Women Who Shaped Me

I’m a self-taught engineer. While molding myself into an engineer, I haven’t had the chance to have mentors or even peers that I can talk and learn from. At the beginning of my journey I was alone trying to figure things out from first principles. As a substitute I turned to prominent figures on the internet who were sharing their thoughts in public.

They shaped my views on technology and engineering a lot. They were all women. Following these people was not a deliberate decision. I definitely didn’t choose them just because they are women. I wasn’t even aware that I’d picked them as my role models. I only understood that I did retrospectively.

Julia Evans

When I first encountered Julia’s blog, she was working at Stripe. She was the one who inspired me to start writing on my blog. Her attitude towards learning in public and doing experiments with the computer was deeply influential for me.

Jessie Frazelle

I think Jessie was still working at Microsoft when I first started reading her posts. I was always fascinated with containers—first because I didn’t understand how they work and then because I understood—and she was the container queen. I still think of her when I use the term “hacker.”

rachelbythebay

I don’t know who Rachel really is but her writing was very influential in my career. Her technical depth is unmatched. I think she alone taught me not to cut corners and care about the reliability of my code. She’s still writing on her blog but my stupid RSS reader is unable to conform to her rules so I can’t regularly read her writings.

Charity Majors

I think Charity was about to found Honeycomb when I started following her. That’s probably why I learned more about the people side of things from her than the technical. Nevertheless, her thoughts were immensely important for me since I was forced to assume leadership positions so early in my career.

These four women were my role models and they shaped me a lot even though I’ve never met them. After nine years in my career, I still think about them.

Happy International Women’s Day to all women around the world!