It is common knowledge that technology is one of the fastest growing sectors in the job market. There is so much emphasis on technology and software. And this is why tech companies around the world are gradually becoming the most valued by the stock market and investors.
The idea that to work in tech, you must sit behind screens writing code all day, is still pervasive among people outside the discipline. Do you ever see people do fabulous things with tech and wish to do exactly the same, but when you see a line of code, you tell yourself this is definitely not for you? I hear this a lot and yes, it is definitely possible to work in the tech industry without necessarily knowing the intricacies of coding.
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Clearly, technology is shaping the future. And while this is a good development, there is infinite literature describing how a lack of diversity in tech diminishes the quality of teams and subsequently the products they develop. Our lives are not defined by the perspective of only a few subsets of people. Therefore, the technology shaping our lives should not either.
There are so many things you can do in tech that will not require you to touch a line of code. Here are some of them:
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Project Manager
Everything in technology is a project. From the proposal stage, to documenting the scope of work, planning and gathering requirements, to creating the software, attaching it to a hardware, implementing it, monitoring, controlling, fixing, and updating. These are all parts of the software life cycle. And Project Managers are needed to manage these various stages.
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You don’t need to know how to code to be a Project Manager. A PMP certificate will put you ahead when applying for project management roles.
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Product Manager/Product Owner
You are in charge of anything that has to do with a product. From the idea to how it’s made, to who it is sold to, how it is marketed and portrayed, etc. It’s a very lucrative career where you might need some sufficient technical knowledge to understand some things but won’t necessarily code to do the actual work.
Instead, what you basically do is you take the vision or an idea and shape it into a real product by talking to software engineers and customers. You are at the intersection of business, customers, and engineering. You do it by making sure the product is a money maker and strategically aligned with the company, and ends up being implemented as close as possible to what customer wants.
If you currently work in an IT firm, note that product manager role is the fastest track into senior leadership. If you can come up with a money-maker idea and bring it to the market, then that’s a great way to be promoted. Most of the VPs and C-level execs come from the PM background.
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User Interface/User Experience Designer
User Interface Designers establish the look and feel of a software’s interface. UI designers are often responsible for:
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- Visual design through each stage from brainstorming to engineering
- Clear communication of ideas and instructions to users through well-designed wireframes, storyboards, user flows, and sitemaps
- Making the interface a cohesive whole by intentionally designing each element of the site or web app to ensure they all work together.
User Experience Designer
User experience designers (UX) create products with the end user in mind. Basically, their primary goal is increasing user satisfaction.
A few key responsibilities include:
- User research: understanding users through interviews or other methods like card sorting
- Information architecture: knowing the most effective ways to structure content on a site or app
- Data-driven design: making design choices based on data analysis
- Wireframing and prototyping: building test versions of websites/web apps
User experience (UX) and user interface (UI) positions are different, but they work closely together. Sometimes you will see them combined into one job. Their overall goal is to create a website or mobile app that is intuitive and pleasurable for the user. UX/UI specialists make their product stand out for user-friendliness and aesthetics.
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Software Quality Tester
Software Quality Testers (SQTs) test the quality of software products prior to public launch to ensure they are working properly.
The field is related to, but separate from, quality assurance (QA). SQTs run various functional, stress, and scalability tests across numerous customer scenarios in efforts to “break” the software with a goal of eliminating bugs and improve the quality improvement of the final product.
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Data Analyst
The bigger the tech world gets, the more data there is to sort through and understand. The goal of data analysts is to inspect data in order to discover useful information, draw conclusions about things like website clicks and sales, and help with decision-making by making suggestions of how to best use what the data presents.
Data analysts take large sums of data and break it down into usable form using graphs, charts, lists, reports, and more. They play an integral role in figuring out the best opportunities for progress and growth for a company.
Data analytics jobs are perfect for those possessing an affinity for data set analysis, trend spotting, and strength in conveying the findings in layman’s terms.
Strong mathematical and analytical skills are key to the role data analysts play, notably knowledge of statistics – collection and organisation of large sets of data are central to the job description.
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6. Technical Writing
Someone has to document everything that goes into developing a website, app, or product. Alongside all of that code and technical jargon is someone who’s writing reports to make everything comprehensible for non-techies.
Technical writers focus on using clear, concise language/content to communicate with readers. They create things like user manuals, press releases, disclaimers, technical reports, specification reports, scripts for help and tutorial videos, and more.
You may be right for a technical writing position if you have a solid grasp of a language and can break complicated topics down to their most basic components. Programmes, websites, scripts, and nearly every other type of product need extensive documentation. It can be instructions for users, requirements for developers, press releases, technical reports, specifications, or a wide range of other types of documents.
To be an effective technical writer, it’s instructive to have an understanding of the sort of thing that you’re writing about, whether it’s an app or a set of mechanical engineering blueprints. Being concise, descriptive, and well-organised are also very useful writing skills to have in this field. Many technical writers get their start in the field that they work in, but others begin as freelancers or writers of other kinds.
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Business Analysts
From the outside, it might seem like the software development cycle is pretty simple: a customer (within or outside of a company) tells the developers what they need, the developers create it, and that’s that. But it’s a lot more complicated. The requirements that the customer has rarely translate to technical requirements smoothly — there’s a lot of interpretation and translation that has to take place before everyone understands each other.
This is where the business analyst comes in. Their job is to bridge the gap between customers and developers by gaining a solid understanding of what the customer wants the software or product to do. This understanding is then turned into a series of tasks that the developers can deal with, one at a time. After going through all of these tasks, the developers will have created a product that satisfies the customer. (That’s the idea, anyway!)
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Marketing/Sales
When it comes down to it, almost every tech company’s goal — like companies in any other field — is to make money. This means that they need to sell products. And that means that people who have the skills to market and sell those products are in high demand.
What sets marketing and sales in the tech world apart from many other fields is that companies are often in tune with up-and-coming methods of marketing and advertising. This can be appealing to many people who want to work in tech without programming.
For example, search engine optimisation, search engine marketing, pay-per-click advertising, content marketing, web production, and social media marketing are all important fields that are relatively new within marketing and advertising that tech companies are likely to be hiring for. Some of them require more technical knowledge than others. But they all benefit from having a good understanding of the technology that the company is selling.
Marketing and sales positions in tech range in requirements and skill levels. Yet, the main goal is to get your company’s name into a large audience’s brains. Once content has been produced, you have to market it.
9. Legal, Compliance, Risk, Audit, and Strategy
For these types of roles, tech companies hire managers and candidates with real experience dealing with current regulations.
Those are always changing, but they do want to hire people with risk and regulatory experience. They are the middlemen between the developers and the business, not individuals producing revenue, but rather supporting the front-, middle- and back-office.
Technology strategy roles are typically for professionals who have worked at management consulting or Big Four professional services firms. Fintech firms are looking for people with business transformation experience to build out their internal strategy groups with the IT or operations department.
Other roles include and are not limited to accountants, Human resource personnel, graphics designers and a ton of others!
Educate yourself more, polish your resume and get a job in tech!