Amelia Travers

Amelia Travers is a Web Developer at a technology company by day, and a podcaster and science communicator by night (or any other time her schedule will allow).

Amelia is the creator and host of Avid Research, a podcast in which she interviews people working in STEM careers to share what people can do with a STEM career, what the challenges and opportunities are, and how experimental STEM career paths can be.

Q: What do you do?

Web development is a pretty broad field, and can mean a lot of things. But specifically I build websites and online experiences using code. I work with a team of other developers to build and maintain code infrastructure and help our customers have enjoyable fast experiences.

As a science communicator and podcaster I draw on all the experience I have gained from my degrees and work experience to interview people about their careers and help them share their stories. It’s a great crossover with development because I built my own podcast hosting platform which was a great challenge.

My day to day work varies a bit, but I spend a lot of time in meetings, deciding on the best way to approach different problems, collaborating with teammates and constantly learning!

Q: Why did you choose this career pathway?

I don’t really feel like I chose my pathway, more that it happened! I was never a computer kid at school, my “plan” was to be a writer for New Scientist, so it never occurred to me that I could work in tech. My pathway has been a result of following up opportunities, chasing adventures and being open to change. I’ve loved changing careers, and have found it really interesting to be able to draw on past experiences in a new context. The roles that I’ve taken on have been heavily influenced by the people around me and the opportunities that they have seen and opened up for me. Many of the jobs I’ve had didn’t exist when I was younger, and may not exist in 10 years time!

Q: What are the best parts about your job? What are the hardest parts?

The best bit about all my work is that I get to constantly learn and try new things. I really enjoy solving problems and that’s something I get to do on a daily basis. I also enjoy learning and working to continually improve how I work and what I do.

The flip side of that is that sometimes constantly keeping up to date, especially in tech where things move fast, can be very challenging! One of the great things about web development is being able to create something new, just out of lines of code. It’s incredibly rewarding building up something from scratch!

Podcasting and communicating science is a huge passion of mine, so spending a lot of time doing that is great fun. I love creating a platform that is helping other people feel empowered to share their stories. It’s great fun asking lots of people questions and getting to learn about other people’s careers.

Q: How did you get to your current role?

It was quite a wild ride from my degrees to where I am now. I graduated with a Bachelor of Science (Hons) and wasn’t able to find a grad job straight out of university, so I went and studied for a Professional Honours in Marine and Antarctic Science. Partly because I thought it sounded like it could be a career opportunity, but also because I hoped to travel to Antarctica! I never got to go to Antarctica, but I got to go to the Arctic twice, then the South Pacific and the South Atlantic on ships.

I had many career ideas throughout this time, but usually found that while I had good ideas, people weren’t quite willing to pay me. So I went back to uni to do a Dip Ed, with teaching as a fallback career, though I was never sold that I really wanted to be a teacher. During that Dip Ed I volunteered with Parks Victoria, and got a role as a Summer Ranger. This opened up the opportunity to work with Parks Vic for a few years, which was great fun and meant I got to see some amazing parts of Victoria. After a few years I wanted to see if I could make it as a teacher and taught in some STEM education centers, which were rewarding but not a long term career decision for me. So after telling students “you should study STEM and learn to code” many times, I decided to try it myself. After a short intensive period learning to code I got a job in a large tech company as a junior and so far haven’t looked back!

Working in tech means that I’ve learned a lot of different ways of working that I now apply to my side projects and science communication, which has been great fun!

Q: What does your career progression look like from here?

I am currently working out what I want to do next. As a developer there are two main career tracks. One is to become a mid level and then senior developer, and possibly an architect (of code). This is a highly technical track where you get better and better at code, solve bigger problems and have a deep knowledge. The other path is to become a people leader, assist other people in their career journeys and help solve people related problems in the workplace. At this stage I’m working towards being a people leader, as it brings together a lot more of my previous experience, and I really enjoy helping people achieve their goals.

I will also keep working on my podcast and will keep working to help it grow and engage more people!

Q: What were your career worries and expectations when you were at uni?

At University I was worried about if I was going to get a job, I was graduating during an economic downturn and there weren’t many jobs around. I was also worried about where I was going to work and if I could find something that I actually enjoyed. I have received hundreds of job rejections in my life and have many points in my career of really not knowing what to do next.

Over time I’ve realised that those times are little seasons that do pass, there will be times when it’s harder to find jobs and times when it’s easier. There will be times when I’m certain about what I want to do, and others where I feel lost. I think this is true for a lot of people. It’s scary and frustrating and emotional at the time, but it does pass.

Building up a wide variety of skills has really helped me feel more confident in job hunting, especially building good listening and confident speaking skills. Also being confident in my ability to learn has been invaluable.

Now I worry less about finding any job, and more about finding the right job with the right people and opportunities.

Having a side project where I get to constantly interact with a good network of people and learn has really helped fill any gaps I have in my day to day job.

Q: Anything else you’d like people to know about your job?

There are a lot of opportunities for people who are keen to learn outside of academia. I’ve worked in teaching, as a Park Ranger, and in tech and people love working with engaged curious people who want to create and do things! There are a lot of opportunities in tech from technical development to project management, and a huge range of the skills that you develop in science or at university will come in handy. It’s a field that really welcomes career changers. If you’re curious about creating software or working on the apps that you use every day, it’s worth looking into!

Side hustle shout out!

I’m a huge fan of side hustles and side projects! Often our day to day jobs don’t cover everything we want to do, maybe we have skills that aren’t being used or have skills we want to learn that we can’t at work. For me, while I love tech, I also really missed working with scientists and talking to people from different backgrounds. It was one of the greatest parts of being at university to me was being surrounded by people learning and doing. This is part of why I started my podcast, to get back in touch with that sense of community. Not only have I learned a lot through Avid Research, I’ve also made genuine friends and some great professional connections. Having a side hustle, whether a podcast, blog, event you run, anything really, can be an excellent way to be part of a broader community!