Celebrating women in tech this International Women’s Day

International Women’s Day is recognized globally on March 8th to celebrate the social, economic, cultural, and political achievements of women. This year, the theme is ‘Inspire Inclusion’ which encourages women’s economic empowerment, developing female talent, and supporting women and girls into leadership, decision-making, business and STEM. This theme deeply resonates with us. 

At Elastic®, we strive to empower women and pride ourselves on fostering an inclusive global culture. In 2023, we began to spotlight female-identifying technologists around the world in various roles and at differing levels of seniority to give Elasticians the chance to share their personal stories and experiences. 

Over the last year, we’ve told real Elasticians’ stories and had discussions about technical roles, what inspired them to get into the technology industry, where their interests lie, and their advice for others who want a career in tech. 

To celebrate International Women’s Day, here are the powerful and inspiring stories of women Elasticians:

Being one of the only women in her computer science program didn’t stop Hannah Mudge from pursuing her dream of becoming a software engineer

Hannah had a love of tech from an early age. Now, she works on Elastic’s presentation team, focusing on Kibana.

Stephanie Harris on how the Spice Girls helped her switch careers

When Stephanie graduated with degrees in music, she struggled to find a job she was interested in. Then she remembered her love for computers. 

Asuka Nakajima aspired to be a hacker. Now she’s a security research engineer.

Asuka Nakajima picked up a copy of Project SEVEN when she was 14 years old, a book that tells the story of a high school hacker who saved the world from cyber terrorists. Here’s how she followed in those footsteps. 

Reading books as a child encouraged Angela Chuang to follow her dream of becoming a software engineer

Angela Chuang followed in her father’s footsteps to a career in software engineering.

Switching majors led Kathleen DeRusso to a career in search

Kathleen DeRusso likes to solve problems, something she gets to do every day in her software engineering job. 

Forging a path to tech through economics — Data Scientist Susan Chang on how curiosity propelled her machine learning career

Susan Chang got into machine learning through mentoring. Now she’s returning the favor. 

Diana Todea pivoted from political philosophy to engineering. Here’s how she broke into tech.

Diana Todea says she’s an engineer at heart, despite completing a postgraduate in political philosophy. She shares her story of becoming a site reliability engineer and how she used engineering certifications to advance her career. 

Christine Weng on why she took time to explore and reflect before pivoting from accounting to tech

Christine Weng spent a few years thinking, reflecting, and preparing to pivot into technology from accounting. 

Looking for a company that fosters inclusion? Check out open roles. 

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