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Analytical Chemist to Innovation Designer
36 Plays8 months ago
Nina studied UX/UI design at Springboard and is currently an Innovation Designer at IBM. Before transitioning to this role, she worked as an Analytical Chemist in cosmetics and skincare development at Johnson & Johnson and Kenvue.
She discusses her strategies for obtaining stakeholder buy-in for UX design changes, how she utilized a freelance project to enhance her portfolio, and offers advice on navigating challenging experiences during the job hunt.
Learn more about Nina via her medium profile: https://medium.com/@ninalyow
First article on relating cosmetic science to product design: https://medium.com/user-experience-design-1/how-being-a-cosmetic-chemist-helped-me-become-a-better-product-designer-d6c067eb5f04
Questions for Nina or myself that could be answered on a future episode? Please send an email to [email protected].
Interested in finally taking the plunge by starting your career in tech? How does $1500 off a Springboard Career Track Course sound?
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Transcript
Meet Nina: From Chemist to Designer
00:00:14
Speaker
Hey there, everyone. It's Wednesday again, and I have another awesome alum today. Today, I'd like to introduce you to Nina. She's studied UX, UI design at Springboard and is now an innovation designer at IBM. Before becoming an innovation designer, she was an analytical chemist in cosmetics and skincare development at Johnson & Johnson and Kenview. Nina, hi, thank you so much for being here.
00:00:43
Speaker
Hi. Yeah. Thank you for inviting me to be on here. Absolutely. And I am so excited to talk to you. You just got your job at IBM about four months ago. Yes. Okay. So super special episode. We have that new person energy.
00:01:01
Speaker
Unlike some people who have been in their jobs for forever so really excited to capture this moment. And I think one thing when I first got to Verizon where I work. We learned at springboard kind of how we had to present our work to our mentor, we had to do that project with.
00:01:25
Speaker
We had to do some presentations, but now we're presenting to a variety of different people, engineers, I present to lawyers. And so I'm just very curious to know what your experience has been with presenting your work now at IBM.
Crafting a Portfolio: Tips and Tricks
00:01:42
Speaker
Yeah, so starting out, I want to say that my first tip for learning how to present for different audiences was actually during the interview for the position that I'm at right now. So I was really glad that after I had presented one project for my portfolio as part of the interview process, the interview gave me some tips of like how to improve without me even asking. So I'm really happy for that.
00:02:05
Speaker
But basically, for my presentation, I had maybe about 10 minutes to present, but I already had a set presentation. I had these many slides to go through. I wanted to get through them. It took a little bit more time. So towards the end, the interviewer actually had to cut me off a little bit and be like, okay, we're running out of time. Can you just give me the ending and two bullet points? So I had to quickly change my presentation routine and just sum it up.
00:02:34
Speaker
And then at the end he was saying that whenever you present anything like even if it's a small like portion that you're working on you're just asking for feedback to have kind of like a hundred page version where you like brain dump everything you want to talk about and then have a really short version that's like
00:02:53
Speaker
three points and it's like quick and easy to say. And then in between you can have like a medium sized version for maybe an audience that wants to hear like some more detail. So I think that was a really good context going forward with how to present. And yeah, recently I was creating a newsletter and we were gathering some user feedback for it.
00:03:13
Speaker
And then with the other designer that I was working with, we had a more extensive deck with each question laid out, every answer. But then when we were presenting to our manager, we only had one presentation slide in the beginning highlighting a few key points.
00:03:29
Speaker
So I think that was a way to show that you can still present all the work that you've done, but just in different formats for different people. Certainly. And I'm so curious, this presentation, who were you presenting to? Was this a manager? Was it someone in UX?
00:03:50
Speaker
Yeah, so for the newsletter, it was just our manager and he isn't a designer. He just oversees our team as a whole. So he didn't have a context of really like what's the importance of user research. He just knew that we need some feedback to back up any new design changes. But he didn't really need to know the significance of every single point. He just wanted to see the outcome. Like what are some action items going forward?
00:04:15
Speaker
And so that's what we presented to him, that like after our research, here are the action items, this is how we're going to proceed with the final designs. Yeah, it sounds like he's a very KPI driven and just wants results. And I guess, yeah, if he wants contacts, he can ask, but that makes sense. I can see that. I think it's interesting how you say he doesn't really understand UX research.
00:04:41
Speaker
kind of how we understand it. I have had similar experiences where I've had to convince stakeholders that we need to do testing and we need to validate some things. And it's not because of any ridiculous reason. It's just, they don't know why it's, you know, they think, okay, you just design an interface. That's it. But how people interact with it.
00:05:09
Speaker
We can't read minds. Nobody can. So interesting to a bit. Yeah. And I am dying to know more about what it's been like starting at IBM. Big enterprise. I can only imagine how vast it is. But I want to start with
Career Shift: Chemistry to UX Design
00:05:30
Speaker
the beginning. So you were a chemist. You were making skincare. I am a huge
00:05:38
Speaker
like bootleg skincare fan. I like to like read all about it and you're probably like, Oh gosh, like one of those. I actually do know the science, but that's, we'll save that for another time. That's another podcast. What, you know, got you to be a chemist, but then what made you not want to be a chemist?
00:06:00
Speaker
Yeah, so I can start from what I studied in undergrad. So I went to study chemistry and because I wanted to work in skincare, just like growing up, I had the opportunity to like do a few experiments with like adding glitter to shampoo, for example, as like my first prototype of like a personal care product. And I think that was really fun.
00:06:22
Speaker
So I thought that I want to learn the science behind cosmetics. So I learned a lot of the chemistry behind it and then starting my full-time job, that's what I wanted to do. I was in the lab either testing products for the quality or maybe on the development end. But as I was working in the lab, it made me think of
00:06:48
Speaker
that I really liked the reasons behind developing a product. And actually also in undergrad I studied industrial design as well because I really liked what I was learning about why you're making a product, like who are you making it for, what problem you're trying to solve. And I really love that
00:07:10
Speaker
the problem solving that goes into any aspect of design. Yeah, physical products, like digital products, I think that was all really interesting. And just like being in the lab, I was just thinking like I, okay, so I like skincare, but I think the science just wasn't fully, I wasn't fully immersed in it. I couldn't see myself like advancing in that career learning about cosmetic science. And I wanted to,
00:07:39
Speaker
I wanted to just be the designer of different products. And for cosmetics, I think it's a narrow focus that I had at one point, but I was just thinking that I would want to think broader about other products that I could make. And so I was looking online for how do I become a designer. And I think the most tangible
Choosing the Right Course: Why Springboard?
00:08:02
Speaker
way to learn on my own and also online on my own time was
00:08:06
Speaker
digital design, so that made me think of, like I needed some more formal education to build up a portfolio and yeah, really showcase that I am a designer and I wanna make this career change. That's so cool. First of all, you know, I saw your bio, you were a chemist and I'm thinking like, how does chemistry kind of translate into UX? But now, as you just explained it, what I hear is like, you've just learned
00:08:36
Speaker
how to just build things. And I think you can build a website. Industrial design is a broad term of what you can design as far as things. But then also knowing the chemistry behind it, that is so multifaceted. What was your first moment with UX design? When did you discover that this could be of interest?
00:09:04
Speaker
I want to say that it was in one of the interactive product courses I took at school. For that one, you had to integrate a physical design for a product. So one of our projects was to make some sort of clock. And it was such a broad question. You can tell time from anything. I was doing some research. And yeah, you can have a typical watch. But you can also have, let's say, a metronome for
00:09:30
Speaker
counting like music rhythms so there's like many different ways to tell time and so just that process of thinking through like how does that product work
00:09:41
Speaker
I made a timer for brewing coffee, something simple, but I was able to create a little interface that was also interactive. It was with physical buttons, but in that way, I still had to think about where would the buttons be placed that would make sense for the user to use, and it's not intrusive to their normal coffee routine.
00:10:01
Speaker
So yeah, that was my first introduction to Brighton School. That's really cool. And I'm sure there's a lot out there today that is applicable to that. I personally, I don't have a coffee machine anymore, but
00:10:16
Speaker
I can see that every person my age is obsessed with coffee. And I don't know, I feel like you should make this. I feel like you might have a niche market here. Quit your job at IBM and make this clock. I mean, it's not like mass producing it for sure.
00:10:32
Speaker
Yes, yes. Well, when you do, I'll have you back on. You can talk all about it. Moving forward, so that was your first interaction. And I know you said that you wanted a bit more of a formal education or course to kind of get you organized, for lack of better words. So how did springboard come into play? What made you think that springboard was what you needed to
00:11:01
Speaker
per take in to get you to where you are now. Yeah, so I had looked at a couple different course options and I wanted to be part-time as well because I was still keeping my full-time job as a chemist. So I wanted to make sure that I'd have time to do it after work hours. And I like that the course has set up with foundation of just like a few either articles or tutorial videos that I could follow along the way to set up that foundation.
00:11:30
Speaker
And then it would build up to actual projects that I could put on my portfolio. So in that way, it was more structured. I didn't have to just Google, what are the best ways to make a portfolio? What are some skills I have to learn? It was just all in that one springboard platform. Another thing I looked at was the mentorship.
00:11:48
Speaker
I thought it was very important that I would have feedback on what I'm working on. I'd have a mentor to ask questions and just learn about their experience as a designer. So I knew that I needed someone by my side, some consistency as I'm going through all of the coursework.
00:12:07
Speaker
And finally, the industry design project was like very eye catching for me because I wanted to work with an actual client, work on a real problem that a company is facing. And so I would kind of have that more of a real world experience and not just like personal projects on my portfolio. Certainly. Yeah, that real world project is really game changing in the sense that
00:12:35
Speaker
I don't know what your experience was like, obviously, studying design, but then going into chemistry. I studied fashion design, and it was very, very clear that my fashion degree, well, it wasn't, I don't want to say it was worthless, but you really needed experience to get a job, which is a, it's not a kind thing in this world to have to do that, but yes, I completely agree.
00:13:04
Speaker
So with that, you're in the course. What do you think you learned there that was really valuable to you? What are you using today at IBM that Springboard taught you? Yeah, so I learned a lot of different ways to conduct user research. I just love that there's different methods of
00:13:27
Speaker
first just uncovering the goals and needs of the users and that's really the foundation of why you're making something or from scratch or if you're making a certain change you want to know like from people using the product like what what are they going through and what do they want to do.
00:13:44
Speaker
And so there was some methods there of maybe you can interview them. Maybe it's just a survey if you don't have time. Maybe you do some card sorting to see if you're on a site, for example. How do you want information presented? I think there's all those different options I was able to add on to my toolkit.
00:14:03
Speaker
Like really I don't remember all of them at the one time But once I have to go into a situation where I have to conduct research I can kind of go through my notes and be like, okay Yeah, I can try this if I need more information maybe I can try a different method. I think that was really important for me
00:14:21
Speaker
Another one was just learning about design systems and also UI patterns. Just starting out, I'm not, I don't think I'm very good at visual design. I think you really have to have an eye for it at some point. Like you can learn about typography and like the layout and
00:14:40
Speaker
of like a typical page but I want to know some patterns of like what works and like what users are familiar with so I think I can start off building a prototype from that point just like with those patterns and like set design systems. Certainly I also can really I can definitely make an interface but I'm not making slick interfaces. Yeah and I was also finding that like with the user testing it can also inform
00:15:06
Speaker
what specific areas of UI can be improved. So that's where I put research first, too. I think that has been the most helpful for me. Absolutely. Yeah. That's something I've really been personally working on. I don't know if you've experienced this, but at least when I first started out, I would get a project. And again, the stakeholders just want your work done. They want their KPIs met. They have their goals. But it really takes a lot to kind of
00:15:36
Speaker
not push back, but stand your ground and say, no, I need more time to really understand this, pull this data, check with our research teams to make sure I'm understanding where I'm coming from, instead of just blindly following what a stakeholder wants me to do.
00:15:55
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. I've heard that from when I was doing my user research for that newsletter I was working on too, that I should back up every decision with data because you can't argue with it. This is what's been said. These are quotes.
00:16:09
Speaker
It's really good to back them up. Yes. Numbers do not lie. So with that, you're in the course. Did you do anything outside of springboard to supplement your knowledge? So I guess this opportunity, it just came to me when I was doing the course. So I was
00:16:32
Speaker
I had heard about this newsletter called Skindy, and Skindy covers cosmetic beauty news and cosmetic science. But typically, beauty news and cosmetic science are written in white papers, and it's very technical.
00:16:49
Speaker
It just gives you the facts about the latest chemistry news. But this newsletter made it more accessible to the regular consumer. Kind of just changed up the language of the news and presented information a different way. So I saw that they were looking for some help in redesigning their newsletter.
00:17:10
Speaker
so I like reached out to them and said that I would love to help you like I've never done a newsletter before but I have an idea for like how to present information and I had some like feedback for what they currently have so it's like okay I have some ideas if you're willing to hear me out like I would love to help help you redesign it and make sure it's better for the readers so I just kind of reached out to them and
00:17:35
Speaker
They needed, they didn't need some help, so I was able to work with them on that. And yeah, that was a really great experience. It was, I guess it was a, they were a client.
00:17:47
Speaker
I guess it wasn't really like a formal project or a client, but I think that was my first point of presenting my ideas to someone else.
Freelance Ventures with Skindy
00:17:57
Speaker
It's not just for me, it's for other readers, it's for the creators of newsletter. So I was able to get that feedback and along the way got to just flex some other creative skills on sending a newsletter and also creating some design assets for social media posts.
00:18:15
Speaker
But I think that was just something fun and able to learn a little bit more about visual design too. Yeah, that is really cool. And I'd love to hear exactly what you said to this newsletter because I think
00:18:27
Speaker
There's a lot of people out there that do want freelance work and going about it can be daunting. It can be awkward, but clearly you did something that worked. So, and it sounds like you reached out to them, you probably shared your background, but did you share, you know, specific points on what you think could make this newsletter more, I guess, reader friendly, user friendly, however you describe it? Like what was your, what was this letter like? I want to say,
00:18:59
Speaker
Let's see, I was trying to actually find that earlier, but I was saying that I also wanted to contribute as a writer as well. So I was like, okay, I'm also a chemist. I want to contribute as a writer. Maybe you have room for this section.
00:19:16
Speaker
And I think I was saying that the colors that they have on their website, it's kind of a muted tone, but in their newsletter, which was a whole different design scheme. And also, the layout of the newsletter wasn't super friendly for mobile devices. All the information got squished, and the layout was just all very disoriented. So I pointed that out to them, too.
00:19:41
Speaker
Yeah, and so I think they I also showed demonstration of like, here's the comparison of like, like a website on a desktop versus mobile, like there's different ways that people could be reading this.
00:19:53
Speaker
Um, wow. So you put this all within like your first outreach email. So I think their email, I was just saying that like, I, uh, yeah, you're looking for some help in our newsletter. They didn't specify like what exactly. So there's like someone to help them out. Um, so I was like, okay, I can contribute as a writer. And also if you need help with any branding, any newsletter design, like I can help with that. Uh, in our next meeting, I can show you some of my suggestions.
00:20:24
Speaker
if you're open to it. Yeah, no. I feel like you really, from what I hear, like you checked off all the boxes. I think a lot of people don't really, well, I don't want to say they don't. I think it's a very intimidating thing to do and they just don't know how to sell themselves, but it sounded like you literally just proved your worth and everybody should learn from you right now. So that's really, really awesome. And this was while you were working
00:20:53
Speaker
full time as a chemist, and you're in springboard. Yeah, so I will say that I did take a toll on a little bit of the springboard work. I sure about to say. At one point, I was like, Hmm, for one of the projects I was talking to my mentor to she was saying that you can even suggest your own project for maybe the third project, you don't have to follow the exact template.
00:21:16
Speaker
So I was going to actually just present my newsletter work as one of the portfolio pieces. So I didn't end up doing that. I still ended up making another project. But right now on my website, I do have a project that's showcasing what I did on the newsletter. I think that was a question that came up in my interview of why
00:21:41
Speaker
you choose to do these positions? So I was able to explain like how I can connect UX design with cosmetics. I think this newsletter design was a good bridge between that. That was an awesome answer too and I'm sure to the interviewer and even to me it sounds like you know you're trying to take the steps to get to where you want to go and I think it's been said on this podcast like your first
00:22:05
Speaker
This wasn't the UX job, but your first job, like maybe post bootcamp, or it sounds like this is concurrent to your bootcamp won't necessarily be exactly where you want to go. But it's, and I think, um, we had another guest talk about this perfectly. It's about kind of like what you're doing now to get to where you want to go. Instead of just blindly applying on LinkedIn and crossing your fingers.
00:22:29
Speaker
So again, another great tip from you. So you're doing all of this work. That had to have been a lot. But you finished the course, and now you're in the job hunt. So I'd love to hear what that was like for you.
Job Hunting: The Path to IBM
00:22:46
Speaker
All right, so after completing the industry design project, I was just working on my portfolio, making sure I documented everything well.
00:22:58
Speaker
And then I signed up for like with the career coach. And I also wanted to make sure that I would meet with her once a week.
00:23:06
Speaker
They also like that consistency of like, this is accountability for me that by this point with the career coach, I want to have like applied to this many jobs, like maybe have one informational interview that can be accountable. And my coach was also just like very, um, very encouraging whenever like I'm, I can be hard on myself too. When I'm like, Oh, I had, I didn't apply to as many jobs this week. Um, I only scheduled an interview, but I didn't actually like,
00:23:35
Speaker
meet up with anyone this week for an informational interview. So I think that my coach helped me like get through those like hard points. So let's say I started applying like November 2022.
00:23:47
Speaker
And I really didn't hear back from anyone. December, I remember that I got a video interview submission for IBM, which is for the current position that I'm at right now. So I just submitted my video with answering a few questions. Didn't really think anything of it. But then from there, the process for this job was very smooth. I was going through three rounds of interviews in four weeks, I would say.
00:24:16
Speaker
And then I got the offer like maybe first week of February. And that really was the only company and physician that reached out to me. Like I got rejections and just no answers from everywhere else. And I think just to quantify the jobs that I applied for maybe close to 70. So, and I was applying throughout like the holiday breaks too. So after the holiday breaks, I was about to just take a break.
00:24:44
Speaker
maybe start back up in February. So yeah, I was surprised by this opportunity to interview and yeah, glad that everything went smoothly. Yeah, for sure. So what was it like? So first of all, I'd love to know what an innovation designer means. Yeah, so this position, I want to say that the name has changed.
00:25:08
Speaker
A few times at first when I had applied, it was called client engineering designer. But basically as in this role, I'm in the sales department at IBM. And so we work in pre-sales and we work with IBM's clients and kind of like de-risk their investment in IBM products. So we would work with them on like a four to six week project to showcase the value of
00:25:36
Speaker
one of IBM's technology. And so we would map out the client's needs to an IBM product in that way. And so I'd be part of those four to six week projects. And with my team, there's business technology leaders. There's data scientists. Or right now, they're called AI engineers. And so we just build out this proof of concept for the client.
00:26:05
Speaker
Yeah, I guess that my role is not traditional like product, user research or product designer, UX designer role, but I still do some aspects of research with workshops, uncovering needs with the clients, some like UX, UI design, if the prototype needs interface design work, or maybe with presentation, just like telling a compelling story to showcase the solution. It's kind of like a mix of very, very different
00:26:32
Speaker
like design roles and aspects of my job. Yeah, that does sound really cool. That sounds like no projects really the same. And I'm curious, you said that the titles changed when you first got that video interview. Were you interviewing for this specific role or was it a general interview? What was, what happened? Yeah, so I was interviewing for this specific role.
00:27:00
Speaker
I only knew what the job description of the role was. I would do some research, some UX UI design, that it was in free sales, but I didn't know exactly what each project would look like, for example. I'm also working with financial services clients, so that's something that I didn't know until I started working in this job for about four weeks.
00:27:27
Speaker
Oh, right. Yeah. That's the nature of like, you have a general role as an innovation designer, but you can kind of bounce around to different clients and industries too. Really cool. So I'd love to know, like we said, you just started here. What's surprising you the most about working versus being in a bootcamp? I know you said this isn't a traditional UX role, but were there any surprises, things that caught you off guard?
00:27:58
Speaker
Yeah, I want to say one of the differences is balancing time with, let's say, client meetings, where I do need to be present for specific workshops. And that maybe takes an hour to even three hours for a framing or solution, solutioning workshop, for example. But then there's so much preparation that goes before that.
00:28:26
Speaker
And so it's, I'm trying to figure out how to prioritize my work of like maybe there's meetings, but then I also have to do my own preparation and like my own, whether it's like product design type of work. So just prioritizing that work has been different than just taking one course at a time. Certainly. And I guess you're also getting projects, not like UX teaches, well, the bootcamp teaches you
00:28:56
Speaker
perfect practice, but I'm sure in your experience you might come in in the middle of something and you have to kind of work not exactly in the linear process like we're taught. Yeah, I would say so. I'm trying to think of a specific example though. I will say that I'm not exactly like given
00:29:26
Speaker
Like let's say if there's a project, usually they're very...
00:29:31
Speaker
like data scientists work heavy. So I would have to step in and be like, okay, in this part of the project, I'm wondering if I can contribute as a designer in some way. Like, can I help present a certain piece of it? Can I help design the interface to help present a better product to the client? So I think I would have to step in more and kind of be an advocate for my own work.
00:29:57
Speaker
I think that's where it's been different. I come in at different points of the project too. Certainly, yeah. And I think a bit of advice I got when I was networking and trying to get into UX was that a lot of people in the industry are saying you constantly have to defend UX. You can't just sit there and assume people are going to include you in projects or think in a
00:30:27
Speaker
design driven way. So it is important to always step up. And I'm, yeah, that's definitely something you hear. But then when you're on the job, you're like, Oh, this is what it means. Yeah. And I'm seeing that also for since I'm in a sales role. Right now, it's the season for account planning. So account planning would be that for a certain client, they're trying to plan out what are the next projects to do with the client? Like, what are some new technology that the clients interested in? How can
00:30:57
Speaker
we present that to them. And so designers have been brought in to kind of shape that planning session, that brainstorming and ideation session with the account team. They're not making a product, but it's really to solve that problem of how can they plan better for their next quarter or like for the next year. That's been interesting in solving those different types of problems.
00:31:20
Speaker
Certainly, certainly. Well, one thing I want to ask is that since you just got your job recently, what I've been noticing on LinkedIn and just in various forums where people are trying to get a job is people are struggling.
Advice for Aspiring Designers
00:31:35
Speaker
The job market isn't what it was back in the summer or fall of 2021 or even before the pandemic.
00:31:46
Speaker
you know, what kind of what would you say to someone who's like just been on the job hunt for months? I would say if there's a way to just like, create a project, like create another project. And that way, maybe you're connecting with an organization. I think, like, it could be a nonprofit that's like in your area, like maybe you can reach out to them and make that connection and see if
00:32:15
Speaker
You can help them out with any UX, UI design work. Maybe do a hackathon, like find other designers, maybe find some engineers and just building something. I think that can just help you practice your skills. And maybe that's something interesting that you can talk about for your next interview. And I think after finding a project, it's important to document it and share that out. So maybe we can share that out on LinkedIn.
00:32:42
Speaker
You can get some interest from other companies to see like what you're doing. Maybe you're publishing it on Medium and just getting other readers to see your work. So I think that would be my two suggestions. And I think those two suggestions, yeah, I completely agree. This sounds kind of harsh, but I can feel the pain of someone just looking for work.
00:33:09
Speaker
but then when they post those heartfelt messages on LinkedIn being like, will somebody please hire me? It's really sad, but also I feel like if you share something a little bit more like, hey, this is actually what I've been doing with my time, that will get you a bit farther than pleading for a job, which I think I have seen a bit on LinkedIn. I'm sure not everybody's doing that, but
00:33:35
Speaker
I definitely think that's a much better strategy, um, than, you know, being a little, a little upset about how things are going or not going. So with that being said, you know, I'd love to hear just about a little bit more about your day and day out at IBM. Like what's, I know you kind of talked about the types of projects you're working on, but what's the culture like there? Like what, um, you know, what makes you really excited to go to work there every day?
00:34:05
Speaker
Yeah, so let me see. Every day is, I think it is very different. I'll say that like maybe one where product we're showcasing IBM's AI technology. And so it's been interesting to learn about that product and like what IBM does there. And I really didn't know too much about it. So it's fun and interesting to
00:34:32
Speaker
you know, take some educational courses that the company provides to learn more about it and being able to understand how design can work in it because I think AI will really change just how people do everything in their day-to-day lives. So it's really cool to be part of that. Let's see, for my team,
00:34:54
Speaker
My team is not just made out of designers. So I think that's really cool to work with. There's like one more senior designer on my team has been really great and like mentoring me and allowing me to shadow her on different like client engagements and work. So I think that there's a really supportive environment there. It sounds like your team isn't very siloed, which is cool.
00:35:17
Speaker
Yeah, it isn't very siloed. I guess for every project you need, everyone's input on it. So like for the data scientists, they have the tools and the knowledge to build anything essentially.
00:35:36
Speaker
to really get out the customer's needs. That's when business technology leaders would come in to form their relationship. Designers could maybe facilitate a couple of conversations and tease out those needs. So I think it's a really good collaborative environment, for sure. That's wonderful to hear. I know it's really tough trying to find a good company culture and
00:36:02
Speaker
you know, having a really supportive team is worth its weight in gold. I've definitely had the other end of the spectrum. So glad to hear that. And I'd love to know, you know, not to constantly harp that you're the new person, but what kind of advice do you have for someone who's just starting their job? Like you've been at IBM for a few months now. What do you think helped get yourself on the right foot there? What might you have done differently?
00:36:30
Speaker
Um, I think one thing is being like proactive about, um, your learning. So going into this role, like I, this is my first time like working with, um, like some aspects of software design new news to the technology. And I'm also working with, um, financial services clients. So I don't know anything about the industry. So I took some time to really like ask around like, how do I build up some foundational knowledge here?
00:37:02
Speaker
And I learned that maybe I could just reach out to some of the data scientists to see, understand the technology from them. There are some courses online. There are some meetings that I can join. So I think I just ended up reaching out to more people and was able to learn a lot more that way. And I also learned to be kind of some skills in proactively
00:37:31
Speaker
just setting up my calendar and not like waiting for someone to be like, okay, I'm free today to meet. It's something that I would have to just set time on their calendar to like, make sure I'm mindful of other people's time with my work as well. Definitely. I'm curious what
00:37:54
Speaker
gave you the foresight to select certain meetings to reach out and join or the certain people like how did you know what you needed to learn if that makes sense to get onboarded? So one thing was talking to my manager. Well, we have like one on one setup. So he told me that there's a few things that I would have to get up to speed on and what is industry knowledge and then learning about the technology and
00:38:22
Speaker
learning what the data scientists do on a day-to-day basis since I'll be working closely with them. So I got input from my manager and then from we have like a designer organization so with
00:38:35
Speaker
the designer that's on my team, she gave me like a few Slack channels to join. So I just, I joined all these different Slack channels. I don't necessarily like listen to everything, but I'm in the know of like, if there's something that I can learn from, I can just like pop in and add that session to my calendar, talking to other designers starting out with me, just asking them like, how was your day doing? Like build up a little bit of community and rapport with anyone that's new, just to see like, okay, are we on the same page of learning things?
00:39:05
Speaker
Yeah, seeing where they're at. Yeah, all good strategies. I think that's great that you have that manager guidance. And yeah, I'd imagine, are you working remote, or are you in person a few days? Yeah, so it's a mix of both. And there isn't really a sign of when I would go into the office.
00:39:30
Speaker
But you try to go in at least once a week on days where I know that other people are also going in. And then for the most part, it'll be just working remotely.
00:39:42
Speaker
That's awesome. Yeah, I always wonder, I think I'm fully remote. So it was really tricky learning names and because I didn't have faces to put to them or I didn't run into people getting coffee. So I'm sure that in-person time helps a little bit too. Yeah, for sure. And I try to make an effort of like, if I know, maybe I wasn't prepared to go into the office, but if someone in my team says, I'm going to be in the office, then I try to make a point to go in there as well and say hi.
00:40:10
Speaker
Certainly, yeah, it really does go a long way. Once I finally got to meet my coworkers, it definitely just gave a little bit more of a sense of camaraderie for sure. So with that being said, we're coming up on time and I'd love to ask, is there anything that we didn't get to talk about today that you'd like to share?
Reflecting on Career Transitions
00:40:29
Speaker
I think like when, well, I guess we might've covered this, but when I was thinking about like, can I really,
00:40:37
Speaker
Leave my my career as a chemist and become a designer I didn't know like how to bridge the gap in between them and so that's when it brought me to like let me just reflect and Write a little bit about like all the different ways that I think my chemistry role relates to a designer role and so I ended up going on medium and just writing a blog post about it and I was happy to see that some people they they liked
00:41:06
Speaker
what I wrote and some people like resonated with that as well. And so that got me into like doing more writing and reflecting on some of the projects which of course you write about it in your portfolio but I think you can write in a different style on medium to express like why you're maybe express your
00:41:27
Speaker
like reasons behind like what you're making or just writing on different topics. So I just felt like writing on medium has been a good outlet for me. Certainly. Well, would we be able to link your medium articles to this podcast episode? Yeah, for sure. Awesome. All right. I will get those from you later and I will do just that. That's an awesome thing to share. I personally have not
00:41:55
Speaker
become a writer. I guess I post a podcast, so there we go. We all have our outlets, but that's really awesome, and I can absolutely see why people would resonate with that. To be quite honest, it's so awesome talking to you about that, and I'm excited to read your articles because
00:42:11
Speaker
If I was interviewing someone and they were a chemist, I wouldn't know the connections. And we had a great episode from Sid a few weeks prior. He was an opera singer. And I'm like, how can an opera singer become a data scientist? I generally just was so curious as to how he did it. And his answer was, it made sense. It makes sense. So really excited to
00:42:40
Speaker
give those articles another platform here. And with that being said, additionally, are you open to listeners connecting with you on LinkedIn or any other social media platforms? Yeah, LinkedIn would be great too. So Nina is N-I-N-A, and my last name is Lau, L-Y-O-W.
00:43:00
Speaker
Well, thank you so much for your time and sharing your story. It's been a pleasure. And for anyone else listening, if you have questions for Nina or myself that could be answered on a future episode, please email me at alumni podcast at springboard.com.