Hello, everybody. And thanks for being here. Thanks for taking the time to come to this session.I'll be talking about my experience breaking into the internet of things, profession, moving to tech from a non tech background, my perspectives as a Gen Z analyst, the structure of this talk, I will talk a little bit more about my background initially and then four pieces of advice and recommendations that have helped me build my confidence and find a community at work um working for a technology company and working for a big corporate.

This is more of my background which I will get into in the next slide. But there's my email. If anybody wants to follow up, I would love to be connected with any of you or if you have any follow up questions, anything like that. So just to start, this is a little bit more about me. I graduated from UN C Chapel Hill at UN C I got my degree in International Relations with a minor in Chinese. I focused on intelligence collection. And while I was in undergrad, I also did a um some education um internships in education and curriculum development. After graduating, I moved over to the consulting world. I worked for a DC based geopolitical consulting firm that mapped us China technology relations. So this is where I was really exposed to some emerging technologies like internet of things, uh biotechnology data centers. And the like this was a very writing intensive job and I really did love writing, but this is where I was exposed to the internet of things, which leads me to my current position. I'm currently working for a analyst firm within a financial services company. So in this role, I research smart cities that have internet of things deployments. So the internet of things is a technology that basically connects previously unconnected um infrastructure to the internet.

So in a city that could be connecting your street lights to the internet, that way you're able to map how much energy they're, how much energy they're being used. And you're also able to turn that into some sort of actionable insight that way you can say, ok, maybe these lights are using too much energy, we can turn them off remotely and it's just having that remote um control and access. So in this role, I talk with cities who are undergoing their digital transformations. I talk about their strategies, their partnerships. I talk to startups that are developing IOT applications, platforms and networks. And I also talk to legacy technology companies about how they're thinking about supporting these data flows in this infrastructure. So these are four recommendations or observations that I've collected in the last year and a half that I've been in this position that have helped me build confidence and acclimate to working for a technology company without um as much of a technology background as maybe some of my peers.

This is an overview of what I'll be talking about in the interview process. How you can build confidence there day to day finding your community while at work, how you can demonstrate your capabilities and identify your strengths and setting reach goals with your community. Step.

One confidence is key. This is something that's really easy to say and it's a lot harder to live, especially when you're a younger woman in a tech company that's dominated, of course, a very male dominated industry. But that doesn't have to stop you from feeling like you belong there as well. So the first piece of advice I have is knowing how to sell yourself, knowing what your strengths are, what your capabilities are for. For me that's writing and oral communication. I know that I'm a great communicator. So during the interview process, I was able to illustrate that through a writing sample. And I could show even though I may not, I'm an expert in internet of things yet, I am able to articulate my understanding of the topic in a way that um other people can read it and understand it too, which I think is just as important as being, having that tech background. Next, finding your people. This has been a huge one for me, obviously as Gen Z and I think in general we all love to work remotely. That being said it is difficult to be on boarded or to start a new job in the pandemic remotely. You don't have somebody sitting next to you at your desk saying where you can ask, how do you do this? Where can I find this?

And that can be a bit tricky, especially as you're kind of a new or you're young, you don't want to be sending out emails asking how do I do this? How do I do that? So for me, I've been able to um find a great community of women at work who have all started around the same time as me, we're all about the same age and we have either weekly or monthly check ins where we just chat, we talk about what we're working on. If anybody is struggling with anything. If anybody has some advice for the rest of the group, it's a great way to hold each other accountable, but also have that community where you just feel like you can be comfortable and you can be yourself. You can express your frustrations and you can grow and learn together. The next step, demonstrating your capabilities. This first step is something that I still struggle with all the time. But qualifying or un qualifying yourself is when you use minimizing language, when you're talking maybe in an interview or in a briefing when you say something like, oh, I just wanted to say or I know I'm not an expert on this but, and that's a really um using minimizing language is something that I think happens to a lot of women when you're in a new space where you don't feel as comfortable.

And honestly, there's really no need to do that. You are just as qualified to talk about these things as anyone else. You've done the work, you are just as worthy to be in that space and discounting yourself or disqualifying yourself from the conversation is something we all do and I've done it, I still do it to this day. But I think once you identify that, maybe that's an issue or something that you do, you can overcome it. When you realize there's no need to do that, you're just as capable as anybody else to be in these spaces. That being said, it is also really important to be authentic. I know when I started in this position, there was all sorts of jargon and phrases that people were using that. I didn't understand things like I don't want to boil the ocean. Let's double click on this phrases like that that I was like, oh maybe if I use these phrases, I will like, feel that sense of belonging and I'll feel like I fit in and that's really, that was kind of just a waste of my time. That's not authentic to me. That's not how I talk and I don't want to, I just don't feel like you should be communicating in a way that doesn't make sense for you that doesn't feel authentic.

I was spending more time trying to use these phrases than actually just communicating what I actually wanted to say. So you can definitely be yourself while you're working. One of these Corporates without having to just blend in and talk like everybody else that being said, something that's helped me with the imposter syndrome and just the nerves you get when you're doing a presentation or you're in a space where you're maybe the youngest person or maybe the only woman is by being very over prepared.

I still do this like for this call, I practice maybe 20 or 30 times if I have an interview that I might think, OK, I could get through 10 questions in this interview. I'll prepare something like 15. I always want to be over prepared, have a contingency plan and um just know that I'm ready and capable to get something done, whether it be an interview, a presentation or something like that, the next step. And this is what really keeps um life interesting for me in my community. Once you do have that community is setting fit and reach goals. So this kind of reminds me of when you're applying to colleges and people say you should set some fit schools and some reach schools. So a fit goal for me might be something like I want to publish 10 reports. By the end of the quarter, I want to talk to 50 people, 50 companies and then a reach goal be something like I want to travel for work or I want to speak at a conference like this. And once you do have that work community, you're able to check in with each other and say, oh maybe one of my colleagues has, she just spoke at a conference, then she can share how that experience went for her tips she has for the rest of us and then we can all kind of lift each other up as one of us or all of us start to rise and that's just reinforcing that community aspect as well.

So just to recap the four CS building confidence, finding your voice and being authentic community, identifying your people and setting goals together to achieve demonstrating your capabilities while being authentic, don't qualify yourself. You deserve to be there. Your capabilities are just as strong and having these writing and research skills are just as important in tech as having the hard tech background and chasing big goals. This keeps the work interesting. It keeps you elevating and accelerating through your career and it's a great way to have that community. So with that being said, thank you all so much. For coming and, um, if anybody wants to follow up, that was my email. All right, thank you. Bye.