Technology

Women in Tech: Augmenting The Reality

Women in Tech

The area of Augmented Reality is perspective and prosperous, so it attracts talented developers and QA engineers who appreciate working in the industry and learning something new. There are a lot of successful women among tech specialists. This article focuses on their career paths, challenges, experiences, and projects. We will find out whether women meet the challenges related to their gender in work. For this, we interviewed experienced QA engineers.             

QA Engineer at MobiDev

Dariia Bondarieva 
QA Engineer at MobiDev

Dariia graduated from the University of Radioelectronics with a BA in Computer Science. Initially, Dariia faced a problem: her family didn’t support her choice. Most of Dariia’s relatives worked as mechanical engineers and geologists and were involved in natural sciences. For this reason, they tried to convince our heroine to choose another direction. Of course, relatives were worried about Dariia because she had chosen a difficult way about which nobody could give her advice. Her good results in informatics, mathematics and physics inspired hope.

Dariia has been working in IT for seven years. She believes that this area allows QA engineers to fulfil their own potential. It’s not simple and monotonous work like you hear from time to time. If you want to work as a QA, you should always learn, become better, and look for new approaches, because all technologies are getting old fast. 

One of the most significant of Dariia’s experiences is connected to a project with Augmented Reality. She worked with the natural environment and tried testing the AR app in motion. This testing in motion was performed at different speeds. QA engineers walked, ran, rode in the car and train, and flew the plane. 

To become better at her job, Dariia read many thematic books: Handbook of Virtual Environments: Design, Implementation, and Applications. Kelly S. Hale, Kay M. Stanney. Augmented Reality: Principles and Practice. Tobias Höllerer, Dieter Schmalstieg. Handbook of Augmented Reality. Furht, B.  

Her experience with Augmented Reality was useful when she started to work with Mixed Reality. Also, she shared her knowledge and experience with colleagues who would run into the same tasks. All that happened during tech talks. When Dariia started her new project with Mixed Reality, she was sure that it must be easy. However, she understood that QA engineers shouldn’t ever think that they know everything. The new project means new challenges. Dariia understood that while she was working with the project dedicated to Mixed Reality. With the development team, she had a great chance to try the HoloLens helmet and plunge into this magical world. They learned to place virtual objects in the real world, tracked the source of the sound, and tried to broadcast it correctly in the helmet.

Elena has higher education in the field of Economics Cybernetics, but previously she graduated from college where she was trained as a software developer. She got into IT accidentally. Elena worked at a private joint-stock company when her colleague noticed her pedantic approach to work and recommended to succeed at a new profession – QA engineer. Elena tried a little project to familiarize herself with the new profession and completed courses. After that, she worked on different projects at local companies. Her experience in the area now includes six years of work. Quality Assurance is an indispensable part of Elena’s life.                 

Perfectionism, time management, good command of English, and diplomacy skills have helped her in gaining a new profession. Elena worked in different companies and has rich experience from those jobs, but things didn’t always go smoothly. When she worked at the first company, she faced a high workload and absence of the support that could help her to grow as a professional.           

Nowadays, Elena is a QA Engineer’s Team Leader. Her relatives appreciate her achievements, and Elena enjoys her team successes. As a Team Leader, Elena considers it her main task to discover new talents in QA and support members of her team who have already formed. She is fond of the job candidates’s excitement, as well as their first conscious steps and decisions in the profession. 

Elena mentions that the position of QA is usually underestimated because lots of people take it as the simplest way to enter IT. You need to understand that Quality Assurance implies continuous self-development combined with improving and expanding technologies. A QA engineer should communicate with all stakeholders and collect information about the system. 

Elena worked on different projects – from CRM systems to trade platforms and crypto-projects. She mentions that each project was a chance to test and improve her skills. In general, the IT area differs from others in that it gives more freedom and respect. If you work on self-development, have a good mentor, and the desire, you can prosper here regardless of gender.   

To sum up, women take part in the development of AR solutions for different niches. This area is predicted to grow in the coming years, so the number of specialists involved in software development for AR will grow. Women do not feel any obstacles to career advancement.

Comments
To Top

Pin It on Pinterest

Share This