Women at eyeo: Franziska - IT specialist for system integration

The amount of women working in STEM disciplines in this day and age is shockingly low, around 16%. At eyeo, we have been striving to reach a 50/50 ratio of female and male employees in our leadership positions, which we achieved in August 2020. But this is not enough for us; we want to raise the overall amount of women at eyeo, which is still around 36%. One initiative to this end is that we take family support very seriously, and offer a financial grant for child care, maternity leave and corona family care. 

As mentioned, the purpose of this series is to introduce you to some of the women of eyeo. We not only want to praise our great employees (which they definitely deserve) but also to show women and girls out there that it is possible to start a thriving career in tech as a woman. 

We will start this series with Franziska who is doing an apprenticeship as an IT specialist for system integration at eyeo and has been supporting our operations team in the Cologne office since May. In this interview she’ll explain why she decided to go for an education in IT, what she loves about tech and why she chose eyeo.

Franziska, why did you want to start an apprenticeship as an IT specialist for system integration?

I tried a lot of different things until I found out that I wanted to start an apprenticeship in IT. I did internships in different areas as a druggist, painter, educator, saleswomen… At some point I found out that the most important thing to me is with whom I work and that teamwork is really important to me.
My father is also working in IT, and so I got an early insight into the field. I have always liked to work on my PC, that’s why I decided to do an internship in IT, which I liked very much, especially the atmosphere in the team and with my colleagues. In most IT-departments the mood is very relaxed and cheerful and this definitely applies to eyeo as well!

What’s so interesting about IT and tech?

In IT you have a lot of variety. Technology is always developing and there are so many components to learn about. It never gets boring! How for example the hardware and software work together and the story behind it, how a human being thought it all up. 50 years ago you couldn’t even imagine something as virtual as software and today it’s everyday life. I’m very curious about everything that will be developed in the future.

What are your daily tasks? What does a typical day look like?

I’m mainly working on tickets in the helpdesk, this is the central place where all requests concerning IT and software from the whole company come together. I will help if hardware doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to or if someone needs access to a new tool or to another team. This includes working with teams and helping them build up their ticket system in Jira or their space in Confluence as well.
I also take care of tidying up individual tools like Jira or our server operating system, this is especially important so we and new admins quickly find their way around and don’t waste time.
I’m also working on documentations for different settings and problems. When the company is changing, the different systems must be adapted accordingly.

Why did you choose eyeo and how do you like it so far?

Adblock Plus is a product that I use every day and for a very long time already, and I really liked the idea of working for this company. During the job interviews I met some of my colleagues and I liked them right away. I just had the feeling that this company is the one.
I love my work also because I have great mentors who take their time to explain the tools and problems very well and create suitable tasks for me. I feel like I’m in good hands and look forward to the next 3 years.

More on #womenateyeo: https://eyeo.com/category/womenateyeo/