June 23rd is International Women in Engineering Day. It’s celebrated every year around the world to honor women in the field of engineering. This day raises the profile of those who are changing the field of engineering and making great impact in the world.
In this blog, I had a chance to meet up with six Autodesk engineers from across the globe to ask them about their role as an engineer and what “International Women in Engineering Day” means to them. I hope you enjoy their stories as much as I enjoyed learning about them.
We’ll start with Anchal Khatwani, senior software development manager at Autodesk, who lives in Singapore. I first met Anchal at one of Autodesk Women’s Network events and since then, I’ve partnered with Anchal in conducting various community events. 😊
AC: Hi Anchal, great to see you and thanks for being part of this blog. Let’s start with a bit about you.
Anchal: Hello. I am Anchal Khatwani, a Sr. Manager for Development within the Localization group at Autodesk. I live with my two children and spouse in sunny Singapore. Looking for new opportunities brought me to Autodesk about 15 years ago and there's never a dull moment at work learning from changes and navigating challenges at work. I am a board member of Autodesk Women's Network and community building is an important aspect of my personal and professional life.
AC: What do you do for fun outside of work? Also, what’s something folks may not know about you?
Anchal: I love to spend time with my children, exercise, paint and host friends and family over good food.
I was a high-speed train accident survivor as a teenager.
Well, as scary as it sounds and it was, this was a life changing moment for me to see the survivors come together to build resilience in adversity and support each other to recover from the tragedy. This incident played a big role in instilling within me the importance of community support and sense of belonging.
AC: Wow, Anchal. That’s inspiring. I can’t even imagine going through something like that. Let’s go to my next question. You are senior manager in software development. Can you describe what this role is about?
Anchal: As a Sr. Development Manager, my role is to oversee the successful execution of software development and localization engineering projects within my organization. I also sponsor key initiatives which I get a little closely involved with in terms of decision making as that's critical to the goals of our team. I am also responsible for leading a team of SW Development Managers, SW Developers, Localization Specialists and DevOps Specialists. I support / coach / mentor my team set and realize their professional and personal goals and career aspirations.
There are many interesting facets of my role. To name a few, the first thing is the strategic view that the role brings that lets me problem solve for larger impact and it's amazing to see when the (positive) outcomes get multiplied. Another bit that I enjoy the most is working and supporting people and teams realize their full potential and see them succeed. Overall, just being able to create that fluidity within the team and unblock people help Autodesk get closer to its goals is what keeps me at it.
AC: How do you keep up with learning about tech? Where do you go to learn and invest in your craft?
Anchal: While there are usual go to spots like gaining high level insights over the internet, Stack Overflow, talking with experts and getting deeper knowledge through online and in-person trainings, I learn the most on the job while talking to people and my team especially while solving problems.
AC: Can you share a highlight (recent or not so recent) from your career, so far, in engineering?
Anchal: The future of AI is promising and the launch of OpenAI has shown that the possibilities are immense. My team is responsible for localization of Autodesk products, content and services and we are at an important juncture experimenting aspects of AI that can be used in the world of machine translation, post-editing of machine translated text, training language models, and many more. This has been one of the highlights for me and my team as we believe that by doing so, we'll be increasing the possibilities for our global customers.
AC: What does International Women in Engineering Day mean to you?
Anchal: International Women in Engineering Day aims to raise awareness and celebrate the work of women in Engineering. As a board member for Autodesk Women's Network, it is important to me that we are sharing the stories, learnings and experiences of successful women in engineering, and by doing so we also bring light to the amazing career opportunities and possibilities available to women in this domain.
AC: Thank so much, Anchal. You inspire me.
Anchal: Anytime. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to share.
Next, I met with Jemma Thornton who is senior software engineer based in UK. I first met Jemma at Autodesk’s internal conference called TechX. Please read on to learn about her and her role at Autodesk. 😎
AC: Hi Jemma, it’s nice to meet up with you again. Thanks for being part of this blog.
Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
I enjoy traveling and exploring the world as much as I can and I also like to play video games and board games when I’m at home, I’ve also been reading more recently and hope to read more.
Not everyone may know that I’m a dual citizen (British & Canadian) and want to travel to Canada more often to visit family as well as see the country – I'd love to travel across the entire country by train one day!
AC: Thanks for sharing, Jemma. Can you describe the role of a senior software engineer? What do you enjoy about your role?
Jemma: As a senior software engineer, I get to spend my day solving a wide variety of logical and technical problems. I am able to help others where needed, help organize projects and tasks and to test code to make sure everything is working as intended. I am part of a team of engineers who work on Fusion 360 and we contribute new features as well as fixing any issues that may arise.
I really like problem solving and creating new features that I know customers are going to love. I also like collaborating with others in my team and as well as others outside my team, which is important as a senior software engineer. I love it when a big project I’m working on gets released and I get to see all of the customers using what I’ve helped create.
AC: How do you continue to invest in your craft? How do you keep learning?
Jemma: I try to do any training courses wherever I can, both technical and non-technical. I also try to go to company events whenever I can, which are a good opportunity to share my knowledge and learn from others, especially (but not exclusively) from those further along in their careers. There are lots of opportunities in Autodesk to learn and develop and I make the most of everything that I can.
AC: Shifting thing a bit, let’s say you are going to mentor an early career engineer, what advice would you give them?
Jemma: Always keep learning new things and meeting new people. Seize any opportunity that comes your way as you never know who you could meet and what you could learn.
AC: What does International Women in Engineering Day mean to you?
It's an opportunity to highlight Women in Engineering and to get more women interested in careers like engineering which they may not have initially considered. It is a day to celebrate how far we have come, but also that we still have a way to go for there to be a more equal ratio of women in engineering.
AC: Thanks so much, Jemma. It was great to catch up with you again.
Jemma: Thanks and great to catch up with you too.
Now, let’s meet with Lily Becerra, sr software development manager who is based in Portland, Oregon. I always make time to catch up with Lily when I’m in the Portland office and I’m really happy she agreed to be part of this blog. 😀
AC: Hi Lily, thanks again, for being part of this.
Lily: Sure, thanks for asking me
AC: Okay, let’s start with introductions. Please tell us about you.
Lily: I’m Lily Becerra, I’m a Senior Software Manager at Autodesk located in Portland, OR. I’m originally from Mexico and I was relocated for work 6-7 years ago. I enjoy learning new things at work and exploring new hobbies in my personal life.
Outside of work, I like to travel to countries with a different culture, I love to dance and to run outside when Portland weather allows it, I also like to 3D print fun/decoration items for my home.
AC: What’s a fun fact folks may not know about you?
Lily: I just moved to an old farmhouse and have some farm animals, I’m thankful we have noise cancellation headsets so nobody can hear the animal sounds during meetings.
AC: Lily, that’s hilarious and your headsets are great. I never hear any animal sounds. You are a senior manager in software development, a people leader in tech. Can you describe your role to those who may not know what it’s about?
Lily: As managers, you have the opportunity to solve distinct types of challenges and close the gaps that are needed within your teams and for your customers, but our main responsibilities include guide and mentor other engineers and to ensure the delivery of our commitments. As Sr. Manager, you will be guiding other managers to align with organizational goals, manage department budgets, help with their career paths to reach their full potential.
AC: What do you enjoy most about your role?
Lily: I enjoy the fact that this role allows me to work with people and with tech. You never get bored because you are always learning something new and solving different challenges. I’m a true believer that one person can achieve great deliverables but when you put together a team, each member brings different perspectives to the table and it brings innovation with a more robust result. As a manager, you can identify the strengths of each team members to help them to grow individually and together.
AC: I love that and I agree that together, different perspectives open up innovation. What inspired you to pursue a career in software engineering?
Lily: I always loved technology and being part of doing something that helps others. I like to be solving different challenges, in software you are part of planning new products, finding a solution, analyze the different paths on how to solve it and you also get the opportunity to collaborate with others or help a customer or a team mate to fix a problem.
AC: How do you continue to invest in your craft? How do you keep learning?
Lily: When I want to learn about a completely new topic I like to start with a book or an online training but in practice I learn more by talking with people; their experiences, the challenges they have solved and how they solved them. I like open source communities because they bring their experiences from different backgrounds and situations when sometimes we are experiencing the same or similar issues.
AC: What does International Women in Engineering Day mean to you?
Lily: A time to celebrate and empower more women to follow this path. When I started my career, it was the usual to be the only woman in a meeting and I’m really happy to see meetings now where we have more women.
AC: Thanks so much, Lily. I appreciate the time you spent with me.
Lily: Thank you for asking me to be a part of this.
I met Nas Hajia, security solutions architect at Autodesk, via her manager and we’ve been able to catch up at various internal tech events. When I asked her if she would be part of this blog, I was excited when she said YES! Here’s the transcript from my chat with Nas. 😁
AC: Hi Nas. I’m grateful that you said YES when I asked you to be part of this blog. Thanks so much.
Nas: Hi, thanks for asking.
AC: Let’s start with you. Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Nas: I’m a proud plant parent. I moved from Toronto to the Bay Area about a year ago in search of sunshine and to my surprise, I occasionally find myself missing the snow-covered streets.
My idea of fun is tending to my plants or laying in the sun while reading a book. My latest project is going through the Dunes series. Also, to my friends’ delight, I’ve started baking again. I hate sweets so the fruits of my labour end up with my friends.
AC: Oh I wish I lived closer to you because I would definitely ask to be one of your baked goods recipient. What’s another fun fact folks may not know about you?
(AC): Oh I may just ask you about the wonders of Li-ion batteries (smile). My next question is about your role. You are a security solutions architect. Can you describe what your role is about? What is an architect?
Nas: An architect creates a technical path to solving a problem through their vision and technical expertise. My responsibilities fall in two categories; designing comprehensive security solutions and services, and enabling the secure design of other services and products in general.
AC: As a follow up, when did you know that you wanted to pursue a career in engineering?
Nas: Quite remarkably, I managed to break a total of four TVs between the ages of 4 to 7 and ended up playing with the parts as experiments. The threat of electrocution was luckily never realized but that’s probably when my interest in tech began and it evolved into system design and engineering.
AC: How do you continue to invest in your craft? How do you keep learning?
Nas: The security field is ever changing, and I’ve been trying to enhance my skills constantly as well. As an architect, researching industry trends is part of the job. If there’s a week where I haven’t had the need or opportunity to learn something new, a portion of my Friday’s focus time goes directly to browsing security blogs, feature releases, or trending architecture topics. You’ll find your favorite resources pretty quickly which eventually makes the learning process more efficient.
AC: What do you enjoy about your role?
Nas: I love creating new architectural patterns and I love finding problems that may have remained unseen while designing solutions to match them. As an architect, you often need to think long-term, and I enjoy balancing multiple criteria to provide answers to a client’s future problems.
AC: My final question for you is …What does International Women in Engineering Day mean to you?
This is a day to advocate equal opportunities for women and other under-represented groups in tech. Throughout the whole journey from fostering interest and passion to skills development, entry into an engineering field and career progression, we all have a responsibility regardless of our area of expertise, gender, and ethnicity.
AC: Well said and thanks for your time, Nas. I appreciate it a lot.
Nas: Thank you for including me.
I met Pingping Liu, software development engineer at Autodesk when she first joined our team. I’m really happy that she is part of this blog and I got to know her a little bit more. 😊
AC): Hi Pingping, I’m really glad you are part of this blog spotlighting some of our awesome engineers at Autodesk. Thanks for sharing your story with us.
Pingping: Thanks for asking
(AC): Let’s start with a bit about your yourself.
Pingping: Sure. I’m Pingping Liu. Now, I live in Shanghai, and originally from Jiangsu province, eastern China. I've been a software engineer for almost one year at Autodesk.
When I was in college, computer science was a very hot major. I chose it and had a lot of opportunities to learn about it. This major was hard but fun for me at first, and I ended up choosing to become a software engineer.
AC: What do you enjoy about your role?
As a software engineer, I think my role is a bit of challenge because some of my work stirs my logical thinking and problem-solving skills. But I enjoy every part of the learning because it allows me to unlock different characteristics about myself, and it pushes me to do my best in every project.
Outside of work, I like to go boxing. Boxing gives me strength, bravery, and some techniques. It's a very uplifting sport and gives me a lot of energy. Once you start, I believe you'll love it.
AC: What advice do you have for computer science students out there who want to follow in your same career path?
My advice to those aspiring computer science students who want to enter the world of software engineering is not to set limits to what you can do. Learn to explore new things and be innovative. However, we should bare in our mind the fundamentals.
AC: Thanks for sharing that advice. My final question is… What does International Women in Engineering Day mean to you?
International Women in Engineering Day is inspiring as I get to see great women engineers shine in their roles in the industry, and it allows me to look forward to how bright my future could look like.
AC: Thanks, Pingping. I appreciate you taking time to be part of the blog.
Pingping: Thanks for asking me. It was fun.
My final guest on this blog is Saloni Sharma, senior software engineer at Autodesk, who is based in Ireland. I met Saloni at Autodesk’s internal conference called TechX . I went to her presentation and later, sat beside her on a bus to an event after the conference where I learned about her cool, past experiences. 😁
AC: Hi Saloni. I really appreciate you being part of this blog. Thanks so much.
Saloni: My pleasure and great to catch up with you again.
AC: Let’s get started. Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Saloni: I am Saloni Sharma, Senior Software Engineer at Autodesk for the past 5 years and have 8 years of experience as a Software Engineer. I am originally from Jaipur, India also known as Pink City, but I am currently based in Dublin, Ireland. I have done my master's in computer science in Interactive Entertainment Technology.
I like to play videogames and enjoy XR on different platforms. I do love nature too and thanks to beautiful Irish landscape, I tend to step out for a walk or hike often. Parenting is a new feather in my hat, and it has been recently occupying me outside of work, and I love it.
Not a lot of people know that I enjoy doing table settings and décor for events and occasions.
AC: Wow, I love hearing about the variety of interests you have. Thanks for sharing that. You are a senior software engineer. If you are going to talk about your role to someone who is still at uni/college, how would you describe it?
Saloni: As a senior software engineer at Autodesk, I work on problem solving of diverse scope which may include programming, CI/CD, infrastructure step etc. For my day-to-day work I need both functional & logical understanding of the project that I am working on. It also includes industry knowledge and business requirement understanding. As a senior software engineer, I must adhere to processes and standards to have seamless collaboration and avoid security issues along with maintaining code quality.
AC: What do you like about being a software engineer? What challenges have you experienced in your career so far?
Saloni: The best part of software engineering is being a creator, innovator, and a problem solver.
Imposter syndrome is my biggest challenge. I have worked with different cultured bunch of incredibly talented, I learned a lot from each of them during my software engineer career path and although I have worked extremely hard externally, but I always feel the need to be the Perfectionist internally.
AC: How do you keep learning? Any tips?
Saloni: I will share some of my go-to sources for my regular learnings.
- Peers: PR (Pull Request) reviews, technical discussion, architectural updates
- Meetups: Open meetups, internal and external trainings
- Network: opening up networks beyond own team helps in understanding the business requirements, scoping and collaboration of cross-teams.
Also, at Autodesk, we have a lot of opportunity to learn because the company provides lot of platforms to collaborate and create networks
AC: If you could look back to your “college/university” self, what advice would you give her?
Saloni: Corporate engineering is a lot different than academic engineering.
With ChatGPT and other AI (Artificial Intelligence) solutions, there is a fear trending that even software development jobs could be at risk, therefore I would suggest being an innovator, not only in emerging tech but also in processes and solutions.
AC: Saloni, what does International Women in Engineering Day mean to you?
Saloni: A day as a reminder that we have made some progress in balancing the gender ratio in Engineering and there is still a lot of work to be done.
AC: Thanks so much Saloni. I agree that there is still a lot of work to be done but each day, there is progress.
Well, folks, I hope you enjoyed learning about these six awesome technologists at Autodesk. To all the women in engineering and allies out there, June 23rd is a time to celebrate and take a moment to realize the impact that so many engineers are making today and have made in the past.
Got someone you’d like to shine a spotlight? Please do share in the comments below. 😊
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