A Look Inside Our Engineering Department Post-COVID

The past two years have changed life and work for many people. With a greater emphasis placed on caregivers, who often identify as women, I wanted to take a look at the impact this has had on the women in the Engineering team at Dashlane, and what values are important to them in the post-COVID era.

Background

While the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic are still being assessed on an individual and collective basis, there are already some interesting statistics regarding how work has shifted. Since the start of the pandemic, millions of people have changed careers or left jobs altogether.  

Almost 4.4 million Americans quit their jobs in February 2022 alone, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, which is just shy of the record of 4.5 million set in November 2021. These figures are holding strong, with another 4 million people quitting their jobs in April as well. This trend has led to the term “The Great Resignation.” 

As employer demand for workers remains high, more people are reevaluating their careers. While many countries were in lockdown and people were home caring for themselves or sick family members, there was more opportunity than ever to contemplate what is really important. Some have referred to this as the “Great Reflection.” 

Flexibility

According to a Gartner study from December 2021, 65% of employees say the pandemic has made them rethink the place that work should have in their lives. For me, this was highlighted over the last year when my mental health and job flexibility became increasingly important in my career, ultimately leading me to pursue a position at Dashlane.  

Flexibility with work/life balance has become even more important in recent years. Companies have had to reevaluate how they want to work in the post-COVID era. Dashlane allows its employees to pick their work modality—either in-office, remote, or hybrid, based on what works best for each individual. In general, Dashlane is extremely receptive to feedback from employees. 

Cécile Chailloux and a colleague meeting in one of the Dashlane office spaces.

Companies that solicit feedback from their employees, acknowledge their feelings, and promote a culture of flexibility will no doubt fare better compared to those stuck in the old ways of working. The rigid rules and expectations many employers enforced even just a couple of years ago are quickly being replaced by more flexibility with a greater emphasis on work/life balance. And if employers don’t get behind these changes, their top talent won’t have a hard time finding a place that will.

“Dashlane is truly open to changing and adapting in order to attract the best talent. Dashlane is very flexible when it comes to time off, work location, and resources, and this is important for anyone trying to better balance their work life and personal/family life."

Diversity in hiring

A benefit of hiring remotely is a more diverse applicant pool. By not requiring employees to come into work in one of our three offices, Dashlane has recruited and hired talent that otherwise would have been unable to join due to their location.  

“It is not just a random company, it is a second home for hundreds of employees descending from various cultures and backgrounds."

Non-traditional backgrounds 

According to Gartner, 56% of employees have applied to jobs outside their existing career path in the past year. This is great news if you are interested in a career in engineering but do not have a traditional engineering background.  

Julia Carbajal, a Software Engineer on our Autofill team, learned to code on her own while pursuing her Ph.D. She later stumbled across a computational linguistics position at Dashlane. By the time she conducted her interview, the computational linguistics position was no longer open, but a software engineer position was, and she decided to interview for it. She asked her brothers (both developers) to help her learn JavaScript for her technical interview, and three years later, she is still happy she decided to interview for that position!

“I discovered I love coding, and I enjoy my work every single day. I learned a lot, but I know I still have a long way to go to be at the level of those who did go to engineering school. But I never feel judged for not having done that: everyone is fairly judged at their level.” 

Cécile Chailloux, a Software Engineer at Dashlane, had a similar story:

“In my previous team, most of the female engineers came from non-traditional backgrounds: natural language processing, neuroscience, journalism ... Getting the opportunity for a first coding job after a reconversion in computer science is crucial for us as employees, and it also opens a more diverse pool of candidates for the company.”

Promoting a culture of diversity, gender inclusivity, and belonging

This July, Dashlane hosted a public event focused on Dashlane’s core values. Holding space for these important conversations is one of the reasons I believe Dashlane will continue to evolve and thrive during the post-COVID job changes.  

Interested in joining the Dashlane team? Find out if there’s an open position that fits your unique skill set, and learn more about what it’s like working at Dashlane.

Kristy Hughes

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