An unconventional route into STEM
We talk to Executive Director of the US Coalition on Sustainability, Joanna Hall, about her unconventional path into STEM and her role as a technologist.
Ada Lovelace week always brings thoughts about the challenges of women and diversity in STEM to the surface for me. As a woman in tech, these challenges are always underlying and something we all grapple with regularly, but thinking about how to tackle it or advise others on the path — well, sadly, that’s not as frequent.
Did you know that, over your lifetime, you’re likely to change careers between 5 and 7 times? There are many routes for women to get into STEM careers, some more unconventional than others, and understanding your transferable skills is invaluable and will undoubtedly assist you in any transition from a non STEM career to one in STEM.
A generalist myself without formal education in a STEM field, I had the pleasure of interviewing a fellow generalist and STEM transfer, Joanna Hall, Executive Director of the US Coalition on Sustainability, about her path into STEM and her role as a technologist.
Joanna has spent 18 years in digital innovation and strategy, and is currently operating as Head of Product for SustainChain. Prior to joining the US Coalition on Sustainability (USCS), she ran a software innovation studio in SoHo bringing well funded new products to market and working with enterprise innovation studios. She helped co-found an ad-tech start-up called BrightLineTV. Joanna’s deeply committed to unleashing the power of technology and human energy for good.
Diving into the interview, Jo tells us about her latest venture (SustainChain), her path into tech and advice for other women.
Hey, Jo! Can you tell me a bit about what you are building, why and what inspired you to start building it?
We’re building a technology platform called SustainChain which is a free digital utility that connects people on a mission to achieve Sustainable Development Goals. We’re building it because we genuinely believe we have the tools, technology and data to achieve incredible things in this next decade as a humanity but we need to coordinate our efforts in a far more INTELLIGENT and accelerated fashion. That’s the only way we’ll go FAST enough to make the dent required.
SustainChain is the world’s largest sustainability action platform that helps humanity achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals
Why are you excited about building SustainChain?
We’re in a very special reckoning moment as a species. A really scary but also incredibly hopeful moment…one of tremendous awareness and clarity around the problems, heightened intention and energy around solving them…and a moment in time where technology has advanced so dramatically that we have this brilliant tool set we can and must direct towards solving our existential crisis! We have more than enough human ingenuity to solve these problems…but will we coordinate and collaborate fast enough is the question.
“And that is what keeps me up at night, it’s not that we don’t have the ability or potential intention or desire. It’s a coordination problem.”
How do you see SustainChain changing how we increase the speed that we solve the climate crisis?
There is so much tremendous work and innovation underway to solve our climate and social crisis, but it is all so incredibly siloed. And so many are just now joining the fight and starting from scratch. Just think about the number of brands and organisations that are just starting out now and figuring out how to be more ‘sustainable’ and what that looks like for them. Most businesses don’t have the budget to have a Head of Sustainability, they have groups or people within their organisation with barely any bandwidth but the passion to get going. They are starting at the zero yard line, often with little staff or expertise. We want to plug them into a collective intelligence…where they can start much farther along the path.
I see our product becoming the central and trusted utility platform that helps rapidly guide folks to known solutions they can adopt and/or other players working on solving similar problems. It’s all about scaling solutions and accelerating the pace of breaking down silos and working together.
What’s next for SustainChain?
There’s a lot to come and a lot of work to do! But our focus is on rapid expansion of the community of change-makers and rapid refinement of the intelligence of the system and engine itself.
Now I want to focus on how you entered the tech industry and your advice to women who want to transition their careers but don’t know where to start.
Can we talk about your journey? When did you start becoming interested in tech? What was the trigger for you to pursue a career in STEM?
I was obsessed with Chemistry growing up, I was really good at math, I was one of those kids that asked for more work all the time and I loved solving problems — I even used to draw molecules. My first book was all about the atomic explosion. I signed up for Civil Engineering at Syracuse because I was good at science and math. I did it for a year and a half and it was so boring and so rigid and I guess it felt stifling almost because I was a person who was left brain right brain and it lacked creativity.
There was no strategy behind it and in hindsight, I was one of the few girls. There were no women professors and I felt like an outsider. It wasn’t creatively stimulating, felt too structured and there was no innovation in that curriculum at the time. There’s a lot of innovation in Civil Engineering now, but at the time there wasn’t any. I didn’t feel comfortable in it. So, I went to the opposite extreme and chose the most open-ended and creative degree possible — advertising and strategy — where I was taking creative copywriting and design courses. I still didn’t know what I wanted to do, but didn’t want to flop again so I stuck with it. Most of my early career was in media and advertising and it was only 5–6 years ago when I joined Originate when I came full circle back into a STEM career. Although, I’m more on the human creative and strategy side but I found a way in a lane now that I can balance both.
Not being the tech person in the room, having my creative and advertising background and being more of a generalist is both a blessing and a curse. I’m generally the one in the room that has enough clarity on both the business and tech side to know what is missing in the conversation. I’m never the specialist in the room but it’s a gift because I’m able to work with people who are far more brilliant and by putting different skillsets and experts in the room, as a generalist, I have been able to bridge the gap and weave the experts and their energy together and focus it in a meaningful direction.
“There were no women professors and I felt like an outsider.”
What challenges or barriers did you face in your journey?
In hindsight, I might have stuck with it if I saw more role models or other young women in the same space. If I felt there was more of a creative outlet or I didn’t feel like such an outsider.
How did you overcome that?
I didn’t overcome it at the time. I quit and switched over to a far more creative and open-ended education track in advertising and communications. I got to take design and creative strategy courses, those fed my left brain side.
What is it like to be a woman in a traditionally male-dominated industry? Did you ever meet challenges/barriers as a result of being a woman?
I don’t know that I can speak on my perception of the STEM community because it’s so broad. Candidly, I’m fortunate enough that I do have a decent amount of and a healthy dose of confidence and conviction which enables me in those situations to recognise them and take advantage of them. Being the odd one out gives me an edge. It gives me the ability to see it and leverage it.
“We need to be focused and striving for parity and we get to the point where our personalities and skillset is what is important.”
Even in the software engineering firm — there was a campaign wanting to bring on more females and because it was like a campaign, women engineers felt special and were treated differently. “I’m not just an engineer, I’m a female engineer.” There were two extremes: the folks who took advantage of that power or extra attention and the others who didn’t want it and just wanted to be an engineer like everyone else. Until you get to a healthy culture or healthy balance, there isn’t the in between which is just a nice healthy mix of diversity and everyone can be individuals and not marked by those labels. I don’t know what my takeaway is — it still is a bit polarising and it feels like there are the folks who feel it and can take advantage of it or those who don’t want it and it’s unwelcome. I respect both but I happen to be the person who takes advantage of it.
What’s something you wish the STEM community would change? Why?
Until there is some sort of enough gender parity and an appropriate ratio, there are dynamics at play that are always going to be a disadvantage for certain individuals. We need to be focused and striving for parity and we get to the point where our personalities and skillset is what is important. Not, because I’m a female or some other ‘diversity metric’. Until basic ratios are met, no matter what, it’s going to be polarising.
What is your top pieces of advice to women who want to transition their career into STEM but don’t know where to start?This might sound hippy-dippy but it starts with just saying out loud what you want, and then talking to friends and colleagues about it. Once you put your intention and desire out there, you’ll start being attracted to other people who have similar interests and they’ll invite you into their networks and conversations…Basically be CLEAR and BOLD with what you want and PUT it out THERE! The talent has already begun the migration to investing their careers and time and energy by moving to work for purpose driven organisations. That will FORCE private sector to make the adjustments they need to retain talent!
“Until you get to a healthy culture or healthy balance, there isn’t the in between which is just a nice healthy mix of diversity and everyone can be individuals and not marked by those labels.”
I myself, quite literally two years ago, wasn’t in sustainability, green tech, clean tech anything. I was running a software innovation studio and building software products for banks and fintech and products I didn’t care a lick about. And I just started to think I want to be in sustainability, what is sustainability, what is green tech, what is clean-tech. I just started reading articles talking to people and putting it out there and I put it out there with my business partner, Jackie, and it was still very vague. I just wanted to do something with tech for good and bit by bit by bit and now three is a gravitational pull around it. You don’t have to have a clear plan, just put it out there.
And what about those who are still in school but are scared to pursue tech-heavy courses?
STEM is cool! And it’s the future, this is the power lane. It’s where the funding is going, where the fun and exciting careers are going to be. There is FAR more flexibility and creativity and potential in STEM I’d argue than any other fields.
What practical, tangible things should people do if coming from a non-technical background?
When thinking about being in STEM it doesn’t mean you have to be an engineer, scientist or mathematician there is so much need for soft skills that surround the hard skills to unleash the full potential of the hard skills. We talk about engineering and building software and building products but if you don’t have a story, you don’t understand your market or understand the business it doesn’t matter how incredible the tech is. I think about marketing, community management, story telling, even sales — sales get a terrible rep — but we are all selling in our own job and our own world. Being a good sales person is just being a super effective communicator. If you can apply those skills to this field there is tremendous opportunity.
Jo, what do you want to see more of for Women in STEM in 2022?
“More female leaders”
To learn more about SustainChain or to get involved, join the chain at SustainChain.
I want to send a huge thank you to Jo for taking the time to speak to me!
Jo and I both agreed that having a network of people you can turn to for advice or just a casual discussion has helped us immensely. If you’re at a crossroads or have any questions about your journey into STEM, please don’t hesitate to reach out! I’m more than happy to have a conversation.
This post first appeared online as a two part interview for Aerospace Xelerated’s Ada Lovelace week posts.
