Built In Colorado: 4 women share how they carved career paths in tech

Wunder's own Product Manager, Katie Lynch, recently sat down with Built in Colorado's editorial team to discuss how she found a way to make a tangible, positive impact on the environment by turning to a career in tech. You can read the full article here:

https://www.builtincolorado.com/2019/02/28/colorado-women-in-tech

Share the story of how you got into engineering.

I graduated from Duke with a clear focus on building a career that made an environmental impact, so it should come as no surprise that my first job was at an energy efficiency startup in Boulder. It's there that I realized the impact that technology can have on our environmental problems, but I also discovered that there are disturbingly few startups building useful, scalable tools to solve those problems.

As a result, I immersed myself in the software development process and got a first-rate education in how engineering teams function. Eventually, I joined Wunder as employee number two, where — for the past four years — I have been helping to build a solar financing platform for large-scale solar projects across the country. Essentially, I found a way and a place to maximize my environmental impact.

What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced in your career, and how have you worked to overcome it?

At various stages throughout my career, I’ve definitely experienced a lot of self-doubts. Particularly when you're in a new role at a young company, it can be hard to differentiate between what you don’t know and what nobody knows. This used to stress me out a lot and cause me to think that I needed to ask others for answers and opinions all the time. But, after looking back on some of those scenarios, I’ve come to realize that my initial instinct or plan is usually right from the beginning. Now, I think I make decisions in the face of ambiguity much more quickly.

Any advice or tips for other women pursuing a career in engineering?

If you’re lucky, you’ll be in a job where you are regularly asked for your opinion. If not, provide it anyway, provide it confidently, and don’t be embarrassed to be wrong. Even if you're new to software or to your company, you can still offer a thoughtful perspective to the problem at hand. In fact, that’s exactly what you were hired for.