>> from Palo Alto, California It's the Cube covering the em where women transforming technology twenty nineteen Brought to You by V. M. >> Where >> Hi, Lisa Martin on the ground of'Em were in Palo Alto, California, at the fourth Annual Women Transforming Technology Event, or W T. Squared one of my absolute favorite events to cover. And I'm pleased to welcome from one of the sponsors, Jennifer Cohen, the vice president of operations at Toyota Research Institute. Welcome to the Cube. >> Thank you, is that I'm really excited to be here to >> This is such a great event. It's It's morning time. You and I both have a lot of energy coming from even before you walk into the keynote here. Collaboration. The positive spirit, the energy, all of these women talking about and menas well past experiences. It's you walk in, and the energy of Deputy squared is palpable. This is your fourth year. So you being here now at all four >> have, and that's why I keep coming back because the energy here is so good because every year I walk away with tips I can use at work and in my personal life, championing diversity >> and diversity inclusion one of the tracks here, as well as trucks like helping emerging leadership the younger generation, which is key because the attrition rates in technology are so, so high. Tell me a little bit about Tech Toyota Research Institute, Terra What you guys doing? And what made it important for tea Right to sponsor W T Square this year. So Toyota Research >> Institute is a subsidiary of China. We're working on a really exciting things like autonomous driving robotics to help elders, agent place and material sciences. So it's really exciting next level stuff. And it's thrilling to kind of coming to work every day on things that we've been hearing about in the world. And now they're real world things, not just the Jetsons, you know? Yes. >> And so you were here as I mentioned the last three years. But last year, uh, when you were here, you were saying a minute ago. You leave this event every year with really useful kind of we'LL put it into tech terms act personal insights, absolutely clueless about your conversations at Tier I that where they said yes, this is an important event for us to >> sponsor, absolutely so that when I When I came back last year, I had brought a couple of folks from T. Ry to attend the event because I've been attending since the beginning. And as I said, every year I find something that I can bring back to the teams, if not multiple things. Andi weaken our chief diversity officer, Our senior chief of staff is also our diversity inclusion Head. She was very passionate about also supportive event. We're involved with Grace Hopper. We have a women's employee resource group. We're really putting our efforts our time here. They were glad to sponsor. And what was so exciting to walk into that room full of energy today and to see t rise logo up there? It was amazing. >> And I'm sure that for that you mentioned that there's about twelve of your your folks that are here that probably feel it's great that you're not just it's not just a logo. Now, this isn't just branding. This is actual. We're here, You're here. It's a focused, concerted effort. That tiara has an in fact when you join Tiara on the last couple of years, one of the things that inspired you was there's a Chena female leadership here, which is not >> common. No, it's definitely not definite, not common in my career. So one of the reasons I started at here I was because of my manager. Who's her name is Kelly K. She's our EVP and CFO, and she's an amazing leader and so on having the opportunity to go to another company. I wanted to go to one that makes a difference. Like tea, right? Look working to improve the quality of human life. And I wanted to work for somebody that I really respect. It could learn from on. It's been pretty rare in my career tohave women, female leaders to report to. So it's been amazing. And that, I think shows in the role that I have the role, that our chief of staff has Kelly's role and the fact that we're here today. It all flows through. >> So talking. Let's talk about more about flow as VP of operations tell me, like, for example, last year's W T squared what were some of the learnings that you brought back and used in your team, whether it's your management style or even hiring the next generation, >> so a few things that I've learned and not all of them are from last year. I'LL be honest. I'm not. All of them are ones I've just up like at you write. But some of them are things about management. Patty Vargas was here a couple years ago, talking about winds and challenges and really highlighting wins and every team meeting that something that it took back. And it well, it's not necessarily diversity. It's been transformational for me as a leader and really helpful to my team's. Then something. Other things I learned were about on, especially in a few years ago, about saying tohr, I'm not accepting any candidates until you have a diverse candidate pool. That's made a really big difference. And it's hard to say it's hard to stick with because it is hard to find women in technology. However, sticking with that has really helped in my career, hiring folks to have a more diverse team, >> so sticking with it, you've been in a technology for a long time. Tell me a little bit about your career path where you stem from the time you were a kid knowing I love computer science, or was it more zigzag ee >> Ah, little's exactly I was actually history, major say, But I always love technology. Back when we had trs eighties, I love technology. And so I actually started doing that to put myself through school, and I loved it so much. It's what I've stopped what's happened in technology for twenty five years, starting as health desk and systems administrator and moving my way up in my career over time, and every so often they still let me touch something technology and a firewall or some of my best. I keep a little bit of that skill set, but it is quarter who I am, and it's quarter Why I made it. Twenty five years sets >> a milestone. Congratulations, by >> the way, twenty five years in any industry that techno technology industry. I was reading some reports the other day upwards of forty five percent contrition, which is higher than any other industry. What have been some of the secrets to your Obviously I'm imagining persistence, but twenty five years is a long time to stick with anything, but you clearly have a passion for this, but I'm sure it hasn't been easy. Give us a little bit of an understanding and maybe some of those more challenging times you encountered. And how did you just kind of with that internal rules also know I'm I like technology. This is what I wanted. >> So, you know, it's always tough being the only woman in a room that's happened the bulk of my career, although thankfully, not a tear I but it has happened across and actually was the only woman at one company, and I thought it was gonna be a great opportunity. And I love the technology that we were doing. And I was excited Teo to infrastructure in operations and support it. And it was really a bad experience. And it wasn't imagine purposeful, but it was not great. And I was there a very short period time when I realized it wasn't gonna work and I had to take a real hard look. Don't want to keep doing this for a living. I do. I don't want to give up technology. So the right thing was to give up that company, right? And the right thing was t make sure that I stayed and what I loved, but not in the wrong spot. So I think being stubborn and persistent. Not being willing to give up the stuff that I love because the environment wasn't right was a huge part of why I have made it this far. And my daughter is a computer science major, and so I really want for her not to have to go through those things apart. The reason I come here today, what I'm excited about W T two is I want to make sure she has a far easier time of it than I had growing up. >> So was your daughter always >> an interested Or did she? Is she kind of following in Mom's footsteps? She >> wasn't the beginning. Actually, she don't want anything to do with it. And my mom's a c P A. And I don't want to do anything to find >> a way. >> So maybe a cool and her uncle, but never the parent, >> exactly. But as she took coding classes, she actually did Girls who code the seven week immersion camp she found like me that she loves it. So I think she'd like to not compare it to Mom. She doesn't want to hear Mom wars, but she absolutely has that same passion. She she loves to code and see the output and see the changes it can make in her life and potentially others. >> So she'd underground. Currently she is. You should give you anything back on the diversity in her. Yes, is she >> does. And I wish I could give you something inspiring. But unfortunately, she it's for four girls to forty guys. >> Okay, so maybe she has that. Maybe it's a DNA thing where she has that some people might say Stubbornness bad. However, I think you're a great example of how that can be, you know, sort of flipped that coin and look at it is persistence. What keeps her saying, I don't care that I'm for forty? >> I'm not sure. I think e think it's similarly the same thing that it's she's passing around and also she's had everybody's in lovely to her. She's had no mistreatment, so she's definitely loving it, but does notice that she's one of, you know, four out of forty. So but would you >> would you advise? And I, I know not like to say the next generation like your daughter's generation, but it's It's the generation of US women who are in technology now with the attrition rates. If they're in a situation, how would you advise him to recognize the experience that you shared with us? That this is situational? This is an industry wide. I'm not going to make a generalization. What would your advice be to them in terms of making that decision to not not leave? >> So I would say, actually, a mentor of mine told me when I was years ago at a company says, Do you like the work or do you do not like the work? Do you like the people do not like the people. If you don't like the people, you need to go somewhere else. But if you like the war, if you don't like the work here in the wrong industry and I like the work and I always have So I would say if you'd like the work, find the right opportunity and see what change you, Khun, doing the company that you're at. If you're at a company and things aren't right, have you to talk to a man in your manager HR there's ways tto see if you could fix it and if you can't, it's okay. Go somewhere else and do what you love. >> I love that it is. Okay, So one of the things that I'd loved digging on as well as you had gone to Terry's a HR and said, I'm not going to be looking at any candidates until you actually did >> a previous companies. But that is my stance since then, >> you know, >> it's without a diverse school, >> okay? And so what is diverse mean to you? What do you say to them? I know you can find us. >> Yes, Well, I diverse. I don't I don't want to dictate it. I just don't wanna have to, you know, the team's all be the same person. I think Joy is talking up the keynote right now about how important it is that we be careful of bias and that we look at those things and that we are having the people who build the technology be well rounded because this technology that's built here in the Valley goes all over the world has to serve everyone, not just the folks who build it. So I think it's having that same mindset going into it, goingto hiring >> one of and that's so important. And there's also debated. Is it a pipeline problem? I just read Emily changed Look proto Pia and where she kind of documents where that pipeline problem was created? Yes, many, many, many decades ago. And a lot of people would say it's a pipeline problem. But the majorities, the underrepresented, which isn't just women and people of absolutely well who say it's not a piper and problem this. And even if we look at a I, there's so many exciting possibilities. All the autonomous vehicle weren't that tear eyes doing, for example, that will impact everybody and jurors facial recognition? You know, there's probably people in the baby boomer, a generation that have iPhones with facial recognition. But the things that joy wish areas about the bias Easter thes malls being trained on, really, it gives me goose bumps. Didn't mind blowing more. People need to understand. We need better data and more diverse data, not just that to train the models to recognize more agree, but there needs to be lots of different, uh, data sets. So this inclusiveness and I think of diversity, inclusion. One of the things that I thought of when Joy was talking about inclusivity is its inclusivity of different data sets and different technologies, so that ultimately going forward, we can start reducing these biases and this technology that is all for good. >> And I think one of things that we've done is, you know, for our company, we actually had on all hands doing unconscious bias training like we are absolutely committed to making sure that we're thinking about those things on the idea if it's pipeline or if it's or or if it's not, I think it's a combination because the fact is, my daughter is in a class with four girls in forty men, and that's not necessarily, you know, there's no judgment there, but that's the reality. So there's pipeline. But I also think we can demand is hiring managers to have a diverse pool come to us? University isn't just I speak to women because that's what you know. That's my story. But there's not. There's, You know, we had those other kinds of diversity inclusion, you know, we have our G d l G B T. Q plus energy starts a lot of letters to get out at once. We have our women than allies. Yogi Employee resource Scripts were supporting that. It's here, I But I think, you know, we see people out there in the world all trying toe push forward on this. I think if we come out of these conferences and take those actions, that's how overtime it's going to get better. So that's my personal thought. >> I love that last question. What are you looking forward to? Taking away from Debbie U T squared for inclusive innovators as the >> well being of a company doing innovation? I'm really curious to see what's presented today, and I know that we've heard studies that talk about women, run companies and with women on board that profitability and innovation go up. So I think that the more inclusive we are, the better. All of our technology that comes out of the Valley is going to be so I'm looking forward to the whatever thought leadership is here today. That's different from each year that there's something different here that I learned it's not the same thing was Pipelines four years ago, right? Like the last year. It was a lot about women's leadership, so I'm really excited to see what comes out today. >> Well, Jennifer, I thank you so much for sharing some of your time on the kid with me today. And I think a lot of people are going to be able to learn a lot from us. Well, we appreciate your time. Thank you. My pleasure. Lisa Martin on the ground with the Cube. Thanks. For what?

>> from Palo Alto, California It's the Cube covering the EM Where women Transforming technology twenty nineteen. Brought to You by VM Wear >> Hi Lisa Martin with the Cube on the ground at the end. Where in Palo Alto, California, for the fourth annual Women Transforming Technology, even W. T. Squared on event that is near and dear to my heart. Excited to welcome back to the Cube pretty much. Rog Lachman, engineering leader, blocked in at the end where pretty much It's so great to have you back on the Cube. Thank you, Lisa. It's amazing to be here, and I can't believe it's been a year, a year. And so last year, when Protein was here, she launched her book. Nevertheless, she persistent love the title You just Did a session, which we'LL get to in a second, but I'd love to get your your experiences in the last year about the book launch. What's the feedback? Ben? What are some of the things that have made me feel great and surprised you at the same time? It's been fantastic. I wasn't expecting that when I started to write this book. It was more like I want to impact one woman's life. But what was interesting is I delivered around twenty twenty five talks last year. My calendar's booked for this year, but every time I go give a talk, my Lincoln goes crazy and I'm connecting with all these women and men. And it's just fantastic because they're basically resonating with everything I talk about in the book. I spoke at the Federal Reserve. Wow, I was like, This is a book on tech and they were like, No, this impacts all of us And I spoke to a group of lawyers and actually, law firms have fifty fifty when they get into law, right when they get into whenever I mean live, I'm not that familiar with it. But getting to partner is where they don't have equality or diversity, and it's resonated. So now I'm like, maybe I should just take the word check out What? You It's been impactful. And so last year was all about companies, so I did. You know, I spoke at uber I spoken Veum, where spoken nutanix it's looking a lot of these companies last year. This year is all about schools, fantastic schools of all different type, so I you know, I've done a talk at San Jose State. I went to CMU. They invited me over Carnegie Mellon. I supported the robotics team, which is all girls team. Nice. And it was fantastic because these girls high school kids were designing robots. They were driving these robots. They were coding and programming these robots and was an all girls team. And I asked them, I said, But you're excluding the men and the boys and they said no. When it's a combined boy girls team, the women end up the girls and organizing the men of the boys are actually writing the code. They're doing the drilling there, doing all that. And so the girls don't get to do any of that. And I was looking at just the competition and as watching these teams, the boy girl steams and those were all organizing. And I thought, this is exactly what happens in the workforce. You're right. Yeah. We come into the workforce, were busy organizing, coordinating and all that, and the men are driving the charge. And that's why these kids where this is at high school, Yeah, thirteen to seventeen, where this is becoming part of their cultural upbringing. Exactly. Pretty. In great. Yes, yes. And a very young age. So that was fascinating. I think that surprised me. You know, you were asking me what surprised you that surprised me. And what also surprised me was the confidence. Though these girls were doing all these things. I've never built a robot. I would love to. I haven't built a robot, and they were doing all these amazing things, and I thought, Oh, my God, >> they're like, >> confident women. But they were not. And it was because they felt that there was too much to lose. They don't want to take risks, they don't want to fail. And it was that impostor syndrome coming back so that conditioning happens way more impossible syndrome is something that I didn't even know what it wass until maybe the last five or six years suddenly even just seeing that a very terse description of anyone Oh, my goodness, it's not just me. And that's really a challenge that I think the more the more it's brought to light, the more people like yourself share stories. But also what your book is doing is it's not just like you were surprised to find out It's not just a tech. This is every industry, Yes, but his pulse syndrome is something that maybe people consider it a mental health issue and which is so taboo to talk about. But I just think it's so important to go. You're not alone. Yeah, vast majority men, women, whatever culture probably have that. Let's talk about that. Let's share stories. So that your point saying why I was surprised that these young girls had no confidence. Maybe we can help. Yes, like opening up. You know, I'm sharing it being authentic. Yeah. So I'm looking at my second book, which basically says what the *** happens in middle school? Because what happens is somewhere in middle school, girls drop out, so I don't know what it is. I think it's Instagram or Facebook or boys or sex. I don't know what it is, but something happens there. And so this year of my focus is girls and you know, young girls in schools and colleges. And I'm trying to get as much research as I can in that space to see what is going on there, because that totally surprised me. So are you kind of casting a wide net and terms like as you're. Nevertheless, she persisted. Feedback has shown you it's obviously this is a pervasive, yes issue cross industry. This is a global pandemic, yes, but it's your seeing how it's starting really early. Tell me a little bit about some of the things that we can look forward to in that book. So one thing that's important is bravery, Which reshma So Johnny, who's the CEO off girls code? She has this beautiful quote, she says. We raise our voice to be brave, and we'd raise our girls to be perfect, pretty telling. And so we want to be perfect. We won't have the perfect hair, the perfect bodies. We want a perfect partner. That never happens. But we want all that and because we want to be perfect, we don't want to take risks, and we're afraid to fail. So I want to focus on that. I want to talk to parents. I want to talk to the kids. I want to talk to teachers, even professors, and find out what exactly it is like. What is that conditioning that happens, like, why do we raise our girls to be perfect because that impacts us at every step of our lives. Not even careers. It's our lives. Exactly. It impacts us because we just can't take that risk. That's so fascinating. So you had a session here about persistent and inclusive leadership at W T squared forth and you will tell me a little bit about that session today. What were some of the things that came up that you just said? Yes, we're on the right track here. So I started off with a very depressing note, which is twenty eighty five. That's how long it's gonna take for us to see equality. But I talked about what we can do to get to twenty twenty five because I'm impatient. I don't want to wait twenty eighty five I'LL be dead by them. We know you're persistent book title. You know, my daughter will be in the seventies. I just don't want that for her. So, through my research, what I found is we need not only women to lean in. You know, we've have cheryl sound. We're talking about how women need to lean in, and it's all about the women. And the onus is on the woman the burdens on the woman. But we actually need society. Selena. We need organizations to lean in, and we need to hold them accountable. And that's where we're going to start seeing that changes doing that. So if you take the m r. I. You know, I've been with him for ten years, and I always ask myself, Why am I still here? One of the things we're trying to do is trying to take the Cirrus early this morning rail Farrell talked about like on the panel. He said, We are now Our bonuses are tied to, you know, domestic confusion, like we're way have to hire, you know, not just gender, right, Like underrepresented communities as well. We need to hire from there, and they're taking this seriously. So they're actually making this kind of mandatory in some sense, which, you know, it kind of sucks in some ways that it has to be about the story that weighing they're putting a stake in the ground and tying it to executive compensation. Yes, it's pretty bold. Yes. So organizations are leaning in, and we need more of that to happen. Yeah. So what are some of the things that you think could, based on the first *** thing you talked about the second one that you think could help some of the women that are intact that are leaving at an alarming rate for various reasons, whether it's family obligations or they just find this is not an environment that's good for me mentally. What are some of the things that you would advise of women in that particular situation? First thing is that it's to be equal partnership at home. A lot of women leave because they don't have that. They don't have that support on having that conversation or picking the right partner. And if you do pick the wrong partner, it's having that conversation. So if you have equal partnership at home, then it's both a careers that's important. So you find that a lot of women leave tech or leave any industry because they go have babies, and that happens. But it's just not even that, like once they get past that, they come backto work. It's not satisfying because they don't get exciting projects to work on that you don't get strategic projects, they don't have sponsors, which is so important toward the success, and they they're you know, people don't take a risk on them, and they don't take a risk. And so these are some of those things that I would really advice women. And, you know, my talk actually talked about that. Talked about how to get mail allies, how to get sponsors. Like what? You need to actually get people to sponsor you. Don't talk to me a little bit more about that. We talk about mentors a lot. But I did talk this morning with one of our guests about the difference between a sponsor and a mentor. I'd love you to give Sarah some of your advice on how women can find those sponsors. And actually, we activate that relationship. So mentors, uh, talk to you and sponsors talk about okay. And the way to get a sponsor is a is. You do great work. You do excellent work. Whatever you do, do it well. And the second thing is B is brag about it. Talk about it. Humble bragging, Yeah. Humble bragging talkabout it showcases demo it and do it with people who matter in organizations, people who can notice your work building that brand exactly. And you find that women are all the men toward and under sponsored. Interesting, Yes. How do you advise that they change that? There was a Harvard study on this. They found that men tend to find mentors are also sponsors. So what they do is, you know, I like you to stick pad girl singer, he says. Andy Grove was his mentor, but Andy Grove was also his sponsor in many ways, in for his career at Intel, he was a sponsor and a mental. What women tend to do is we find out like even me, like I have female spot him. Mentors were not in my organization, and they do not have the authority to advocate for me. They don't They're not sitting in an important meeting and saying, Oh, patina needs that project for team needs to get promoted. And so I'm not finding the right mentors who can also be my sponsors, or I'm not finding this one says right, and that's happens to us all the time. And so the way we have to switch this is, you know, mentors, a great let's have mentors. But let's laser focus on sponsors, and I've always said this all of last year. I'm like the key to your cell. Success is sponsorship, and I see that now. I am in an organization when my boss is my sponsor, which is amazing, because every time I go into a meeting with him, he says, This is about pretty much grew up. This is a pretty mers group. It's not me asking him. He's basically saying It's pretty nose grow, which is amazing to hear because I know he's my mentor in sponsor as well. And it's funny when I gave him a copy of my book and I signed it and I said, And he's been my sponsor to be more for like ten years I said, Thank you for being my sponsor and he looked at me. He said, Oh, I never realized it was your sponsor So that's another thing is men themselves don't know they're in this powerful position to have an impact, and they don't know that they are sponsors as well. And so we need. We need women to Fox and sponsors. I always say find sponsors. Mentorship is great, but focus of sponsors Look, I think it's an important message to get across and something I imagine we might be reading about in your next book to come. I know. Yeah, well, we'LL see. Artie, thank you so much for stopping by the Cube. It's great to talk to you and to hear some of the really interesting things that you've learned from nevertheless you persistent and excited to hear about book number two and that comes out. You got a combined studio. I'd love to thank you and thank you. I'm Lisa Martin. You're watching the queue from BM Where? At the fourth Annual Women Transforming Technology event. Thanks for watching.