Kathleen Vignos: Finding Balanced Success Between Freelance and Family

Kathleen Vignos never imagined that she would become a software engineer. While working towards her degrees in Structural Engineering from the Universities of California and Michigan respectively she took several programming classes, but found them frustrating due to the archaic lack of feedback provided by the code. She also had the misconception that she needed to be good at video games in order to succeed in a career in that field, so it hadn’t crossed her mind that she might have an aptitude for such pursuits.

After graduation she took a position that was in line with her education, working as a structural designer for Degenkolb Engineers. However after a few years that stopped being fulfilling, and she started looking for alternative paths. That is when she happened upon a company called Accenture, which was a great global consulting organization that provided on the job training in coding languages. That gave her a chance to transition from one type of engineering into another.

After working as a technical consultant on software implementations for Accenture and PeopleSoft (and a stint at a startup during the first boom), the next big challenge in Kathleen’s career came when she started having children, and she had to strike a balance between her professional goals, and taking time to raise and care for her family. She did this in a bold and creative way, by starting a freelance web development business. That gave her the flexibility to take care of her home when necessary, without having to give up her job or put her development as a software engineer on hold.

With her company, Vine Design, Kathleen was able to have “everything.” When her children needed her, she had the ability to structure her schedule so that she could be there for them. At the same time she was able to take on a number of different projects for a variety of companies over the years. That kept her constantly facing new challenges, and forced her to keep up with the latest trends in coding and development.

When the opportunity to work on the WIRED web development team as a staff engineer arose, Kathleen’s children were older and more self-sufficient, and she jumped at the chance to return to a dynamic, in-office working environment. The fact that she had remained sharp, current, and focused from her freelance work, eased the transition back to the office. Years of freelancing had trained her well in the arts of resourcefulness and problem solving, which were critical as she came up to speed on the complexities of a site like WIRED that attracts 30 million unique visitors per month.

Kathleen’s curiosity propelled her to learn every nook and cranny of the WIRED site, and today Kathleen is the Director of Engineering for WIRED, a position that she absolutely loves. There she is responsible for the software development and technical operations undertaken for all of the company’s digital manifestations, including their website, apps, and mobile properties. Most recently she oversaw a complete redesign of their online presence, and helped to migrate a stable of 17 different WordPress blogs into a single installation.

When asked what advice she would give to women looking to enter the tech industry, she says to, “STAY TECHNICAL!” According to her, “Women are often pushed out of technical roles and into product and project management. That’s fine for some, but the best opportunities for women are in staying as technical as possible. That’s the big gaping hole where so few women are present.”