QuickBytes: Challenging biases with Celine Wong, Tech in Asia’s product manager

This special edition of QuickBytes is part of “Women in Focus,” Tech in Asia’s campaign for International Women’s Day 2021. In this series, we hear from women in the Tech in Asia team who are driving the company’s growth and development. The following interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Celine Wong, product manager at Tech in Asia / Photo credit: Celine Wong

Celine Wong is a product manager at Tech in Asia. In this interview, she shares how she found her way to the role and the prejudices she’s had to fight along the way to get there.

For the benefit of our readers, what do you do at Tech in Asia?

I’m a product manager who leads the product and engineering team at Tech in Asia. Broadly speaking, my work is about finding the sweet spot between our users’ needs and the company’s mission and business goals. There’s a lot of collaboration with cross-functional teams to translate that vision into digital products and features.

In recent years, I’ve also been spending a lot of time figuring out new and better ways to grow our subscription products in terms of user base, revenue, and expanded offerings.

How did you arrive at this point in your career? Tell us about your journey and the pivotal moments along the way.

Back in university, I took on a bunch of side hustles, which helped me come to the conclusion that I like building and selling stuff. Being able to successfully market and sell looked important and fun to me, so I pursued that path after graduation, joining a digital marketing agency and then, later, an advertising agency.

I learned a lot and had a lot of fun during this time, but somehow, something was missing. I realized that what I really wanted to do was to influence the product itself. So I doubled down on building things.

But, what to build? Tech products came to mind as the best, most scalable, and efficient way to solve problems, so I went with that. I took the plunge, quitting my job to join a software engineering course.

I learned how to build simple versions of popular apps during the course. I wasn’t an expert or anything, but the world of tech was demystified for me – this was really empowering. I also learned that, unlike some of my counterparts who were focused on refining their code to the nth degree, I was most excited about looking at the problems we were trying to solve with apps and features. I wanted to figure out what exactly to build and how best to deliver it to users, all with the best user experience.

That’s not the job scope of a software engineer, though, is it? So I’d found my calling as a product manager and started applying for relevant roles immediately. I’m grateful to have landed the role at Tech in Asia in 2017. It’s been four years now, and I’m still learning new things every day.

What is your biggest achievement in Tech in Asia?

Helping the company to pivot our free media product into a paid subscription-based one has got to be the highlight. I’m glad to say that all the work and investment has paid off – [subscriptions is] now one of the reliable revenue streams that enables us to continue serving the community in a sustainable manner.

What about the biggest challenge you’ve faced in your career? How did you overcome it?

Breaking barriers and expectations that society has placed on women, along with the mental walls I put in place for myself. I nearly didn’t make the pivot into tech because I thought I wasn’t smart enough to do it. It didn’t help that none of the people who were successful in the industry looked anything like me.

It’s still a work in progress. I try to be as objective about things as possible and see myself as a product that has plenty of room to grow and iterate. This mindset allows me to take an experimental approach to the things I do at work and also helps me to not take successes or failures too personally. They’re all just opportunities to learn more about my own strengths and weaknesses.

Do you think the tech industry has done enough to promote gender diversity or empower women?

Who is your female hero or inspiration? Why?

What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

Flipping the question around a bit – what’s the one piece of advice you’d pass down to other women looking to get into the tech space (or in general)?

For this year’s International Women’s Day, what do you #choosetochallenge? In other words, how do you intend to help further the cause of gender equality?