Would you have done anything differently?

I would polish up on my writing skills and communication skills early on during college or even in high school.  I would learn acting skills that would help me with presentation and dealing with difficult people.  Emotional Intelligence and how to win friends and influence people should be class offerings in universities. 

Until I was a junior in college I thought the people who volunteered to do things in class knew what they were doing, even if it was a new subject. I finally asked a young man how he was going to do the problem the professor had asked someone to do? He said he didn’t know yet, but he was sure he could figure it out. Wow, that was an eye opener to me. He didn't know anything more about the subject than I did, but he had internal confidence that he could figure it out.

The point is, just because someone appears to know more than you do, especially if you are shy, like I was, know that they probably don't understand anymore than you do, but they have internal confidence. It changed my perspective and I worked hard to improve my confidence.

This is a great question because this reveals a lot of foresight on the part of the answer seeker. Personally, looking back, I do feel I was very, very lucky to be a part of projects that allowed me to learn a lot of useful skills at the start of my career as a foundation. I also feel because I studied engineering it definitely gave me a firmer foundation to understand technical concepts, but the best thing it gave me was perseverance and determination to learn no matter how hard the thing looks. I always loved learning because it posed a challenge to my skills and was almost like solving puzzles.

Also, keep in mind your role in different organizations can change a lot depending on their own environment and internal structure. It’s always a constant learning phase. But looking back, I think in school at least I would have wanted to be more determined and have more grit to keep working at tougher subjects and spend more time immersing myself. Because that knowledge not only gives you a sense of empowerment, it enables you to develop the mental skills, I mentioned earlier, that will aid you all through your life.

Subjects, roles, classes, and assignments can all change but if you have the right mindset developed and can look beyond a narrow purview (which I think in school and college can happen, i.e. just focus on getting the highest grade, etc. and not really care to understand the foundations of the subject), you won’t regret much.

Hope this helps! You can do it!

I would have spoken up more. There were many times that I had thoughts or ideas or questions but I was afraid to speak up. Many times I was the only female in the room, so I was afraid of saying something stupid or drawing attention to myself. I learned over time that various perspectives are needed, and my voice is important to the conversation because of that.

I would have sought out mentoring earlier in my career and asked a lot more questions. There are always some tricks of the trade that are important. Everything from the order of authors on papers to the style of a resume to being prepared for the kinds of information beyond a resume that an employer may want. I also would have studied harder and challenged myself to learn things deeply even as an undergraduate.

Nowadays, there are many courses and classes for Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, science experiment classes etc. I wish I could have had exposure to these courses as I wanted to learn this 30 years back. So, if possible, please get exposure to these classes so you can make informed future and career choices. The other view is, as far as possible, stay technical – that is, grow in a coding/development/research-related field. For example, grow from coder/developer to project manager to program manager to development head etc. Don’t deviate into non-technical cadre if you are in a technical/engineering/coding firm, since in a technical firm, technical people are compensated best compared to other managerial staff.