Leveling Up: How Women in Tech Continue to Rise

One tech leader shares her advice for navigating the upward climb.

Written by Zach Baliva
Published on Nov. 16, 2023
A tech leader gives a speech onstage.
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There’s still work to be done. 

It’s a common response to questions about the outlook of women working in tech. To be sure, progress has been made. About 20 years ago, women made up less than 10 percent of the tech workforce. Today, that number is close to 35 percent. 

While the gains are encouraging, the numbers only tell part of the story. Women are thriving in the industry, but they aren’t making it to leadership positions in parity. In fact, according to DDI’s 2023 Global Leadership Forecast, the number of women in tech leadership roles has fallen to 28 percent. 

Becca Henegar works at Sure. She’s made her way through this landscape and into management by prioritizing collaboration, taking ownership of decisions and maintaining a growth mindset. Here’s what Henegar had to say about what it takes to stand out in the new tech landscape. 

 

Becca Henegar
Engineering Manager • Sure

Sure aims to make insurance accessible by demystifying the process, bringing transparency and ease to the insurance cycle.

 

How can individual contributors prepare for roles in management?

The shift from contributing as an individual to a management role requires a change in focus and responsibility from specific deliverables to understanding and owning the broader objectives and impact of the team’s work as a collective. I’ve found that this shift comes easier when I can proactively and consistently seek opportunities to improve issues and close gaps in my team’s systems or processes. 

It’s also necessary to take ownership of the work my team delivers and be accountable for the outcomes, even when I don’t directly do the work. This includes being supportive when issues arise, answering questions from external teams and doing everything I can to ensure that all projects are delivered successfully.

I also work to prioritize collaboration. Everyone has something to learn and something to offer from working closely with others. 

Everyone has something to learn and something to offer from working closely with others.”

Pairing up with people in your discipline will solidify your understanding of the work, build trust and empathy, and provide opportunities for mentorship. Working closely with people outside of your discipline while working towards a shared goal will also help keep all parties aligned and deepen your understanding of how the team’s work impacts the company.

 

Share a moment or achievement that accelerated your career.

Before working at Sure, I spent the entirety of my career at my previous employer. I was a software engineer and team lead for over eight years. As a leader in the software engineering department for the first six years of my time there, I felt like I had a solid grasp on the objectives, technical systems and domain of each team in the department. In 2020, I made an internal switch from the software engineering department to the data science department. When I made that transition, I quickly realized that there was a whole world inside the company that I had no knowledge of before. I was humbled by the influx of new problems to solve, new business contexts to understand and new technologies to learn.

This transition from leader and subject matter expert to novice was jarring at the time, but it was necessary for me to maintain a growth mindset and continue pushing myself in my career. This opportunity allowed me to put everything into perspective and apply what I had learned as a software engineer into practice. It taught me the value of prioritizing continuous growth over mastery.

 

What is one trait or skill all good managers have?

Empathy. Managers are ultimately responsible for the health and output of their team, which requires creating an environment where people feel seen, understood and valued.

 

 

Responses have been edited for length and clarity. Images provided by Shutterstock and listed companies.