Four questions for a Misbehaver: Tiffany B. Brown

Kicking off our new weekly feature that will highlight women working in technology, web developer Tiffany B. Brown took time out to answer a few of my questions about what she's up to and her experience in the industry.

Misbehaving:  Tell me a little bit about who you are and what you spend your days doing.

Tiffany B. Brown:  By day, I am a web developer in the communications office of the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech). I design and develop web sites for various departments on campus on a LAMP platform. Since we're very big on web standards, everything I code uses table-free XHTML and CSS.

At night, I am freelance web designer-developer and blogger. I work on small web-dev projects, typically as a subcontractor for larger web firms with sales staffs :-). I also write three blogs:  my personal blog (www.tiffanybbrown.com), which is mostly about web design and development; BlackFeminism.org, a blog about race, gender and politics issues; and CulturedWino.com, which is about wine.

Actually, my "night job" is where I learn most of my new skills. I can experiment with new ways of doing things, and new technology that I don't get the opportunity to do at my day job.

M:  As a woman in technology, what's been your proudest moment or most gratifying experience?

TBB:  My proudest moment happened the other day. My department hired a new manager for my team. During our "get-to-know-you" meeting, she said that people were gushing about how clean my code was. Hearing that was a huge confidence boost. To think you're good is one thing. To hear through the grapevine that your colleagues also think you're good is another.

Smaller moments of joy come when I learn something new, solve a problem or finish a project. I try to have those moments three times a week.

M:  If you could turn back time and do anything differently in your tech career, what would it have been?

TBB: If I could do it again, I would have gone to school for tech. I got a journalism degree -- a *print* journalism degree. I graduated college just as many newspapers were starting to go online. I quickly figured out, however, that online was where I needed to be.

Working in journalism as an online producer was my entree into geekier things. But in retrospect -- especially now that I'm actually *programming* stuff -- I wish I had a theoretical and methodological foundation to draw from.

You know what's funny? My dad is a programmer, and has been for at least 30 years. He chose not to push me down that path. I didn't even have a computer until I went to college. I could smack him now. Had he pushed me, or at least nudged me gently, I might have been able to cash in on DotComBubble 1.0 (hee hee).

M:  What advice would you give to young women considering a career in technology?

TBB:  Be brave. Don't be afraid to be the only woman in a room. Don't be afraid to speak up. Don't be afraid to ask questions, even if you think they're stupid.

Be interdisciplinary. Technology is a commodity. Thinking of ways to applying technology and also understanding how people use technology is where the value lies. Bioinformatics, for example, uses computer models to gain insight into biological questions. It's not "the future" of technology. This cross-disciplinary approach to technology is happening right now.

M:  Now that's good advice.  Thanks for your time, Tiffany!

Are you a woman working in the tech industry interested in being featured here on misbehaving?  Or do you have someone in mind who should be?  Let me know at ginatrapani at gmail dot com.