I really enjoyed studying maths and sciences at school and so went on to study physics at Durham University, UK. During my undergraduate degree I complete several internships in various fields; it was my internship within a research department at Proctor & Gamble that I enjoyed the most and helped me decide that I wanted to pursue a career in scientific research within a commercial organisation.
Give an overview of your professional path.
After
graduating with a Master’s degree in Physics I joined the graduate scheme at
Sharp Laboratories of Europe. Once I had
completed this scheme I became a research scientist in the Optical Imaging and
Display Systems department, conducting research into consumer electronics
products in this field. After three
years at Sharp I joined Plastic Logic as an engineer mainly concentrating on
their organic TFT electrophoretic displays.
In 2015 FlexEnable was created from Plastic Logic’s people and
technology in Cambridge, the change meant I got to work on a wider range of technologies
including sensors, OLEDs and LCDs. As I
gained more experience at FlexEnable I went on to project manage many of
FlexEnable’s customer and European project and take leadership in many internal
research projects.
Provide a short overview of your job. What are your main responsibilities?
I
split my time between technical project management and technical work. The project management involves a lot of
managing and monitoring risks, costs, scope and progress as well as a lot of
planning. My technical work is focused
on display metrology and optics.
What do you find the most rewarding in your job? What do you find the most challenging in your job?
The
most rewarding aspect of my job is successfully solving a technical problem and
seeing that contribute to the development of a particular technology. The most challenging aspects are
understanding and accepting the business aspects of the development or progress
of a particular technology or project.
What is your role within the PHENOmenon project? How do you expect your work in PHENOmenon project to contribute to your career development?
I am the lead for Phenomenon at FlexEnable. I hope this role will help me develop my experience in working on funded
projects.
What would you advice to girl students that want to pursue a career in a science and technology field?
I
would recommend students to remain broad at undergraduate level and to explore
many different areas before committing to a particular field to ensure it’s a
good long term career choice for them.