Wong joins Domo as SVP of engineering, gives lessons on career growth, females in industry
Catherine Wong[/caption]
Domo, the business intelligence startup, hired Adobe’s Catherine Wong as its senior vice president of engineering.
Wong previously was vice president of engineering at Adobe’s digital marketing unit in Utah. Wong started her career at Omniture, which Adobe later purchased, in 2000 as a software engineer. She has a degree in computer science from Brigham Young University. She will report to Domo’s chief technology officer Daren Thayne.
Prior to the announcement we sat down with Wong to talk about her career, female engineers and Utah recruiting. Here is a partial transcript of that conversation.
Career Longevity
If you look the industry norm the pattern is to jump between companies. I feel really lucky and grateful. I did change roles every couple years. For me it was a great fit to do that all within the same organization. I loved that. It was a really great way to learn. But I also think its great to jump between companies to get that same experience.
If you have the drive, and a company and a management team that really believes in that and is able to cultivate their employees and offer those opportunities, it is phenomenal.
Identifying a mentor
As you’re looking for mentors you’re looking for elements of what you want to learn and emulate. Find natural rapport. It’s a hard thing to force. Mentors are also looking for people who have the energy and desire.
For Wong, mentors have included Kevin Lynch (VP of technology at Apple and former Adobe CTO), Josh James (Omniture co-founder and Domo CEO), Brett Error (former Omniture CTO and Domo chief scientist) and Brad Rencher (Adobe’s senior vice president and general manager of digital marketing).
Career Growth
If [growing your career is] something you desire, make sure you are communicating that clearly with your manager and your mentor and that you’re looking for opportunities to try different roles or functions. You can benefit from a strong spirit of mentorship and an environment that encourages you to raise your hand.
Coming out of school, I had, perhaps, the misperception that you have to know how to do something before you can even raise your hand to do it. There is a feeling of ‘I didn’t learn that thing yet, so how do I do it?’
What really helped me was hearing the message that even though I hadn’t done something before there was no reason that I couldn’t learn to do it or couldn’t participate or learn from those who have done it before. That message was really encouraging.
You can naturally grow into something with the support of an organization and with a lot of hard work.
The most important thing I learned early in my career was how it really is all about the people — customers and employees. While we do work in technology, I was very fortunate to have mentors who showed me so many great examples of how to center everything around customers and the teams of employees of an organization. That’s probably the most influential lesson I received from mentors early on.
Increasing females in computer science
In a lot of cases there are stereotypes. Girls or women haven’t seen computer science as a field that women are in. There is not an awareness.
You can certainly increase exposure at a college level, but the opportunity lies with the younger grades if we really want to increase it broadly. We’re starting to see that happening. We have some great programs here in Utah.
Utah relocation
People wind up coming because when they visit the area they experience the wonderful surroundings. If you’re into an active lifestyle, Utah resonates really strongly. Utah is also so family friendly. There are neighborhood activities. There is a community here that people feel they are joining. The caliber of people you get to work with also helps, as well as the different types of tech companies emerging here.
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