Welcome to the Software People Stories. I'm Shiv. I'm Chitra. And I'm Gayati. We bring you interesting untold stories of people associated with the creation or consumption or software-based solutions. You'll hear stories of what worked and sometimes what didn't. You will also hear very personal experiences and insights that would trigger your thoughts and inspire you to do even greater things. Before we jump into today's conversation, a special thanks to PM Power Consulting for encouraging and supporting this show right from the start. With over a thousand person years of collective experience, PM Power has helped many organizations, teams and individuals chart out their own journeys of excellence and make progress. Thank you, PM Power. Now, let's move to today's episode. I'm very excited to welcome all of you into the March month, where we are showcasing extremely powerful individuals right from a climatic expert to a person who's actually beaten all odds in terms of health and in the technology world. She's a senior director for art in software. And I'm also super excited to share our male ally to share what he thinks about women who are breaking various constraints and various barriers and how he looks at the world very, very differently. Today, you listen. Fantastic conversation I had with Dr. Vaijainthi Shriragman managed so many personal problems including cancer, including autoimmune disorder, including personal issues to manage early on. And she shares how she transition from a semi-conducted industry to software and starting as a seed developer and moving into a domain of logistics and supply chain getting early on MS and later doctorate degree. And she shares how all of the things that she's done so far has led to her current role of being a senior director in UPS where she almost casually talks about how she's able to move 2% of world GDP on a daily basis at her current role. Listen on. Welcome to the software people stories, Vaijainthi. I'm so so happy to have you here. I know you as several of TARS including as a in IBM as well as today as a senior director in UPS. How would you introduce yourself to our listeners? I think if you have to ask me in one single word guide 3 having no knew and you've seen me I will say I'm a go getter. I think that's a better way to put it. That's how people around me know it know me as well guide 3. All right. So let me start with the early stages of your memory of getting into software. What was your earliest part? I know you have a doctorate degree as well as your several degrees you've had over your career. But what is your early memory of working in software? It's a very interesting phase of my life right. If you remember in the 90s I graduated in the year 1992 there was no clear rule book on where to go how to go what to achieve. And I always wonder if I had a rule book that you have today which is given to most of the college students on navigating their career may be would have taken off much better in our career. But I don't repent either right 92 I graduated from engineering I went and joined the organization which is called Murgappa group as a research engineer. I remember I walked in and to the office I was given a big computer we didn't have a laptop it was a desktop and I remember seeing an oscilloscope next to me because I was an electrical engineer and it was primarily a system site programming I was working on I was a C++ developer I had to really learn it on the go. I remember a bunch of manual sitting there from Borland C++ and we used to fight like cats and dogs to get hold of that manual because we can't take a Xerox or photocopy of it it was so extensive and literally I used to come to office very early before somebody else could grab the manual and that's how I remember I started learning C++ on my own and over a period I also learned Delphine that's another language and worked on designing the circuitry where we used to test our software onto it we were working on a PCB testing machine basically we were coming up with a machine for testing the PCBs printed circuit board and it was a very very interesting phase of my life where it is a blend of electronics electrical software engineering and what better I could have asked for in my first job and that was the phase I started my career guide 3 and that's my first week of election actually. Wow Borland C I learned my first one was in Fortran and quickly Fortran was almost like a one semester long in Africa it was all C++ in fact C++ came later C was the go-to thing in fact C has come a full circle now if you look at code forces everybody wants to use C language or C++ language only right now. Absolutely it's ultra cool and when you pass out of engineering what was the first kind of job that really excited you I know we all have several jobs but what was that first thing just I have phoned my niche sort of a job. Again very profound question and did I have a choice I asked a question to myself because I remember when I graduated out of engineering I was talking to my father because I went through phase where I had a healthy shoes in my final year of engineering. I was not sure what would I be doing after my engineering do I graduated as a gold medalist from University of Madras in those days I was a first rank holder but I didn't have a very clear part given my health challenges I'm bringing this upfront now because that's one of the area which women will have to focus on but we have very poor that. When I had my health challenges I had an auto immune condition at that time and my first job even before joining the Muruga Pa group or EID parry I joined for a very brief period with Tata project limited as a transformer design engineer and my first assignment was to go to Russia and my father said hey you know what you might want to really rethink about it because it's a very cold climate out there given your auto immune condition I don't think that would be the best option for you to go with. Now I did think about it why did I even lose that opportunity because that was very closer to my heart. In those days I was really cursing myself why did I let go of this opportunity but I don't do that now right I'll tell you why and I didn't have much option I had very limited option because I had to look anything in and around Chennai because I wanted that support system for my health condition by because I became I would say physically challenged with my left hand because of my auto immune condition I needed help for me so it was it was so excruciating pain in the sense mentally physically that my options are limited and then I remember walking with my resume to every company giving my resume there was no hot mail or Yahoo mail it was just the physical printout of the resume I used to carry to every office I remember standing in front of employment exchange giving my details out there even I could get a work in an electricity board right because being an electrical engineer and it so happened that I happened to get into Muruga Paguru I joined them as an R&D engineer and that really gave a trajectory to dream to achieve and you asked me the question in what options or choice I think the choices were limited for me at that point in time. Wow thank you for answering that honestly with all the vulnerability Viji I think it is knowing you I know some of what you've gone through and you're continuing to fight through many of the personal health challenges and it is true that women end up having lot more.
not just for themselves but also for their larger social life. Their well-being is constantly being there. So it must have been extremely hard in terms of getting that breakthrough in Murugappa group and building your career from there. And it has also taken you when you move to IBM, IBM is the long-standing career that you've had in your role. What got you attracted to IBM? I know you're very proud of your strength in IBM. What got you into IBM? I had a couple of, before I did my work in a couple of organizations. I worked in a semiconductor industry for a short term. I would say for around two and a half years I worked with National semiconductor I was in Singapore and that was a real game change of for me. That is where I was able to really start embracing a different culture. Today we called about cultural mindset, right? Nobody taught us there was no book for us. We experienced it on the ground. That's something that happened for me. Different culture people, you're going to a land where you have no idea how the work looks like or class balance looks like. I remember walking into this organization on the day of my interview. The first question that was asked to me could you please lift this odds low scope and keep it on the other side. I was thinking what a stupid question it would be. Then they asked me to crimp few cables. They asked me to write few pieces of code and then finally I got selected and my manager then Mr. Tian Han Lim. I went the first day and after I joined I asked why do you even ask me to go through all this off lifting or all the low scope crimping what not. He said Viji, remember one thing. I want you to go with the feeling that you belong and you don't blur and I thought that was a very very profound message. What he meant was you are going to be one among all of us though you might have a disability. You don't want to feel left out and you have your own individuality and that's what that meant. Belong don't blur. That was one thing which stood out and I said, "Hey this man had the audacity to tell me that you have a capability and you can really do things and keep it up." That was a life-changing moment for me. It was not the technology. It's that that people who kind of give you that confidence that if you fail I'm that hold you and that's what Tian Han Lim did and I'm grateful to that man even today. I'm in touch with him and thanks to him. That was one life-changing moment for me. I can feel the goosebumps in my arms when I hear this you know story Viji. Thank you. It is amazing right? I think I can imagine what 20 years it must have been 25 years since this incident has happened. Yeah because I was it's 30 years guy three because I'm 34 years into the industry. Yeah. 30 years back you mentioned it's you call it as Menali ship today. There was no such terminology that existed even then. Exactly exactly. Yes and I felt yeah this is a place I really want to work. Interestingly IBM didn't happen overnight. Life throws you with a lot of curveballs at you and one of the curveball was becoming a single mother at a very early phase of my life. Okay. Okay. And I would have shame in telling it because many times women think that that they are doing mistake. No. Nobody has done a mistake. Life is full of challenges and you have to start accepting this challenge and work on looking forward as to what is the next option for you ahead. And I was thrown a curveball of being a single mother. My child was just 15 days old and I had to really look up to my child and start earning for the child. So I said I need to do something different in my life but I need a support system then. So my support system where my parents and my sister. So I decided to relocate back to India for good and I settle down in Bangalore and I happen to work with so called a startup today you call it. We used to call it as a small company then. At a unicorn these are all the new words dragons that we have come up with. True. It was amazing. I went and worked in a startup. The first thing I learned was how to handle a cold calling. If a phone call comes at your friend desk. How do you really pick up a phone and say hello this is VG here. I work for so and so company. May I know how I can help you. Right? And then start talking about your product, your services. And that's when I knew that selling is part of your whole work. Right? It's not about developing a cold but how do you even sell a cold to an external entity? And that I learned in a startup. I was there for a couple of years and then I started working with them. And that shaped me a little bit because I was the only I would say senior again a women working there handling lot of men. That is where I knew how to think like a man and walk like a woman. Right? Because I might look very traditional but my thinking processes. How do you conduct yourself in a boardroom? And then again I had a situation where I'm still a single mom want to take care of my son. Own for the kid. And then I decided I need to make a better leap now. And that's when I joined IBM. I always call IBM with a lot of passion because I both there for 18 and a half years. And I work through different business unit of IBM. And that's a company within a company I call it. Right? So that's where you always I think you met me when I was with IBM. And I was very passionate about IBM and I spoke to you today. I'm very passionate about UPS. The company I work for now. Right? Okay. So that's the reason I know small question long answer. But I had to tell you the transition I have made on how I landed with IBM and now I'm with UPS. Yeah. So what do you do at UPS if I care if you at a high level without breaking any confidentiality? What? Okay. Exited. Okay. I'm going to say to a very layman's term. What UPS does is to move a parcel from point A to point B. Now any parcel that comes into my network, we call it as a brown network. How it traverses and reaches my end customer. All the tracking, the navigation through my network is all managed through a technology. And that is what is we do in terms of tracking, managing it, ensuring the customer satisfaction is being met. All that part of the operating the network is something that is a portfolio that I manage from India. And we move around, I would say in a day 28 million packages a day, that's around 2% of the world GDP. So think how technology is important given the scale in which that we are operating today. Wow. I 28 million. In a single. Yes. I know anytime you actually talk about UPS, you literally the world is going moved by UPS is the general tagline that is being mentioned. How do you transition from a software company? IBM is largely a software company. I know it's got several flavors of it from there to a global capability center. Can you share some of the learnings or your own transition from being extremely IBM works in specialized capability centers. I know that part, but how did that transition happen? Okay. Again, I'm going to give you an answer. One thing I consciously did guide three was to stick on to a domain. If you look at my profile, I did my master's in supply chain. Some of the work I did in IBM initially was on procurement side of the world. I ensure that it's in and around logistics procurement and in
supply chain. And then I did my masters in business analytics. Then I decided when I'm going to move from world of IBM, I want to be in a company which is starting from scratch and I have the will wither all to make a decision and run like a startup. And GCSE was one such opportunity because when UPS was setting its shop in Chennai, I basically I lived in Bangalore all along and then I took a bull step of moving to Chennai. I said, why what better opportunity could I have got? I should latch on to it. I should think that I'm running my own company. If I were to run this company, what would I do? What would I not do? Right? But I had a great leadership which trusted in me and said, hey, here is the policy of the company. This is the boundaries in which you have to operate, but we give you all the freedom. And they trusted. And that's when I moved in here. It has been around two and a half years now. Growing, learning, every day is a learning for me. Believe it or not. And learning just not from my leadership, learning from every generation that I have in this flow. Beat from Gen Y to Gen Z and maybe another alpha coming in. I might be learning from them Gen Alpha as well and other Gen X as well because I belong to Gen X. So I am learning every day from people around here. So that's one of the reasons I moved here to GCSE. It was an opportunity and I wanted to have a mixed experience of a startup. What better thing can I get? Yeah, it's a when you actually are part of the founding team of a location. You set the tone when I was in UPS office earlier last week because it was profoundly nice to say while it was global, you can actually see the KC way and beautiful in terms of the history. I also loved the local flavor to it. Beat are so sorry to the the columns to how it was extremely warm in terms of how the whole offices and how the people are also. I could feel that the disease touched there. And from when you look at domain right now, my terms of supply chain logistics and management, with AI taking over literally everything that we do, how do you see yourself being positioned to help not only yourself but also the next gen of software engineers and what how are you seeing from your vantage point? Yeah, it's a great question. AI is here to stay. People might say, "Oh no, I don't think I'm going to embrace it. Start embracing it early on." And everybody, including the leadership to every individual in the organization, have been asked to learn be hands on. That's something that in a GCC world you need to understand, you will have to be a techno manager and hands on. You cannot be somewhere in the fence of the organization. You have to be with them. And then exactly what is happening in AI? Each one of us will have to be hands on. We are learning in the process. We have take short, almost every week. We gather for 15 minutes. We share our experience. We learn from Gen Z. They show and they tell as this story showing happens on the floor. And that's how we are learning. And AI is definitely something we are big time in UPS. And we are trying to infuse in every part of the business flow. And it's going to be a journey by itself. And I think we should not worry about it. Start embracing it early on. That's the message I want to give everyone. Yeah, I think the idea is ensuring that you make use of AI as a companion and make yourself more productive. And when I say you extension is your team, I think essentially you're actually making yourself, you know, unbreakable, so to speak, right? In fact, we have AI early on itself, Guadal. We have a product called O'Rion, which is basically on-road navigation system. It tells you what route a driver will have to take to deliver a package. And it was not developed yesterday or day before. It has been there for many years now. It has an intelligence to the level that they have to stick on to the right lane of in the US because your fuel consumption is lesser, the traffic stops are lesser. So there is a lot of intelligence that has gone behind this product. And before even Google could come up with a Google map, we had our maps. And we have the address analytics almost 99% accurate in our systems for the US. So AI has always been there. I think now we are in the league where we have to take it to the next level. And that's what we are doing right now. Yeah, and I see you already did you did your MS in analytics back in 2010 or I'm forgetting that. Yeah, coming around that time. Yes. Properly you do that. Take that step. I know you were in Bangalore that time. You had come back from the public. How was in Bangalore? I was handling a lot of data. That's when I realized you're handling so much of data. People are talking about how do people are talking about calf, cut. They're talking about different tools. Imagine all the I always jokingly say that you can say all the fruits and vegetables. You say all that like the mango, mango, DB, everything were around. I said, Oh my God, everybody's talking all fruits, vegetables. Now let me do something very different. I am handling a data. Now information is something very important for people. So that is when this is important message for women. We always deliberate. How do I really do my higher education? You have to look out for options that can be integrated with your work. That's why I went for work integrated learning program where you can work on the weekdays and we can you're going for your classes. And that's how I decided to join business analytics. And that opened up a new avenue for me in terms of the projects in terms of interacting with people, new set of network that opened up for me. And I started closely working with some of the institution as well, some of the colleges and so on and so forth. So I think that's how guys, it's more of data handling that made me to think about business analytics. You came the other way around in terms of say how do I make sense of this data and then add that sort of a hadoop or add that degree to myself rather than now off let when I speak with my son, he says, Mummy, I will ask I'll give this data to Chad G. P. T. and it will give me the graph. It's a doing that for fundamental and foundational aspect of it. That makes you to understand any change that is happening around you more clearly. Right? Yes. So when you look at the changes that are happening around you, including Orion, including all these analytics that are happening. How do you see yourself five years, eight years from now? Okay. You know what? It's a it's a it's a it's a in fact this is a question typically people ask in an interview, right? What do you plan to do after two years? I said, for God's sake, I don't know how technology is changing so fast. I don't know what's coming next. Then I don't know how to define my life. Okay. The only thing that I can define myself is do I have a capability to learn, right? Do I have the drive to learn? That's the only thing that I ask. I need another five years where I have a mental good mental well-being and I have an ability and curiosity to learn. I don't know how the technologies are going to take a shape. My worry is with a lot of charge. I don't want to lose my common sense on a light. I don't want to have my common sense and tag up. That's what I'm looking forward to. Absolutely. Yes. And and five years from now, I think I would have got retired. Trust me because I'm already 55, 60, I would be retired. Will I keep quite after five years? No. It's all about give back time, right? So because it's a next
generation who are seeking help now. The help that they need is not going to come from chat GPD, it's going to come from you, me sitting with them across the table and telling them what is humanity is all about. I don't think people have really thought about it. Now people will say, "Hey, you know what, this lady got 50, I got into 55 and she is talking on philosophical, it's not philosophical, it's very practical." In fact, today many people who walk up to my office, the kind of magnitude of problems that they have, it is not related to their work, it's related to other pressures in the society and they really do not know how to juggle things. There is no kind of a rule book today that we have that if you come across this problem, this is a solution. And people like you and me are going to be the people who can help them out and they just need somebody who can listen to them and who can empathize with them. I think that's what I am going to do after five years. But I remember when the very famous tweet came out last week with anthropic, anthropic Lord, somebody wrote the "Ajita" and Shridhar, Vimbu actually forwarded the tweet and retweeted and said, "Hey, guess what? Our society is moving towards that, small self-sustaining and giving society. That is where real innovation is going to happen." I am just recalling what he said to what you are saying, Viji. In the end of the day, value gets added when we are able to change profoundly, like your own person who said, "Rather than lifting it, you should not blur, you should be bored." So I love it. The podcast is to celebrate the women's day. We are showcasing for extremely well accomplished women the whole month. So happy women stay to you. It's a little tad bit early, but all the same. And any messages for women who are listening right now, Viji? Only one message. Don't be guilty. I think there's a lot to this message. I have seen women, they feel guilty. They are spending more time at work. They feel guilty when they are an overachiever. They feel guilty when they go out and enjoy. They feel guilty that they are not able to give time to their son, their spouse. And they feel guilty if they go solo vacationing. I think everybody comes with certain destiny. And if it reminds me of one of the message, one of my men told me, say that you are in an aircraft and it's going to crash. What do they tell you? First put their oxygen onto yourself before you can save others. So first you need to take care of yourself. For that you should not feel guilty. Eat good food. Feel good about yourself. Dress well. Have friends. Meet up with the front. You have every right to do that. So only message I'll give on women's day is don't feel guilty. That's important. In Tamil Nadu there is a paramori called Svar in Dal dhan sittiram. Basically for those who don't know Tamil Nadu it's basically only if you have a canvas, can you really draw on it? Only if you are able to take care of yourself. Are you going to be able to take care of the world and create innovative solutions? I think this is very, very wonderful conversation with you so far. Any other advice that you want to share before we log off? I think I have one other advice to people because this is specifically for women again because since the podcast is centered around women's day, I always tell them rewrite yourself. There are going to be girls thrown at you at every phase of life because I'm a cancer survivor as well and for people who don't know much about me. You never know what kind of situations you're going to come across. I almost lost my vocal cord for three months. I used to go to speech therapists to kind of work on my basic fanatics talking about ah, oh, I mean I was thinking I was like a baby. Now I got my voice back. Maybe certain areas still have a struggle pronouncing but till I'm fine, I always tell them that rewrite yourself. You will be having a lot of challenge. There are going to be people who are going to judge you but rewrite yourself. Rewriting in the way that you are going to be selfish. You have to be selfish. You will feel guilty. That's okay. Put your guilt aside. Be selfish. Rewrite yourself. Only if you are okay, people around you are going to be okay. And that's an advice I want to get. Rewrite, rewrite yourself. So that's a message I want to give them. Just to let you know that there are people in our generation like Gayathri, you are a Gen X, I'm a Gen X. You might be taking care of elderly at home. Right? That's a beautiful thing that anyone could do. At that time, you will be frustrated. Surround yourself with the right set of people. You're going to be challenged even then. People are going to say, "Hey, you didn't take care of me well. You took care of me well. You could have done this better. You were not perfect at this." That's okay. This is the best you could do and you have done it. Move on. That's what I have learned from every setback I have had in my life. For the people who are in the podcast, now I'm settled. I have a family. I have a husband. I have my mother-in-law very forward looking. I have a beautiful family set up. That is the ecosystem which has been moving forward. Surround yourself with the right people. Reading an ecosystem that is very positive is a very important thing for every woman to do. Saying no to toxic relationship, however close it may be, is a positive step that you're doing for yourself and for the loved ones as well. Extremely important. Thank you for sharing. I think it's important to say that. I'm also happy that you're sharing from a point of having lived the life and talking from a point of experience. Thank you. This is even a very, very wonderful conversation. I feel like we should have multiple conversations and have so many more questions to do it. Thank you, but opportunity as well. Appreciate that. Thank you for being on software people's stories. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Take care. Happy Women's Day once again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Have a wonderful day ahead. Bye. Thank you. We thank Siddharth for the music and Anita for promoting the software people's stories. If you liked this episode, please subscribe on your favorite podcast line and spread the word in your network. If you'd like to share your story, contact us at
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