They are supported by Texas Mutual Workers Compensation Insurance Company.

You need the tenacity to understand that you're going to have to self motivate yourself when you ask for help.

People help you always be learning.

Always be open to learning new ideas.

Welcome to Salad.

I'm Melanie Mendez Gonzalez, your host, on this episode of Salud.

We're going to talk we're going to log in with three exceptional Latina leaders in the world of technology, all based here in San Antonio.

For one, her Texas hills took her from the schools of SAIC to working in the White House.

Another will share with us her road to robotics.

But our first guest has shown how to lead, learn and be of service to the community all while staying steeped in technology.

Vamos.

Here's where all the action happens.

Of course, we have a lot of behind the scenes action.

Cheney For somebody who's met you for the first time.

Describe what did you.

Oh, wow.

What is it that I do at the end of the day in the people business?

So whether it's my role at CPS Energy or my role as a CEO and digital engineer at Web Head, I'm in the people business.

My job is to design and problem solve for the average individual, just like the enterprise and customer.

So let's talk about Web Head for a little bit.

You started this company how many years ago?

1994 will be 30 years November this year.

Wow.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

So what led you to the point to start a tech company in 1994?

I think it all stemmed from being, you know, coming from a blue collar, low income family.

When you have a lot of responsibilities in a low income family, you have to be very resourceful.

You really just find ways to survive.

And so that led to saying I want to be the first to go to college.

And in college I happened to be dating someone that was in the computer science, pursuing a degree in computer science, who then worked at the High Performance Computing lab.

So in order to see each other, we would only see each other at the lab.

And that exposed the actually to the World Wide Web and the Internet back then, when it was still research and not necessarily commercialized, but as someone who was pursuing a degree in sociology, I literally understood the impact it would have.

And I said, I'm going to start a business with this.

It basically haven't yet.

You got mail, if it makes sense.

As cachet as it sounds.

It was very easy for me to visualize how this would transform the way we live, work and play.

And more importantly, it would catapult me into creating my own opportunity versus breaking through a glass ceiling.

So what is what was it like to be Latina in tech then, or even still today?

Even now, it actually has not changed.

I probably represented less than 1% back then because there wasn't a lot of Mexican-Americans.

We were the first Mexican-American Internet company.

And so today, if you look at where women are in STEM in general, women and entrepreneurship, specifically tech Latinas, we still represent 2%.

So, for example, the average woman who pursues a degree or a career in STEM leads the industry by age 35.

So that kind of gives you an idea regardless of ethnicity.

It is very difficult for a woman to navigate the STEM environment.

What advice would you give to Latinas, to women who want to be in STEM fields, who want to be at a tech company?

I would just say you have first have a vision for yourself.

The vision for yourself is really important.

And then like anything else, you have to have a strategic plan with that vision.

And what is that mission and that moral compass that you want to aspire?

Like, honestly, all of it is very important because you will be challenged at every turn.

What is our roadmap for yourself and where do you see that end result to be?

And the reality is that a lot of us are going to hit a lot of base hits before we hit home runs.

And that journey is just to be consistent with those be base hits.

They add up.

You need the tenacity to understand that you're going have to self motivate yourself.

And regardless of what industry you're in, because it's going to be a lot of work.

And so I kind of go back to, in my opinion, you don't have to be the smartest.

You don't have to be the brightest.

But if you're consistent with where you want to go and what you're going to be, you're going to win.

You have to understand that we don't all enter it with equal, equal, everything.

Some of us have a better opportunity because we were raised in a family that was more affluent.

Some of us have a better opportunity because our parents went to college and they raised is different.

Someone was Frank like myself, had no role models, no income.

I mean very little income.

You know, you have to understand that, you know, be realistic.

But at the same time, that vision, again, the strategic plan, the consistency is more powerful than it is to always have that competitive advantage.

I'm very curious how you would describe your leadership style.

It's interesting and it really depends on the situation.

But I would say for the most part, I'm very authentic in how I lead.

This is what you get really raw and how I do things.

Yes, very intelligent, very analytical.

Very few people see that, which is fine, as a matter of fact, being underestimated about how smart I am and how strategic I am has been action advantage for me because people see the wrongness of me and and sometimes you get stuck on that and they don't really want to see anything else, which just is another example.

As as Latinos, we're stereotyped.

The fact that we get stereotyped so much or the stereotype is reinforced.

It really has allowed me to to be more strategic about how I operate, because they don't, as they historically underestimate me, to be as put together as I am.

So, you know, I would just say authentic.

I'm really real when it comes to leadership.

So we take all of this your your experience as a tech entrepreneur, as a leader, and we get to chairperson of CPS energy.

You have to go through a confirmation process.

CPS historically, they've been 144 years of only had seven women be on the board.

They've only had actually one Hispanic CEO.

And I was very instrumental, instrumental in doing that.

And that was probably part of the proudest moments to be in a position to hire the first Hispanic CEO because of energy.

And and we're making history.

We're the first Hispanic duo to lead the organization.

It took only 144 years for that to happen.

But better late than never.

Along your journey, who have been your mentors?

You know, it's a little challenging because, you know, we can say our parents.

So, yes, obviously my mother was very instrumental in different ways than my father was.

I would say I've had very little mentors in tech, but I've had two significant individuals that have been really consistent in my life.

One of them was Itamar Khalid on Woodrow, and she was my first mentor in marketing, like she had worked for.

She actually did the first Hispanic campaign for AT&T, So I learned a lot from her about strategic marketing and what really marketing meant.

And she was very instrumental, not just on a career path or what to do web head, but even on a personal level.

I remember her like even by my first dress for like a gala because I couldn't afford stuff like that.

But she was like, You're an executive, you have to look the part.

And it was also feeling comfortable and becoming my own person and understanding that there's different versions of me, like in software and I needed I was being upgraded and, and how I was viewed and that meant, you know, learning how to dress, learning how to, Yeah, be presentable for a different market.

Right?

So she taught me a lot.

And so I've noticed a pattern that most of my mentors are typically first generation.

Jamie What do you see for the future of women and Latinas in STEM or regardless of STEM corporate America just in general?

Latinas Hispanic women represent 60% of the workforce, so do the math.

So really, it's not really an opportunity for women.

It's really an opportunity to see how corporate America is going to support Latino women in the organization.

So I really think it's an opportunity for them to realize that that's 60% of your workforce.

Are you going to be supported, support them or not?

So my advice to any woman out there, regardless of ethnicities, if your employer doesn't support you, move on.

Instead of staying somewhere and hoping they're going to get it together.

Right.

I say thanks for sharing your story with us and being here and having us here.

Well, thank you again for the opportunity to welcome to geekdom.

We're here in downtown San Antonio, which is a tech district.

Amanda, tell me what you do.

I run my own business called Javi LWD So we operate at the intersection of technology, people, politics and art.

And so I like to say that Jabiluka is where imagination and implementation come to play.

Tell us about how you were raised, where you were raised.

Yes, I grew up here in San Antonio, grew up on Flaco and Basi.

I'm very proud as a kid.

I'm very proud of my education, the schools I went to.

So I went to the for a middle school.

So I like to claim the West Side.

And then I graduated from Breckenridge High School.

So I claim a little bit of the South Side, although some folks might say, Now that's downtown, depending where you are.

So I started my career in social media around 2000, 8009.

And so initially I was interested in privacy policy.

So how do you explain privacy to people in our community?

How would you explain privacy to your grandma?

Even now, it's difficult.

Were you interested in privacy before you started social or you became interested became interested in it because as a social media person, you have access to all this information.

So think back to 2829, where you could see other people's profiles.

You could target audiences in a different way than you could now.

Now it's more powerful.

So it just started all these questions about like, what does that mean?

Who has permission to do that?

So that's why I went to grad school, was to learn about communications policy, I.T.

policy, and then I learned about cyber.

Cybersecurity, to me is important because it's related to national security.

And so national security is important to me because I feel like it's related to defense policy.

So if I look at why I got into all of this, I look back at why I went to DC, why I went to grad school.

Talk to me about your time at the White House.

I can't.

I feel like I still need, like years to process that experience.

It was amazing.

Like, just an honor.

Something I would never have thought I would do in my life.

Like if somebody would have said, This is how your life is going to go and this is where you're going to be.

And it was very hard to get there, right?

So I served in President Obama's administration from 2016 to 2017.

So my boss as a federal chief information officer, and so that office, his job was to draft and implement federal cybersecurity and I.T.

policy across a whole government, which is amazing.

And so from Department of Education, from NASA, from Labor, from DOD, Department of Defense, just all of the big, big agencies would come together and I would be in the room and I get to hear, you know, what are the common challenges with the common opportunities, You know, learn from them.

Workforce development was huge.

Just all these different lessons, which was amazing.

Yeah.

And my boss is very supportive of me speaking up.

There was one meeting I did not, you know, after a meeting I waited.

I was like, Hey, what about this and that?

Like something, some suggestion.

He's like, You should've said that in the meeting.

I don't know why you're telling me now, but, you know, I want you to feel like you can speak up.

How do you choose which battles to take on and which ones you just leave?

It's very difficult.

There's been times where folks said they would pay me for something they didn't fight it.

And then you give up.

Yeah, right.

Just knowing this is not going to go anywhere.

There's times I would say, though, yes, I choose my battles.

However, I'm always vocal about the wrong.

So I think I don't have to dwell on it, but I'm not going to let somebody disrespect me.

I'm not going to let somebody disrespect another, you know, woman or another person or another colleague.

So I think being intentional and where your energy goes, right, like, I don't want to feed into rumors, I don't want to feed into negative negativity.

I want to be productive.

Throughout your career journey, have you received advice that you didn't take?

I did some of it for better, some of it for worse.

Gosh, I think the silliest one again on the stories.

When I went to somebody once in DC who I respected, older leader, older woman about how can I be taken more seriously in the workplace.

Obviously I have curly hair.

She had curly hair as well.

And she's like, I straighten my hair and I feel like people take you more seriously when I straight in my hair.

You just, you know, it's like I know myself.

And even then that was like I don't know how many years now, probably almost 20 years ago, I didn't take the advice.

I was like, I'm not going to be that person.

That's not me.

Yeah, I can't do that.

Yeah, I can do that.

Yes, but asking for help is very hard and that's something that I've been advised to do, and I think that's one part that this year I've been intentional about asking for help a little bit more and it's scary.

But I think that's the normal feeling when you ask for help is feeling a little nervous.

But it's been helpful, right?

Surprise when you ask for help, people help you?

Yeah, which is very encouraging and supportive and energizing.

To what about people who are coming, so to speak, behind you women, people of color entering cyber security field.

What advice do you offer them?

I would say obviously ask for help.

Asking for help is huge.

Staying curious, being curious, being open to learning from everyone.

Meaning good experiences, bad experiences.

One thing that I've been sharing with folks is if you're in an environment that you don't like working in, you can learn in that environment too, because if you are in a difficult situation, you don't know who you are and you don't know what you want.

Then it just gets overwhelming angry.

So there is power in knowing who you are, where you come from, what you stand for, what you want to contribute, and then you can just run from there, right?

And you'll find people to run with you.

Yes.

So that's exciting to be sure.

Awesome.

Amanda, thank you so much for sharing.

Amanda And yes, the cyber security cleanup.

Thank you.

Yeah, this is the entrance to plus one robotics.

We are a startup here in San Antonio's Ivy.

What do you do?

I am a CB, an engineer, and I'm currently working as a robotics software developer for plus one robotics.

I can explain that in regular people's time.

Okay, So essentially I help robots see what's going on in a certain scene.

So in our purposes we use AI to help us see packages and areas.

So that's as far as I can go with that.

But that's the way that we utilize AI and they kind of work together.

The perception uses machine learning and AI in order to better improve its results.

How did you how did you get to want to work with robots?

Yeah.

So when I was in high school, it was always something that I was very interested in.

So AI and robotics or something that I'd seen in TV and in science fiction.

So we're talking like Star Trek, we're talking Star Wars, we're talking even Terminator.

You know, it was it was scary.

But I think it was just an exciting idea that humans could actualize.

And so I took an interest in that at an early age.

Now, as far as my trajectory of my career, it went another way for a while.

I went into fashion design and merchandizing.

For about three years I was working on my degree and found that it wasn't completing everything that I was interested in.

So I took a break from that, took years to get into retail, but it was something I could do to make money and luckily I met a wonderful man.

His name is Alejandro Vasquez and he is now my husband.

And he helped he helped fund my interest in A.I.

and robotics.

I went back to UTSA, got my degree in computer science with a concentration in data science, which was more AI based.

In addition to your husband, were there other mentors and supporters along the way with you as you transitioned into this career?

So the mentor that I had growing up that kind of inspired me to get more into AI and robotics.

This is going to sound insane, but what I did have was a TV and I had a Star Trek, and one of my favorite shows was Star Trek Voyager, and there's a character in there who is seven of nine, and she was a cybernetic individual who was saved by the crew of the Voyager.

So I still look up to her as as a fictional character that that teaches me to always be learning, always be open to learning new ideas and to be receptive.

So you are the co-founder of Women in Robotics.

Did your upbringing inspire you to do this to help other women, younger women in the field?

Definitely.

I think that something that I learned from from watching that show and specific was that there's a lot of philosophical lessons, and I feel like I learned a lot of wholesome and selfless ideas.

And, you know, I try to live as selflessly as I can throughout my life because I think there is a certain you know, it's one of the four elements of life that I definitely hold to.

And it's about living for not only yourself, but living for your your fellow human and about deriving that that vicarious pleasure, I guess, from seeing them benefit from your experience, from your lessons, from your wisdom.

And so being part of women in robotics, I was able to go to schools, to go to panels, to talk to groups of business women, to talk to various people from all different backgrounds and share the experiences that I had and honestly have a place to have a sounding board.

And I don't have the grand lessons to learn, but I can provide you what I've learned so far.

It was a great experience to be able to do a lot of that.

How would you describe all of that as part of your leadership style, the work you do now?

I think that people should always be learning, you know, and I think that so many of us close ourselves off to learning new lessons.

I think that we hide behind platitudinous, you know, sayings that old dogs can't learn new tricks, you know, and all of those, you know, similar sayings.

And I just I can't get behind that, you know, never a day in my life as I've gotten into my mid thirties now, I haven't stopped learning.

You know, one day in my life when you're in the community or when you're just talking to Denver, women in general who are interested in doing what you do, what advice do you give them?

Something that I hold true to myself, and I think that applies to many different facets of life is and I'm sure that people who are familiar with this, they're going to think that I'm probably tearing this up, but I'm going to try my best to be respectful.

There's a Japanese concept called Ikigai, and it's about paying attention to the four elements of life right?

And so I think something that we've all heard growing up is that like you got to find a job that you love because then you won't work another day in your life.

Right?

But I found that in several careers, right?

I found that in make up artistry.

I found that in retail.

I found that in customer service.

I found that in numerous different activities that I did.

But it wasn't enough for me.

You know, it's it's we live in a materialistic world, unfortunately.

And so, you know, you don't not only have to have something that you love, you also have to have something that you can make money at, you know, to pay Caesar his coin, but also to provide for your family.

And so that's another facet of life.

The third is it has to be something that you're good at.

So earlier we spoke about being good at whatever it is that you're doing.

It doesn't mean that you start out that way.

It's about using the love that you have and the regularity of that activity that gets you to that point.

And the last thing is it has to be something the world needs.

And so that is another reason that living selflessly is so important is because it's a fourth of the equation.

And they always say that and unexamined life is not worth living, right?

So make sure that you examine it once in a while.

Have you ever received advice that you didn't take All the time?

All the time, Yeah.

I think that when you're as you think about those deep questions a lot, you tend to think that maybe you found the answer before someone else and you're like, I'm set in my ways, you know, But, you know, I think that one of the best piece of advice that is the most platitudinous thing you're going to hear, and I know it's something that we're all aware of, but I would ask that you think about it deeply, which is this too shall pass.

You know, that is an old Persian adage and what it means is that life is transient, it's passing, it's changing.

You can never step into the same river twice because the water's always different.

Right.

And so keeping in mind that the good and the bad will all pass with time is something that keeps me thinking about tomorrow.

Could never come.

I want to live today as hard as I can, and so I wish I would have taken that advice a lot earlier and never been bored.

You know, I wish I would have never wasted time, so I appreciate that.

Talk to me about being a woman in a I robotics technologies that we hear a lot of.

There's not a lot of women.

No, not a lot of women of color or Latinas.

Talk to me about your experience in this field.

Definitely.

So I just had a conversation the other day actually with a coworker about a situation that we often find ourselves in at the workplace, which is when you're in tech, you're going to be the minority as a woman.

And that's just that's just how it is.

And, you know, I'm all for equal opportunity.

That is not equality of outcome.

That does not mean that all women are going to be interested half the time.

You know, 50% of the workforce may never be, you know, women here.

What do you see or what would you like to see in terms of women working with robots or A.I.?

I'd like to see more women taking chances with start ups.

I think that there's, you know, multiple startups in the city and in others that I'm familiar with that have great women CEOs, great women, cofounding PhDs, etc..

But I'd like to see more of it.

Thank you so much for sharing your story with us today.

And of course, thank you for having me.

Time to log out of this episode of Salute.

What a great tour of Latina leaders in technology.

Thank you for spending time with us.

We'll see you next week with another look at Latino leaders in San Antonio.

Does that mean salute the supported by Texas Mutual Workers Compensation Insurance Company?