The key to success as women in tech? Learnings from Acumatica Summit - record your wins, say yes, and don’t fixate on perfect answers

Working in technology can be a challenging, and sometimes lonely, place for women but there are ways to navigate this. 

For Stephanie Valenti, VP of Sales at FinTech BILL, 'Say, yes' has been her career mantra. Valenti has made a lot of pivots during her career, starting out in sales and progressing from individual contributor into leadership, she’s also served as CRO and COO, leading finance, HR, operations, and even a manufacturing plant. She notes:

If I look backwards, it was all about a whole lot of saying yes, despite the risk, despite the preparation, despite if I was ready. Someone would come to me and say, we want you to go take this lateral role, or we want you to go move across the country. And I'm like, alright, didn't even really think about it.

But Valenti is now reaching the point of the career where she’s considering when to start saying no. She adds:

I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but after all of this time of saying yes, yes, yes, it starts to take a toll a little bit. I don't want not to have the opportunity, but it's balancing when is the right time for each [opportunity] as it presents itself.

The opposite was true for Shary Dye, Major Partner Account Manager at Acumatica. She found herself at a point in her career where she was saying no too much, specifically to advancement. At the beginning of her career, she was able to advance very quickly and manage a lot of teams. She then took a step into being an individual contributor in sales. She quips:

It was wonderful. I did not have to wipe noses or rear ends in my career anymore because I was already doing that at home with my children, and I just didn't have any more to give.

Dye was working at a software company that kept asking her to go back into management. She kept saying no. She explains:

This is good. I'm making a lot of money. I'm having fun. I'm just not ready, and I don't want that headache of having to manage people again.

Joining her next company gave Dye the push she needed to go back into management.  Under new ownership, with new investors and new management, the business leaders were making decisions which were having negative impacts on the customers and employees. Dye explains:

I was ready to leave because employees weren't happy anymore. And I was complaining to my friends, to my peers, and letting them know, this isn't the company I want to be at anymore.

Once again, she was asked to move into a leadership role within the company, and originally she said no, relishing her position as a lone wolf. But then, one of her good friends at work convinced her that she could do great things in that role. Dye adds:

She said, 'Be the difference. See if you can be the change. Instead of bailing on this, take a shot, if you're going to leave anyway'. And I did, and it was wonderful. I really feel that made an impact. I was a mama bear for my team.

Her new role saw her leading half of North America and customer sales for the business, and got her a seat at the table. Dye notes:

Had I not said yes to that, I never would have the opportunity to make change in my organization.

Self-promotion

One of the areas where women often struggle in the workplace is self-promotion, advocating for themselves for new positions or opportunities.

As a way round this, Dye has been instigating her own regular performance reviews for a few years now. Instead of viewing performance evaluations as a once-a-year necessity, which she would cram for last-minute like an exam on what she’d done in the last year, Dye now jots down her achievements on a weekly basis. She explains:

They can be big things that have KPIs around them, but they can also be things I'm proud of, as far as things I've done to help my team or my peers.

Instead of waiting until the end of the year, she takes the initiative with her manager on a quarterly basis to go through those notes. Dye adds:

I say, 'Here's the things I'm proud of, here's the initiatives I've been a part of, the cross-functional teams and projects I've been on that you may not even know about, and I'm really proud of these things, and I just wanted to let you know what I'm doing'.

Doing this has resulted in a lot more opportunities coming her way, including presenting a keynote at the recent Acumatica Summit. She says:

I wouldn't have had that opportunity if I hadn't shared with my boss some of the things I've been doing internally. A lot of people assume their bosses know exactly what they're working on, but in reality, that's not always the case. So the fact that you're being proactive, to have these quarterly meetings and highlight the things you're working on, it keeps you top of mind without selling yourself.

Three Ps

Helen Yu, founder and CEO of Tigon Advisory, is a firm believer in the three Ps as a means of boosting your chance of career progression without having to do the hard sell about yourself. The first of these is preparation - doing your homework so you always know who you're interacting with while at work. She notes:

Every single interaction, even in the elevator, could lead to some bigger opportunity.

Yu learnt this lesson at her first job, which was in the mail room at CNA Insurance. When one of the senior executives showed up, she started talking to him, asking him questions, and mentioned she’d seen him on TV. He asked her why she was working in the mail room at the business – it was while she was studying for her MBA – and gave her a number to call. Yu adds:

A week later, I became the most junior person on the Treasury Department. Because I was going through my MBA in finance and accounting.

Her advice was, while life isn’t always that lucky, ensure that when you have that moment, be ready for the opportunity by doing your homework in advance.

Second of the three Ps is presence. Yu explains:

When I say presence, it’s not how you look, but being present when you interact with people, and you are there to really listen to them, listen to understand.

The third and final P is partnership. When she joined Marketo, Yu wasn’t familiar with the industry, as switching fields from finance to marketing was a completely different type of industry. She says:

I had to pick up people to learn about the field, everything was different. So I set up one on ones with people; it's more important to have powerful questions than perfect answers. That leads you to all sorts of opportunities in the longer term. Partner with someone along the way.

Seeking out champions across different functions is something that has worked for Valenti. She notes:

One of the things that I find that we do as women sometimes is, we take on a lot, and we don't share and collaborate. So if you're not comfortable tooting your own horn, another way to think about this is, let's say you put together a project, you have the document, you have the execution of how you want to deploy that project, share that with cross-functional partners with a simple question - does anyone have any feedback on how they can support this project or add in value?

This is a way to champion your own work without doing a sales pitch on it, while also getting valuable feedback. As Valenti says:

People love to help other people. It's in our nature. So that's another way I would think about making sure that you're getting yourself out there.

My take

Some excellent tips from three women who have switched through many different roles and fields during their careers, gathering plenty of useful advice along the way. In part two, we’ll be covering how to get comfortable asking the hard questions and why risk-taking is crucial to progression.