Niamh Savill, Senior Solutions Architect at Halo: Breaking Into Tech Without a Tech Degree

Hi, my name is Neve. I'm a senior solutions architect at the Halo Zero. We employed 200 people across the world and this is my big big flood. Do you need a bit of a type of individual or can that be trained? I think you have to be challenge driven. I don't think you could walk into Halo to be a coach. Tell me for your journey. The approach to me is acting. You want to be on the team. And I was like, "Hell, yes, I want to be on the team." Once you're a spicy young woman who may come across Halo, I want to get into a technology industry. If you want to do it or you're a great nut, do it. What should do if they flip? What gets you at a bid in the morning to flip the doover? I think. Hi, my name is Neve. I'm looking forward to speaking with Jack. I'm a little bit apprehensive, but excited. I think it's generally quite good to represent women in the tech industry when speaking publicly. So that's why I'm looking forward to talking about them. The reason I say yes is because I think it's a really good opportunity. I haven't met Jack before, but I'm expecting quite a fun conversation. My colleagues have said it's been. I hope that people take away from the episode that if they really want something just to be brave and shoot for it. Hi, Jack. Let's go. So welcome to my do-they-flip-how are we? I'm really good. Thank you. Have I you? Yeah, not bad. You're not bad. I love it when it's summer. 'Cause it puts you. Put everyone in a better mood, doesn't it? Oh, yeah. It's just the bit of an end. It's just coming down. All happy vibes. Absolutely. And we're going to have happy vibes today. Everyone learn all about your career. I want to start with your first job. Like, tell me a little bit about how did the world of work happen for you when you first got into your first job? And what did that teach you about life? Yeah, my first job was working for my dad. So he worked at an agricultural firm, but he had a site, a cell of selling toys on eBay. So I was packaging all of the toys because I was basically just desperate for pocket money and also looking at the toys that he was selling. So that was my first job. I might have been 12. I might have been 14 around this age. So really pretty young. And then after that, I did a job at the Kellop. So we've got some connections. Yeah, we have. I was a bit of just like shelves and second there. Then to university, I did a job at the SU. So I was working in the kitchen. After uni, I worked in a Chinese supermarket. It was the use of my degree. And then I found pay left. So in terms of the world of work, what did it teach you about work? Because sometimes you go into work and you don't know about certain stuff. What was one of those moments that you just thought, "Oh, I understand work now." I think the first job I had was more about the character building side of working, like how you present yourself and how you speak to people. And also the way that you speak to people is what you get back. I didn't learn more about the typical 9-5 stuff until Highland, basically. But community of skills and things like this was the main takeaway from those jobs. And when it comes to communication, what are your tips to young people on how to communicate in the workplace? Really don't worry about asking multiple times. Or if you think that you are unclear, completely starting again, rephrasing it. And asking back the same question, if what you've had back to you doesn't make sense, just keep kind of pestering almost until you get the answer that you're looking for. I love that. I think that's great advice because actually, I use the saying, "There's no such thing as a city question. "It's the only one that you don't ask." And just so go and give it an ask. And then how did you come across Halo? How did you find Halo? It was just a classic kind of indeed. So really, I was. My partner, he also works in tech. So I was looking for a graduate role because I didn't really want to work in the Chinese supermarket forever. My degree is in Chinese, so it makes me think so. I was working there, but. I think with language degrees, you're often kind of. pushed to say you're siloed into doing translation jobs or just kind of. standard, maybe even sometimes it is just hospitality or retail jobs. And I can't settle for that. I don't want to spend my life doing that. So I was looking on indeed at graduate jobs within Suffolk at the time. And Halo was one of the ones that came up. So I read about it and my partner was like, "That sounds pretty good." So I gave it a go. I had no idea what was going to come about it because on paper with a language degree, I wasn't sure if Halo would be interested, but here I am. Here you are. And how long have you been at Halo? Three years, next month. Wow. And tell me a little bit about that experience and your advice to others that watching these fantastic videos and go, "Actually, I want to be at Halo." Like, tell me for your journey, Halo. So you join and then like, what was your first job in Halo? What was you doing? Up to what you're doing now? So when I first joined, I was on the support desk. The graduate scheme was slightly different to how it is right now. You got paired with a mentor and you kind of shattered their cause and then do the support on the side. My mentor did consultancy and I was really kind of inspired by the work that he was doing. So I decided that that was the path I was going to go down. But about three months into working at Halo, my old boss at the time, she approached me saying, "Hey, I'm launching a new product in January. Do you want to be on the team?" And I was like, "How, yes, I want to be on the team." And then kind of did a bit of support and also just aiding her and kind of initial marketing things like this at the time. And then from January in 22, 23 maybe, I started just doing consultancy work for any of the new projects that kind of came in as well as just on the side help of any sales, help of anything to kind of build the product. And then as we kind of grew and evolved, I stayed in consultancy, but I also helped with more of the sales side of things to improve a concept building up environments for demos. And now I'm also assisting the product manager with kind of development, kind of roadmap, which I'm going to put stuff like this as well. So lots of fairy, different of opportunities. Bit of everything. Bit of everything. How do you build that mindset in terms of encouragement and confidence to put your hand up and say, "Yeah, I'll get involved." "Yes, let me support you. I might not know much right now about this roadmap stuff, but I want to learn." Like, where does that come from? Inherently, I think it came from learning languages. When you're learning a language and you're trying to communicate with an native speaker, most of the time you've got no idea what they're saying, right? But you want to know what they're saying. So you kind of keep asking or even just looking up stuff on the side after your class or whatever it is. And it was kind of the same game here. So obviously when Halo Sierra launched, I knew a little bit about Serum products, but not enough. And then as I spoke to more customers and I got into kind of roadmap development, I would be like, "Okay, well, what do they do?" And just kind of looked into it and found out and then looked that way. What is your most enjoyable experience at Halo? Ooh! What is something that's just like, like, change your whole kind of thinking or it just, one of those moments that highlights that you'd refer back to. Oh, my best ever day at Halo was I went last year on a trip to Miami, probably my best friend at work for a client. They paid for us to, we had to work on the weekend, but then we got some days off for free afterwards. And that was, you know, you've already been paid to go to Miami. So you get a few nice days for free, so I can't complain on that. And when you joined Halo, did you think that it would be giving you the opportunity to travel? Because I've interviewed some of your other colleagues and they also got the opportunity to travel. It seems like there is opportunity to travel. In the job role, it did say it, but I was expecting, like, "Hull," or, you know, "Liverpool" or something. I wasn't expecting Miami and I think soon we're going to get some maybe, like, Singapore or something like this coming up. So that's cool. And what would you say is like your life lesson, since, was something that Halo just taught you that you didn't know about yourself, you didn't know about the world of work, you didn't know about technology that's kind of really stuck with you. But it's so okay to be yourself. You don't have to conform to some kind of standard that, you know, the corporate world expects you to. It's just be yourself. The clients will, like, your colleagues will, like, you, and it will make your life just happier in general because you're not ending the day like, "Woo!" And, you know, like, taking off that soon, like, not yourself, basically. And in terms of, again, I ask every Halo colleague, I even ask Paul Fender and CEO of Halo, if you could sum up Halo in one word, what would you sum it up? We've had a number of different kinds of things. words, but what would your word be? I can't do a single word, but I think two, two, three. Yeah, I think, hey, those just got this kind of unity to it, where everybody's going towards the same goal, and everybody's the same similar age and things like this. So there's just this kind of like, everybody is together in unison and working towards the same thing and feel the same thing all the time. So it's just this kind of overwhelming feeling that everybody is in the same boat, and everybody wants the same thing. Did you have any doubt being a female in tech? Because there's so much more that we have to do for the industry to get more young females into technology. For you, what is your journey? I've had a number of leaders who now run Amazon saying when they started, it was so difficult, it's still difficult. But what's your true form on it? I think I've been quite lucky to be honest, maybe in a different company I would have experienced different, but maybe when I applied, I was a bit doubtful, but I don't know whether that was being a woman or just my qualifications today at that point. But hey, I've always felt welcome. I haven't felt like being a woman to help me back anything like this. That's brilliant. And what is your advice to other young women that will look at the job description and go, "Oh, I can't do one thing on there, so I won't apply." Because that's what we've seen in our data, is that if a young woman has one thing that she can't do on that job description she won't apply, but I just apply anyway, do. You can do whatever you want to do. What's your advice to young women who may come across Halo? I want to get into the technology industry. What is your message to them? I mean, for all people, not just women, is it's a wish list, it's not a requirements list. And for women, just don't be shy. We could do everything that a man can do. So if you want that job, you apply for it. I love that. And do you need to know about technology to work in technology? Like, you obviously had your language degree, but did you know much about technology on how your partner was in tech? Not really, no. I would say, when I applied, I could probably squeeze my way through a PowerPoint, but that was about it. I think three years in and what I'm doing now, of course, I need to know about technology, but when I was applying, I didn't really know, no matter what Paul thought I knew. But if you're willing to learn, I guess that's the best thing in which technology it's always, always changing. So you might know everything one day, but then I say, you're not going to know the new things. This just happens. Because there's always change, and there's always something to know. Run me through your, like, what a. It's very hard, especially when you're in a company like Halo, to say what does a typical day is like, because I'm throwing it's different. But like, what are your main kind of objectives throughout the day that you kind of look after and what, like, get involved with? On a typical day, I would say it's mainly probably four to five calls a week, a day, sorry, with different clients, depending on where they are in their projects. So obviously, we talk into them at the beginning, kind of refining what their requirements are, how we're actually going to build their Halo. Of course, it's building out that Halo and kind of, you know, making it do that's bad. And I would be lying if I didn't have some calls, where I'm simply just chatting to the client and building a relationship for some. How is it important. How important is it to build relationships with your colleagues, your clients, and anyone that you're talking to with, that's a career advisor, whether that's someone that you're applying to go to job with, obviously, you found Halo through Indeed. Like, there's a lot of. A lot of young people that will be like, "Where, how, where, how do I start, how, like, what is your advice when it comes to applying for work or taking the next step forward?" Because there is a lot, I get it every day in post-existing dramas, a lot of in-post-existing drama rant. How do they kind of overstep and go, you know what? It's okay, it's going to be all right, I've got this. I think in terms of kind of making impressions with colleagues, clients, random people on the street, who I thought it may be, they don't remember you for your job title or kind of, you know, what degree you have, what work experience you have. They remember you for who you were or who you are. So, you know, I take every day as well, just going to be myself, you know. I'm going to tell them what I'm doing tonight, because that's how you kind of build that bond, right? And you make them trust. And we've even won sales just for being good suppliers and friendly suppliers as well. In terms of the imposter syndrome thing, I think to a degree is something that you have to live with. I don't think you can just get rid of it. You've got imposter syndrome forever, but I think it's kind of remembering every day that you are where you are because of who you are. So, just kind of maintaining that, and you wouldn't be where you were if you hadn't done everything you've already done. You said you got the opportunity to go away with your best friend. Did you know your best friend before you joined Halo or did that individual become your best friend? No, so if I joined my team, I think, maybe six months after the project launched, she joined, I think, two years ago now. So, a little bit after me, but we just get on really, really well, and I've talked to her, even if I don't need to. I'll talk to her every single day. So, when the opportunity for Miami came up, to be honest, I just didn't want to go by myself, so I asked my boss if I could bring her. And he said I could, so we went together and she helped them, but you know, it's a group that was great. I'm seeing a trend. There's a lot of best friends forming Halo, which is fantastic, which is always great to show the culture. Obviously, Paul came on the show last year on My Do They Flip. How would you sum up Paul's leadership and kind of how Paul is a founder? Well, his leadership is very gentle, but I think that's what kind of inspires us to thrive on our own, basically, because he's not like, do this now, has to be done this, this is your job, this is your job, you can kind of be like, well, I make my own decisions. I'll set up my own kind of agenda for today. And also, that needs to do, and we can improve on that. I'll just do it, but you don't have Paul or based on the structure of the leaders, kind of forcing you to do things that even maybe you don't consider important, or just simply aren't important. And does that take you some time to get used to? Or did you pick that up? We've helped you get it with the toys that he, but we're doing the AE-based stuff. Like you're going into an organisation, nine out of ten organisations, you'll go into, and it will be you sit here. You do this by then. And if you don't, this is what's going to happen. For you, you're given the freedom to kind of say, okay, we'll do this, do set your own agenda. Do you need to be a certain type of individual to be able to be self-motivated, obsessed, ambitious, and everything in between? Or can that be trained? I think you have to be challenged, driven. I don't think you could walk into Halo and just expect to like, host through. You have to see a challenge and want to take it. Otherwise, you know, you'll sit on your desk for the first three months, and everyone will need to see you haven't got that kind of pushed for all of the other Halo employees. And did that push in that kind of grip to want to make a difference? Did you bring that into Halo? Or did Halo teach that? Or was it a mix of both? I think I had it, but they have fostered it a bit more. I love that. Because I love people that are ambitious, high performers want more in life, and will just focus on the little bits to make everything else better around them. So I love that approach. What's your message to anyone who wants to apply for Halo today? Where it's unindeed, where it's by watching it, because they're watching this video. What is your message to people? If you want to do it, or you're regret not doing it. I love that. I know you're ready for my final question. Yep. What should do they flip? What gets you out of bed in the morning to flip the do-the? I'm really excited to where Halo Sarah is going as a product right now and working in the team every day is just so exciting. So that's what gets me out there. Well, thank you. Thank you for coming to speak your truth, for coming so smiley, and just being really honest with around the culture, what you do in your role. It really feels like you've found your place to thrive. So thank you. Thanks, Emmett. There we are. [APPLAUSE] How did that go? Oh yeah.