Between you and success, is YOU only: IWD 2024

I am Samina Hanif, a Customer Success Manager with over 10 years of experience in the Software World. Being in a customer-facing role, the sense of accomplishment we get while making day to day lives of our customers easier is unparalleled. To facilitate their technical journey and provide them with solutions to make their everyday task easier holds special importance.

What I am today has a long list of fears and self-doubts that I overcame with the help of my supportive family and the great mentors I got to work with throughout my career. They believed in me even when I didn’t and didn’t let me quit, instead guided me, and gave me opportunities to learn and grow. Right from my student life, I feared doing a technical job and always thought this path was not for me. After graduation, I got a great opportunity to work as a Software Developer and every day broke the shell of fear little by little and made me the strong woman I am today. I still have new fears, but I make sure they are not holding me back but only to strengthen me.
At my first employment, there were only two girls in our whole office of 50+ employees. Over the years, we have seen improvement in girls’ representation in the TECH world, but we are still far away from how it is in developing countries. While COVID had many negative impacts, its gift of Work-from-Home has opened tremendous opportunities for women in my home country. We see a spike in women working in tech roles after COVID-19 and with WFH and hybrid work models.

A turning point in my career was back in 2018 when I attended Dreamforce in person. The aura and everyone and everything at Dreamforce sparked energy and motivation and showed in reality how many women are working in TECH, working in so many different fields that we don’t even think existed back in my home country. I promised myself to bring all that experience back home and spread it with my fellows and everyone I can share.

I believe in the motto that you cannot go forward without giving back to your community. I started by mentoring my team members beyond the work circle. I worked with them on their personal development and goals, and over the course, I have mentored many people both inside and outside my organisations. I provide them with hearing ears to know about their challenges and fears and provide them with guidance so that they can overcome them.

I strongly believe that women will excel in any field of TECH if they believe in themselves and get past their fears and doubts. If they are given the opportunity and supported in their roles with equal rights as their male counterparts, I have no doubt we will do wonderful things.

One thing I would suggest to all aspiring women to learn is how to make decisions, especially quick decisions. Mastering decision-making is essential to success, even more, so if you aspire to be in a leadership role.

The inspiration you get from people working in the same field as yours or what you aspire to be is unparalleled. It is for this reason I believe that all of us women should network more, be more vocal on social media, and share our successes and struggles and how we overcome them to give inspiration to those in need.

While working on ourselves and growing in our roles, it is essential to give back to the community from which we emerged. I work with organisations that provide free Salesforce training to fresh graduates and women, including moms returning from career breaks. It is a six-month course that runs on weekends, and I am proud to be a part of it.

In our hopeful future, I see more women emerging in leadership roles, being accepted in their roles with equal freedom and amenities, and excelling in their roles. I am sure that with every woman leader known in the world, we will get 100 more.

Thanks to Zumzum for providing incredible opportunities and empowering women’s success.