On the lighter side of things , we ask the industry experts what makes them tick . . . .

I ’ m going to be very personal for a second . I had a baby in high school , and as a single mom I was the first person in my family to go to college . I got two degrees and made it to CTO by 35 . There were a lot of achievements and bumps along the way . I can ’ t separate them out , it ’ s the whole chain .

What first made you think of a career in technology ?

I was studying to be a lawyer when I took an intro to computing class and did well , but it was the first B I had ever gotten in a college course . I continued studying law , but it was boring . So , I decided I wanted to go back and study computing because it was tough . That ’ s when I changed my focus to computer information systems instead .

What style of management philosophy do you employ with your current position ?

I ’ m mostly collaborative until a decision is made . Then I hold myself and my team to that decision . Then I hold us to the line that will get us on the path . At that point I get authoritative .

do you think is the current hot technology talking point ?

Dev Ops versus Site Reliability and these float back and forth at different times . Technology-wise , it ’ s probably Serverless Code .

How do you deal with stress and unwind outside the office ?

It sounds so cheesy , but it ’ s true : I ’ m solar powered . I try to spend time outside . I love anything to do with water , and I have a beautiful garden that I love to spend time in . The more stressful work gets , the better my garden looks .

If you could go back and change one career decision , what would it be ?

I can ’ t go back and think about that . I ’ ve left positions where if I ’ d stayed a little longer , I would have made

If you ’ re collecting customer data , it really isn ’ t useful unless you have a way to do something with it .

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