Women in tech with Insight logoMarieke Quartermaine headshot

Sara Biancuzzo: Self-made role model

User Experience (UX) Consultant 

Sara Biancuzzo grew up in a small Western Australian town, without career role models in the technology industry.

Traditionally in her culture, men often owned their own businesses. Women largely supported those businesses and raised families. “I didn’t know that working in technology or having a career in general was possible for me,” says Sara, a User Experience (UX) Consultant at Insight.

“I knew what I wanted to do, but I didn’t know how to get there, I didn’t have anyone to look to, to get an idea of the journey or the steps they took to get where they were.”

But having fallen in love at an early age with the arts she studied Graphic Design in high school and decided to follow her dreams, moving to Perth to study Graphic Design at Curtin University.

After graduating, she got a role as a Junior Graphic Designer at a small NFP where she soon found herself designing and managing their website and app.

“That’s where I was introduced to UX design and from there I just started to teach myself and learn more about it,” she says.

“I fell in love with designing solutions to improve people’s lives, creating that experience for the user and crafting that journey.”

Within two months of taking a role as Graduate UX Designer at Insight, her drive saw here she was working full-time with a client, gaining value valuable on-the-job training, while also completing some formal training.

In UX, Sara found her passion, working on a variety of projects from websites and apps to designing dashboards to enable companies to understand their data and make better decisions.

The job enables Sara to take on multiple roles, from running usability and interface testing, doing user interviews to understand pain points, and mapping user journeys to interface design and prototyping.

She’s particularly proud of her work on an application to assist students at Murdoch University to craft their own personalised degrees.

She’s also been a catalyst for change, with her younger sister now inspired to pursue a career that she’s passionate about. Friends too, have followed her lead, developing careers.

“It is possible to make it on your own, without having industry connections first,” Sara says, noting that colleagues have provided plenty of support and assistance throughout her journey at Insight.

“Research what you love and see what exists out there, because there are some amazing roles, particularly in technology, and it is such a rewarding career.

“Take the leap, because it is really exciting!”

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