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As a team lead, Austin Kness, senior data engineer on the Information Delivery team, supports hundreds of decision makers around the company through reporting platforms and data visualization technology. This helps leaders see how and where to make the most impact for member health.

Austin loves his work, but he met his first love on stage.

Austin grew up in Iowa and sang in church with his mother from a young age. Those early memories resonated, and as he got older, he kept pursuing chances to sing at family reunions and school functions, before moving to the high school show choir, musicals and eventually opera.

“I always liked the athletic challenge of opera,” Austin explains.  “It’s very physical, but no dancing — I’m terrible at dancing!”

The physical aspect appealed to Austin in part because he was an avid athlete, as well. As captain of the football team in high school, he sometimes had to contend with the clashing of worlds.

“The TV show ‘Glee’ resonated with me 100 percent,” Austin laughs. “I was definitely that jock kid singing duets and solos in our practice room.”

At first seen by faculty and students as secondary to exciting sports, Austin’s insistence on following his interests eventually rubbed off on other kids, and he saw the program grow during high school.

“We went from practicing in a storage room with a leaking roof to an entire music wing being added to the school over about four years,” Austin says. “Seeing that change in attitudes really meant a lot.”

Trotting the boards

After majoring in vocal performance in college, Austin joined the San Francisco Opera’s fellowship program. It was there he would meet and fall in love with a girl from Tennessee, his now wife, Susannah.

“We got to perform as a couple on stage a few times,” Austin recalls. “Our characters would be singing about being in love or having a fiery argument — it was really easy to perform those scenes.”

The two married at the city courthouse, just a block away from the opera. As Susannah’s opera career continued to flourish, Austin looked for other ways to support her dream and ensure a steady income.

Making data sing

Though music and art were his passions, Austin came by data science honestly.

“My parents were in wireless architecture and engineering, and I had built my own website as a performing opera singer, so I was already well versed in technology and design,” Austin explains. “So I started working full-time while taking classes in web development at night.”

The days were long, and the work was hard, but Austin persevered.

“The thought of sitting in a cube all day was daunting for me as an artist,” Austin admits. “But I liked the creative side of web development, and I was lucky to find a place like BlueCross.” 

Austin joined BlueCross as an intern while finishing his degree and quickly became a part of the information technology division.

“A surprising number of great programmers are singers or musicians,” Austin points out. “They find studying musical theory and structure while being able to improvise and think outside the box makes for great skills in that field.”

As an opera singer, he’s also able to grasp languages quickly and adapt to information.

“If you’re singing words in another language, you need to know what you’re saying, or you can’t get across the emotions to the audience,” Austin says. “So I’m familiar with multiple languages — Italian, German, French, Spanish, Russian and even a little Czech.”

That ability to quickly grasp patterns and meaning has been integral to his work,  as Austin and his team help business areas block out the noise and focus on the most relevant data for members.

“Being able to connect the information in different areas of the company and get a clear picture of how effective a website or health program really is impactful,” Austin says. “I really like breaking down those siloes and helping find commonalities across different areas.”

It’s a similar joy to the one Austin gets while singing.

“That intense intimacy and sharing, on a sort of profound human level, is what always excited me the most,” Austin says. “I always loved singing together more than alone. Something about a group of humans on the same path, creating the same song together, can’t be replicated.”

Now living in Kentucky, Austin enjoys the freedom of working remotely while still connecting with his team virtually. 

“If I take a break after a meeting I might pluck on my guitar, play the piano or learn a little more violin,” Austin says. “So far I can play both ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ and the ABCs for my son. I don’t know if he’s figured out they’re the same tune yet.”

The work-life balance Austin’s found at BlueCross is a far cry from the cube farms he feared in school.

“I’m able to work at a place where you can get your technical work done but also experience culture and connection on a human level,” Austin says.

“The culture at BlueCross is second to none.”