Notes Taken During the Presentation

Kathyleen Beveridge: Her career & Journey

  • Wells Fargo, Nikko Securities, 1995 - 1996, investment advisor Stock broker Went back to school and switched careers
  • First high tech job at HP Loved to surf there
  • Qualcomm - Senior Manager Sales Operations and Director of Global Sales
  • ThermoFischer - senior director of marketing Biotech
  • Education
  • MBA, University of South California
  • BS Finance, Santa Clara University

  • Studied abroad in Spain

  • Quote she lives by: Maya angelou: “my mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with passion, some compassion, some humor, and style” Words to live by:

  • SURFING DOESN’T PAY THE BILLS

  • Investment banking is only one to one impact
  • Grateful that she works for company which makes a big impact on people Company Mission Statements:
  • HP: Create technology that makes life better for everyone, everywhere
  • Qualcomm: Inventing the tech everyone loves
  • Thermo Fisher Scientific: Enable our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner, and safer
  • Similarities: Using tech for the good of the people, main idea is to help people, doing something that people want Every tech company that she worked in, it had a macro, global impact on the people of the world
  • The product or service is life changing or generation changing
  • Qualcomm chips were in 99% of cell phones in the world
  • Everyday a billion people’s lives are impacted by Qualcomm technology! Thermo Fisher:

  • 100,000 colleagues

  • 7,000 R&D scientists/engineers
  • 1.5 Billion invested in R&D

  • 40B in revenue

  • Note: R&D = Research and development She:
  • Senior director of marketing and commercial sales
  • Voice of sales, voice of customers
  • People work really closely with scrum master to commercialize the product
  • No matter what you are doing, she enjoys working with all the folks. She can’t do what others do. You can take a concept and build it and make it happen She has data scientist in her team
  • Join massive fragment data bases outside the company to predict customer demand and where the sales will be
  • They sell freezers okay (very important, remember this)
  • Databases predicted where the demand will be BEFORE customers place orders Kris Porter: Him:
  • Software developer - SRE, DevOPs engineer, Infrastructure engineer
  • There were no CS classes when he started -
  • First cs class was second quarter of some year in college
  • Graduated in 2008 Bachelors and Masters degree
  • UCLA
  • Failed his first CS class; stopped after failure (thats pretty bad ) Words to live by: It doesn’t matter what you like at this age, you can have a tech career later on.
  • Marketable skill
  • Research project: internet of things
  • Robot that deployed somewhere in world
  • Costa rica: swings in the trees and gives biological readings (THATS SO COOL) Career:
  • NBC Universal, Streaming media infrastructure
  • Twitter (does he know elon musk?) you should ask
  • NOT a security engineer
  • Now works at Twitter (HE GOT FIRED)
  • Very interesting, most of his team was laid off (thanks elon musty)
  • Requirement to go work in the office in SF
  • Remote workers got kicked out
  • When you see companies shuffle, you have to go (don’t wait)
  • Mysten labs?? Learning Highlights
  • Continuous learning
  • CCNA training
  • Machine learning and Deep Learning
  • Python
  • Data Structures, Algorithms, Systems
  • Rest APIs in his job at twitter
  • Slowly movies to graph UL Agile Methodology
  • Technical perspective, different companies have their own version of agile, they use it depending on what they need
  • Qualcomm, - 150 engineers, interacted with each other, planned all of the work for the quarter in a big meeting that last 2 day (good way to coordinate)
  • Agile is important Business landscape can change: Use Sprints
  • Gone are the days where projects take 6 months
  • What can we do in shorter time periods?
  • That skillset is highly regarding Machine Learning
  • Learn how to use python libraries
  • Use information on when to archive and delete repositories
  • To cut cost Questions: Most important skill to have in the tech industry:
  • Continuous learning
  • Not just learning a particular programming language, but to learn everything
  • Different companies have different stacks, everytime he moved companies he had to learn new programming languages
  • Everyone has different ways of doing things
  • Don’t be super concerned about things you read on the news
  • In learning the skill to work with computers, that is self fulfilling
  • Start ups are a risk
  • Only risk is not learning (thats deep)
  • Be adaptive
  • Career path is zigzaggy
  • Dated herself for 35 years
  • Never thought she’d be doing what she’s doing
  • Best technical people
  • Listen to requirements
  • Translate it in terms of how the technology can solve the requirements
  • Help speak it to her Biggest Challenges faced in the tech industry:
  • She spent 14 years in qualcomm (semiconductor industry)
  • Acquisitions?? Buy other companies
  • The big fish in the pond (acquiring companies)
  • Serial killers (but not quite)
  • Interviews are ridiculous
  • Interviews are a series of timed, random tests
  • Could be a problem to solve in 30-45 minutes
  • Code has to compile with no errors How is your work-life balance:
  • When you talk to a company, you’re in a position to negotiate
  • You’re the one with the skill
  • Some good companies, some bad
  • You have to learn how to use services that are specific to certain companies How does coding help in the business industry?
  • Plenty of people were software developers academically, but moved into non-tech senior roles
  • Coding is a way of thinking
  • A way of looking at a problem and dissecting it
  • Critical thinking, problem solving
  • Think methodically
  • She interviews people on their ability to be a problem solver, and their ability to walk her through what you did what you did One of her questions:
  • You are in a room, not electronics, just whiteboard, pen, pencil
  • How many cars were sold in the United States last year?
  • She wants to know your assumptions, how she derived her answer What are you interested in exploring or learning right now?
  • He is interested in learning about block chain technology
  • AWS and google cloud stuff at large companies How would coding help with investment and finance?
  • Understanding algorithms, patterns, and analytics

Notes Taken During the Presentation

It is important for girls to be in engineering and computer science because these fields are crucial for shaping the future of technology and innovation. Girls bring a unique perspective and set of experiences to the table, which can help lead to the development of new ideas and solutions to problems. Furthermore, having more diversity in these fields can help break down stereotypes and biases, leading to a more inclusive and equitable industry.

It is important to keep trying even when you fail in engineering and computer science. These fields can be challenging, and it is natural to face obstacles and setbacks. However, it is important to persevere and not let failure discourage you. Instead, use failure as an opportunity to learn and grow, and to develop new strategies and approaches. With determination and hard work, you can overcome any challenge and achieve your goals in engineering and computer science.