Discovering my professional identity as a Software Engineer

The bio blurb on my portfolio site reads, “Looking for a Fullstack Software Engineer who values putting people first in business and the community? As an experienced Frontend Developer with 4+ years of experience in Customer Services, I prioritize people-first values in all of my work.“

I felt like an imposter when I wrote it. How do I put people first? How do I prioritize people-first values? What even are people-first values? Is it just a buzzword that sounded good to me at the moment?

After much thought and contemplation, I have figured out that it is the best description that I could come up with for my professional identity.

How it started

I first encountered the term people-first when I learned about my previous employer Guusto. I found Guusto’s Head of HR, Noah Warder, on LinkedIn. I was immediately blown away by all the amazing work he was doing. Never before had I seen a professional so compassionate and empathetic, and so invested in helping the community around him thrive and grow. “Surely there has to be a catch, right?”, I thought to myself.

I remained cautiously optimistic as I applied to Guusto. I went through the smoothest interview process I had ever experienced and got the job! And boy was I not ready for how exciting my time there was going to be.

How it went

I worked alongside two great leaders - Skai Dalziel and Joe Facciolo, who practiced the same people-first values that Noah preached and promoted on his LinkedIn. The entire product is supposed to help employers create meaningful employee recognition programs to better recognize and appreciate their employees.

I watched these 3 leaders implement people-first policies, iterate on them and practice them every day that I was at Guusto. And what made it even better was that these implementations were not top-down. They were collaborative at all levels across the organization. My direct leaders at the time, Noah Reid and Emma Wang, ensured that my voice was always a part of these decisions at the top!

My favorite definition of being people-first comes from a post that my former direct lead(and my dear friend) Noah Reid made during Pride month:

Being people first is committing to communication, honesty, empathy, compassion and growth. This goes far beyond policy or HR, this is leadership action, this is vulnerability, support and encouraging difficult growth. This is Skai, Joe and Noah leading by example and valuing each member of this team as an asset for the entirety of who they are.

To say that I learned a lot would be such a massive understatement. Through this experience with people-first culture and values, I decided that this is the professional I want to be. And these are the kind of businesses and people I want to see successful. We need more businesses that will put people first! I want to work with more people who will put people first!

How it's going

Since the realization that I want to be a people-first professional, I have continued to expand my network to include more and more people who practice people-first values in one form or another. Notable mentions are Leon Noel for literally changing my life by starting #100devs and Danny Thompson for all his work in encouraging junior developers who are trying to break into their first roles.

I learned from and emulated all the amazing people whom I have mentioned above to become who I am today - Sukhdeep Singh - a Software Engineer who puts people first and wants to see them succeed in business as well as their personal lives.

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If any of this resonates with you or you would like to chat, I would like to chat with you too! Please reach out to me on LinkedIn!