes because you have to, and if you're really unhappy in your career at the moment, why not try something new? Why not give it up to fate and say let's give it a go, because if it doesn't work, guess what? There's always something else out there.
Speaker 1:Yes, it's just about trying. Yeah, and in tech there are so many free areas to get started as well. If you try something, you don't like it like try something free, try a free boot camp, like if it's not for you, it's not for you, there's so many people in the tech industry that says you know what?
Speaker 2:I started as a business analyst, or I started as a web developer. Now I'm a content designer, or whatever the example may be. Some people start as developers and they work their way to product management. But they tried and it didn't work for them. So they found something else within the industry that intrigued them and they moved to that and they gave that a try. You're still in the tech industry. It just might not be the role that's a good fit for you, but there's so many different roles that there's almost always something new to try, if you really wanted to I think it's almost a relief for people as well that when they get in they speak to colleagues and they realise actually they're not the only one with a non-traditional background.
Speaker 1:That's sometimes quite an eye-opener for people and you think but everybody here is going to have a computer science degree and they've gone on and done a PhD in something that I can't even pronounce. And actually you get in and you realise your team are also from very squiggly careers and you're like, oh goodness exactly, and you're going to realize as soon as you step into the industry and you sit down.
Speaker 2:You're not going to sit in front of a desk with all this green code from the matrix going over your head. It's not that. It's really not that complicated I think we need to move away from. As women, we cannot be in tech because developing code is not for us, because you know what, at the end of the day, even those girly apps that we use on our phones needs to be developed, so why not try influence any of that? I mean, that's still getting into tech one way or the other, whether you're a content designer for something like that, a data analyst so many opportunities.
Speaker 1:Exactly. I love that. That is a really lovely, positive place to end it on and brilliant advice for our community members listening. But, sharni, thank you so much for coming on. It's been an absolute pleasure to pick your brain and hear all about your background and how you landed at McKay Digital, so thank you for taking the time to come on Spilling the Tea Absolute pleasure.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me, Kayleigh.
Speaker 1:Thank you for everybody listening, as always. Thank you for joining us and we hope to see you again next time.
