Womenize! – Inspiring Stories is our weekly series featuring inspirational women from games and tech. For this edition we talked to Sreenidhi Narayanan, Software/Electrical Engineer at Ivani LLC and Co-Founder & CEO of Embark Women. Read more about Sreenidhi in this interview:
 
Hi Sreenidhi! You are an active member of various Women in Tech initiatives, could you tell us about Embark Women?

Embark Women was started as a networking group in Tyler, Texas with two other co-founders as a networking group to connect women in business and tech in various levels and to have a platform to share experiences. Also, it guides women through practical education, mentoring, and meaningful exchange. It started out of the need to have such a group in Tyler, where I was located at that time, and was finding difficulty in discovering women-related organizations to network and for job search.

When we found the gap, we just decided to create the needed space ourselves and invite others to join and learn from each other. Over time, the group grew to over 800 women leaders who are eager and passionate to mentor and inspire the next generation and each other. Our motto is collaboration, not competition. I recently got made CEO of the group, an incredible honor, and I am ready to open up Embark Women to be at the forefront of building a community for women in any discipline, to have a network where they can have a safe space and grow. 2021 is going to be a challenge and a learning experience for the group!

How do you structure your day to day life to find a healthy balance between job and hobbies?

Frankly, am still trying to see what this healthy balance means. Currently trying to take it one day at a time. I do small things to make sure I have time to do what I want.  I make sure I create time for myself for my hobbies. I work the normal 8 hours and then fill my evening with webinars/seminars for personal development, and I read books before going to bed. I have networking calls around the times I take a break from work so that I can chat with inspiring women in tech and business. On weekends, I try to stay away from social media, though it’s hard because I love Tiktok and I like Linkedin!

What is your approach to problem-solving and does technology support you in it?

For me problem solving is to figure out the last known good. When did it work smoothly, before everything started breaking and then iterating in small increments from there to isolate the issue. This is useful in software debugging.

In reality, I like to talk about issues I have with my group of cheerleaders, mentors with who I have cultivated a good relationship and who want to see me succeed, and my friends. In these covid-times, it is hard to go out and network and find friends, and technology has been a boon to me to forge those one-on-one connections with people and learning from them. Slack, Zoom, Discord, Linkedin have all been a blessing to connect with like-minded individuals and really building my own personal board of directors.

Thank you for your time, Sreenidhi!

Sreenidhi’s Links: LinkedIn │ Embark Women

Womenize! – Inspiring Stories Feature by Sophie Brügmann