After graduating from a recognized school with a not-so-recognized major (a B.A. in Individualized Study: The Role of the Poetic), I found that opportunities were limited and my ideas about what I wanted from ‘a career’ were even more so. I ended up continuing with the types of roles I had held while in school (administrative and operational), and felt that deviating from a past job description was way too much of a risk. I had trouble focusing on what I wanted or what I liked, and instead made all of my decisions according to what I thought I could get.
It wasn’t until I took my first position with The Second Shift that this began to change. I was hired for a traditional ‘Sara’ role in operations, but because we were a small start-up team, I was exposed to and assisted with all aspects of the business. I had always had an interest in tech, and as we worked on the second iteration of our website with some incredible female technologists (Michelle Pae, a Product Management Consultant and Heather Moore, the Co-Founder and Senior Engineer at Citizen Code), I found myself completely inspired. With the support of The Second Shift team, I went back to school to learn how to code and haven’t stopped coding since. I now work with The Second Shift in product management and web development, and with another start-up as their data visualization engineer. I am working flexibly, loving what I do, and building products and services that I am so very proud of.
This is why my #Wominspired role models are all of the women I have met and worked with at The Second Shift – women who have decided to focus on what they want for themselves and what they want to see in the workforce, rather than letting their pasts and traditional modes of working define how they operate. I feel so lucky to work with this team of talented, experienced and innovative women, and know I wouldn’t be where I am today without their encouragement, persistence and all-around awesomeness. Thank you!