About Me — Anh Dao Pham
I’m a 40-something Asian-American woman with a husband, two kids and a dog. I lead software projects for a living. Why do I write?
My family history
I was born in 1977, just barely after my parents rebooted their lives in a new country.
Less than two years earlier, my parents had fled Saigon via helicopter with my eighteen-month-old sister in tow, just a few days before the city fell to the Communist regime. My mom’s oldest sister, who worked for the United States Embassy, had unexpectedly received approval for our families to escape the city with only a few hours notice.
Everyone on both sides of my family packed immediately to leave their lives in Vietnam behind. One of my dad’s sisters and her husband left their homeland with literally nothing but the clothes on their backs.
Once my parents made it to the United States, they did an amazing job re-establishing themselves, caring for my sister and me, and sheltering us from hardship. I grew up oblivious to the challenges they endured to give us the promise of a better life.
My mom bravely stayed at home to raise my sister and me with no family or friends nearby to help her, while my dad worked to climb the ranks as an architect for the State of California. Eventually, my mom renewed her license to practice as a pharmacist in the United States and my parents opened a small business to pursue the American dream.
Throughout my childhood, I was never deprived of food, clothing, school supplies or toys. My parents raised me by example to work hard, to be generous with what you have, and to always be respectful of others.
I was expected to overachieve when given the opportunity, and as a result I never felt held back from pursuing anything even though I was both an Asian minority and a female.
When I was in the second grade, one of my teachers wrote a note on my report card that read, “She could be our first female president!”
My mom tells that story proudly, as I was the first person born in my family to be a natural U.S. citizen who would even be eligible to pursue that office. That quote is evidence of how I was always encouraged to live the American dream, to find a way to make a difference in people’s lives, and to pursue goals that were bigger than myself.
My life today
Flash forward to today and I’m now married, with two beautiful mixed-race children, and a little white dog. We live in Los Angeles and own a house and two cars.
We have enough money to eat the food we want to eat, buy the clothes we want to wear, go on vacations, and purchase presents for all our friends and family during the holidays.
I’ve also had a successful career for the last two decades in software, leading project teams in a variety of interesting and challenging settings— consulting, start-ups, and large corporations. And while I’m not done pursuing growth in my career yet, I have achieved enough to make myself proud.
Life is good. I am grateful every day — I’m enjoying the life that my parents risked everything to give me.
Why I write
Now, at the midpoint of my existence, I am looking to transcend my day-to-day life, to pursue goals that are bigger than myself.
Writing is a vehicle for transcendence.
I write because I see writing as a way to be the ultimate teacher— a means to get what I know out into the world into the brains of many more people than I can mentor at a single company at my job.
I write because I want to leave a lasting legacy of my life on this earth, one that will allow my thoughts to exist on dusty bookshelves for years to come.
I write because I know that my parents’ true goal was not for me to be a specific profession like a doctor, but to be a successful Vietnamese-American woman who can serve as a role model for others. By publishing my thoughts and pursuing broader success, I am inherently drawing pride to our community; I am demonstrating what is possible when people endure hardship to pursue a better life for their children.
Angela Duckworth recently wrote in her Character Lab blog See What’s Possible:
“Do go out of your way to expose the young people in your life to inspiring role models they can relate to, whether it’s an Olympic athlete or a local entrepreneur.”
I write because I not only want to expose my children to role models, I want to be one for them.
I joined Medium because I wanted to be a part of a community of people who had goals like mine, a community that would support me in my quest to achieve something beyond myself.
I hope you are willing to help me by reading what I write, engaging with my stories, and encouraging me to continue. Please let me know if I can do the same for you.
What inspires you to write? Please comment and share you stories with me. I would love to read them!
Anh Dao Pham is Vice President, Product & Program Management at Edmunds.com. She has twenty years of experience leading technology teams and is the author of Glue: How Project Leaders Create Cohesive, Engaged, High-Performing Teams.
