I am a (female) software engineer - AMA

[IWriteCode]

(namechanged)

Computer programmer, software developer, coder...really not that interesting, but since there are a few other threads about careers...AMA!

TEDx My little one isnt of a school age yet however i believe a fair amount of primary schools use Scratch or a variant of the assist with learning.

Have a look at this. scratch.mit.edu/

Thank you OP, I might PM you soon. But one last quick question to you and whatsmyname - How many years experience do you think someone would need to go down the contractor route? There's obviously a degree of risk too as if you don't get contracts you don't get paid, but I'm guessing there is enough work around?

I have friends who contracted from day 1 out of Uni!

I think it depends on the type of role you will going for and daily/hourly rate you expect.

Having a niche skill always helps.

Do you prefer very detailed requirements or just an idea of what the customer wants?

There's also a need for creative skills, to design front-end user interfaces and so on.

Def fewer back end devs at the companies I've worked at (I'm on the product side rather than architecture or engineering), but increasingly seeing more front end, and a fair amount of female QA leads. Also lots of female scrum masters, although that's not a tech role per se. Loads of female designers and product owners though!

Wynona, I like to work very closely with the client, and what I have found in all my years of experience is that what they want is not necessarily what they think they want, so making a very detailed spec is kind of useless as they will keep changing their mind. I don't do Agile methodology per se (a development strategy that is very fashionable right now) but I do believe in iterating, showing progress to the user and frequent communication with them, getting them as involved as possible.

Morning! Appreciate it has been awhile since this thread was posted but I was intrigued as to how you look for new roles. Are you able to share the companies that you work with to look for new roles please?

I'm also in IT and self-employed, 18 months in and I have never looked back!. The nice part about the contracting sector is that I actually get paid the same as my male counterparts. I'm also based in Wales and the market here is good!

What part of the country are you? :)

My son loves computers and I feel it will be an area he will go into. Any advice for tweens to help them?

Have you been patronised by males in IT environment? How do you deal with it?

How old are you?

How do you find time to keep up with all the new tech (if you have kids)? Im a SQL dev branching into cloud and i struggle with time.