Video Transcript

Kelly Luo, IBM software engineer

Working in web development
So, hi my name is Kelly. I'm a software engineer at IBM and I’ve been a software
engineer for four years.
So, what drew me to web development was that towards the end of my college career
I became more curious about the impact and future of technology since it affects our
everyday lives. So, I began taking computer science courses and I became passionate
about building things from nothing, and I wanted to use the skills that I learned to
bring a positive impact to whatever industry or product that I could work on. And I
loved that front end development specifically was at the intersection of coding and
design and it allows you to be a critical thinker while also being creative at the same
time.
So, at first, I didn't know that this was the right career for me. I just knew I had a
natural curiosity for coding and problem solving. And the more I worked in my job and
continued to do well and thrive in it. I knew it was the right path.
So, at IBM it's exciting because I'm able to solve many problems for IBM employees
as a whole, IBM developers, and even IBM's CEO, CIO, and other executives. So, I'm
able to make process views seamless for different groups within IBM, make their lives
easier, and enable them to make more intelligent and informed decisions. And while
doing this successfully for our users I found myself loving what I do and wanting to
explore and gain experience in each area of the stack to deliver better products and I
just became passionate about the problems I was solving and so that's how I knew
this was the right career for me.
So, my first manager, Max Pugliese, and my first team members mentored me early in
my career by helping me home in on my skills and focus on depth rather than breadth.
And that's why early in my career my focus was a lot more on front end development.
So, Max and my team members really helped me grow technically and figure out what
I was interested in. And then leaders like Jill Fourie and her team also sponsored me
to go to Grace Halper and other conferences so through these opportunities I was
able to grow even more professionally and personally. I was able to learn a lot and
then bring back that new found knowledge to my organization. So, the leaders,
mentors, and colleagues I’ve interacted with during my time at IBM, they've all
inspired me in some way and have taught me something.
So, the best career advice I’ve received was to always be authentic and to build your
own personal brand at work so that it aligns with your personal values and beliefs.
And when this happens that's when you are your most authentic self at work, and you
really enjoy and are passionate about what you do. So, the exciting part about the
applications I work on is that they keep IBM running and they help IBMer's be

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productive. So, the applications and products I develop bring a better world to
IBMers. Which then enables them to bring a better world to everyone else. I get to
make that positive change every day and with the user feedback we get, we are able
to make it a better place together. And, in general, the ideas that you can bring to life
from your imagination onto a computer screen can be used to do good and bring
positive change to the world.
On a day-to-day basis I meet with my team to give updates about the progress on the
work assigned to me and throughout the day I'll be tackling a new technical problem
from a different area of the stack, so it varies day-to-day there. And also get to
collaborate with other developers, UI designers, UX researchers, data scientists,
product owners and we could determine technical feasibility, defining technical
requirements, or discussing optimal solutions.
My favorite part of my job is that I can challenge myself every day with new problems
and it's never routine or dull in that aspect. I am always learning something new and
going through learning phases when I work on something I don't know about and that
makes me a job not tiring and it makes it exciting.
I would tell them to find the value that you bring to your team and to capitalize on
that. For example, if you're a new team member with no experience you can bring
new ideas from your schooling or training and give a fresh perspective. There's always
a unique value that you can bring to your team and organization. And two, I would say
always be up for a challenge. In web development there's almost always an answer
and a way to do whatever the request is and when you utilize the resources that you
have available to learn, the possibilities for what you can create are endless.

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