Katie Mcky

 

Jobs in information technology skyrocket

 

According to Emsi (formerly known as Economic Modeling Specialists International), a CareerBuilder company, five of the top 10 areas for new job creation include IT.

 

No surprise here, as IT touches every industry. The good news continues: IT also offers a solid starting salary, and potential for earning a six-figure salary.

 

And while the current numbers aren’t good for diverse hires at some of the most well known companies in the IT industry (at companies like Google and Facebook, African-Americans employees number below 5 percent), the opportunities are present – and diverse – at many companies, as exemplified by the employees interviewed below.

 

Empower With Knowledge At SALESFORCE

 

As a cloud computing company headquartered in San Francisco, CA, Salesforce is IT through and through. However, Salesforce master technical trainer Leah McGowen- Hare, MSEd, although neck deep in IT, works primarily with people.

 

“I share my passion for teaching with Salesforce customers and employees on a daily basis, empowering them with knowledge on how to build and customize applications on the Salesforce platform,” she explains.

 

“I love the people who work at Salesforce, the spirit of innovation and true commitment to giving back to the community,” she adds. “Any great organization is defined by its people. The people at Salesforce are true collaborators who always seek to usher the best ideas forward and bring them to fruition. I also admire Salesforce’s commitment to giving back. The company contributes 1 percent of its equity, employee time, and product back into the community. Giving back is woven into the core of the company culture.”

 

Although McGowen-Hare is one of 17,500 employees worldwide, her voice is valued, both due to the corporate culture and McGowen-Hare’s own initiative.

 

“I wanted to proactively give back to the community that would utilize my gifts and talents, teaching technical topics,” she says. “I came up with an idea to offer a pro bono women’s class to our nonprofit customers. I pitched the idea to senior management and they were in complete support. My pro bono class also inspired my fellow colleagues to conduct their own pro bono classes with groups and organizations that they wanted to help. Outside of this class, I also hosted a Black Girls Code workshop at Salesforce. Once again, the company’s executives and technical talent showed up to encourage my efforts. The commitment here is strong, authentic, and ongoing.”

 

McGowen-Hare pushed through her base proclivity to take risks.

 

“After Peoplesoft was acquired by Oracle in 2004, I left to take a job that paid well, but did not mentally challenge me,” she recalls. “Historically, I was risk averse. I gravitate towards stability and certainty; I’m a 1040 type, not a 1099 type. However, despite this, I decided I would attend graduate school and continue to work, but for myself. I started my own company while balancing the demands of graduate school. I learned that at times you have to take risks and make the uncomfortable, scary decisions.”

 

McGowen-Hare backs up her verve with value.

 

“Being a female and African-American in technology in a male dominated industry can be challenging,” she notes. “During different times throughout my career, I have been categorized or put in a box. I don’t fit one category. I am too big and too dynamic to be put in a box. My classes are primarily made up of male students. When I come through the door, I am the last person they expect to deliver their developer class. Yet after the class, they get a 3-for-1 from me: sound technical knowledge, a fun learning experience, and an open mind about other people. While I am part of the small percentage of African-Americans and women in technology, I do not represent the lack of limitations in this industry. I am an example of the possibilities.”

 

McGowen-Hare enhances her value by expanding her teaching tactics.

 

“In graduate school, I studied different learning lessons, from kinesthetic to audio learners,” she recalls. “ I applied this knowledge to my teaching style and it made me more effective. People have different ways of learning. It’s never a ‘one approach fits all’ situation, especially for complex or technical topics.”

 

She urges students to not hesitate and get busy building their developer creditability. “It’s crucial to continue to build and create using the latest technology,” she asserts. “I would recommend students understand the pros and cons of different tools and approaches; and understand how technology can be used to solve problems. Once you bring value to the table, everything else falls in place. So, build that creditability, identify problems, and create solutions that add value.”

 

Make Magic At MOLINA HEALTHCARE

 

Liana (Lee) Smith, IT department manager at Molina Healthcare (Long Beach, CA), has had an atypical career in information technology, coming to it mid-career and from the non-tech end of business.

 

“I started on the business side of the house,” she explains. “My most intimidating time was when I applied to enter the IT field and I didn’t have a strong IT background. The technology moves rapidly. I thought that there was no way I’d be able to keep up with the brilliant people who made magic happen when I worked on the business side.”

 

So, how did Smith adapt and eventually prosper?

 

“I was willing to say that I didn’t know anything,” she says. ”I wasn’t afraid of people judging me and people were comfortable with me. They wanted to teach me and the fear dissipated over time.”

 

Her willingness to learn enabled her technology leadership.

 

“As a manager in IT infrastructure, my team integrates the physical, financial, tech, and contractual aspects of our assets: laptops, desktops, all your in-points,” she says. “We’re the one who enable the workforce to use their technology.”

 

Her IT colleagues are one of the perks of the job. “I love working with the people that I do,” she says. “‘Steel sharpens steel’ never meant anything to me until I came to IT. I work with such refined technical minds and it’s refined my thinking. It’s pushed me beyond what I ever thought I could achieve. I look at what I orchestrate now and it was once so foreign to me. I enjoy working with people who make me smarter. I understand the meaning of a router because I was exposed to it. I have evolved into this techy person and I enjoy that so much.”

 

You don’t have to start in IT, says Smith, but “you can end up here.” Nor do you have to stay in a specific IT corner.

 

“Don’t be afraid to go outside your IT box,” Smith says. “You might have started in security operations, but realize that the landscape of IT is vast. You might want to do network, coding, or the project management field. If you have an affinity, go for it.”

 

Molina lets you expand your IT landscape, supporting expansion through training.

 

“I do like the amazing amount of professional advancement through internal and external training here,” Smith says. “IT is unique in that we encourage our employees to continue to grow in their field. We offer online training courses to all types of employees, from interns to full time.”

 

Smith also loves the bennies at Molina, which demonstrate a high level of caring for the community and employees.

 

“It’s hard to not mention our benefits package, which has grown over the 13 years I’ve been here,” she says. “There’s tuition reimbursement, an employee stock program, and a volunteer time off program. Molina is very strong in the Long Beach, CA area and we look for organizations that we want to support, such as housing and beautification, and Molina pays for that. The employee stock purchase program offers more discount than what is standard. We offer 15 percent, whereas most companies offer single digit discounts. We also have partnerships with area schools and many students get hired on from internships. In fact, seven out of 10 get hired.”

 

Molina, which employs 16,000 people, also listens to its employees. “They survey us before they make major changes,” explains Smith. “They really listen and care.”

 

Deliver The Right Skills At ANTHEM

 

Leke Adesida, staff vice president of technology at Anthem (Indianapolis, IN), zigged where most zagged.

 

“I decided to change my career path from being a respiratory therapist to becoming a network engineer,” he says. “At the time, I had a choice between choosing between Novell and Microsoft tech nologies. When I started, I went along with others in pursuing Novell certification because Novell had the biggest market share of the network operating systems, but halfway through my certifications, I changed my path to Microsoft and became one of the first professionals to become a Microsoft Certified System Engineer. By following my intuition about where I believe the market was ending, based on the GUI interface rather than the command line interface and then analyzing Microsoft market share of the client desktop space, I took a calculated risk and it paid off.”

 

His foresight then has him in a VP’s office today, but Anthem, which has more than 37,000 employees, is more virtual than brick and mortar, enabling efficiency.

 

“The most surprising thing is how efficiently the associates work together, despite being a virtual company,” says Adesida. “While the associates are located throughout the United States, it has not led to any deficiencies in productivity or effectiveness when it comes to meeting our corporate objectives goals. In addition, being a virtual company provides an opportunity to hire the best talent we can attract instead of being limited by geography.”

 

Adesida has the essential role of managing technology risk and identity management processes to ensure secure and efficient business transactions.

 

“Over the last 15 years, as the dependencies on computers grew with the awareness of protecting information stored on them, coupled with increased privacy concerns of the general public, I saw a need for developing security skills to protect the integrity and confidentiality of the information,” he explains. “There is no other sector where the protection of information is more critical than the healthcare sector.”

 

Adesida took a chance and it paid ongoing dividends. He urges you to do the same.

 

“Develop an insatiable appetite for learning and willingness to take on new challenges, without being afraid of failing,” he says. “This is the key to developing marketable skills that will continue to make one relevant.”

 

Design Better Applications At TERADATA CORP.

 

The technology bug bit Lindbergh (Lin) Hampshire, IT Specialist at Teradata, when he was young.

 

“I was always interested in technology, which made my choice to go into a technology field easy,” he explains. “My father would occasionally bring home one of the portable PCs from work (this is when it took 5.25-inch floppies) and I would spend hours in front of it. Our first family PC was a Commodore-64, which, to this day, I still have possession of. As time went by, my interest grew for writing code and creating my own little applications.”

 

As IT services data center operations team lead, Hampshire manages the server, storage, and infrastructure supporting enterprise applications and business processing at Teradata.

 

“What makes my job interesting is the interaction with internal Teradata development and support teams along with our vendors to meet or exceed expectations,” he says. “Having a data center position not only means ‘keeping the lights on,’ but interaction with other groups and vendors to improve what we currently have.”

 

Taking on various roles at Teradata, which is headquartered in Dayton, OH, Hampshire learned how to “meet or exceed expectations.

 

“I started at Teradata in application development, where I stayed for four years,” he says. “Starting as a programmer gave me a chance to explore other areas in the technology field that may have interest for me. The first four years was time well spent getting a better understanding of the business side and needs of business customers. My interest shifted to the servers that held my development and production environments. It was a desire to learn how the different hardware platforms were being utilized so that I could design better applications.”

 

Hampshire made sure his learning was both broad and deep.

 

“Preparation for my current position involved learning, working, and understanding different server- related operating systems and how those operating systems can work together to complete different tasks. To add a little more complexity, it’s the understanding of types of storage environments along with the networking necessary for those environments to work smoothly together.”

 

He encourages others bitten by the technology bug to also learn broadly and deeply and even beyond IT.

 

“The technology field is vast, but there are basic skill sets that everyone considering making the plunge into technology should have,” Hampshire says. “Communication is a big part, and should be an area that is given plenty of attention. The technical field is no longer a country-by-country area anymore. You need to be able to communicate with people on a global scale. Good analytical skills will go a long way. This is an every changing landscape, so being able to adapt will also come in handy.”

 

A Fun Ride At ELECTRONIC ARTS

 

As senior product manager at Electronic Arts, Laura Teclemariam and her colleagues are faced with problems that all the major companies are trying to solve. “But the biggest difference is that I love the product we are working for,” she notes. “You really do get to work hard and play hard at EA.”

 

Electronic Arts (Redwood City, CA) is the entertainment software company known for such video games as Madden NFL, FIFA, Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes, and The Sims.

 

“I have always wanted to work in entertainment,” adds Teclemariam. “ It’s an exciting sector to talk about and be passionate toward every day. At EA, we evolve our goals annually and so you get new exciting opportunities each year. I decided to become a product manager because I wanted to be the customer’s voice for a technical team and help the team build a product that customers will not only use, but will also love.”

 

One of 8,500 world wide employees, Teclemariam is responsible for the vision and product requirements for all of EA’s internal engagement, targeting, and advertising products. She started at EA working on mobile products and now works on the digital platform for the data team. She loves her colleagues and the company’s culture.

 

“Working at EA has been the best roller coaster I ever been on in corporate America,” she says. “There are many days that you are working with some of the brightest people to solve the hardest problems in tech. Then there are other days you are enjoying the company culture and atmosphere while being proud of our title releases.”

 

Teclemariam appreciates EA’s focus on its customers.

 

“EA has a lot of impact in the gaming industry as one of the largest leaders,” she says. “I am surprised at how dedicated our leadership is to making the consumer experience a priority and having a ‘player first’ mentality. This is the type of leadership that takes a company from good to great.”

 

She is known for being a hybrid product manager powered by marketing and technology expertise. “My tenure in marketing tech started years ago with running my own startup for seven years, which specialized in entertainment and sports digital marketing,” she acknowledges. “After my personal startup years, I led the product efforts for a $100 million mobile ad-tech start up. Then the journey brought me to EA to lead our engagement and advertising tech platform.”

 

Her journey was not without its challenges. The year she started college, Teclemariam was one of two African-American students to enter the University of California Berkeley majoring in electrical engineering and computer science. “It was scary at first to feel alone culturally and not share any cultural moments with anyone in my department. I used it as an opportunity to teach other students about my culture,” she recalls. “With my student groups, I would share home cooked meals like collard greens, hot water cornbread, and fried pork chops. This helped me feel pride in representing my ethnicity and I continue to educate my peers about my culture and share the great traditions of being African- American.”

 

To get started in the gaming industry, Teclemariam has two pieces of advice. First, while in college, be sure to have an internship before you graduate.

 

Secondly, she urges young professionals and college students to apply to jobs online and to network. “You would be surprised at how many people who are qualified but don’t know it because they failed the first rule, which is to apply online,” she says. “Then make sure to utilize your network and recruiter contacts. Our recruiting department can help you find the best fit at our company and are awesome to work with.”