Muse and Metrics S5 EP5 — Heightened Awareness with Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian [Guest Bio, Summary, Audio and Transcript]

Guest Bio

Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian is a multifaceted software engineer and a vibrant voice in the tech community. Based in the scenic locale of Vancouver, British Columbia, she brings over a decade of experience in career development, software engineering, and community building. Vaishnavi stands out as a prominent speaker and organizer for GDG Burnaby, where her efforts amplify the presence and impact of technology enthusiasts.

Her advocacy for neurodiversity, diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI), and women in tech is not just a professional stance but a personal commitment. Vaishnavi’s work in these areas is underpinned by her profound understanding of the intersectionality of these issues and their significance in the tech landscape.

In her current role at Electronic Arts, based out of Vancouver, she brings a collaborative spirit and a deep passion for championing neurodiversity and accessibility. Her approach to teamwork and project development is infused with an acute awareness of the importance of inclusive and empathetic practices in the tech industry.

Vaishnavi’s technical acumen is complemented by her prowess in visual communication and storytelling. She skillfully integrates these elements to demystify technology and make it accessible and engaging to a broader audience. Her approach counters the notion that tech is an exclusive domain, showcasing it as an inclusive field open to diverse talents and perspectives.

A recognized figure in tech conferences and panels, Vaishnavi has a knack for engaging audiences with her insightful content presentations. Her journey through numerous competitions, hackathons, and technical quizzes illustrates her dedication and skill in the field.

Moreover, her talent extends to writing, where she has been a prolific contributor to school and college magazines, newspapers, and has earned a reputation as a skilled reviewer in technical writing.

Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian is a dedicated professional who not only excels in her technical role but also passionately works towards creating a more inclusive and diverse tech community. Her advocacy for neurodiversity and women in tech, combined with her expertise in software engineering and community building, makes her a distinguished and inspiring figure in the tech world.

Summary

Key Highlights:

1. Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian’s Background and Advocacy:

• Based in Vancouver, Canada, Vaishnavi is a software engineer at Electronic Arts.
• Actively involved as a technical ambassador and GDG Burnaby organizer.
• Champion for neurodiversity, accessibility, and women in tech, integrating these passions into her professional and community roles.

2. Emphasis on Neurodiversity and Inclusivity in Tech:

• Advocates for greater awareness and inclusion of neurodiverse individuals in tech.
• Shares personal experiences with neurodiversity, discussing the importance of accommodating diverse needs in workplace environments.

3. Journey and Challenges in Tech and Cultural Adaptation:

• Reflects on her transition from India to Canada and the cultural shifts in perception and approach to STEM fields.
• Highlights the differences in tech culture between South Asia and North America, including gender and societal expectations.

4. Integrating Visual Communication and Storytelling in Tech:

• Focuses on the art of storytelling and visual communication to make technology more accessible and understandable.
• Discusses how effective communication can demystify tech and create inclusive spaces for diverse audiences.

5. Navigating Gender Dynamics and Self-Advocacy in Tech:

• Addresses the challenges of gender dynamics in tech and the importance of self-advocacy.
• Encourages speaking up about accomplishments and embracing one’s unique contributions to the field.

6. The Importance of Community and Mentorship:

• Stresses the value of community support, mentorship, and building networks in the tech industry.
• Shares experiences of participating in and contributing to tech events and panels.

7. Personal Growth and Learning in a Diverse Environment:

• Discusses the continuous process of learning and unlearning biases, and the importance of understanding different perspectives.
• Emphasizes the need for managers and leaders to recognize and support neurodiversity in the workplace.

8. Enhancing Leadership Skills and Global Perspective:

• Explores the development of leadership skills and the understanding of global cultural dynamics.
• Highlights the importance of inclusive leadership in fostering a diverse and innovative tech environment.

Conclusion:

This episode with Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian delves into her experiences and insights as a software engineer, advocate for neurodiversity, and a leader in the tech community. Her journey illuminates the challenges and opportunities in embracing diversity, inclusivity, effective communication, and leadership in the tech world. Vaishnavi’s story is a testament to the transformative power of community, advocacy, and personal growth in navigating the dynamic landscape of technology.

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Transcript

(This is a raw transcript — there may be errors)

00;00;06;07–00;00;17;09
Philippa Burgess
Hello and welcome to Muse and Metrics. This is your host, Philippa Burgess. This is season five episode five and today’s topic is heightened awareness and administration.

00;00;17;16–00;00;47;05
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I’m Vaishnavi Subramanian from beautiful British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. I’m also a Women Techmakers Ambassador from Vancouver. I am a software engineer by profession. I work in Electronics to the Electronic Arts to based out of the BBC, and I’m very passionate about working collaboratively. Champion of the Neurodiversity and Accessibility. What I have seen just being a part of the team has been exponential.

00;00;47;06–00;01;20;01
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I think what perhaps sticks. Years and years, sometimes close to a decade. I could kind of condense within this short duration. I participated in so many commercial Women’s Day panels within the WTO by virtue of having so many people always looking for speakers or panelists or collaborators. I managed to collaborate in three or four places and also organize and talk about things and passionate about technology.

00;01;20;03–00;01;44;06
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
The use of AI and also the other passion of mine is visual communication. How do you integrate visual communication and storytelling in the art of explaining technology so that everyone feels belong and not get overwhelmed by it? Because some a geeky side of things that only a few people can access? Absolutely not. It’s just the art of storytelling.

00;01;44;07–00;02;07;22
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So that’s how the lithium helped me get exposure, and I was able to use the medium to present in so many places. And then one thing led to another and then, you know, the power of social media people to hear like the stuff, can you collaborate here and there? And just things started coming to me really organically. There’s a saying that your vibe attracts your tribe.

00;02;07;25–00;02;28;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So sometimes, you know, when you don’t have a particular platform, you just keep broadcasting privacy if there’s a like minded person. But then having a medium like the medium, they’re going to be who look they have make the best of this. People who are advocates and people who are passionate about tech, who are women. So, you know, it kind of fit on the criterion.

00;02;28;13–00;02;36;02
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
All you need to do is just bring those voices from the platform. All you need to do is just send a message some, and then you’ll be amazed.

00;02;36;02–00;02;47;21
Philippa Burgess
And I have been so blessed that when I all of the two summits and now during the season and every time I’ve done a call out, my calendar just fills up. It’s like, Yeah, thank you so much.

00;02;47;21–00;03;00;23
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
You know, then you have to kind of pick people versus you reaching out in closer places and then just setting the ball rolling. Here you just broadcast and then things come due again.

00;03;00;25–00;03;29;00
Philippa Burgess
It’s been joyful and I’m very happy about that part of it. So let’s just let’s go back into your work. You’re you’re in Vancouver, B.C. And how did what inspired tech? I know some of the conversations I’ve had between the American culture. I’m not as familiar with the Canadian culture relative to the South Asian culture, because we I find in like our American culture, if you’re interested in math and science, you’re the outcast.

00;03;29;05–00;03;55;08
Philippa Burgess
You’re not that it is not as welcome. And I look at our media and I look at how we in shows and media kind of reflects society as well as storytelling. And we send messages to our kids that if you want to be popular, math’s not the way to go. And I feel the South-Asian culture definitely celebrates math and sciences way, way more than we do in the North American culture.

00;03;55;11–00;04;17;19
Philippa Burgess
And I feel that it is something that I want to talk about and make sure that people can understand that there’s really cool things in the math and science conversation. And I also felt excluded from math and science until I stepped into a technology certificate and now a master’s of science. And then I can own and claim my identity as a woman in STEM and a woman in tech.

00;04;17;22–00;04;19;20
Philippa Burgess
So tell me a little bit about your journey.

00;04;19;23–00;04;48;07
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I don’t want to generalize, but speaking from South Vision, I’m an Indian by origin, by roots, all my ancestors. Everyone’s from India, so I speak solely from that perspective. But stem and steam as such is highly worshiped in countries where it comes from. It’s like the total opposite of what you mentioned here. You can have your hobbies. You can be a stand up comedian, you can be an artist by night.

00;04;48;07–00;05;13;23
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
You can move like that. But you need to have a certain degree, or at least a degree. But I really focused on science and technology. AUSMAT Because that’s where your day job comes from. That’s where you feel like your money can come from. Everything else is a hobby. Whatever you do, anything else, you could be a graffiti artist, you could be a painter, you can just run some events, but they all are secondary jobs.

00;05;13;23–00;05;45;01
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So it’s very, very popular culture coming from the Canadian, from the North American culture. And I moved to Canada just about most of five years back. So it’s a very recent phenomenon. But then coming from a place where it’s like every second person a stone’s throw away is an engineer by choice or by force here. It’s just that not so many and it’s not like, there’s so much celebration, there’s so much of awareness and inclusion towards that.

00;05;45;01–00;06;17;11
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And it just felt a little confusing to me because I almost thought because North America, most of the Silicon Valley in the States is the hub for tech. So I assumed that pretty much every person or 90% of it is primarily based on people different have STEM degree. So that was a little different. But then in our culture, at least in our community in India, it’s a de facto it’s like, you know, engineering and then figuring out what you want to do with your life.

00;06;17;13–00;06;21;20
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s generally like that.

00;06;21;23–00;06;41;27
Philippa Burgess
And that’s very different. And I think I think the AI machine learning kind of wave that’s on us right now is inspiring a lot more people to say, maybe I should learn a little bit more about the foundations of what go into this, because it is something I can even see the U.S. government is putting out programs for.

00;06;41;27–00;06;53;00
Philippa Burgess
You belong in STEM and trying to make them more attractive to kids and more inclusive to kids and more welcoming because they the future requires these jobs and these skills.

00;06;53;02–00;06;55;26
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And yet digital, right?

00;06;55;28–00;07;17;11
Philippa Burgess
Well, I feel like the last 20 years didn’t matter who we were. We’ve all had to become digitally literate and now we’re in data literacy. And data is the new place that we’re at. And it doesn’t matter who you are. Everybody’s lives is impacted by AI and machine learning and technology. And so those are things that are becoming just more obvious.

00;07;17;11–00;07;40;23
Philippa Burgess
But then also, as we transition in the workplace and the role of women and the role of diversity and you touched on neurodiversity and being an advocate and a champion for neurodiversity, can you talk about how you’re seeing that being embraced in the workplace and kind of the types of advocacy that you do and how you self-identify as Neurodivergent?

00;07;40;25–00;08;09;28
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I think the last decade or so, everything as this whole much greater awareness towards neurodiversity, accessibility and product UI, UX design, having people come into focus groups, even in gaming communities, because earlier we never felt represented or never felt heard. And you know, there was no concept of shift left learning where, you know, these things come as a part of your requirements, part of your design.

00;08;10;02–00;08;46;15
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It was more of an afterthought earlier. But then if you know, but the same nothing about us. Without us, it’s primarily very if you want to make certain products or products better for the community, you need to involve them or involve us growing up. But I’ve always been a late bloomer. It kind of takes them. I’ve been a slow learner and also the it is the aspect and it’s just I had some days when it’s just when I get stressed, I startle sometimes sensitivity to sound, the light and so many things.

00;08;46;15–00;09;25;12
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So it’s it’s every time I look at any user experience and always thinking I need to check for colorblindness, I have color sensitivity and sometimes I get all the sudden softness because of the sheer number of pop ups, sheer number of things that started me out of the blue audio message flash message thread. So I’ve been noticing it earlier, but then, particularly in the last decade, with so much emphasis coming primarily from the gaming community and discord in other places, I feel like I can actually use my voice to make products better and vibrate better.

00;09;25;12–00;09;57;11
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It doesn’t mean it has to be complicated. With ten layers by better just being too simple. But you just don’t confuse anybody. You just do a bare minimum if you’re logging in or signing up on a new website, you just sign up. You don’t do extra things. Just, you know, the questions will keep it simple, stupid. It’s it’s all that can be suddenly felt below and with a lot of voice system linked in in many places and even in games like Sims talking so much about it, it just felt like full.

00;09;57;13–00;10;08;21
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Now it’s kind of good training Sometimes you all these things that are true, it’s also good for us because but with the advocacy and awareness factors also go up.

00;10;08;24–00;10;30;11
Philippa Burgess
It’s very helpful to think about user experience and that different people come out things with different needs. As far as and you talk about let the light sensitive do the sound sensitivity, I do notice that. And now there’s more things that will have a warning in advance of them if there is going to be something that is a trigger warning.

00;10;30;13–00;10;51;07
Philippa Burgess
I think that that didn’t really exist before. I think there’s more of awareness and I think that the voices need to be absolutely need to be heard, because if we’re not speaking up, then it’s not becoming part of the culture. And then those changes aren’t being made in those products being developed and modified. So I think that’s very incredibly important work.

00;10;51;10–00;11;24;19
Philippa Burgess
I come at it just in terms of more of sort of an ADHD diagnosis and have always been very independently minded and have this way of being in the world that I don’t notice is different, but I notice a lot of people reflect back to me that, you just think differently and operate differently. And I did notice that my tendency to interrupt people was not meant to be socially inappropriate.

00;11;24;19–00;11;57;15
Philippa Burgess
It was meant to express my enthusiasm or that my thinking had already finished the end of their sentence. So I was already ready to respond. And I think that at least being diagnosed helped me become more aware of those things. But I’ve always needed bosses and managers who embrace who I am and take my talents that might not even exist if I wasn’t neurodiverse and embrace them and work with me on things because I can also, in times make things far more complicated than they need to be.

00;11;57;18–00;12;16;19
Philippa Burgess
And I love them saying, okay, this one simple or this one’s super time sensitive, you know, just make sure. And knowing helping me to prioritize. Yeah, there are certain things. I think it’s important to also be working with people who understand you from a boss, manager or leader management.

00;12;16;22–00;12;42;06
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I haven’t had good experiences and bad experiences. I think it’s lots of cultures. I’ve been moving countries and then working with companies which are this sort of Europe, some that’s been sort of India, sometimes best of North America. So it’s not just the company culture, it’s also the culture to manage this culture. It’s about what culture trickles from the headquarters, what kind of witness they have.

00;12;42;06–00;13;08;06
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So I’ve had good, bad, ugly experiences of what all of this rage And you said about things where, you know, losing your train of thought or interrupting, I have those. And I work a lot to ensure that my kids don’t come out. I have a 100% of all this when I’m very mindful I can work on all these triggers.

00;13;08;06–00;13;29;17
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But any stress trigger, any sensitivity, that’s it. It blows up and then, you know, I just let the guard down and then things go berserk very badly. I totally get that. And sometimes I’ve been told something or you don’t get it, You don’t. And it’s because I’m slow and I think very, you know, So I definitely hear all of them.

00;13;29;17–00;13;58;03
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And I’ve had lots of issues with emotional regulation. And I always thought I’m sensitive. But then I didn’t realize that being neurodiverse yet. Emotional regulations are very different. I’m very what you see is what you get, you know, literally like how you see it’s very I don’t know where to mask. They’re not to mask if you see how you I, I would actually see how I am then to see it and good you know how superficial people just see that.

00;13;58;05–00;14;26;12
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But then there are so many things and some of it being neurodiverse also meant I was extra vulnerable and such. People get bullied a lot more, get targeted a lot more, get isolated. They are the first to be knocked off because they’re different. They have very difficult to accommodate many other terms or this or that. It’s difficult to work with them only by those things and say, it’s me, it’s me, I am the problem.

00;14;26;14–00;14;48;16
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But it took me years and perhaps the kids to understand that I’m actually different because I always thought everyone’s like this. I’m just challenging that. I’m struggling with the mean. I think I’ve given this the right to speak about it. Well, because, you know, you just kind of keep complaining and whine about everything. But then I realized normal people who have materials, freedom of movement.

00;14;48;16–00;15;16;05
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And so it did get easily diagnosed with depression and anxiety, then it’s not that. It’s just emotional regulation aspect and then the brain working differently. So I had managers who were not aware of any of these things, you know, and back in the day, even of performance in relation to many things, they had standard boxes to raise the bar if you just put in a bell curve, so to say, and then see which end of the spectrum is good.

00;15;16;08–00;15;40;10
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But now, thanks to a lot of eye witness in the last decade or so, you feel represented even in terms of applying for jobs. You know, you see so many places where they said you need any accommodation. Do you actually feel neurodivergent do you? Actually, I did. For some people say it’s better to be in some people say no.

00;15;40;13–00;15;54;19
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Again, it’s it’s a debate to have. But the very fact that someone’s willing to give you that voice to say, you know, are you neurodivergent is there a need to accommodate to help you with? I think that’s a good start.

00;15;54;22–00;16;21;11
Philippa Burgess
It’s a very good start. And I think there’s so much that goes back to, as you were saying, the corporate culture, the management culture, who is on that team and how that team interacts really defines many people’s experience at a company. Is who your managers are and who you’re who’s on your team and how they either understand or don’t understand can really, like you said, make that good, good, good, bad or ugly.

00;16;21;13–00;16;50;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s a one of the reasons why people quit as well, right? It’s the good for the manager, not necessarily for salary or everything. So then you go into some of the organizations that I that code. I think earlier when you growing the technical ladder from engineers in engineer after big defect to become a manager there was a role which is completely technical where you’re just focusing on the architecture side of things.

00;16;50;16–00;17;16;12
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But then not necessarily everyone is not a manager. Some people just like to be, but then they didn’t have a growth because every two or three years you get promoted and then they didn’t have a box with which can still be an independent contributor. Just stick to tech. They got the challenges of people management. Some people don’t like it, you know, because you don’t get, you know, most of the better people.

00;17;16;12–00;17;35;08
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Management is also ego management. You’re playing with egos of seniors and juniors, some people who are very good at what they do, but that attitude is very different, like they’re the best. So you play with people’s attitude of ego as well. So, you know, they didn’t they didn’t have a special category where they can just grow by themselves.

00;17;35;08–00;17;45;18
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So I think that’s what also the problem stems from. And they didn’t want to become manager, but if you want to be promoted, you have to take that step.

00;17;45;20–00;17;48;25
Philippa Burgess
It reminds me of the Peter principle. Are you familiar with that one?

00;17;48;27–00;17;49;17
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
No.

00;17;49;19–00;18;24;20
Philippa Burgess
So the Peter Principle basically says that everybody gets promoted to their place of inefficiency or incompetence. You get promoted, so you you can’t push your way up to promotion. It’s more that there’s a vacuum to fill and that corporations live on a bell curve. And so if you’re too good, you’re out. If you’re too bad, you’re out. But everybody sort of in that average middle and then you get promoted because there’s a vacuum to fill and they look for who’s the most best qualified of the team that we can kind of pull up to this next position.

00;18;24;22–00;18;40;19
Philippa Burgess
And then when it comes time for the next promotion, you’ve you’ve been promoted to a point of incompetence. So you’re not the next qualified person to be promoted again. And so people just get stuck at their level of incompetence.

00;18;40;21–00;18;58;25
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Exactly who the principal also talks about, where you indirectly are preparing for the next role before, without you knowing that you have it. It’s it’s a course wound sometimes. Sometimes you don’t want it. But if that’s the way to be benchmarked, then you just take it right?

00;18;58;27–00;19;26;24
Philippa Burgess
Yes. But I do think that that idea that companies can actually be thinking about training their managers and having managers, support manager, mentorship, making better managers because if if they’re the the lynchpin of what makes an employee experience better and adds to retention, I think, you know, managers really understanding what makes a good manager think there’s a lot more managers who can use that support.

00;19;26;24–00;19;43;23
Philippa Burgess
And I think a lot of companies also don’t acknowledge that and that some managers don’t know to ask for help or that there’s a whole way of understanding that becoming a manager is its own growth and its own learning.

00;19;43;26–00;20;15;21
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Exactly. And also, I mean, talking with management, it’s also about conditioning. Sometimes we all have generational trauma. We all have our own feel types, we all have our own conditional bias. We all have so many judgments and then you talk to someone, you wouldn’t realize that it is something it’s very easy for me to address. And then weeks, months, years down the line, indirectly doing the same thing because of what condition.

00;20;15;23–00;20;40;21
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And that takes so much more time to unlearn. For example, when I was in India, I was primarily dealing only with Indians. So give or take a few foreigners. And then here in Canada and I have a colleague who is from Europe, another colleague from Australia, you know, across the board and so many places. And then I’m like, No, I have these judgments and like, Russians.

00;20;40;21–00;21;07;03
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And there’s, you know, there’s so much of judgment and I’ve really I’m looking for things that I also doesn’t really need to talk the talk and we’ll talk. But I wasn’t doing that because of this. Again, biases that I had built in. And then every day I tried to unlearn some of those. It doesn’t come naturally, so I have to be mindful earlier, I could just speak my mind because I think that’s how I am.

00;21;07;06–00;21;27;21
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I don’t speak my mind. And we are in a democratic country, you to speak so I am right now. I really think. Why is because your intentions are very different from your actions and your body language. If if I am talking to someone who is represented in the LGBTQ elite, how how was my thoughts coming across to them?

00;21;27;21–00;21;55;17
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Am I putting them down indirectly? Am I being nice to them? I don’t think no. Maybe I have respect to them, but maybe I don’t understand it. So now there are so many more lives that I have to be super aware of these nuances. How do I mean, what’s the pronoun I may literally using gender stereotypes, you know, just because you look so to me, I’m addressing you with the gender, but you belong somewhere else.

00;21;55;17–00;22;21;24
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So there’s so many What is that everyday feel like just because I am very free spirited, I can talk my mind know. But when you’re talking to so many people, especially the leadership, it’s like not everything is the same. Each one is different. But I have also had to learn all these and then ensure that at the end of the day I need to make sure everyone feels safe, everyone feels good.

00;22;21;29–00;22;41;29
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It all comes back to basic human needs, human rights, you know, all the fluff, extra layer of promotion money. Does it all begin next level? Are you making that person feel human? You know, that’s that’s kind of the bottom line. We need to talk about very much.

00;22;41;29–00;23;12;10
Philippa Burgess
And I think that in these conversations where we’re talking about technology and we’re talking about coding, we’re talking about software development, and there’s a huge people element to this both in the teams that are required to create this and the working environments and then the end user experience and and how that is able to be accessible and deliver a successful experience for having the end user and the customer in mind.

00;23;12;12–00;23;44;15
Philippa Burgess
So people are a huge part of technology, having good communication skills, having good people skills, good management skills, being a good leader, and then knowing as well where to look for our heroes and our mentors and fighting and building our communities and our friendships and our peers. And so people are absolutely key. And I think that Google has done a good thing to bring this community of women together, to support each other, to celebrate each other, to build this network, to build these friendships.

00;23;44;17–00;24;12;27
Philippa Burgess
I think that is so important because it goes so much more than technology. It goes to people in a small way. I was I was proud of myself for attending a GDG event in New York City for International Women’s Day, and there was a net open. There was breaks between the panels and there’s an open networking and I saw these two young ladies standing next to each other looking doe eyed.

00;24;12;27–00;24;38;09
Philippa Burgess
They didn’t know each other. They weren’t engaged with each other. They were just in the corner looking rather stunned and isolated. And I could just tell that they had no idea how to approach networking, how to approach this. This group of people who were chatting among each other. And I kind of scanned the room and I just went directly to them, introduced myself, allowed them to introduce themselves to me, introduce themselves to each other.

00;24;38;11–00;25;04;28
Philippa Burgess
And as soon as we started talking, other people came and joined us. And then when I naturally kind of moved on to other parts of the room, they now had a little conversation going. They now were welcome, they were now included, they were now happy. And I just felt so much joy for such a simple interaction to help them not just be so doe eyed in the corner by themselves.

00;25;05;01–00;25;33;02
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Exactly. And one of the things that we failed to see as managers of software engineers is how can we make the leadership more introvert friendly, You know, be it networking, public speaking. It’s all about trying to mid-market, trying to market yourself, trying to. You don’t have to be loud sometimes, you know, you can still be silent and have your voice being heard.

00;25;33;04–00;25;57;20
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And unfortunately, I have noticed time and again, not even in the name of networking, wants us to kind of come out of your comfort zone and just keep talking and be that cheerful. But continually, some people are like that. They are very shy, they’re introvert, and I was one such person. It took me five years to a work on myself to kind of put myself out there.

00;25;57;20–00;26;23;03
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And again, it’s like my natural said, it takes a lot for me. I don’t like any attention when people I said, just don’t post my name, just don’t tag. I don’t know it. It still doesn’t come naturally. I get in looking at that, but as workplaces company don’t judge people just because they’re introverts. Some people are not good at icebreakers, some people are not good at small talk.

00;26;23;03–00;26;51;00
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
They just cut to the point because they feel like their energy can be better in just designing things, doing better things. That’s where the inclusivity aspect comes in. Then definitely. Sometimes I’ve been to conversations where I zoom out. I go to my own world for various reasons. It’s again, my neurodiversity kicking in. Sometimes there was a meeting by the number of amazing meter by date of premium.

00;26;51;03–00;27;19;27
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
All that was great. And after every I, because they had a big gong, they would hit the gong. And I think so it’s a way of indicating you switch that on switch the tables and stuff that Gong gave me so much of start all started me so much. It kind of got me anxiety level some because of the sound, you know, because I had that extra sensitivity the quick 20 minutes for me to normalize.

00;27;20;00–00;27;47;29
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Everyone else had no effect except for me because I stopped and then I had to literally go. But the person was comforting and it hit an extent before you hit the gong. Just make eye contact with me and just kind of give it up. So that prepared it. It’s very true. I mean, the earlier me wouldn’t even have the courage to go tell them that because it’s not their fault, but they wouldn’t know what it means to be on the stage.

00;27;47;29–00;28;09;22
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But only last year when this happened, I went to the conference and said, Hey, you know, and after that, for the next five rounds, whenever they had to switch statements and switch people, she would make eye contact and to him. And then I was prepared. I didn’t start that. But and once I started, it’s like a tumbleweed, you know, I can’t focus.

00;28;09;22–00;28;29;20
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I can’t talk. I’m just there. But I cannot participate in that. There’s so many challenges. That’s when I realized if I have this issue and improve, it can have their own issues, but their problems are not seen or not heard because they can’t figure it out.

00;28;29;22–00;28;54;24
Philippa Burgess
It’s definitely important because I also feel like introverts oftentimes do harder work. They do quieter work, and oftentimes the extrovert is out there loud and proud about things that they know nothing about. And sometimes this is even gender related. I had an incident where recently where I was speaking to a gentleman and he is an expert in I.

00;28;54;29–00;29;24;27
Philippa Burgess
Why? Because he’s read some headlines about it and and I’m sitting here, I’m completing a certificate program. I’m complete. I’m going for my second master’s. I’m doing as much as I can to just learn and actually be proficient into which I’m speaking about all. There’s a lot to learn and I’m very approaching it from a I’m at the bottom of the mountain just kind of climbing in my own, you know, small steps and realize how big the mountain is.

00;29;24;27–00;29;46;13
Philippa Burgess
And he is just at the top of the mountain. And and even though he was kind of airlifted in and dropped off there and and it sometimes is a gender thing, too. And it just it really reminded me that just because someone can have the showmanship about it doesn’t actually mean that they have the skills.

00;29;46;15–00;30;08;18
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I totally get that. I mean, that’s gender discrimination. We have so-called civilians, if you know the terms and alien. It’s just a love child who pitched a ladder to put on the destroyer. That would happen, baby, like in my twenties or so. So it’s just this thing and I get you so many times. I feel like I know a lot.

00;30;08;18–00;30;41;19
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But even to ask that question, like I have to do my research, maybe this answer is Google. I have this drive. It reminds me of someone telling me that Now, nowadays the movie reviewers sum up that of us on Twitter. They don’t even watch the movie. They just hear. So some people like reading from a movie theater, just these scenes and then reviewing based on your story, reminded me of how some people have not even watched the movie, and they’re just reviewing based on inputs from various sources and some trends.

00;30;41;24–00;31;04;28
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Twitter here and there. It’s it’s it feels like someone’s like you see some scholars who spent years and decades and then some person who’s very extroverted just picks up some fancy video or audio, just classic of their own, or they just get more attention with the alternate. They’re just silently did all this research for decades.

00;31;05;01–00;31;30;10
Philippa Burgess
And to be aware of that in ours, that’s a different kind of bias. But that is something that I think that the tech make or master program is helping women take maker ambassadors who I feel when I talk to the many of you I’ve been talking to, that we all come with strategic leadership and operational leadership. We know how to think about things.

00;31;30;10–00;32;01;19
Philippa Burgess
We know how to get things done. Where I’m seeing the growth, it’s a growth in myself. I growth in you is a we’re becoming better thought leaders and better bridge building leaders and learning how to speak up about our accomplishments and what we do know and clear about what we don’t know and what we’re moving towards learning. I know that one that actually that same New York event that I went to, I met my first Jedi, the first person to introduce themselves to Judy, and immediately thinking, Tell me more.

00;32;01;19–00;32;33;13
Philippa Burgess
I’m interested in this. What that that sounds really interesting. And then have begun this process of saying, I want to become a Jedi. And as I heard you say on our group call the other day, you’re in that process as well. And how much humbleness I think we tend to be as we approach what we consider to be a very high level credential and how well prepared we want to be for that and finding our our path forward.

00;32;33;15–00;33;01;03
Philippa Burgess
Trust me, this this gentleman that I was speaking to, he would have already applied and possibly even gotten it because that the the absolute just sense of entitlement and confidence in all the ways that the way that we approach things is much slower, much more diligent, much more detail oriented rhetoric.

00;33;01;05–00;33;34;14
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Yeah, and that reminds me of. Yeah, to be honest, last year I did the WPA for good GDP for good, good for good kids. I didn’t even know any of these things, you know, And to start with this and slowly catching up and then thanks to the Google IO and Google, the events that we attended in Florida and the San Francisco and then just I met someone called Medusa, his ability program manager for Gigante, if I’m not wrong.

00;33;34;17–00;33;52;06
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And then that I didn’t know how to ask, how do I become a Jedi? And then you know, he up and if he was busy and then he said, I said, Look, I’ve been so many presentations. But he said, Do you have it all consolidated in a place? He said, Maybe you might get her. He said, We have a session.

00;33;52;06–00;34;11;16
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
As I said, yes. Can you put all your talks there? So I feel yesterday all I did was I only put all my technical talks there and then I get nudged to can you guide me on the next steps? He said, Do you know what WB WTU the Academy? I said, I just about recently apparently actually got it.

00;34;11;16–00;34;35;19
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
He said, That would be a good starting point. And he said, I will support you doing other things where there is it, those are non-tech. You know, I didn’t do a lot of talks. What was your communication? And then as introverted, some strategies, a lot of what how do you usually talk about yourself without talking by just you visualizing your things, your thought process.

00;34;35;19–00;34;56;12
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So I did a lot of presentation. I said I didn’t put in because Jedi is supposed to be only like a hard code. Thick things. He said, No, you should learn the market rules and find those had to face because I didn’t put any of that. And why am I being so shy? It’s not like I took credit from someone.

00;34;56;12–00;35;20;10
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s out of my baby. Something I did, but I didn’t put any of that. He said, No, you should learn to put that in the market. And in a way it is helping me and but again, it’s not coming naturally to me because I’ve done all this work and people don’t see it. But to give a 15 to 20 minute talk, it’s 20 hours of research.

00;35;20;12–00;35;40;08
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
The shorter the duration to speak, the longer. I think because you have to be very specific you can’t beat around the bush wanted to work on position actually takes me 6 to 8 hours to prepare, but the shorter ones actually takes me to Beyonce. And being a full time working parent, it’s it’s a lot of thing. And then you’re like you said, it could be the gender.

00;35;40;08–00;36;01;21
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
We don’t ask for this. I always used to think my work will do the talking so I don’t have to market myself. And culturally, I was told that you should never speak about yourself. You know, that’s considered like headstrong. Hey, great, this should speak about you. You work on your limitations, but you cannot talk about yourself. It’s like blowing your trumpet.

00;36;01;23–00;36;25;09
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So I got conditioned. Got to know if you don’t advocate for yourself, nobody will let you put their oxygen mask on yourself. And I’m in my thirties. Okay? I’m still working on that. It’s not coming naturally, but it’s the name of the game. And if you don’t catch that game, you will be left behind.

00;36;25;11–00;36;55;10
Philippa Burgess
You can actually, though, build on a little bit of what you said about the cultural, because really good PR and really good marketing does get other people about you and raising you up and lifting you up and putting you in that spotlight. But if you don’t step up to get yourself into their or awareness and the whole thing, to me, the definition of what is marketing marketing is getting people to care.

00;36;55;12–00;37;18;28
Philippa Burgess
And when you get people to care. So sometimes we also need to be aware of who are those third parties through media, through partnerships, through conferences, events, who are the ones creating that platform and allowing that spotlight, getting other people to positively talk about us. So you can use that part of the cultural conditioning. But you’re absolutely right.

00;37;18;28–00;37;37;11
Philippa Burgess
You have to break out and speak up and speak out for those people to even know about you. Because if I’ve learned anything from marketing and media, it’s it’s own resume. When you want to speak at a conference, they say, what other conferences have you spoke at when you want to be in a magazine, What other magazines have you been in?

00;37;37;13–00;37;48;26
Philippa Burgess
They you build a media resume and the more that you’ve done, the more that you can point to, the more opportunities at larger scales open up.

00;37;48;28–00;38;12;22
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Exactly. And they lasted I used to think, to speak at conferences. You haven’t read the best stuff, but it’s almost as though you’re the either the founder, the coauthor of all your stories and tech and people who are mediocre like me. I’m either bad at something, not great at something, somewhere in the middle, just surviving. I would think that there is no place for me.

00;38;12;22–00;38;35;08
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And it was so wrong. In the last 1 to 2 years, have you spoken at so many conferences and realized that it’s not about how much you know, it’s about the art of storytelling. And then the feedback I received was you made it look so simple. You made it. You made it one because. I would have some nice conditions that I would create, might take.

00;38;35;10–00;38;57;02
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I would have storytelling built. Some use my tone to kind of build some drama, have some pop quizzes, have some history, play off words, electricians, you know, sometimes it just feels like you’re in a drama class. You are doing some dramatics. And in fact, people are like, you can be mediocre and kind of personalize with your own skills.

00;38;57;02–00;39;27;11
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s also almost like you talking impromptu, but doing improv, right? And not everyone can do that. Then they started embracing this and trust me that they I and this makes them I started getting all these things. It’s like almost the nature and power of manifestation that means. But I was my own enemy, thinking that I’m mediocre. I don’t deserve these things because I got good at it to now using the same things.

00;39;27;11–00;39;49;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s like having that digital for different your painting, different picture every day. And you know, each one gets to see a different thing because you’re presenting your perspective. It’s the same concept. It arrived at some point. I was talking to someone, they said, Well, I don’t understand what Kubernetes is. If you know, Kubernetes is the containerization platform and.

00;39;49;16–00;40;06;25
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
There was some confusion. They said, this is not good. This is Kubernetes. I said, Think of it as a Triscuit, you know, in pictures. You know, you just keep having these things. If one thing that is the other group is to fit in. And they said, think of it like a distortion mechanism, how you try to fit in your dishes all the time.

00;40;06;25–00;40;28;28
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s like a because you keep adjusting so the oil fit and the spindle can actually water all of them and equally wash them. So it’s a game of there is even in your dishwasher because you’re constantly adjusting and organizing, layering them nicely so that everybody sits that one of them then gets washed. They’re like, okay, so then I like, okay.

00;40;28;28–00;40;45;04
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So I realized something which others do, and that it’s, it’s kind of cool. And then it kind of started getting me going without me putting myself because people started appreciating and I’m like, okay, this is a good skill to have, you know?

00;40;45;06–00;41;02;01
Philippa Burgess
Absolutely. The storytelling is kind of where it was, where I started. I worked in the entertainment media field for my first part of my career. I when I went to USC, I went there because of the entertainment and media program. Although I learned very early on, I decided I was going to be a minor in film and a major.

00;41;02;02–00;41;18;24
Philippa Burgess
I started with English and then I loved critical analysis and I love to read, I love to write. But when we got to the class on short stories, I would write things that were more my day blogging before there was blogging and. They’re like, That’s not a short story. And I saw how talented the people around me were.

00;41;18;26–00;41;36;13
Philippa Burgess
And I think there’s a difference between struggling to learn something that is learnable and you’ll get there versus things that are really so far out of you’re just like, this is not where I really where I belong. And so I decided at that point I just discovered that there was a major called International Relations, which I’d never even heard of before.

00;41;36;16–00;41;58;10
Philippa Burgess
And it actually came even for someone who was studying political science. And I was like, well, not as interested in domestic politics as I am in. I’m interested in culture and the world. And the global piece of it seemed very interesting to me. So I switched majors because I felt like I could get all the reading and writing that I was quite good at and very comfortable with it.

00;41;58;16–00;42;17;19
Philippa Burgess
And yet I was learning about history and culture in the world. And, and that was a good fit for me. And then now with my graduate studies, layering and urban planning and GIS and spatial data science and and now I’m adding that to human security and geospatial intelligence. I’m sort of building and layering. But my minor was in film.

00;42;17;19–00;42;38;07
Philippa Burgess
I worked in the entertainment industry. And so my foundations are in storytelling, and I feel that learning spatial data science is another tool in my toolkit to tell stories, but now are informed by data and now are informed by maps and how we can tell stories with visual design on maps.

00;42;38;09–00;43;03;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Interesting. That’s how it’s all intertwined and interconnected. You know, it’s like filmmaking. It’s there’s a storyteller to give it to the audience, to direct, of course, to visualize the story and also these actors who have to personalize their stories, bringing images that perhaps they don’t relate to, but then start bringing in that. And then that is the art director.

00;43;03;15–00;43;28;01
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So it’s it’s it’s such a theme book. It’s not like one has to do that. I mean, the director and the writer has to get equal credit to even a software project. It’s all about having all these people in on the success is not just the success of the manager or the director. Of course, the see the vision, the kind of center’s vision and mission for the company, for the team, the culture.

00;43;28;04–00;43;49;18
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But then the executive also lives in the opinions of one engineers. And also the success also depends on how they’ve been treated. Have they been treated with kindness? Have they been heard? You know, there are good days and bad days, happy days and sadness everywhere. And then how they all come together. It’s like a happy marriage of sorts.

00;43;49;21–00;44;13;14
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And throw in storytelling, you know, if you can’t articulate, you have the greatest software in the world. But if you cannot explain to your clients what it is in a very basic fashion, most of the clients are not excited. They they approve the project, the being, the money. But if you complicate things for them, they get disappointed because all I wanted was a simple button.

00;44;13;14–00;44;28;05
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Why did you add two images? You know, because you need to know your audience. You need to know that they will not even know all these cool software terms or lingo that you talk about. It’s it’s it’s also about understanding your audience and how can you keep it simple.

00;44;28;07–00;44;45;25
Philippa Burgess
I have a I have a tool that I like to share about how to a lot of people who aren’t as knowledgeable about where do I start? How do I tell the story? You start with the triangle and on there’s three threads of the triangle. On one is you, the other is your audience, and the third is your mission.

00;44;45;27–00;45;05;06
Philippa Burgess
And your audience cares about the side of you that relates to who the audiences and what is the mission. So you start by kind of writing down notes on what’s everything I know about this audience? Who are they, where they come from? And we talked about marketing. That’s the whole point of storytelling, especially marketing, is getting people to care.

00;45;05;08–00;45;19;06
Philippa Burgess
And so you then sort of go, Well, what’s my mission with this audience? Is it Educate them, inform them, what’s my call to action? What am I trying to get this or how do I get them to care? What do I want them to care about? What do I want them to do? And then you bring it back to you.

00;45;19;06–00;45;28;20
Philippa Burgess
Okay? What aspects of myself do I need to introduce to give myself credibility that relates to this audience in this mission? And in the middle of that is your story.

00;45;28;23–00;45;54;24
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s interesting how you have been mentioning the word marketing with how people care. I always used to think in general, marketing is about leads to sales, leads to revenue, because marketing and sales, all they need to do is advertise to the extent that people eventually buy the product through substitution one another one off, and never realized the fundamental concept of marketing and sales is actually to have at once the care the bike.

00;45;54;24–00;46;09;03
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Anyway. I never thought about it and thank you for that perspective. I think I would look at that as this goal that you let people care the moment you get it. Just give it, all right.

00;46;09;05–00;46;31;15
Philippa Burgess
You’re invested. And I think a lot of the and this goes back to my work in entertainment got pitched a lot of stories, fictional stories, nonfiction and our our whole evaluation because we were in the middle management agency managers. So we were kind of the gatekeepers in a way, but we were going to be selling to someone else.

00;46;31;18–00;46;50;13
Philippa Burgess
And our question and it was a compliment to say, to ask the question, who cares? So if you tell me something, you won’t tell me a story. You want to say, Hey, I want to write a book or I want to do a speech. If I were to say, who cares? I don’t mean that in any disrespect. I want you to passionately come back and say, Here’s who cares and why.

00;46;50;16–00;46;52;18
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Know your audience in a way.

00;46;52;21–00;47;26;12
Philippa Burgess
And if you know. So when you’re thinking about speaking at a conference to ask the question, who cares and when you can answer that question, who cares? Well, here’s why they care. Because it’s relevant, it’s timely. They’re perhaps on the back foot in their jobs because things are changing around them and they want to learn to keep up whatever it is, whatever their motivation is, their fear, their desire, and that you’re tapping into all of those emotions and bringing them along with you and helping them to have a transformation to fill a gap.

00;47;26;15–00;47;28;19
Philippa Burgess
That’s the

00;47;28;21–00;47;59;11
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Yeah, it’s on the are as they found the purpose by knowing your audience and the moment you know who your catering to it, it feels like you can just break down those silos and then just connect to them. If you just come up with very five over the top piece and perhaps your audience’s going to write it if you know your purpose and mission and we are catering to I think half the job is done in a way.

00;47;59;13–00;48;22;21
Philippa Burgess
Yeah, because the word in the phrase who cares is obviously oftentimes used in a dismissive of the muted way. Like who cares? Like, not, not, not important. But if you can ask that question and answer it passionately and in detail, you’ve got something. And that’s where we found, you know, the difference between I mean, actually the rule of Hollywood.

00;48;22;24–00;48;43;05
Philippa Burgess
Don’t be boring is really you know, another part of it is don’t be boring. And I think even like I got a master’s in urban planning and I think that’s the thing is to me that’s kind of boring. So I layered on a gist. I layered on a second master’s. Now it’s I’m getting a little bit of like, tell me more.

00;48;43;08–00;49;09;08
Philippa Burgess
I want to learn these things. Absolutely. I’m in deep detail of wanting to learn to ask you well and Python and how and the the Azari software and all of these technical pieces but I’m wanting to get it to a point where my education leads not only to my hearing, but I can invite and inspire other people to care as well, because I can put connect dots that maybe wouldn’t be put together if I wasn’t intersecting these disciplines.

00;49;09;10–00;49;42;16
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Exactly. That’s why I like the term osmosis. You know, people think osmosis is just related to science and physics, but it’s just the power of absorption. And then, you know, I also like the term synergy 1% cannabinoid or just the sum total of all this individual. Their knowledge, their assimilation actually holds. Like if I didn’t know much, if I had you, even hypothetically, you are going to see this on a topic I heard five six explodes all these six blocks talking.

00;49;42;18–00;50;05;24
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I still am not an expert, but I get these six different perspectives and then that kind of can shape my knowledge. And that’s where the power of osmosis also comes in. And then knowledge is all about assimilation. Knowledge is all about having these thought leaders give their own. Take sometimes a perspective different from yours, but sometimes perspectives, same as yours.

00;50;05;27–00;50;25;15
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But then just a great to disagree, you know, to bringing in all these folks. Like case in point is I would not have been able to replace humans is important. You’re just having these thought leaders give these voices. It just opens up so many channels. And you heard the synopsis and just bursting.

00;50;25;17–00;50;54;04
Philippa Burgess
They absolutely I think that community ends up being a big part of it because you get that from being part of conversations and having, like you said, your vibe is your tribe and those people come to you because we’re all sort of figuring these same things out. And working together is how I’m approaching it. Is this idea of not so much coming out and saying, I’m a big queer jazz expert as much as saying I’m a spatial expert.

00;50;54;06–00;51;16;25
Philippa Burgess
And then here are the platforms and tools that I’m going to be able to speak and utilize and be a proponent of, and that Google would feel comfortable sending me to a conference to talk about. I want to give you my perspective and is I feel that I need a great amount of technical proficiency and I’m working really hard to gain that and I need time.

00;51;16;25–00;51;48;18
Philippa Burgess
I feel like I’ve got another 18 months ahead of me in my academic program. And so for me, in the GEDI process, I feel that it’s there’s some learning I need to do, but I’m already now a year and a half into my learning, someone said it was about five years of professional that was was needed to, to really kind of own GDC but when you are GDC, what they do is they pay for all of your travel, They’ll pay for you to go be the speaker, be the presenter.

00;51;48;24–00;52;15;04
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
What a privilege. It’s not like I didn’t even know about t.d ee did three months back. And you know, I used to think GDS only Google type Google video specific Google products like Flutter, and I’m like, I’m a generalist. I want, I want my own things. I specialize mostly in Microsoft technology. So some very I think I was my own enemy.

00;52;15;04–00;52;48;09
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And then if you don’t break of your barriers, how will people know? And then really like, you know, the shy girl who’s not just supposed to say, Hey, I like you’ve been very shy, melancholy. Amanda I just had the final courage to ask them here, How do you become a Jedi in the know? Like, anyone can, as long as they’re passionate acknowledges and they look, you back up with the credentials and look and, you know, it’s sometimes, you know, your own shyness.

00;52;48;12–00;53;07;19
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
You should just write off yourself as I don’t look a bit all these years like I’ve been in industry for 14 years. It’s not just a year or two I’d be realistic in therefore, when it was in school, 15 years in the tech industry. So I’ve seen it all and some of it I was my own enemy, age.

00;53;07;21–00;53;36;01
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Exactly. I had very similar assumptions. I think that’s the right word. VeriSign, a specialist in Microsoft stock and is that a conflict of interest? And, you know, eventually I realized I should have just asked was. But then the moment I came into WTO, there’s a big overlap. Many Europeans are genius geniuses. They are also the student clubs. They also the Jedi leads.

00;53;36;04–00;54;01;03
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And then, you know, just keep following that profile. And then I realized that, you know, technology’s agnostic of many things. It’s it’s like if you look at the there’s a term called the in databases, I forgot the message. It’s something called polyglot persistence or something where, you know, the great sequel to tomorrow you replace with my school or something.

00;54;01;03–00;54;21;29
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
It’s just the schema changes. But the fundamental data, unless you talk about sequels it’s no secret that those are different. So what? How do you make databases very agnostic of depending on one step forward and a little one to look? It’s again, it’s all a relational database. So in all sequel today, tomorrow morning, tomorrow it would be something else.

00;54;21;29–00;55;06;03
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But if there are document based, we shouldn’t do so much rewriting that it breaks. We should be able to it’s it’s software quality like a factory pattern in order to for this tomorrow is less than a little stupid it’s still work you know so I think the the whole emphasis of Google to be a technology leader by inputting all experts from different media and different platforms, different segment risk culture to just come in for the passion of technology, I think speaks volumes about where they are and how that makes all of us, you, me and all the people we know so passionate about because they just say we can all coexist.

00;55;06;05–00;55;31;25
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
You can have your own staff, they could have their own stick to their word in terms of finances and budgeting. They are competitors, but funding mentally, we are in it for the power and passion of technology. And also when you’re fake being represented, you organic is stock marketing. It’s the care industry. Not so much. It’s like, you know, when you have so many choices.

00;55;31;25–00;55;59;21
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Let’s say you had this local community, local mom business you want to support this is the victim. Who do you support? Who who makes you feel care? You know, so ultimately it all comes down to venue. When someone invest in your shows, the gratitude, you just go places, you know, you just they don’t have to do anything, you know, just a small lift that give you and then this that opening the floodgates, you just automatically make you embrace.

00;55;59;21–00;56;22;17
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And then I remember this year I recommended the program to at least ten people. I don’t want to part of a mental work group in Vancouver. And unfortunately, eight of them didn’t get through. Only one of them got through. Then I realized it’s the competition. They received so many more applications. Are you heard this is this is the whopping amount compared to last year.

00;56;22;17–00;56;49;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Maybe that’s how I got lucky last year. I got I guess because we started making a red list. Now they can only select 200 for cohort that something great, but they get some. It’s all because it started giving us so much that we we are spreading the awareness but then they’re there’s only so much they can accommodate It’s not like you just bring everybody immediately between them and representing myself.

00;56;49;13–00;57;15;10
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I’m not just representing myself, I’m representing my organization, my culture, my community, my client, you know, so many things. So somebody have to start being mindful and ensure that you’re being a people pleaser. A great piece, everybody, but then being mindful of representing a good image of everyone you represent. Right? Exactly. It’s not about like I filled out this.

00;57;15;12–00;57;40;22
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Every market is getting clutter or costume or beauty market because of the influencers, you know, Instagram, everything is getting cluttered. But I realize there’s a space for everyone. You know, I always like to give this anecdote where it was stellar and then Milpitas, people were there was dear to them, and then television kept it really cool. We lose it, it makes a stir.

00;57;40;25–00;58;03;18
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
And then the statement, Black phones came. You have Amazon Prime, Netflix, Hulu, and so many things. People said, do we have to close theaters? Not because it’s going to be all of people are not going to theaters, you know, but the still tried to coexist. That’s when healthy competition comes in. You have things for streaming platform, you have things for a 3D entertainment.

00;58;03;19–00;58;27;02
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
You have things where the whole family can go. They cannot coexist. Of course, the competition is going to be the same thing. You know that thousands of cars, thousands of other mediums that people walk and represent and what but the venue I give my voice to someone who has a great code of conduct has the documents that I can go through, see how are the monitors in it?

00;58;27;03–00;59;01;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
Are they are they also doing a charitable cause? But because sometimes it’s also important who you are learning your cost to this for? I was the only thing that’s finite. I wish it was in private, fortunately. But then you should also be very cognizant of who are you representing, what are the value systems like? You know, if on a very basic level, you can’t do everything for money, if you just told like you don’t believe in the value system or where they’re coming from somewhere, I think should question yourself, why are you doing something?

00;59;01;15–00;59;26;15
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
But it’s it’s very important. That’s why whenever people approach, I like to do my own little research and just be mindful of who I am. Because if I help build it all and just be open about it, that means appreciating the value. Some of it. If I were giving you this voice and acknowledging that means that I really you and I’m acknowledging that and I believe in you, trust me for you to take me to the next level.

00;59;26;17–00;59;49;01
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
So it’s very important to go beyond money that’s very in the WTO meeting last week, I said one for the kitchen, one for the soul. So that is all there are listing. Sometimes you just do it for money. That doesn’t mean I’m not very happy. I’m not happy. I’m happy. But sometimes passion doesn’t always bring you money, but sometimes you want to do things just for the community, for the greater good.

00;59;49;01–00;59;54;13
Vaishnavi Venkata Subramanian
I think that’s where I might add. Sometimes they cannot coexist right?