Kaarthika Thakker (she/her)

Kaarthika Thakker is currently an associate product management intern at YouTube and last summer, she was an engineering practicum intern at Google. Outside of tech, she is passionate about music, working as a station manager of her college radio station, and social issues. Her dream is to find a way to leverage tech to deal with issues like housing inequality, gentrification, and displacement.

When Kaarthika went to college, she wanted to make an impact on social issues, so she studied sociology and economics and did diversity and inclusion research in a psychology lab freshman year. When she took an intro computer science class, she fell in love, although it took her until her junior year to officially declare as a Computer Science major. She sees so much opportunity to do good within the tech industry and wants to mobilize people and resources within tech to focus on the impact technology is having on the local community.

“My favorite class in high school was Physics, although when I took it, I was the youngest student and one of only two girls in a class of forty people. When I went to Rice University for college, I wanted to make an impact on social issues, so I studied sociology and economics. But then I took an introductory Computer Science class and absolutely fell in love.

As much as I loved Computer Science, it took me until my junior year to officially declare it as my major because I never saw myself as an engineer. I always thought I wasn’t the “type” because I was into art/music/social issues and I didn’t “fit in” to the stereotype. But now I see so much opportunity to do good within the tech industry. I want to mobilize people to care more about the impact tech is having on local communities.”

Source of inspiration: Kaarthika is inspired by her mom. She was born and raised in India and she became the main income earner of her family at a young age. Although she didn’t go to college, she manages all the finances of her house and small business. She has sacrificed so much, but she always makes her family here first priority.

Book Recommendation: Becoming by Michelle Obama

Catherina Xu (she/her)

Catherina Xu (she/her) is an Associate Product Manager at Google. Prior to Google, Cat coded for YouTube, co-led Stanford Women in Computer Science (WiCS), and invested in student founders with Dorm Room Fund. She cares deeply about empowering the next generation of women in tech, business, and entrepreneurship. A Bay Area native and a Shanghai transplant, Cat loves to travel — she enjoys running, hiking, and exploring the coffee scene in new cities.

1/ When did you know that you wanted to work in tech?

Like many other freshmen at Stanford, I decided to take the introductory Computer Science (CS) courses. Halfway through my first quarter, a few friends convinced me to go to a hackathon in San Francisco.

“I only know how to code in C++ and just learned about recursion last week,” I warned. “So I won’t be of much help.”

In 12 hours, my team built a Unity game from scratch. I was shocked at how quickly I could start applying my CS skills. I realized that CS was not only a new language, but a new way of thinking about organization, interaction, and efficiency. I was hooked. Over the next two years, I attended a hackathon every quarter. I co-directed HackOverflow in 2016, an on-campus hackathon focused on first-timers, women, and minorities.

Though I’ve stopped frequenting hackathons since starting at Google, I’m still constantly in awe of how tech enables ideas to move from conception to the end user, in a matter of hours (longer if it goes through code reviews!)

2/ Who is a role model that you look up to?

I’ve always looked up to my dad. In 2001, he left Shanghai to pursue better work and opportunities for our family. He’s worked as an electrical engineer at many semiconductor companies since, but one thing has remained constant — he’s the hardest worker I know.

Over the years, my dad has taught me a lot by example — work ethic, mastery, persistence, and how to build a life from scratch. He played no small part in inspiring my love of tinkering and the sciences, from helping me build the next-generation dollhouse (consisting of two circuits regulated by brass fasteners) to championing DIY furniture hacks for my first college dorm room.

3/ Where is your hometown?

Sunnyvale, California.

4/ What is a struggle that you’ve faced and how did you handle it?

When I entered Stanford, it seemed like everyone around me had already been coding for the better part of their life. A close friend had finished the CS core in his free time in high school; several others had built games or launched chart-topping apps. When I decided to pursue tech with full force, I was starting at the bottom.

I struggled with imposter syndrome in every class. I spent more time at office hours, rewatching lectures, and on problem sets than most of my peers did, for more or less the same result. Over time, I grew more confident about my CS ability. It’s the sum of all the times I worked hard, and got the results I wanted — nailing an interview because I’d studied, landing a customer deal for Google because I’d taken the time to research technical requirements. It’s about attributing success to ability and grit rather than luck, something I’m still working on every day.

5/ What is something that you are immensely proud of?

One aspect of tech that’s often overlooked is how inherently collaborative it is. The stereotype is that computer scientists sit in basements alone and don’t come out until 3am. In my experience, that statement is mostly true, except for the “alone” part.

Power Networks, the first paper that I published, started as a final project for a natural language processing class with two friends. The paper used neural networks to predict power relations from an email thread in a corporate setting — for example, in a two-person email exchange, the classifier would identify Molly as the ‘superior’ and Matt as the ‘subordinate’ if Molly was higher on the corporate ladder.

Between our class final paper and the paper we submitted to ACL, only about 10% of the content remained the same. Over the course of two weeks, we worked day and night (on top of classwork) to build a new LSTM-CNN model, training and testing repeatedly to (in)validate our hypotheses.

The constant re-evaluation of priorities gave me a taste of PM work, and what it takes to see a project from idea to fully-functioning classification system. Power Networks was a cool application of state-of-the-art deep learning tech — but ultimately, I was most proud of how we pulled it off as a team.

6/ What’s something that’s been on your mind a lot lately?

I’ve been thinking a lot about how current incentive structures don’t do a good job of encouraging the best technical minds to optimize for social impact. If your startup idea doesn’t capture a billion dollar market, VCs won’t fund you. If you want to spend your time working at a non-profit, you’ll probably have to accept a big pay cut. Thus, many new grads choose not to (or can’t afford to) work in these spaces and take a more traditional path to tech. It makes sense — social impact can often be at odds with generating financial value. I’m not sure what a good solution to this looks like, but I’d like to see stronger collaborations between government, big tech, and philanthropic organizations to help align the incentives and move the needle.

7/ Favorite food?

Creme Brulee of any form!

8/ Favorite book?

Robert Sapolsky’s Behave. I missed out on his infamous class, so I picked up a copy for the summer after graduation. The book explains human behavior in the most scientifically rigorous way possible, and doesn’t lack in Sapolsky’s dry wit and humor.

9/ If you could try another job for a day, what would it be?

Something in the performing arts, maybe as a member of a band or a touring Broadway show. I can’t think of anything else that would be as terrifying (and exciting).

10/ If you could give your 18-year-old self a piece of advice, what would it be?

Don’t over-optimize because nothing is linear. No set of actions can be guaranteed to get you from A to B; on the other hand, trying out C isn’t necessarily a detour from B.

Take the time to explore in college, because you’ll have a lot of time to dive deep later.

Mika Reyes (she/her)

Mika is currently a part of Dorm Room Fund’s Female Founder Track and will soon be joining LinkedIn as a Product Manager. She was born and raised in the Philippines and studied Economics, Psychology & Data Analysis at Wesleyan University. Professionally, she was previously a KPCB Product Fellow and was the first Product Manager at Ripcord and Kumu. Her mission is to grow the tech & innovation hubs in Southeast Asian markets (starting with her home, the Philippines). She is exploring this through marketplace models that empower the ‘micro-entrepreneur’ and technology that improves accessibility to economic resources. Mika enjoys Latin or hip hop dance, writes occasionally on her blog (mikareyes.com), and loves snacking on almonds.

“The idea that I may not be home for Christmas this year, for the first time ever, makes me really sad. Christmas is a phenomenon in the Philippines; it’s a time for reunion and partying. It’s karaoke season for Christmas songs. It’s food coma. But most importantly, it’s the best time to be with family, immediate and extended. I think a lot about how Christmas can be a pain point for the whole Filipino diaspora. Thousands of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) sacrifice being with their families every Christmas so they can provide for them in more lucrative jobs abroad. I’m lucky; I don’t have to carry that weight on my shoulders, and if anything, this would be my first Christmas without my family ever. Imagine all the Filipinas who’ve been separated from their children for years! If my personal sacrifice this season means working for a company that works to provide economic opportunity for people like OFWs, I can hold off the lechon a while longer.”

Larissa Purnell (she/her)

Larissa is a Product Analyst for Rally Health, a digital health company. She received her B.S. in Business Administration with concentrations in Health Policy & Management and Digital Studies from the University of Southern California. She discovered her passion for the future design of the healthcare experience during a college internship at Kaiser Permanente and has worked in health technology ever since. Her experiences in this area include working at an international startup, a design firm, and partaking in the Technology Development program at Optum (part of UnitedHealth Group). Her passion for helping people live healthier lives also seeps into how she uses her free time: DJing for a high intensity cardio hip-hop class called 305 Fitness, serving as an Emerging Leadership Ambassador for Boston Healthcare for Homeless, and advising a Spanish startup, Medvisit, focused on bringing patient care to ex-pat communities globally.

“Throughout middle school and high school, my father experienced tremendous pain, both physically and mentally, and had felt that he wasn’t being heard by his care team, who simply attributed his condition to his obesity. During my sophomore year, my family switched healthcare providers to Kaiser Permanente and his physician immediately recognized that he had been misdiagnosed and, in fact, had a genetic disorder that had contributed to his obesity and required immediate attention, including multiple surgeries and genetic testing for his immediate family.

Throughout this experience, particularly when he was facing the threatening surgical procedures, I felt helpless. Then, I began to realize that I could take action on trying to make an impact on the system that had prolonged his illness. I signed up for the USC Marathon Team as a way to commit myself to supporting my Dad through intensive training, since I couldn’t be right beside him during his surgeries and recovery. I took on a second minor in Health Policy and Management to learn about the healthcare system and the ways in which I could have an impact. I applied for an internship at Kaiser Permanente, as their care model was what helped save my dad and put our family’s trust back into the system. By the start of my junior year, I had discovered a field that I was passionate to grow a career in, completed my first marathon, and most importantly inspired my dad to start training in his recovery to run his own half-marathon (which he’ll be completing this December!).”

Stephany Yong (she/her)

Stephany Yong (she/her) is a Product Manager at Glossier, formerly at Facebook, and Head of Marketing at Women of Silicon Valley. Prior to Facebook, she worked at Instagram, YouTube, and Box. The proud daughter of two immigrant engineers, she cares deeply about creating equal access to educational resources especially in STEM and celebrating the stories of strong, inspiring women.

After graduating from college in 2016, Stephany moved to San Francisco, where she spends her free time exploring the city’s food scene, hiking around the Bay Area, and rooting for her hometown LA Lakers.

1. When did you know that you wanted to work in tech?

Going into college, I didn’t have much prior exposure to Silicon Valley and the tech industry. I actually spent most of my free time in high school writing for the school yearbook and wanted to pursue a career in journalism.

During freshman orientation at Stanford, there were dinnertime conversations where kids were casually talked about their startup ideas or which systems engineering class they were taking. I was intimidated by those discussions and wasn’t sure if there was a place for someone like me in tech.

Nevertheless, I still wanted to learn more about the startup scene, so I got an internship at a startup called Pixlee, which at the time was based out of the Stanford startup accelerator. After class, I would take a bus to their office, where I worked on marketing and copywriting. After a quarter of interning there, I was absolutely enamored. I got to work with some of the most intelligent, humble, and scrappy people I had ever met, and had a front-row seat to a founding team finding product-market fit and raising their seed round.

Through that experience, I began to draw parallels between the product development cycle — of deeply understanding a people problem and building a solution — with what I loved most about journalism, which was getting to the core of what people care about and creating a compelling story around it. From there, I knew I wanted to pursue a career in tech.

2. Who is a role model that you look up to?

My mom. When she was 17, she moved from Shanghai to West Virginia by herself to live with her uncle and went on to study Electrical Engineering in college. She shared her love of math with me, stressed the importance of doing things in a principled manner (i.e. show your work), and taught me that although you can’t control the hand you were dealt, you can move forward and build what you can with what you have.

My mom is a wonderful role model of a woman that can hack, sew, build, and run anything she wants to, whether it was maintaining our household, fixing up one of the apartments she manages with my dad, rewiring the piping in my bathroom, or helping me construct a trebuchet for my high school physics class. She embodies what a female engineer is in my eyes — determined, resilient, and a humble problem solver.

3. Where is your hometown?

Chino Hills, CA.

4. What is a challenge that you’ve faced and how did you handle it?

In navigating my career, I’ve encountered imposter syndrome at almost every turn — whether it was when I decided to switch my major to computer science late into college (facing the internal dialogue of — wait, programming doesn’t come naturally to me), or when I was applying to PM jobs (wait, I don’t have any formal software engineering experience), or when I started out as a full-time PM at Facebook after college (wait, I feel severely under-qualified to lead this very talented team).

I’m still very much a work in progress on this front, but I’ve been lucky to have amazing mentors and managers who have seen the best in me even when it was not entirely clear to me if I was good enough — they’ve pushed me to speak up more, go for promotions, and take on increased scope.

5. What is something that you are proud of?

I was working at Box the summer before my junior year in product marketing. I loved the people and the company, but I wanted a role that centered more on building products. I had lunch with a senior female product manager (PM) at the company, and she told me that in order to break into product management, I would need to have a strong technical background in computer science. Although I’ve since learned that great PMs come from various backgrounds (including non-technical), at the time I took this advice at face value.

For someone who likes to plan out everything, switching majors halfway into college into an engineering discipline was severely out of my comfort zone. Although I enjoyed the handful of computer science classes I had taken to get my feet wet, coding didn’t come naturally to me. It took a lot of work for me to overcome that fear of failure, but once I set my sights out on pursuing a career in product, I went all in.

For two years, I played catch up and took extra classes, which led to long hours in the library and at office hours. But looking back, it was well worth it — in the process, I ended up taking some of my favorite classes at Stanford in human-centered design that reaffirmed how I wanted to build consumer-facing products. Later that fall when I passed the technical Google Associate Product Management interview, it affirmed that I had the chops to be a PM at a tech company.

6. What’s something that’s been on your mind a lot lately?

This idea of living life at your own pace. I think there’s this meme around turning 30 (especially for women) that you need to be at a certain place both personally and professionally. And once you pair that with Silicon Valley culture, where you’re constantly bombarded with stories of a founder of X having accomplished Y by the age of Z, that pressure to hit targets by a certain age seem even stronger.

I think it’s important to bring into perspective that our careers span several decades and that it’s ok to make decisions that maximize for long-term growth, as opposed to immediate payouts. It’s something I’m actively working on, but getting rid of superficially imposed timelines seems like a good first step.

7. Favorite food?

Clam chowder. I’ve yet to encounter a clam chowder that I haven’t enjoyed, whether it be in a cup, in bread bowl, or from a can.

8. Mac or PC?

Mac

9. If you could try another job for a day, what would it be?

I’ve gotten into a few lifestyle podcasts lately, so I would try out being a podcaster. The podcast in question would be some cross between Armchair Expert and We Met At Acme.

10. If you could give your 18-year-old self a piece of advice, what would it be?

You’re a lot more resilient and capable than you give yourself credit for. You have as much of a right to be where you are as anyone else; while you should be self-aware of your shortcomings, don’t downplay your strengths. And on a slightly unrelated note, the Lakers are going to suck for the next few years; do not feel obliged to become a bandwagon Warriors fan.