How Intuit’s tech culture helped me grow as an individual and engineer

After being at Intuit for over two years, Ebony Hargro shares her impression of Intuit’s tech culture, reflects on her career journey, and lets us know what she’s looking forward to at AfroTech.

Ebony Hargro headshot with blue green gradient background
Ebony Hargro headshot with blue green gradient background

Tell us about your career journey to Intuit. How did you learn about the Apprenticeship Pathway Program? Anything you would like to share about that experience?

I learned about the Apprenticeship Pathway Program through G{Code}, an organization that teaches the basics of web development to women and non-binary POC. It was a challenging but life-changing experience. I learned a lot in a very short time and can’t believe how much I’ve grown since starting the program. I’m also very thankful for the community of other apprentices (former and current) that I’ve been able to build friendships with.

How would you define the tech culture at Intuit? What differentiates Intuit from other organizations?

One thing I really enjoy about the tech culture at Intuit is how knowledge-sharing is prioritized. It feels like there’s some sort of Tech Talk or share-out every week, from engineers across the company with varying levels of experience and expertise. As someone who is pretty curious about everything, learning from the successes and mistakes of my colleagues has been really helpful for my growth.

How does the work you do at Intuit challenge you as an engineer?

I’m an Intuit QuickBooks engineer and my team focuses specifically on accounting automation, and we work to build features to help make certain parts of the bookkeeping process as pain-free and accurate as possible for customers. I’m challenged intellectually every day as an engineer to make sure I understand not only the technical aspects of the features I build, but also understand the impact of those features on how customers do accounting. 

During this year’s AfroTech conference, Black tech innovators will attend in-person and virtual programming on emerging trends, networking opportunities with industry leaders, and conversations with top tech recruiters. What excites you the most about attending AfroTech? 

This will be my first time attending AfroTech, so I’m kind of excited about everything! I’m most excited about attending the product and engineering sessions like “The Toolkit to Advancing Your Engineering Career” and “Journeying Upmarket with Calendly Founder and CEO Tope Awotona” to learn strategies about how others have achieved success in this industry. There are quite a few sessions on AI as well, so I’m excited to attend those to hear about how other companies are leveraging AI, especially after our own recent announcement about Intuit Assist. I’m also excited to connect with Black engineers during events like the Engineering Meetup to network and bond over our shared experiences being underrepresented in our field. Overall, I’m hoping to leave AfroTech with some tips and strategies for my career (and leaving with a new friend or two would be a great bonus!)

For more information about Intuit at AfroTech 2023, including registration for Intuit’s hosted 90s-fused mixer on the night of Nov. 1st, click here.
We would love to meet you at AfroTech!

_

At Intuit, we aim to foster positive experiences at every level of someone’s professional journey. While we have dedicated resources to increasing representation of underrepresented communities, at all levels, we acknowledge we have more work to do.

If you are interested in joining our team, check out our open positions. For more information on Intuit’s EEO policy, please click here.