Unleash Space alumni profile: Connor Hare

Connor Hare

Connor Hare is a Bachelor of Engineering student who worked for two years as a Creative Technologist for the Business School’s Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE). As a CIE Creative Technologist, Connor trained other students and how to use technology in CIE’s makerspaces, Kura Matahuna Unleash Space and Te Ahi Hangarau. As a third year student, he now also has a role as a Senior Engineer at IT security monitoring company Watchful.

I’m Connor, a third-year student at UoA student, studying software engineering. My journey with CIE began in high school, with hackathons hosted at Unleash Space like KiwiJam and the Terrible Ideas hackathon, run by Zac Miller-Waugh. I would come down with a group of friends from Whangārei to participate in these events. Then, in my last year of high school, the University’s makers club came up north for a community event, and I met CIE staff member Etienne Naude. The next year I came down to Auckland to start my studies as an engineering student and immediately went to Unleash Space. There I saw Etienne, and he encouraged me to sign up as a CT.

I’ve given up my role as a CT this year, as participating in a hackathon led to me meeting the head of design at a software engineering company. He hired me in an intern role, and then after working there for a bit they invited me to work full time, and I’ve since been promoted.

It’s been great, because I no longer have to break into the industry as a fresh grad with no industry experience. I can say that I have the professional experience building a product and further develop my skills and connection in the industry, allowing me to branch out quicker and find more opportunities.

My passion for doing software development has really propelled me along this path. I’ve known that I want to work in software development for a long time, and everything academically has been in pursuit of that goal. I think it also helped that my hobbies were directly related to my chosen profession, so when I would do events for fun, I would also be furthering my employability and skill set.

My advice for other students aspiring to break into tech roles would be to go to hackathons, they are a great way to get your name out there in a good way. It’s so much easier to prove to a potential employer that you are the person they want if they have seen what you can do. Also, be interested in what your pursuing, especially when it comes to tech. If you want to break into high-level tech roles, you need to be really capable. If you are early on in your career, you won’t have any professional experience, so you better really stand out against all the other candidates. It really helps if you’re passionate about doing what you’re doing.