From Traditional Engineering to Tech Company : How do I tackle the challenges
Hi, I’m Seli Ballo and it’s a pleasure to share my experiences in STEM field through this writing. Although I haven’t had the chance to join summer or winter classes that Generation Girl conducted, but I’m so delighted by the idea how this organization is run. I first read about GG when I was surfing the web as I also have the same interests in empowering girls or women to study and have a career in STEM (which is a male-dominated field).
According to my own experience, at the first place it was not an easy decision for me to choose engineering as my major. My parents were concerned about this, especially they wanted me to pursue another career path to be a doctor. It took the whole my high school years to convince them that I truly want to enter engineering as it is aligned well with my interest and ability. After the long discussion, they agreed and let me chose civil engineering at Petra Christian University in Surabaya. I was truly happy but felt like being tricked at the same time because I thought the program would be more physics heavy (turns out it was heavier at mathematics like I had to finish 4 mandatory calculus classes, but at the same time it was my fault too for not dug deeper into the courses before I applied). Hence, it’s highly advised to deep dive up to courses level if you want to apply to a certain program at university.
My years as a female engineering student was fun! Surprisingly, I cherish my university years that much. Although I could not hide it that I was struggling to finish the courses and especially courses which include laboratory work. In addition, in my batch there were only a few female students. The female:male ratio is 1:10, yeap only 10% of the student population (almost 30 out of 250 students in one batch) is female. Honestly speaking, hanging out with the guys during university year is fun but at times I missed that kind of “girls talk” moments. However, there’s nothing to be worried as you can still have some girl-friends from other departments :)
As a fresh graduate with super-idealistic way of thinking, I knew that I had always wanted to pursue a career in civil engineering. Right after graduation, I got a job in a structural engineering consulting. Everything seemed to be perfect and went well just as I expected. I felt happy and excited in finally able to apply what I have learnt in school to tackle real engineering problems. I got the chance to involve in some prestigious high rise building projects and got to design several structural elements such as foundation, floor, stairs, beam and column. I also got hands-on experience in building concrete and steel structures. However, after three months of working I started to question myself : Is this really something that I want to do for the rest of my life? How am I seeing myself in 20 years with this career track? Can I maximize my potential while I am here? Am I growing or just being pressured? Those questions have made me confused since at first, I truly believe that to be a structural engineer is something I’ve been dreaming of. On the contrary, I also craved for more human interactions (this has been my all-time favorite activity) because being a structural engineer made me spend my days mostly sitting and doing the calculation behind the table. Long story short, some circumstances made me decide to pursue another career path and try to follow another career path. One thing about finding passion that I learned is : sometimes your passion might NOT be what you think your passion is.
Sometimes your passion might NOT be what you think your passion is
Now, here I am, joining a tech company in product division which happen to be something I never ever dream about. Based on my observation, I think that in product management there is still a higher ratio of male compared to female (prolly 60:40). During my 6 months in Traveloka Product Management Acceleration Program, I was placed in Accommodation — Third Party Sourcing. I’m responsible for managing end-to-end accommodation supply from demand assessment, integrate new partners up to product development and optimization. To put it simply, my job is to make sure that Traveloka sells good quality inventories in its accommodation funnel in which this directly affects the customer journey from booking, staying until post-stay. Several interesting things that I have learnt are how to analyze customer behavior, business trend, business strategy, brainstorm to solve operational or technical issues and maintain relationships with both internal and external parties. In merely six months, I got the chance to expand my professional networking since I worked with a lot of bright people inside (cross departments : engineering, marketing, revenue management, operations) and outside (business partners) Traveloka. What I like the most about working here is, Traveloka value its users and always try to accommodate their needs. Therefore, It satisfied me to know that I have taken part in bringing added value to our customers as well as the company. I dare to say that the product management role is holistic, dynamic yet challenging.
I dare to say that the product management role is holistic, dynamic yet challenging
To sum up, I have gathered some tips for you girls who want to pursue a career in STEM :
- Deep dive into the majors that you want to apply for university (make sure you could anticipate what you’ll be going through)
- Be good at math (initially I was not good at it either but it’s okay since practice makes perfect)
- Enhance communication skills. You can start by joining student board or other organizations which suited your interests
- Be meticulous. In general, women usually better at paying attention to detail while most men tend to see the big pictures
- Be persistent, don’t feel inferior just because you’re a minority or it’s “uncommon” for girls to be in engineering. Just be yourself, accept the challenges and show them that girls can :)
- Make a lot of girl-friends, connect with other girls who also study or pursue a career in male-dominated fields so you won’t feel lonely
