San Jose State design studies senior Vicky Vo has leaped over many hurdles to establish herself as a force to be reckoned with in the male-dominated tech industry.
She hosted a two-part event on Sept. 23 and Oct. 2 with SJSU’s Humanities and Arts Student Success Center about landing an internship for user experience and design, also known as UX.
Don Norman, Apple’s first UX architect, coined the term in 1995. User experience is “the person’s experience with a system, including industrial design, graphics, the interface, the physical interaction and the manual,” Norman said in a February article on thenextweb.com.
Vo said a friend recently nominated her for the Forbes 30 Under 30 2021 list and that she has gained traction in the UX design industry through contests and internships.
“If you’re not in the tech industry, you might not know that getting an internship [in the field] is super hard,” she said over Zoom.
Vo said tech companies typically have a four-to seven-step interview process with coding and design challenges that applicants must excel in to be considered for different positions.
She worked with academic adviser Sandy Ho after transferring to SJSU in Fall 2019, when Vo shared that she has participated in many international UX design contests like software company SAP’s “Design-A-Thon” competition, which she won in 2019.
She told Ho she hosted events about landing UX design internships, increased accessibility for women in the tech industry and created beginner workshops for people interested in the field.
Ho and Vo then began collaborating on the event for the Humanities and Arts Student Success Center in an effort to share some of Vo’s knowledge about UX with others.
“I knew it was an up-and-coming field and many students are interested, but you don’t hear a lot of students already engaged with that field,” Ho said. “For me, [Vo’s involvement in UX] is absolutely phenomenal.”
Vo’s interest in UX design initially sparked when she was deciding whether to continue studying psychology or switch to graphic design.
“That’s when I discovered that if I become a UX designer, I can do both,” she said.
Vo said she is drawn to the marriage of psychology in human-computer interactions as well as pursuing her passion for art through app and web design. Vo started researching online how to teach herself the basics of UX design by attending Eventbrite webinars hosted by professionals.
“The only way students get into UX is through [the] self-taught [method],” she said.
Vo participated in contests to compare her self-taught design skills with peers and to track her progress in the industry.
“It started with one [contest] and I thought, ‘Oh my god, this is so fun,’ so I kept doing it,” she said.
Vo’s hard work and research into the industry paid off as she received around 10 international awards.
She attributes her success to posting on the job recruiting website, LinkedIn and cold emailing companies that piqued her interests.
“I’m living proof that cold emails work,” she said. “When I was 19, I sent out 30 cold emails to companies in the Bay Area and guess what? Five of them got back to me and one of them took me as an intern.”
Vo’s friends said the key to her prosperity is her ability to notice aspects of life that other people overlook, by stepping into the user’s shoes to foresee what problems may arise.
Vo, along with her friend Julia Fernandez, co-founded Students of UXD, an organization geared toward helping students interested in UX learn and network with other students.
Fernandez, an Academy of Arts University graphic design senior, has known Vo for five months after meeting
through LinkedIn.
“She has a drive that I have never seen before – I see her pushing and doing so much work as a superwoman,” Fernandez said. “I think she’s on some kind of design steroid that we all wish we could get.”
Vo, who is originally from Vietnam, came from a low-income family with less access to opportunities, making her nervous about how people would perceive her as an international student.
“My parents are not wealthy at all and they really did their best to send me over here to study so that I can get more opportunities,” Vo said.
She said every step toward her goals are for her parents, who prioritized her access to a quality education. Vo sees every step as a building block toward her future.
Vo said she encourages her peers to start early, accept that mistakes will be made and proactively create plans
for themselves.
She has revised 170 resumes and mentored dozens of students through her organization to sharpen their skills.
As the pandemic shut down many businesses, Vo lost her internship at Google after receiving an offer.
While she remains busy with current projects, Vo will be looking to apply once again when the application window opens.
She said she believes her success means it’s attainable for all students.
“[I want students to] always look at things as an opportunity and then [they] can really grow from it,” Vo said.
