Diverse: a SWE podcast

Ep 295: Sisterly Advice: Engineering Execs Share Keys to Success

Two sisters earned degrees in electrical engineering — but from there, their careers diverged into different paths. Jeanne Trinko Mechler, fellow at Marvell, followed the technical track, and Donna Trinko Majcen, vice president and general manager of the global services portfolio at Keysight Technologies, pursued the management track. In conversation with FY25 SWE President Karen Roth, Trinko Mechler and Trinko Majcen share insights from their 65+ years of combined experience to help women engineers maximize their careers, take calculated risks, and decide whether to pursue a technical or management path in STEM.

Duration:: 41m
Broadcast on:: 31 Dec 2024
Audio Format:: other

I've had individuals say, "Well, I want to be in management because I want to tell people what to do." And that is kind of the, then you shouldn't be in management. Welcome to Diverse, a Society of Women Engineers podcast. SWE gives women engineers a unique place and voice within the engineering community. On Diverse, we highlight incredible women in STEM and discover who they are at home, at work, and everywhere in between. You can find all of our episodes online at podcast.swe.org or wherever you stream your favorite podcast. Hello, I'm your host, Karen Roth, FY 25, president of the Society of Women Engineers. Welcome to Diverse, a sweet podcast. Today we're exploring how a degree in engineering can open doors to both technical and management career paths through the stories of two sisters who are both engineers. Jean Trinko-Meckler is a fellow at Marvel where she has become a leader on the technical side, pushing the boundaries of innovation. Donna Maitzen pursued the management route and is now vice president and general manager of the Global Services portfolio at T-Sight Technologies. I'm excited to dive into the sisterhood journey and learn more about these diverging paths. Jean and Donna, welcome to Diverse. Thank you. We're very excited to be here. I'm very excited to learn more about the potential opportunities for my future daughters and, you know, where they're looking at for their future too. So hopefully the, when I get big enough they can take a little bit of inspiration about your journeys too. Happy to share. So on Diverse, we love to hear the origin stories of how women got interested in STEM. Can you each share what initially sparked your interest in STEM and since your sisters, how your family may have impacted that direction? Jean, let's start with you. Okay. Well, thanks for having me. It's, I think it's so important to have role models and our dad was an electrical engineer at IBM. So early in my career, I did an informal survey of 25 women engineers and about 40 of them. I'm sorry, 40% of them had parents, mostly fathers that were engineers. So I guess it's not surprising that we followed in his footsteps. And, you know, my dad, he liked to say that every project begins with a tape measure. He did carpentry and electrical and plumbing and auto repair. He was like a real Mr. Fix-it, I guess you'd say. And we'd kind of help out, or at least we paid attention. And it was just three girls in the family. So my sister Donna and then we have one more sister in between us actually. But so there was really no gender stereotypes. We kind of grew up, we used to mow the lawn and use power tools, take things apart and fix them. And, of course, we used to joke that in our family, you had to be an EE, either electrical engineering or elementary education. My mom was a teacher and, you know, so she kind of, we learned from her to speak up confidently and teach and my dad was the engineer. So I was always kind of curious about how things worked. I was good at math and science. And so, you know, he said engineering seemed like a really good fit. So Donna, we both studied electrical engineering at the University of Vermont, or were three years apart in school. And, you know, then I graduated, I was hired by IBM, and, you know, that's kind of how I got my start in engineering. Right. So you can imagine we had similar backgrounds growing up a couple of years apart. So as Jean shared, we definitely didn't have role model that was, this is what a boy does, this is what a girl does when we were growing up with three sisters. I don't think there was ever a representation of that. So having parents that were very hands-on, very handy, we had a very old house growing up. And when you have an old house, you either have to have experts on speed dial that are available at any moment, or you need to become really good at doing stuff yourself. And so I think because of that, our parents were always doing stuff around the house and rewiring the house and doing the plumbing, as Jean said. And so we ended up kind of building that skill set as well. I had an old car when I was working and my dad made sure I knew how to change the tires that I could add oil. I actually changed the oil a couple of times when I was in college. So those are the kind of things you kind of just learn how to do. And I laugh because today my husband and I own a very old house. So we have a similar affliction that we've carried on. But as Jean said, I think she was naturally a math and science person and I kind of had that same skill. And so when I was a senior in high school, I was wondering, "Gee, what should I do as my career?" And seeing an older sister who was at that time going into her junior year at UVM and doing great in electrical engineering. And I said, "Well, I think she's paid the path and I think I'll follow the same way." So she was also a very strong influence on me and where I could kind of take my career next and what I should do as I move forward. So one thing I did when I got to college is I joined what's called the co-op internship program that they had at UVM. And it was nice because it was really a formal program. You got to do three different internships throughout your degree. And by doing that, you kind of get a sense of what is it that you want to do and what areas of interest do you want to focus on. So that was one thing that I kind of added and Jean was then working at IBM. And she was actually a great influence and convinced me to join Sweet because she was a starting member of Sweet at UVM. And then she also was running a summer tech camp where we could do science projects for middle school girls. And that also reinforced kind of our love of science and engineering. So a combination of all those things I think became a real positive of kind of influencing a direction. One thing that was interesting for me in a turning point is when I was doing my co-op programs, I had gone through two different internships. So through the end of my sophomore year going into my junior year. And both of them were in R&D. And what I found kind of coming through the second one is my passion for engineering while I still loved the degree I was working on, I wasn't sure R&D was exactly the right fit for me. And so I kind of came back after my sophomore, second internship and said to my dad, you know, I'm thinking I might switch to a business degree because I just wasn't as passionate about, you know, sitting, working on a project, kind of working more independently. And so I had some great conversations with him and with his much many years of experience, he said, you know, a business degree is wonderful as well. There's lots of great companies you can go work for. But if you stay in engineering, you can go work for some of these great technical companies out there. And I'm sure you will find positions that don't have to be R&D. There are lots of different opportunities. So one thing I did is when I interviewed after graduation, as I looked for are there positions outside of R&D. And I saw openings in technical sales, application engineering, product marketing, business development, technical roles. So when I took my first job at Hewlett Packard out of college, I actually took a position as a technical support engineer. And that was a great starting path towards where my career ended. Yeah. So you can see that Donna could not avoid engineering though because the whole family was full of engineers who are like, that's it. It's going to be engineering. I love hearing those kinds of stories. You don't get to hear those kinds of stories quite as often. Like usually it's the, my dad was an engineer and he had a great influence over me and that kind of thing, but not the, you know, really, we made it a family affair. So that's a really fun story. And so you both earned degrees in electrical engineering, but eventually your past diverged even more. Gene followed more of the technical track, Donna moved on to the management track permanently. Could you share any key moments that prompted you to really go in those directions? Donna, why don't you start us off because you already kind of started to go down that path with your, with the prior question. Yeah. No, happy duties. So as I mentioned, I joined HP right out of college, actually moved away and it's interesting. Gene and I have never lived in the same city or same state, even since we've both been working, but I moved out to Colorado and I always joke that Hewlett Packard hires engineers and then trains them to be what they need, whether it's, you know, focus on marketing or business or management. So in a way, I felt like I actually got my business degree, but on the job at HP. So, you know, coming back, mentioning our father again, and I know you've mentioned the example that a lot of people have influencers like that, but he was a manager and really, I think loved developing his team. And in some ways, I think I had very similar interests and skills. So, you know, I started in one position, loved what I was doing at HP a couple of years later, I had another job opportunity on the product management side, introducing a new product, loved that too. And then just a few years into my career, I had an opportunity that the job that I had originally taken as the tech support manager opened up. I was this tech support engineer and I wasn't in that team for a few years, but that management position opened up. And I had a couple of really great managers that I've worked for over my first two years at HP. They encouraged me and said, "Hey, you know what? This might be a good career path for you. Why don't you interview for this job?" So, I was still kind of in my late 20s, but I thought, "Well, maybe this is the right time to kind of think about management." So I decided, "Okay, I'll take the leap. I got the job." And I still remember one of the first days on the job, I ended up chatting with, you know, each of the new individuals that I was going to directly manage, not all of them had I worked with in the past and was one gentleman, Bill. He was an older gentleman kind of at the end of his career. And the two of us are talking and he goes, "Boy, you know, I think you could be my daughter's age." He's like, "Actually, I think you're younger than my daughter." And I think I could have taken that as negative as he thinking, "I can't be his manager." And I said, "You know, then we're going to learn from each other." And it ended up being a fabulous partnership. He was a great, you know, manager or mentor on the team, really was able to be supportive. But what I learned kind of in starting down that path one, I loved the first job I had as a manager. It just, it fit with my style. It allowed me to kind of listen to those around me, really start down this path. And I felt like I had kind of found the right direction of where I wanted to go next. What about you, Jean? Oh, sure. So I did want to say one more thing, so when Donna got her undergraduate degree, I actually got a master's degree at the same time, although I had joined IBM at that point, and I was working. And for me, I remember joining IBM, you know, for the first time, and I felt like everyone was talking a foreign language, you know, three-letter acronyms, and I remember thinking, "I didn't study this in college." So I remember thinking, "Okay, well, oh, if I can keep taking classes and learn some more, I can, you know, get that master's degree." Eventually, I got a second master's degree, which is kind of funny, because my second master's degree is actually an engineering management, but I've never been a manager. So it's actually kind of fun, but I really wanted to get kind of the business side of things I wanted the financial, but I've always been very committed to the technical path. Honestly, when I first joined, I mean, I always liked digging into the problems or, you know, kind of, you know, some new challenge was the latest technology, you know, that excites me. So that's why I went ahead and got the master's degree in electrical engineering first, and then kind of followed up with that MBA, but that was part-time, and I was working the whole time at IBM. And I would, again, I would say that my dad, who's at IBM, sort of said to me, you know, he was like, "Gene, CMOS, don't, you know, don't go into a bipolar. CMOS is going to be where it's at." And then he was like, "Oh, logic, yeah. Go into logic. Memory chips are, you know, going to be a commodity." So he was always kind of giving me advice about, you know, which technical path to pick. And I do remember looking around at the few other women engineers that were around me, and I have to say, it seemed like more of them were getting steered into management, but there was one woman that I knew through Sweet, actually, Casey Norris, who she was just a really strong technical person, and I really looked up to her as a role model. And she said, you know, she said, "There's more people that seem to be on the management side." And she's like, "You're very technical. I think you could be on the technical path and do really well." And so she was always on the technical path. So she was the one on the ones that kind of inspired me to stay on that path. And the other thing I guess I saw about management is that I would see these women go into management, and then, you know, they would struggle to balance their families and their careers and their kids. And sometimes when they get to, like, second-line management or whatever, they seem to get burned out. And I did see them making the difficult choice to kind of drop out of the workforce temporarily or permanently. And, you know, I had three kids. I wanted to enjoy my kids, and it seemed like you needed more facetime with management. So for me, it just, optically, I was more interested in the technical side of things, diving deep, and, you know, that just seemed to work out well. I could still pick up my kids and have some time with them, but I could log back on remotely in the evenings and do another couple hours of work. So I always got my work done, and there just seemed to be a little bit more flexibility around it. I mean, I was very fortunate that IBM introduced, like, flex hours and family leaves. So when I had a kid, I could take six months off, and then my husband could work part-time the next year, and he was a great support person as well. And so for me, I think it was just a little bit more work-balanced decision of choosing the technical path, and then also sort of that road less traveled, where I could, you know, be interested in the next big challenge. I got to do research on test patterns and diagnostics for delayed effects, which was, you know, something I get to publish in the journal of research and development, then IBM decided to go to do an external OEM ASIC business, and I got to, like, design lots of chips for external companies, and, you know, it was like I had to teach them how to use our libraries and how to teach our customers how to use libraries and how to use our tools. And then, you know, when the number of IOs on the chip started to explode, we decided to start adding, you know, serializers, deep serializers and 30s onto the chip, so I wrote a textbook. I'd never written one before, but I thought, why not? Let's write a textbook. And then, you know, AI accelerators for data centers and working on the first pet-off single chip. I mean, just breaking records for large language model processing. All that stuff is just very exciting, you know, these multi-dye packages. I just really felt very attracted to the excitement of being on the leading edge of technology. It's really fun to work on things that haven't been done before. And so that, for me, that was just, I think, a better fit for my personality. You know, the part that I really, really love about both of your stories is that you both, even though you both have an engineering background and studied it down the engineering path in college, but you were both very cognizant about what you wanted out of life, what your other skill sets you were good at, and we're really able to capitalize on that and kind of maneuver around. We so often hear, you know, stereotypes about, you know, "Oh, if you're an engineer, this is all you'll ever do." But you both really were cognizant about the important things that your best skill sets, that were important to you in life, and how you navigated around that very differently, and then used each other as resources as part of that. It's interesting that you say that, Karen, because I think both Jean and I have thought about neither of us have taking breaks, I would say, from our careers. We've both worked. We both have children. You know, we took months off, but we've never taken years off, and not that that makes, you know, it's always great that people do what they need to. But I think because both of us have found what are we passionate about, what do we love about working, it's allowed us to stay energized and continue to take on new roles. So I think you're absolutely right. If you know what your passions are, what you're good at, and you kind of keep focusing on that with your career, it makes it a lot easier to want to stay with it and kind of continue to learn and grow. Yeah. Some people, if you have a free hour, what would you choose to do with your free hour? If you would want to dive in and solve this difficult problem, and solving puzzles and problems is what you would do with that free hour grape. Or if you are more inclined to build a team or, you know, align with people on a strategy or whatever, then, you know, that maybe gives you a clue, like, which way you want to go, you know, is maybe better to be on the technical path, or is it better to be on the man? That's really great advice, because I know a lot of women out there struggle with that, too, of like, oh, if I go down in the management path, will people assume I'm not technical or, oh, if I stay on the technical path, will people assume that I don't have leadership capabilities? Like, women really struggle with that. And so I really appreciate that advice from both of you and being really thoughtful and staying strong in your skill sets and finding a great path for each of you. Yeah. Thanks. As a technical expert, how do you stay on the cutting edge of your field? And what opportunities do you look for when you continue to grow? Well, you have to be really rigorous to keep learning, you know, stay curious, right? And it goes along with sort of anticipating industry trends. Like, well, when will the data center customers want co-packaged objects? Or is it a good idea to, we got to invest in 3D packaging or 3.5D packaging and all these really highly integrated multi-chip packages. And what is the roadmap of development that customers are going to need for their next generation and the next generation after that? When you're on the technical path, it's very important that you have to have not only knowledge of your own companies and development, but what's happening in industry? What are other people doing? So I would say that I kind of got the first, you know, idea of this from when we went when IBM decided to do this external ASIC business. And you know, so I started there, that gave me that customer focus. And then that same team was sold to Global Foundries about, I guess it was almost 10 years ago, and then acquired by Marvell. So it's interesting. I've actually been working with a lot of some of the same people for over 35 years. And you know, now Marvell in the connectivity and custom silicon business, it's been really fantastic because they're, you know, really focused on the new chip design challenges, AI cloud data center customers. So it's exciting. I mean, so I get to like develop the hardware for AI and then use AI to do it, which is a lot of fun. And it's just some really exciting time to be in engineering. So I would say that it's the never stop learning, never stop teaching other people. You know, some people think it's job security to keep other people in the dark about what's going on. But honestly, that's the opposite of how you advance. It's like you've got to share your knowledge, you know, make others successful, bring other people along with you and, you know, and train your replacements even. You might think about it that way because train other people and then you get to go on and work on the next big thing. So that's kind of been my strategy all along to kind of, you know, stay on the technical track and stay fresh. And it sounds like you've been very successful at that since you have a, you're a fellow now. Yeah. I think it's a funny term though, don't you? Like, for she's a generally good fellow, I'm going to be thinking about that now. I'm going to say, that's going to stay with me, I think. So, so we switch back to Donna. What was the most surprising thing you learned when you first stepped into management? Yeah, great question. You know, it's always interesting you think back, like, what is it that caused me to one jump in and then really go, this is the right path? And you know, I think probably the first thing, you know, a lot of times when you first talk to folks that think they want to go into management, I've had individuals say, well, I want to be in management because I want to tell people what to do. And that is kind of the, then you shouldn't be in management too, that's what your objective is. So, you know, I think probably my first surprise was I didn't have to have all the answers. Being a manager really isn't telling people what to do. It's really saying, how can I help this team achieve its best? And I've always found that my most successful times are when I look to the team and say, what is it that this team has as its strengths? And how do I maximize those strengths? Because then that will drive the success of the organization, which of course then drives the success of the business. And so it really is a people first mentality in how to lead a team and really drive it towards our goals. But what I also then found is that as I moved through management, you know, when you're a first level manager, I really do feel like your number one focus has to be on the success of the team and how they act and interact on a daily basis. But what was missing from that to me was now how do you take in the strategy? I kind of found myself asking those questions of, well, is this really the best path for us to take? Or could we be more successful if we add other elements? And so I found myself wanting to do that more and more. And so as I kind of progressed past first level management, I really found I wanted to get in the middle of the strategy. I wanted to help to set strategy, make decisions as we were going and really be closely connected to customer. I mean, I think Jean actually mentioned that very well within her conversation is, you know, she wants to know how can she help our customers be successful and design the right solutions that are going to get us to the next generation. And actually that customer piece was crucial for me as well to feel like I was successful. So I wanted to know where our customers were going, be involved in that, and really then have a P&L. Right? Because if you have a P&L within your business, now you know, you know, this is what success looks like for growing. And what can I do to continue to move it down that path? So those became kind of pieces that I think kind of moved me forward from what I learned when I first started managing until why I really wanted to go into more of a higher-level management and then move on to becoming a VP. I don't think we hear that message of, you think that you want to tell people what to do. You're probably not cut up for management story quite enough out there. You know, the recognition that when you turn into a manager, you're actually turning into a serving of kinds to the people that work for you to make sure that they're empowered and grow and have capabilities for the future and really are executing on the vision for the company. Like, it's almost a reverse of telling people what to do is what makes a really good manager. Absolutely. And I think Jean's comment earlier, which is teaching other people is crucial because you should be looking for who's going to be your replacement, who's going to be the next person that comes along. And I think that's important whether you're on the technical track or you're on the management track. That should be your continuous look of how are you advancing those around you. So they're being successful because that's what's going to drive the overall company success. That's a great theme that I've been hearing woven throughout from both of you is how much your mom's teaching background influenced, how you communicate and work with other people. Oh, definitely. My mom was very assertive, I would say, I mean, she was a teacher. She was a teacher. So she always taught us to speak up, you know, speak our mind and not to be shy. I was kind of shy at first. And she also had a love of theater also. So that was something she kind of, you know, gave us some. We were involved a little bit in the different school plays or we learned how to tap dance or whatever. You know, you would think, why is that important? Well, you've got to be able to speak and explain things clearly and get your point across if you're going to either lead people in a certain technical direction or lead the team. I mean, that's so important that you you'd be able to have those skills. So yeah, she was definitely a role model for us as well. I've been my older daughter started kindergarten this year and I keep reflecting on the strength of the personality that her poor teacher has to have in order to really corral that the 20 of them in that kindergarten class with all different backgrounds and still tiny little personalities in order to like prepare them on how to learn for the future, like and just, you know, being able to deal one on one with each of them, but be able to take the class along for the ride, like, that's a tough job. So I'm curious about this concept more about taking risks and taking a chance on yourself and everything that you've talked about. So question for both of you, how do you assess risk when making these career decisions and what career chances would you encourage our listeners to really take Jean, let's start with you. Sure, I can recall a time, you know, this is like a story I'm going to tell you about where it was kind of a turning point in my career. It was it was just shortly after we had started this OEM ASIC business at IBM and a chip came back from the fab and the customer reported that the 30s was only working at high power supply voltage. But when I started to drop the supply, still within range, it was losing lock and I mean, no one had any idea what was wrong, you know, we sort of listened to what was going on. But I raised my hand and I got on a plane with one other engineer and the two of us went to California to the customer's lab. We didn't know what was going on, but we just said we're willing to help. We ran some self tests on the 30s and tried some different things and we started figuring out that the clock wasn't even getting to the 30s at low voltage. So it was not the 30s, it was in the clock tree. I remember I started digging out what was going to what was wrong. And it turned out that there was some missing Vias in the middle of this new clock buffer that was current starving it. And that was the causing the problem. We did a metal spin and, you know, like a month later, basically they had working parts. But the reason I tell the story is just that I realized that so much of your success is just built on the little act of raising your hand and I call it run to the fire, you know, be that person that is going to take the risk that they can solve the toughest problems. You know, you will be successful and you will be, you're paid to think on your feet. And that you should think to yourself, I can make change, I can make an impact, you know, and it might not be a roaring fire every time, you know, not, you know, that was, that was a situation that I have to say, I've only maybe three times in 35 years had a situation where, you know, it was, you know, trying to, that was that severe that there was something that wasn't working. I think it's just a smoldering, annoying issue that everybody's hitting, but you realize it's costing the company a lot of productivity, you know, so if you're the person that kind of says, we can make this happen, kind of starts modeling the way or leading the team or whatever that to make the difference that I think is just huge. And so, you know, I really think back often to that one time where I kind of stuck my neck out and it's, and I succeeded it, it just kind of reinforced the fact that one person can really make a difference and that is, you're willing to take some risks in your career that you can really be successful. And I'll just join in here to say one, I love Gene's example and, and the two of us, you know, as you can imagine, we spend quite a bit of time talking and hearing each other's stories because we bounce ideas off each other and we've always been supporters and helpers along the way within our career. And I always felt her advice of run to the fire was a great one. And I've absolutely seen that in my career at trigger points, sort of looking for where are there opportunities that you can take advantage of that are kind of going to be your next leap of where you're going to go and in a situation not as exciting as hers, but I was in a senior manager role. I was managing our America's field marketing organization. Great job. Love did. It was a great opportunity. I didn't have to travel too much so back to spend quality time with my children. And so no complaints on that, but I was working on kind of where we were and it was kind of the beginning of the digital age and we really needed to transform to more of a digital first marketing versus where we were, which was much more face to face and networking with who we knew from a customer base. And so I ended up kind of seeing this gap and not seeing that it was being filled and decided, you know, I think it's time to kind of put together a proposal of how we should really transform the way we market as a company. And not really being asked, I sat down with one of my colleagues and the two of us kind of put together this proposal and shared it with one of our senior vice presidents to sort of say, hey, here's some ideas of where we should go next. And he read through it and said, you're absolutely right. This is exactly what we need to do next. There's a gap here and Donna, I need you to lead this. So that turned into kind of the looking for an opportunity within the organization where maybe there wasn't somebody that was saying, here's what needs to happen, but we needed to be the one saying, this is what needs to happen. And that actually led me down to the first vice president position that I held within the company. So it really did kind of move in this position of don't just wait, don't say I'm safe or I'm comfortable or I'll wait till someone taps me on the shoulder. But when there are opportunities or when there are challenges, take those challenges on. Don't assume somebody else is going to do it. And then that opens up the door to what I think become exciting and great opportunities. The great part about these stories is I keep flashing back to our theme for Wii 24 and for this entire fiscal year for the society women engineers really, which is together we rise. And so to me together we rise isn't just about, you know, powering people in their careers, it's about how are we there for every aspect of each other in order to make sure that we come together as a community. And so I'm always reflective on it's the little things that have made the biggest differences in my life and careers, whether or not it's someone that, you know, told me to take a chance on this guy that I was dating and making sure that I open up to him or whether or not it's someone that told me I was going down a wrong path and I needed to think about something differently or whether or not it's just the people to bounce ideas off of and making sure that I was ready, mentally and prepared to go into new scenarios and go into that fire. So I appreciate both of you being an awesome embodiment of really that theme and what together we rise really looks like. Yeah, I think Karen, you just mentioned something that's so crucial, which is what's your network? And that probably is one of those things that I keep thinking about over the years is you need to maintain your network, who are your mentors, who are your advocates, who are just your friends and people you can bounce ideas off of, who are your coaches, and holding on to that is so crucial because those are individuals that sometimes can reflect and see something in you or a challenger dealing with and give you great advice. They could be the same people that say, hey, here's a new opportunity that you should be taking on. So maintaining and keeping that network, I think, keeps you and keeps me excited about where I am, keeps relationships going, but really helps me throughout my career and has always allowed me to then understand where I can go next and helps with stepping stones. So that is that rise together and having that network of folks that can truly be the support network. I agree. And I was going to say I'm, you know, I'm a lifetime sweet member, actually. I mean, I was the charter member of the North Country section, which is Vermont and New Hampshire. I was a charter member of the University of Vermont section, you know, when I was a student, I was, you know, oh my gosh, I was, I think I was president of the section for 25 years for some, and then I was reaching governor for three years. So I've always said that sweet was such a big part of my network of mentors. I mean, the ability to just have so many strong women, you know, there to tap into has been incredible for me. So I will definitely say that. And now I will also say, of course, I'm very proud of my sister and we definitely use each other's advice as well. You know, it's sweet has been such a constant in my life, too, as you would hope out of someone who's become the president of the society, of course. But it really is phenomenal how, you know, you take on mentors and whenever you come up with a challenge that once you've built that strong network of who to go to, then there's always someone there and a systems engineer by training. And so I am making sure that I always like to know what the next step in my life looks like. And, you know, that's not how life actually works. You got to go along with the punches and see what's next and it's always been amazing to me that whenever I'm ready for the next opportunity in my career, someone's always been there to say, Oh, yeah, here's what's next. And it hasn't been as much of me preparing or looking to the future or applying to the right things. It's just making sure that I'm as prepared as I can be. And then the next step is there. I think it's important. I always tell people that you need a whole board of directors, right? You should have like a whole bunch of people that are, you know, kind of mentoring you and giving you advice. And then you're ready because they've seen what you could do. And they go, Oh, you know, this here's somebody that could take this challenge on. That's a really great way of putting that that, you know, you have a board of directors for in your career and life. I love that. So this has been a really great conversation before we wrap up. What is your final advice about what e2v would give someone who's really at a crossroads in their engineering or management career and trying to figure out whether to pursue which of these routes. Donna, your last thoughts. Yeah. So similar to you, Karen, I didn't have what I would call a career map. I didn't lay out the I will become this. But instead, you know, kind of looked and said reflect on my strengths, reflect on what creates passion for my job. And what I found is that the management track was the right thing for me and really allowed me to play to my strengths and work with individuals, you know, look for opportunities within your current network and then within whether it's inside your company or outside your company. That's another piece that I think I've looked at is you kind of want to kind of keep looking around and opportunities sometimes do fall. And there's triggers, right? There's points where you go, Oh, this is the right next step for me. And sometimes those steps are sideways because you want to round out your skill set. You want to round out your knowledge or learn a new business. And sometimes they're up. And so I've just found kind of keep your eyes scanning. You don't need to feel like that career map is the only way to get there, but really kind of keep looking for opportunities. And when you see them, take the leap, don't don't hesitate. You don't need to know everything. You just need to know that you will you want to learn. You have a passion for learning and continuing to build and take advantage of those opportunities. Yeah. And I think for me, I would just say that, you know, we used to have this thing at IBM where we talked about think Fridays where you spent time to kind of introspect, not that we didn't think Monday through Thursday. We did. But on Fridays, we really thought, you know, oh, and I think you have to have some introspection. You have to think about some of the important things that you're interested in or that you would be good for you to do. I know I was talking about presentations and publishers and patents. And then, but then I guess more importantly, it is just find somebody that you can use as a sounding board about different situations, about what you might want to try, talk to a number of different people, get their opinion, you know, find somebody to get. And I said, I will say sisterly advice, you know, if you, if you don't have a real sister, like I have Donna, then, you know, one of your sweet sisters will be, would be good. But to kind of bounce the ideas off about what would be a good next step. I think the more people you ask about the better off you'll be in your career. So I hope, I hope, I mean, I'm very grateful of the fact that I've grown up in a family of engineers. I'm a sister who's an engineer and then I have tons and tons of sweet sisters. So that's been really helpful for me. But I think using all of that advice and resource will always help you make the right decision. Thank you again to Donna and Jean for sharing. Those were all really phenomenal thoughts. And I hope our listeners really appreciate the insight you've given, especially on that last point, Jean, I'm making sure that, you know, you take a wide breadth of input because, you know, sometimes mentors give it you input from a biased perspective and sometimes things change. So making sure that you have the different sources of input to help really ground yourself in that path forward is huge and really that board of directors come. And I think that's going to stick with me for a little bit. So thank you for putting that in my head. Well, thanks so much for having us today. This was really a lot of fun and what a treat for me to spend the time with my sister and me as well. As you said, if you don't have an actual sister in STEM, make sure you find a soul sister in STEM because it'll make your career so much more fun. It'll make life so much more fun too, right? Absolutely. So I'm your FY 25 sweet president, Kenra. And from all of us at Sweet, thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Diverse. Please don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with your social network. You can visit podcast.swe.org to keep up with our episodes and learn more about how the society of women engineers empowers women to achieve their full potential as engineers and leaders. [MUSIC] [MUSIC]