Unleashing My Journey Crossing Transcending Boundaries | WWCode Member Journey Part 1 

For Women’s History Month, we asked our members to reflect on their journeys as women in tech. In part one of her experience, Kirthikka Devi Venkataram, Lead of the Women Who Code Data Science Technical Track community, shares her path from childhood in South India to her early career success. 

I come from South India and have been to multiple spectacular places, such as the coastal area valleys, which bring a cool breeze. I also lived in a crowded city center. Traveling to these diverse places with my parents gave me the comfort of always being home, enjoying and experiencing multiple cultures, cuisines, people, and environments. 

Epitome of Opportunities

Life was as delicate as roses till my teenage years when it worked out like a wishing well: be a school leader, be a sports champion, win zonal level status in badminton, or secure certificates and prizes, representing diverse national level competitive exams. This impassioned discourse led to winning the trust and confidence of others, shining as a star. My focus on technology, research, and engineering ignited and perpetuated when I realized my strengths: fixing a nonfunctioning radio, self-learn Debian, playing FIFA and Road Rash tirelessly, and working on many other innovative applications and games despite not being a computer science student. I designed a solar energy-based mobile charger in college, an MVP showcasing to the public, tapping the power of alternative energy sources in 2006, showcasing in an innovation exhibit. However, my opportunities to market or sell were naive. This intense interest rewarded me by completing my Master of Engineering with high scores, securing Anna University’s rank V. Also in the top 5% in Bachelors from the same university, securing distinction, competing in a challenging curriculum under unified universities undergoing a modified syllabi with no previous reference. 

I was the first in my family to enter the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology as a professional, earning my first job in India’s first university-based Research Park with several incubators in IIT Madras. My job profile was to perform technical marketing through live demonstrations while working for the incubator of a top US-based semiconductor manufacturing company. During my work break time, I attended postgraduate classes in wireless networking and communication engineering at the university, gaining high-standard exposure from the institute.

In parallel, I was also performing tasks assigned by the professors, achieving focused results. Becoming a researcher of products, understanding and analyzing the deep technical functionality started at this phase of my career, comparing and contrasting the products in the market. This research cum academia profiled career journey gained me significant exposure to implementing and building digital signal processing algorithms and models on real-time systems, especially the voice coder-decoder architecture when the Indian telecom and networking industry was entering the implementation of adaptive pulse coding modulation. 

This was when many of the standards were made into working system modules, where I had an excellent opportunity to learn and experience speech coding for multimedia communication. This job did not have a fancy title or remuneration; nevertheless, it gained core research exposure in handling and building models using cutting-edge technologies on the latest embedded processor kits. I wish I had completed a PhD there, though life had different plans. My father was struck by a severe health issue that shook our family, and I had to sacrifice my PhD journey to take care of him.  

Cultivating a career for oneself, being self-reliant, and standing on one’s feet post-education are quite significant to women. I deeply respect the Western culture in this aspect of inculcating life survival skills right from childhood. Coming from an authentic Indian family background, admiring cultural values, and being a single kid in my family, I was made to emphasize being deeply rooted to become self-sufficient financially to counter any circumstances. Irrespective of any life circumstances, I neither seized the following technology nor enriched my skills by staying market-focused.

This passion for technology has always driven me as a guiding light. My journey of unleashing transcending purposeful excellence as a woman in technology continues. 

Read Part 2 of Kirthikka’s journey here.

Learn more about Kirthikka and connect via LinkedIn.