Discover has a Quiz to Make a Match with your Perfect Career, and the Best Answer is More Women in Tech

By: Jennifer Burns, head of candidate brand at Discover

I’ve always admired that it’s called Grace Hopper Celebration. To us at Discover, it is so much more than a conference or convention. It is the largest gathering of female technologists in the world. That alone deserves headlines — but for this celebration we decided to set the bar higher: we’ve challenged ourselves to make job offers to attendees to help fill our more than 300 open positions across technology and data science.

There will be a lot of companies in attendance and not a lot of time, yet we know the hunt can feel even more overwhelming for the candidates themselves. So we’ve found a way to be both fun and helpful. We’re debuting an interactive quiz that helps match candidates’ strengths with our open roles and hopefully helps them learn a little bit about themselves along the way.

Ask yourself, would you rather go to a party or a movie? Explore new roads or follow the map? Do you usually stand your ground or find common ground? Speaking of hot-button issues…what’s your position on pineapple on pizza?

These questions may not seem like they probe deep into your psyche, and they’re not meant to. We don’t want to cause stress, because there are no wrong answers. (Except pineapple pizza. There’s only one right answer for that one.)

But truly, the only wrong answer would be feeling like you have to hide your personality at work. We are looking for a wide variety of personalities to fit a variety of tech roles. Quiz takers can discover if their profile is a match to:

• The Tech Translator, whose adventurousness and initiative makes them great business analysts and project managers.
• The Rockstar Coder, whose strategic and precise approach helps them soar as software developers and cloud engineers.
• The Data Boss, whose considerate personality and problem-solving abilities lend them to roles as data analysts and data scientists.
• Or the Digital Disruptor, whose dynamic persona and love of learning could lead them to numerous tech roles across sectors!

You can take the quiz at our Grace Hopper Celebration booth or after the celebration on our careers website.¹ I know I’m not the only one who’d be interested to hear where you land. We especially hope those who take the quiz at our booth get a chance to speak with a Discover employee that matches your Make a Match profile. We’re not just a financial institution, but more of a tech company, and we’re counting on the next wave of tech talent to bring new ideas to the table every day. We’re here to make the best experience possible for our customers — and because of the minds like those at Grace Hopper Celebration, we’re getting better at it.

But why this event in particular? Well, if you haven’t heard of AnitaB.org, it’s Grace Hopper Celebration’s organizing company. I bring it up because its mission is reminiscent of how Discover seeks to do business: it’s about envisioning a future where those who dream up the technology mirror those for whom it is built. If the latest tech is meant for 100 percent of the people, we want the people developing it to represent this audience.

With the latest tech in mind, a Discover sponsorship of Grace Hopper Celebration provides us with a great platform and set of tools to enhance both our technology efforts and our diversity — especially as it relates to female talent. And hiring diverse talent — across the whole company — allows new and unique ideas to be brought into the workplace.

You never know how the next great idea will come to you or your company. We’re betting a quiz can be where it starts.

The same way we treat our employees is how we treat all applicants — with respect. Discover Financial Services is an equal opportunity employer (EEO is the law). We thrive on diversity & inclusion. You will be treated fairly throughout our recruiting process and without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or veteran status in consideration for a career at Discover.

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¹The quiz is a fun exercise only and not a test or a scientific tool. The results will not be used in the hiring process or used to evaluate your background or qualifications. We welcome you to visit our Discover Careers site to learn more and formally apply for any roles of interest to you! You may also apply without completing this quiz.