This Shopee project manager is carving her own path to success with the ecommerce giant

Every year Tech in Asia celebrates International Women’s Day, in support of equal representation and opportunities for the female tech community. This article is part of “Women in Focus,” Tech in Asia’s campaign for International Women’s Day 2021.

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The internet economy has seen a strong uplift since the pandemic began. One company that’s risen to meet this demand is Singapore-based ecommerce platform Shopee, whose mobile-centric platform makes it easier for millions of users to shop from their favorite brands and businesses.

Behind the scenes, the platform is powered by engineering and product teams, among many other functions. Part of that team is June Chair, who has served as a project manager at Shopee for the past 1.5 years – a role she fell into out of sheer serendipity and by keeping an open mind.

“Before entering the workforce, I’d always thought of myself as a math and science student,” Chair says. “I specialized in mechanical engineering in university and focused broadly on product design and creating automated production systems.”

June Chair, project manager at Shopee. / Photo credit: Shopee

So a career in ecommerce may not have been the first port of call for the project manager. Shortly after graduating, however, she was invited to participate in the TechSkills Accelerator Company-Led Training program. The initiative by the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) of Singapore aims to accelerate the professional development of fresh graduates and mid-career professionals through partnerships with various local companies – Shopee’s parent company, Sea, among them. Through the six-month program, Chair learned necessary technical skills and knowledge that allowed her to take on a tech role with the ecommerce giant.

“As a fresh graduate at the time, I wanted to get ample hands-on experience in a young and fast-paced environment,” she shares. “Rather than limit myself in terms of what to pursue in my career, my goal was to explore as many roles as possible to find something I could excel in, and stick to it.”

Entering the shifting tech landscape

The road to Chair’s entry into the program involved an assessment of her stakeholder management skills and knowledge of project management processes, which included scenario-based questions.

Chair was candid about the fact that she had minimal tech experience. In fact, in her view, the biggest challenge of her shift into tech was how “intimidating” the first lessons were.

“It felt like others could follow the lessons more quickly. Thankfully, I had undergone a computer science-related module in university, so it wasn’t too difficult catching up,” the Shopee project manager says. The beginner’s course also involved running through the basics to ensure that all participants were on the same page before diving into deeper content, she adds.

During the CLT program, Chair opted to focus on the IT fundamentals to better understand the tools utilized in software development, the product development life cycle, as well as the commonly used technical terminology.

These insights prepared her for her role, which involves collaborating with teams – including developers and software quality assurance engineers – to review products and features and ensure bugs or testing issues are resolved on time.

Chair, in discussion with her colleagues. / Photo credit: Shopee

“When I manage projects and solutions with developers, discussions can get quite technical,” she says. “I don’t have to understand technical terms in detail but having an understanding of their work definitely helps me to coordinate tasks better.”

According to Chair, being a female in the male-dominated tech space served less as a hurdle and more as a means of motivation for her to “challenge the norm by pursuing a career that isn’t traditionally believed to be female-dominated.”

Having a genuine interest in the tech industry also helped: The Shopee project manager saw that new opportunities were emerging amid the world’s increasing reliance on technology, and she wanted in.

“It comes as no surprise that there are fewer females in tech. There were very few women in my engineering course in university, too,” Chair recalls. “But that doesn’t mean there are a lack of opportunities in the tech sector for females. Based on my experience, tech companies are ultimately looking for the best skills in the industry.”

Around the world, seven in 10 women in tech expressed that that their skills and experience were assessed without gender biases during the interview process for their first IT or tech role.

However, women still have to contend with many other factors such as high barriers to entry into the space or unequal access to opportunities as is the case in some countries across Southeast Asia. Indonesia, for instance, holds the lowest share of women in tech roles across the region at 22%. Things are a little different in Singapore and Thailand, where the percentage of women in tech stand at 41% and 42%, respectively.

To counter the perception that the tech space is more suited for men, Chair says it’s important that more avenues are available to showcase role models and the success stories of women in tech.

“This would also help make the leap into tech less intimidating,” she adds. “Having female role models can also help in showing that it’s equally possible for women to succeed as well.”

Tech roles are not one and the same

Another common misconception about entering the tech industry is that technical skills are essential for success.

“It’s important to differentiate between tech-heavy and tech-light roles,” Chair says. “I’m in the latter, where having basic technical knowledge is sufficient because I’m not expected to code to implement features.”

In her day-to-day work, Chair collaborates with internal stakeholders across the engineering, product, and marketing teams – all of which have exposed her to managing a wide variety of tech projects. A key advantage of her role at Shopee, she adds, is being given the autonomy to make and execute decisions despite her “limited experience” in the tech space.

“Such on-the-job training felt challenging initially because there’s always the fear of failure,” Chair admits. “An open culture environment may be daunting at first, but it’s helped me to reflect, learn, and be more comfortable with devising solutions to challenges.”

To further her growth while completing the training program, the project manager also underwent a stakeholder management course through Shopee Academy, the ecommerce giant’s learning platform for employees. Such courses, she says, ensure fresh graduates are given sufficient learning opportunities outside of school and equip them with the skills to work with diverse teams.

This is just one example of how companies can provide avenues for employees to fill their skills gaps while retaining talent. Businesses, too, must take the necessary steps to create an all-inclusive and supportive environment for continued growth.

“With encouragement from the team and the open culture at Shopee, I’ve gained confidence and become more comfortable with challenges,” Chair says. “It’s also key not to compare yourself to your peers but to instead find ways to improve what you can do.”

Shopee is the leading ecommerce platform in Southeast Asia and Taiwan which provides customers with an easy, secure, and fast online shopping experience through strong payment and logistical support. Find out how you can join Shopee’s Company-Led Training (CLT) programme here.

This content was produced by Tech in Asia Studios, which connects brands with Asia’s tech community. Learn more about partnering with Tech in Asia Studios or get in touch with us via the form below.