I got a new job!

Summer of 2021, I was floating in a pool, taking stock of my life, brainstorming what a stable job that I enjoyed might look like. I loved doing biology field work, but hustling from seasonal job to seasonal job was getting more difficult and less sustainable, especially during the pandemic. As I pondered what career would suit my personality and strengths, I thought about all the folks I worked with over the years, imagining myself in their shoes.

When I thought about Lee and Cindy, who managed the database and mobile data collection apps for my field jobs with the National Park Service, an idea started to form. These were the rare folks I worked with that had the time and expertise to fix technological wonkiness as it inevitably cropped up. I’m not talking about troubleshooting – they could fundamentally change the software we were working with to better suit our needs. I thought the environmental sector, but really any sector, could use more folks like them.

For most of my life, I thought software engineering jobs were not a viable option for me – that was the realm of whiz kid hackers and indoor folks. In spite of my misconceptions, and buoyed by the unprecedented demand for developers early in the pandemic, I started to learn web development. I figured no matter what career path I go down, knowing how to build a functional website would be a handy skill.

I started simple, took free courses on Codecademy, moved on to more advanced courses, and kept building more and more on top of what I had learned: HTML, CSS, Javascript, everything built on top, and everything supporting it from below. Somewhat to my surprise – I really enjoyed it! It tapped into the part of myself that loved building contraptions with K’nex as a kid. All of the unexpected roadblocks and challenges working on projects became interesting puzzles to be solved.

By the time I felt I had learned enough to be hirable, finding a job proved to be quite difficult. The types of jobs that I was originally after, combining my biology or music background with coding, were very few and far between. The wider developer job market had gone and continues to go through a major contraction after the COVID hiring sprees. Standing out in a crowded applicant field was getting more and more daunting and the “Advent of AI” certainly hasn’t helped the hiring situation.

Three years later though, the hard work of learning a new skill has paid off. I’m excited to announce that I’ve started a new job as the Heritage Data Management System Systems Manager with the Arizona Game and Fish Department. With system in the title twice, you know it’s got to be good.

It is a really fascinating role that is part software development, part biology, part data management, all in service of conservation in Arizona. The HDMS program processes field data not only from all of the AZGFD programs but also everyone in Arizona doing field studies that require a Scientific Activity License. It makes the data more easily available to help guide conservation strategies and future studies. Looking through the license tables I see many familiar names of folks I’ve worked with over the past 9 years. It is highly likely some of the data I’ve collected over the years has made its way to the HDMS database.

What is most exciting about the position is, as systems manager, it is my job to improve workflows. If a process causes frustration or confusion, I get to fix that, and where I see the opportunity I get to create brand new tools. It requires attention to detail, know-how and most of all, creativity.

The HDMS team has great folks and I’m excited to continue digging in.

My office window species list currently sits at 10, full of potential.