On Tuesday, March 17, 2015, Dallas SWE members headed up to McKinney for a joint meeting with the employees of Emerson Process Management at their Regulator Technologies site. The meeting of over 35 attendees included networking and appetizers, before an informational session and a tour of the facility.
Group Photo at Emerson
Stephanie Law, Vice President of Marketing and eBusiness, spoke about Emerson’s history, expansion into the international market, and other manufacturing facilities and service centers in Texas. She spoke of her own journey from engineer to marketing professional, from learning presentation skills to becoming a subject matter expert to management. Susan Hughes spoke of her career path to Vice President/General Manager of Tescom, mentioning she had specifically been told she would not have been considered for a position without her STEM background. She mentioned the support she had throughout her life, from her parents encouraging her to a female math professor pushing her into active roles within groups to a higher-up persuading her to apply for a higher position when he noticed her potential. Susan encouraged all the attendees present to take initiative to help girls stay in STEM and other women navigate their careers through inclusiveness, encouragement, and respect.
In keeping with our new tradition, Dallas SWE President Barbara Read (right) took a photo with first-time event attendees Sarah Rivers (left) and Susan Hughes (center).
Following the speakers, Rebecca Hawkins gave a product overview and demonstration of the regulators made by Emerson. Elizabeth Biru have a tour of the flow lab at the McKinney site, including their regulator testing setup and methods.
A special thank you to Chantel Bailey, for organizing the event with Dallas SWE, and our speakers and tour guide for their time presentations. Emerson sponsors SWE memberships for all of their employees: if you work for them, take advantage of that opportunity! We hope to see all Emerson attendees at future Dallas SWE events!
Mark your calendars for the next Dallas SWE professional development meeting on April 21st! Also, keep a lookout for details about the Joint Professional and Collegiate Leadership Training in April. Details to follow.
Dallas SWE has a lot of exciting events planned for you this spring! Please join us: we would love to see you at one of our upcoming meetings or outreach events.
April 25. 2015, time and location TBD: Leadership workshop with ASME
Additional opportunities to get involved:
High-Tech High Heels is a local organization that partners with Dallas SWE. They are seeking volunteers for a speakers bureau for periodic requests that are all over the metroplex such as school career days, speaking in classrooms and special events like robotics competitions and panels. Almost all volunteer opportunities are one-time events, so it is perfect for the busy professional who may have the occasional space in their schedule to volunteer. Please contact Kristen Parrish with further questions.
Dallas SWE offers scholarships to graduating female high school seniors from the Dallas area, are majoring in engineering. Scholarships are based on academic excellence. The deadline for applications is April 15, 2015. Click here for more information!
Our March Professional Development Meeting is sponsored by Emerson Process! Emerson is a global leader in bringing technology and engineering together to provide innovative solutions for customers in industrial, commercial, and consumer markets around the world. Founded in 1890 in St. Louis, Missouri (USA), Emerson delivers solutions through five business segments: Process Management, Industrial Automation, Network Power, Climate Technologies, and Commercial & Residential Solutions. With sales of $24.7B and more than 130,000 employees in over 150 countries, we have a customer-focused, results-driven culture where employee performance is recognized and rewarded. Join Dallas SWE as we tour the Emerson facility and hear career advice from some of Emerson’s outstanding women!
When: Tuesday, March 17, 2015
6:00 pm – Networking starts
6:30pm – Speaker Presentations and Site Tour
7:30pm – Dallas SWE Announcements
Last day to resister for event is March 15th (we have to give Emerson the list of attendees)
Attendees can park anywhere
Please arrive a few minutes early for security check-in
About the Speakers
Stephanie Law is currently Vice President, Marketing and eBusiness for the global Regulator business. Stephanie joined Emerson in 1994 and has held various positions in Regulators, including but not limited to Applications Engineer, Director of Marketing when the Industrial business was initially formed, Director of Commercial Service Regulators, and most recently served as Vice President, Marketing for the Natural Gas business. In addition, Stephanie was on a short international assignment in France for the Natural Gas business.
Stephanie received her BS in Chemical Engineering from South Dakota School of Mines and received her MBA from the University of Iowa.
Susan Hughes joined Emerson in 2003 and is currently Vice President / General Manager of Tescom, a business within Emerson. Susan is responsible for Tescom’s global business which includes all functional areas such as sales, marketing, engineering, finance, human resources and operations. The Tescom business has manufacturing sites in Germany, Minnesota and Shanghai. Prior to her role as Vice President / General Manger, Susan spent five years in China with Emerson as a Plant Manager in Shanghai and as the Director of Research and Development and Marketing in Nanjing.
Susan has her bachelor’s degree from Grinnell College in Mathematics and Chinese. She has her MBA from Washington University in St. Louis.
To those of you planning on attending She Networks, She Wins tomorrow night, we’ve gotten word that it has been rescheduled due to expected inclement weather. The new date is March 18, 2015. Registrants will receive an official communication from SMU SWE soon.
Dallas SWE members and officers attended the 2015 Region C Conference February 6-8! Hosted by the University of Texas at Austin SWE section, it was a full weekend of learning, networking, and celebrating successes in our Region (Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas) over the past year. You can visit the conference website here.
On Friday, Dallas SWE members carpooled down I-35 and arrived in Austin to find a welcoming Casino Night social hour. Guests learned how to play Blackjack, Poker, Roulette, and Craps. At the end of the evening, we cashed in our chips for raffle tickets: over 20 drawings were held for the prizes! The evening was a great opportunity to network with collegiates and professionals.
Saturday’s breakfast keynote speakers included Peter Zornio, Chief Strategy Officer at Emerson Process and Polly Bessel, Vice President of Transport Engineering at AT&T. They offered technology updates from their respective industries and some inspirational words of encouragement to the next generation of women engineers. After breakfast, several speakers from Region C leadership conducted a joint Region meeting (professionals and collegiates). Region business topics covered communication strategies (email, website, blogs, social media), the Region C Tactical Plan, an update from our SWE Senators, introduction of a proposed new SWE logo, and the announcement of the Region C FY16 officer slate. A lot of really cool things are happening in SWE!
Professionals and collegiates then split off into separate meetings. In the professional meeting we got updates on financials and membership for the region, voted on a financial proposal, and then broke off into some brainstorming groups on the topics of leadership pipeline planning, society committee participation, and leadership retreat planning for the summer of 2015. The brainstorming sessions were a very productive way to capture feedback from section representatives on these important region topics. After the professional meeting ended, the first workshop sessions began and the career fair opened to conference attendees!
During lunch Saturday, SWE Speaker of the Senate Brittney Elko delivered the FY15 State of SWE address. We also got to hear FY16 Region Conference Bid presentations from the University of Arkansas and Texas A&M University. Your Dallas SWE Section Representatives will vote for the location of the FY16 conference in next few weeks. After lunch, there were three more workshop session slots to attend and the career fair continued. There were over 20 companies present at this year’s career fair!
In the evening, professionals enjoyed a networking social hour at the conference host hotel before taking a short shuttle ride over to the Etter-Harbin Alumni Center for the Award Banquet. Guest speaker Anita Gale gave an inspiring and charismatic address, giving her insights from her long career in engineering on the Space Shuttle Program and her involvement in international aerospace design competitions that encourage young students to pursue STEM careers. The award presentations included section awards for successful membership campaigns and outreach programs as well as individual awards for career success and SWE service. Dallas SWE Section Representative and Webmaster Shelley Stracener received a Governor’s Choice Award from Region C Governor Dianne Beever for her service to Region C as their Webmaster and Social Media Manager in FY14 and FY15. Check out the live Tweeting she did from the conference at the Region C Twitter page!
From left to right: Anique Cooley, Cherrie Fisher, Amanda Posadas, Barbara Read, Shelley Stracener, Nandika D’Souza, Zaineb AhmadFrom left to right: Kashmira Engineer, Shilpa Nagaraj, Barbara Read, Zaineb Ahmad, Amanda Posadas, Cherrie Fisher, Shelley Stracener, Anique Cooley
This was the first Region C Conference some Dallas SWE members had attended and their reactions were overwhelmingly positive.
“Loved my first Region C conference. The keynote speaker from Boeing was great. The seminar by the Biotech company CEO was especially good. She was motivating us to try new opportunities that we generally consider ourselves not ready for. I liked that. All the logistics for such a huge event was planned out well and everything went on seamlessly.The seminar on ’10 things to do with your money’ was very basic and I think addressed the student group rather than the professional group. That could have been a little better. “
~ Shilpa Nagaraj
“What I liked the most was the brainstorming we did during our road trip to Austin – looking forward to implementing those ideas in the coming months! It was also great to find out how other SWE sections plus another region (Region I) are doing, and get ideas from them. I also enjoyed getting an advance look at the proposed new logo for Society of Women Engineers.
I would definitely recommend attending future region conferences to other members. It is a great way to meet and network with other members of Region C, both professional and collegiate.
~ Barbara Read, Dallas SWE President
Here are some ways to get involved in SWE at the Region and Society level:
