 Hello and welcome to another episode of the Geotechnical Engineering Podcast. A podcast focused on helping geotechnical engineers stay up to date with technical trends in the field. I'm your host, Jared Green, and I've been practicing as a geotechnical engineer for over 17 and a half years. And in addition to practicing engineering, I enjoy mentoring young engineers and first generation college students. I've focused on helping to increase the number of pre-college students that are interested in STEAM majors and fields. By STEAM, I mean science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics. In this episode of the Geotechnical Engineering Podcast, which I may sometimes refer to as the Geopod, I'll be talking with Dr. Menzer Pelevan, PhD PE. She's a geotechnical engineer with a specialization in seismic hazards and resiliency. Menzer knows four languages, has a PhD, she spent two years working in New York City, and she's featured in a movie. And she's now working at Jacobs in Seattle. And in this episode, we have the privilege to talk with this successful engineer about earthquake engineering, STEM, STEAM, and diversity and inclusion in the engineering world. Dr. Menzer Pelevan, PE, is an aspiring and accomplished leader who has distinguished herself as one of the main influencers in the civil engineering industry. Her aptitude and dedication to the engineering profession have been recognized through the important leadership roles she has been appointed with despite her young age. As a leader, Menzer has been spearheading the change in the engineering industry by promoting the crucial role that engineers play in shaping the future and changing the world. And by exemplifying a strong and dynamic role model to inspire and empower the next generations, especially women in engineering. Menzer is a geotechnical engineer with a specialization in seismic hazards and resiliency. She has been actively involved in pioneering research projects that advance the state of art and state of practice of geotechnical earthquake engineering in collaboration with several research institutes. She is an author for several journal and conference publications, in addition to serving as a reviewer for several journals. Menzer is the facilitator of the earthquake engineering community of practice for Americas at Jacobs, and she is the deputy team leader of the geotechnical group in the Seattle office. As an internationally recognized engineer with an outstanding technical background, Menzer actively uses her expertise and engineering skills in delivering projects focusing on and maintaining high technical capability and quality. She is actively involved within the industry and professional organizations serving at several leadership positions. Her achievements and impact within the industry have been recognized by prestigious awards. The 2016 ASCE New Faces of Civil Engineering and 2017 ASCE President's Medal, 2019 Middle East Technical University Recognition Award, 2020 Engineering News Record National Top 20 under 40. And with that, let's jump right into our conversation with Menzer. All right, welcome to another episode of the Geotechnical Engineering Podcast, and we have with us today Menzer. Menzer, welcome to the Geotechnical Engineering Podcast. We're honored to have you. How are you feeling? I'm feeling great. I'm honored to be here. Thank you for inviting me, Jared. Excellent, excellent. Well, Menzer, we already introduced you on the show. We shared your bio, but you know, in your own words, can you share with our listeners a little bit more about what it's like? You know, what do you do over at Jacobs? What's your daily day look like for you? How day today? Oh, my day, they changes a lot. So just to give a little bit background, Jacobs is a global engineering solutions firm. Actually, we're going through this big transformation that brings us to be a more solutions firm. And you know, the things that I do, what in Jacobs changes with respect to that too. And that's one of the favorite parts that I like working there. I am a geotechnical engineer. I'm based in Seattle, Washington. I specialize in earthquake engineering. So that's what I had my PhD and I did all those researches. But that doesn't mean that that's the only thing that I do. However, being in Seattle in a very seismically active area, of course, helps because every project has a seismic component. One of the projects that I'm working on right now is the seismic vulnerability analysis and also the seismic risk assessment and obviously upgrades for existing pump houses, a 50 year old pump house. We started on this project, I think two years ago, and we did initial explorations and we found that the soils are vulnerable to liquefaction. And we are now in the second phase of this project where we are actually running almost half a million dollar exploration program where we are doing over water explorations, explorations inside the pump house or the foundation slab. All those things. It's very exciting to be able to find and what it was assumed to be based on 1969 drawings and the data there and what it compares to what we know now is fascinating to me. So that's one of the projects that I work on. But I also help with a lot of project management and the quality assurance and quality management for projects. There is an eye line project which is a rapid transit, rapid ride in Seattle. So instead of the subways, it's pretty much like a bus that is going to in a fast track. So we are doing a quality assessment management plan for that one. It is a significantly big project. It's around 160 million dollar project. And then there is another one which we are the project manager, construction manager. We are doing construction management for waterfront Seattle. So I'm doing a quality management for that one. But the one that I'm most interested in is our company is really taking this what we are going through right now, the pandemic very very carefully and very seriously. And we are looking into the ways that we learn from it. We and Jacobs understand that we are not going back to our old ways and we are trying to find how the future of work will be looking like. So there is a core team that works on this future of work initiative. It is not just a real estate, but it's combining the culture of the company, how our culture is going to change, how our tools are going to change to support how our real estate and the places we're going to change. So that is also a very exciting project. So I'm doing a lot of things. Yeah, it sounds like you're busy and you can't be bored. That is great. And when you think about geotechnical engineering, I mean, what sparked your interest? Like, how did you first get involved with wanting to be a geographer? Jared, there's a movie about that. I know, I know, but maybe most of us have seen it, but assume somebody hasn't seen it. Yeah, I know. When people asked me that, there was such a good answer. I actually, it's, I don't know if it's a good answer, but how it started is, I was in the ENR sub 20 on the 40 and the company wanted to promote it. And then there was a question that was just ex-asking exactly the same. And I was so busy. I didn't mind it down. I wrote, there is a movie about that. It's like, is she being sarcastic? It's like, no, there actually is a movie about it. But okay, I'm going back. So the way that it started, actually, like, because movie doesn't really tell the whole story. I'm from Turkey. And then there was a magnitude 7.2 earthquake in 1999 that hit Turkey. It lasted less than a minute, 45 seconds only. And within 45 seconds, official records say 17,000, but many believe it's more on around 35 to 40,000 people. More than 125,000 people were injured, more than 250,000 left homeless. So that's just, that's less than a minute. That's less than a minute, 45 seconds. Less than a minute, 45 seconds. And that shows how important as our, our basic industry is for the livelihood of everyone, you know, it is, I will come to that point another time. So what happened is I, my family did not get affected. We were living around 300 miles away from the epicenter, but that epicenter is where my mother spent a good amount of her teenage years. So she was living there actually when she was a teenager. Anyhow, we spent the night at outside because I remember my mother coming and like waking me up and saying like, leave everything, you're just getting out. Because that's strong that it was like, it was, and also the worst part is at 3am in the morning. So everybody. So the, you know, the, your reaction time is much different. We spent the night in the car and I just remember very vividly the next morning, because you're trying to make sense of what is happening. You know that you're living in an earthquake from region similar to what's going on in Seattle, right? People know that we are living in an earthquake from region and we're doing much better thing, but much better educational, giving educational information about what to do during an earthquake in Turkey at the time. Nobody knew, but really there was no education around it. And so we go back, you're listening to the radio over the night and in the morning when we, I mean, it was obviously safe to go back, we go back in and you turn on the TV and you see like six blocks along the coast went into the sea. Like it's just, it disappeared. You see the aerial views, the whole city is gone. Like it still gives me goosebumps. Yeah. Very sad image. And it's just like, why is this happening? Like, I mean, how is that, how does, and you know why it is happening because there was no regulations with, you know, if you are, let's say, you have a store on the corner and somehow you got rich, you would buy an air, like a land and deal with a contractor who might not have any experience or understanding about like building in an earthquake from region. And when that happens, you lose life. So that is like the part of it. But there is a second portion of why I became a civil engineer. It is the part is Turkey was a growing country, you know, infrequent country and still is. But when you, when I was a kid, when you look around all the decision makers, they would have ties with the construction industries and nothing has changed over the years. When I was younger, I just wanted to make a change. I wanted to be one of those decision makers. I want to be the person who is influencing these decisions and not just me in the construction industry, but that I mean, that's what I liked since I was a remote girl. And I was lucky, though, one thing that is interesting that was asked to me after I aired and dream day, they're just like, what measure were there any women like that you see that I could be. Oh, no. And like, they, and then they asked, like, you didn't think that all that and all being, you know, males and I didn't change anything like the person. So it never even occurred to me like because I didn't Oh, they're all men and I wouldn't be able to be like them because I'm a woman. Did not even cross my mind when I was young kids. Maybe if I was growing up in a maybe like a family that would have embedded that thought into my brain, maybe I wouldn't be a civil engineer today. So yeah, yeah, now it makes a difference. Wow. That's so powerful. Menzer, you've been involved in promoting the crucial role, you know, promoting the crucial role that engineers play and shape in the future and changing the world. And your opinion, I mean, what is the future of work for geotechnical engineers look like? And what can we expect to see changing soon? I think one of the things that we need to be really ready is what what type of skills are we going to need. So our industry, because of because it's experience driven, has not been, let's say, adopting the advances in the tech in technology as much as what has been happening in the other industries. So in my opinion, we were we stayed a little bit behind all those advancements and those advances, advancements are going to catch up and they're going to be disruptors. If we as your technical engineers and the geotechnical engineering firms want to stay on top of it and want to keep on what we are doing, we need to catch up. And what is that? So we need to realize that there's going to be automation. We are not going to be doing the things as the way that we are doing before. It's just like, you know, we need to be bringing those technologies in. And the ways of that we are training our new engineers will be different. We are going to be needing people who are not just like looking up the code and like writing those equations into Excel. It's we're going to need them. I mean, it sometimes drives me nuts. Like it's like this, this, those are those are easily automated things. So we need to be looking into the place and if we don't do it, there's going to be some company that is coming up just similar to what Tesla did to automation industry, right? Somebody is not up and those are in an all automated way, more efficient than you are. And if we are not really training our people for the critical thinking, problem solving, and really in the emotional intelligence side of it, because it is going to be a part of like how you manage other human and how you are actually like bringing these solutions and innovation into the company. So I think we need to be starting to change these stereotypes within the company. And the reason why it may, in my opinion, it's been the latest, I think our industry lacks a little bit of generational diversity in the areas where the decisions are being made. And, you know, the way that you did the work experience is amazingly valuable. I mean, and you know, geotechnical engineering is obviously an experienced urban business. But like when on the other sides of it, I think one of the main challenges is how are we going to attract the talent? If we do not keep up what we offer, if we do not keep up to bring the flexibility to our workers and to understand the needs and desires of the incoming generation. So like, for example, for Gen Z, all the research shows up, they want to wear several different hats and they want to grow literally. Whereas if we look at our geotechnical industry, it is more of a vertical growth rather than literally. So how can we bring those in? And maybe these are not, I mean, there is a part that is in the way that we solve the problems, but there is a part in the way that we attract the people. If you don't attract the people who's going to do all that work. And why are we using the best talent? And also that comes into the attracting to diverse talent, right? And that bringing that diversity in to our geotechnical profession. When we walk into the Geocongress or any other geotechnical engineering conference, if everybody just looks like us, there is a problem. But it is also like if everybody looks different, but we only bring in the people who thinks like us, because diversity is more than just the way they look. It's also bringing that diversity and allowing that by being inclusive. You're so right. I mean, if we want to be problem solvers and we want to, you know, solve these challenges that we'd never faced before, we need to be able to think differently. And if we're all thinking the same, we're probably not going to get the best solutions. Really good points. Really good points. You know, with the current pandemic, I have to imagine that there's lessons that we learn. And when you were talking about the future of work, I'm trying to wonder, you know, what are some of the lessons we learn from this pandemic? And how does that impact the future of work, Minda? So one of the foremost is that we're agile. We're flexible. I, it was in my company, it was I know in our industry that we thought we have to be in the office to be able to do this work. But that's what it's doing. I just so and then how many months it has been. So I looked the count. We started working from home probably end of March. So just if I were to go and tell, you know, a senior engineer and say that like, you know, I want to work from home for X amount of time, like for these many months, they would have thought that either I'm not going to be productive. I'm not going to be able to do my work. And it's just like what it turned out to is like in Jacobs, 55,000 people, because this was global, almost 95% went into remote working. And we're still not working in so many places and things are going, people are being productive. Actually, flexibility allows for, which is a very important point, mental health, your body, your life balance, because you know, maybe you don't really have to be in the office from eight to five, which allows you if you have if you're a parent, or if you have other, you know, things that you need to do and you need to work shift your work schedule or you need to, you don't need to be in the office like every day from that time, you can just focus work from wherever you are. And that brings the flexibility. But that what that flexibility also does is allows us to bring diversity into our industry, because maybe there were people who were not able to keep up to that eight to five and they were therefore kind of excluded. Now we can include those. And one other thing is the use of technology, right? We've always had this technology, we could have always done these meetings with the videos and like, you know, collaborating across the world. Since the start of the pandemic, I've been so busy, but also it gave us like so many different operate like the opportunities because, you know, if you are doing all the meetings in person, it is very difficult to bring in a junior engineer. But if it is a virtual meeting, then why wouldn't we ask the junior engineer to just listen and so it is also the mentoring and like giving them the opportunity to learn. Of course, there are parts that we are missing. And we need to understand that this is not the permanent solution. The solution will be a disturbed distributed environment. And that's what we are looking into in Jacob. So where we would have our offices as just like places for people to go for, you know, for collaboration with people. And also, we are not saying that this is, this should be like only like this, like only remote or only on the office. It is a combination. So if you are just doing your focus work from eight till 11, you don't need to be in the office. And but you have a meeting at noon, you go into the office for an afternoon meeting, and then do your work over there. So that's, I think with many tech companies were doing this, right? But this is now what we are shifting to. And I think we, I mean, it's not just our industry, many industries discovered this, but it is a very well needed thing. And we've done a survey among our company and there were over 20,000 people joining it. The one strong message that came out is people want flexibility. And you have the opportunity to bring them flexibility, why wouldn't they? Because that ability allows for developing their mental health. We want to invest in our people's work-life balance, because we know that everybody is their best selves that way. That gives us opportunity to train the new talent in a different way and provide more opportunities. I have like, I mean, I am collaborating with people from in UK, in Dubai, in Australia. It's just much easier because everybody is like now adjusted to this. What we shouldn't do, Jared, in my opinion is, you know, at the end of this whole situation, this is a pilot test that we would never be able to do. That if it would be such a loss for our industry, I know our company is not going to do it, but it would be such a loss for our industry if we were to just go back to the old ways. Wow. We are not going back to the old ways. No, you're absolutely right. And the reality is that if any companies decide to just go back to the old ways, the talent's going to go. You're going to leave because think about how attractive it is to have work-life balance. A lot of times when we grew up as engineers, work-life balance is something you had to put to the side in order to move forward. But to think that, you know, even for folks that don't have families, to think I can have a hobby because I don't have to commute four hours a day is interesting, you know? If you don't have to, if you're just doing the work from home, like, I mean, if you're just doing your focus work, so being in cubicle and, you know, most of the time the counterargument is like, but there is the person that is sitting next to you. If you have a question, then you can ask, well, no, all these like the $5,000 is sitting next to me. I mean, you know, there's a time difference and everything. You can just use MS Teams or Skype or whatever the messaging place or the communication venue that you are using. And we are using MS Teams and I think it's fantastic. It's just working fantastic. That's wonderful. That's wonderful. Well, Menzar, you specialize in earthquake engineering. There's a number of listeners, some that are, you know, still in college or grad school, there are some that are more seasoned, but, you know, somebody said, what is earthquake engineering? What is it that you do? How would you, how would you explain that? You can get as granular as you want or you can keep as high level as you want. You're the professor here. You have to put the PhD, but what's earthquake engineering? What is earthquake engineering? Earthquake engineering is like on its simplest phase is trying to design the structures or infrastructure that we design to provide life safety. And I think that's a quick, like the interesting part of it. I'm giving a practitioner advice. There you go. Practitioner's answer to this. Yes. It is, it is basically designing the structure so that it's on an earthquake depending on where you live on the continent is like, and then not every place is seismically active. But if you're living in a seismically active place, earthquake engineers, it can be geotechnical earthquake engineer, structural earthquake engineer, we often work together to basically design structures or infrastructures to resist earthquakes to ground shaking. So that is the simplest way of answering that. What geotechnical earthquake engineers do and I do is, so it is, you know, in the seismically active areas, you would need to be able to understand how much shaking is going to hit that particular site. And there are ways of understanding this depending on the subsurface conditions, which vary significantly from one location to another. And in fact, it can even vary under a footprint of a building. So first, you need to understand how those soil conditions are varying. Then you would need to understand at that location, what type of ground motions you will expect, how much of that soil deposits that you have under your structure or infrastructure might amplify or be amplified that shaking that you were predicting. And then the next question is, are there going to be any hazards due to that shaking? One of the hazards that is very commonly known is liquefaction, where the soil loses its strength and basically starts acting like a liquid when the ground shaking hits. If that happens, you know, just imagine you have a building that is sitting on soil, you are accounting for the soil to carry that, but then the soil starts acting like a water, then you see the building tilting, sinking, and, you know, the soil moving away if there's a sloping condition. So in the very basic description, that's what the geotechnical earthquake engineers do. But of course, once you get these shaking, then you need to start to do soil structure interaction, how the structure and the foundation of the structure will react to those shaking given those soil parameters. So I try to make it as simple as I could. Well done. Well done. I mean, I know that you could talk about that for hours, right? Easily. Easily. It's like, this is what I do. Excellent. So like, not just what I do, I really love doing geotechnical earthquake engineering. Yeah, I could tell you're passionate about it. I mean, we've talked several times and I think that really what's moving to me is moving. I guess there's a geotechnical pun there, but what's moving to me is that as a kid, you got this, you had this experience with an earthquake and it literally changed the trajectory of your life. And it's just powerful because a lot of times people don't know what geotechnical engineers are. We don't know what we do and what we focus on, but your story is one that it's captivating. I have one more thing to add to that. Yes, please do. Seeing an earthquake and going through an earthquake is something, but in my career, I also had the opportunity to travel to Nepal after 2015, Nepal earthquake and to Mexico, central Mexico earthquake and both cases. So earthquakes keep happening, but one thing we need to understand is earthquake engineering is still a very young field. So what we knew in 1999 is significantly different than what we know now in 2020. Every single earthquake teaches us something. I know we are getting more and more technologically advanced. We have all these labs and the numerical models, but there is no way that we can totally mimic the mother earth. So those series of depositions, our predictions are only as good as what we know now, but the earthquake engineering started very recently. We started talking about the confection in 1980s. So your building stock is built way before that and in New York, it's one of the things, right? All these buildings are like the brownstones. They are very strong in one direction. They're not strong at all in the other direction. And the understanding of the size and city effects, different types of soil, different types of soil deposits, every single earthquake, that's why it just teaches us something new, whether it is the basin effect. So before 1985, Mexico City earthquake. And I think this is a phenomenal example. We didn't know really about how those deep basins affect the ground motions. And the Mexico City was devastated. It was just basically on the ground. It was a big devastation bigger than 1999. And in 2017, Central Mexico earthquake, you saw that they did learn from that. They built accordingly. They upgraded their seismic codes accordingly. And there were very few like the damage compared to 1985 in Mexico City. And the distance, I mean, of course, earthquake characteristics are a little different. But the trend is the same. If they kept building as a way it was before, that would have been a much different scenario after that 2017. And that applies to everywhere. So like we really need to still learn from them and keep improving that. And I think that is also the part of the earthquake engineering that keeps me very interested because every year we are advancing it. So like it is not a city, you know, just like the small advancements. There can be like real major advancements. So I worked with the NGA East Group that is looking at these upgrading the attenuation motions for the Central and the Eastern America. Until now, our codes were built on the predictions based on the California Arctic, because that's where we have the data, right? The code was based on the California. But the characteristics of the Central and Eastern North America is significantly different than the Western North America. The rock conditions are different. The types of motions that you will be expecting is different. So there are significant improvements that are still going on. Wow. So it sounds like there's lots of opportunity for folks that are going into research and, you know, there's a lot out there. We haven't solved it yet. We haven't solved it all yet. Oh, that's great. So let's take a look at something else. You hinted at it a little bit before, but I know that you're passionate about diversity and inclusion. Can you share a little bit about your involvement in the industry and perhaps even at your company to advance equity, inclusion, diversity within the profession? Yeah, very happy. I'm really very passionate about the company. So when we think about diversity and inclusion, there is one code. It's a very generic code and maybe some people are tired of hearing it, but I'm a dancer, so I'm going to start with it. Diversity is being asked to go to the party. Inclusion is being asked to dance. So it is really just like you going to the party is not enough, but the equity in that case it comes is just like if you haven't had the dancing background and if you were a beginner then somebody will come and help you so that you will be able to go on that stage to be able to dance. So that is like how they are interrelated to each other. In our company, we prefer saying inclusion and diversity because we understand that without inclusion, diversity does not really matter. So it doesn't really bring anything if you have a 95% diverse group in a room, but there is only one person leaving the conversation and the others are not included. That doesn't bring the value of the diversity into your community. So my whole passion actually did start with a little before Dream Bake, but mainly with Dream Bake when people did ask me, so you didn't think you could not be one of the decision makers when you see that they were old men and I didn't. It is like how you strain your brain, it didn't occur to me until then. And then they asked me, so nobody said anything that would discourage you when I started thinking, then I started realizing, yes, it was when I was in high school, all the classmates were just like, whenever I have higher grades and because I was in the science group, so in Turkey they divide you as the social sciences and they had like, I don't know, like it's just like the STEM kind of area. So I was in one of the science classes, so it's obviously a lot of males and I would like have higher scores in the test than they are and they would always have, you don't know these, you just memorize, you're just so good at memorizing. And then it is not, so like it is the whole idea of like you are not actually smart. I mean we understand that you are the top in the class, but it's not because you are smart, it's because you can memorize, which should also be smart, right? I can memorize everything, so like it is like, why not? And then when we were going into the university entrance exam, I remember that there is a history teacher, he really liked me a lot and I might be his favorite student in the class, but like he was asking, so what are you going to go, what are you going to do? And the saying that everybody would answer is civil engineering because the civil engineers were the you know, the construction industry was the industry that leads Turkey, so everybody was very common to answer that way. So which I did too, and he's just like, let's think about that, like how are you going to do that? He didn't ask any of the other guys, he just asked me and I was obsessed and I'm just like, well I'm going to go to this, but he's just like we're not going to be able to get into that too. I'm like, you didn't say those to them? And the stories continue, I just want to like let everyone know that it is, but I did not internalize this obviously, or maybe I didn't and I just like buried it in deep and it was, it couldn't come out until somebody really asked me, nobody could tell you that you can't be doing that. So university entrance exam is like, I think that's one of my favorite stories, so because it really shows how the stereotypes work. There is in Turkey, in order to go into the university, so there's 180 questions, 180 minutes. Once a year, you whatever you score that you go, you don't apply to universities, it's just your score, so like you know, there's so it is a very important thing for just like, because like if you don't score well, then you lost a year in your life because you cannot go into the university, or it's just like whatever you do in that 180 minutes is just like planning on that. Me being, if you know, if the listeners are don't know, I'm a very girly girl, I love high heels, I mean, and I believe I do better, but I feel better. So when I was going to the exam, and it was always the same whenever I had an exam, I would have my hair done, I would have like makeup on, and yes, I was wearing high heels as I was walking to the get on the exam. There was a guy and his father walking next to me and my mother, and then the father turns to his son and she's like, look at her, you you disqualified her, you elevated her easy, did there are people like her getting into this exam? And like, I'm just Wow. What? And you can hear him, you can hear him, you were there with your mom. Yeah, you can, I mean, it's just like, it is like so interesting, he doesn't even know me, just the way that I look to him, pretends that I can't be smart, or I can't score well. Well, I was in the first top 1%, so the chances are I eliminated that guy. But I mean, it's just like this concept goes on, right? And when I was doing my master's, one of my advisor asked me to go into his like room, and it's about the time that I'm going to complete and everything. And he said like, you are one of my favorite students. It's just like, you are amazing. And if I were to open up a hotel in somewhere, I will put you into management, you don't know anything because you may eat, you'll just figure it out. So like, you make things happen, and I know this, but people don't know it. And if you want to be looking like this, and don't change yourself, you have to be twice or three times better than the person next to you. It's always going to be the case for you, if you want to go with this. And I think one of the things that I am proud of is I did not change. I stayed true to myself. So the long story is like, because I know how important it is for people from my own experience to be their whole selves. I know how it feels to not to be accepted as who you are or to be judged based on how you look or where you're coming from or from your base or an accent or any of those things, which has nothing to do with my ability to do the work. Or maybe sometimes you are judged based on the type, the way that you do the work, because you're coming from a different cultural background, not based on the outcome. So I know how much of a burden that it can be and how much of a loss it would be to lose all these people who wouldn't be the way that other people are. So like the decision makers or the senior engineers. And one thing that I really truly believe is when we are growing up, we're always told, treat everyone like the way you want to be treated. That is so wrong. That is just the assumption is that you, everyone wants to be like me. Everyone wants to be treated like me. Everyone is like me. No, nobody is like each other. We need to be able to understand to treat everyone like they want to be treated. It's something that they need. So that brings that inclusion and that brings that diversity without really understanding that we can't do this. In geotechnical engineering, so I've been chairing the outreach and engagement committee and we've been focusing on bringing like more generational diversity into the profession. Making sure that when we are having the conferences that there is an equal representation of females and the males and session chairs at the panel attendees. And I think we've been improving a lot. Obviously, we have a long ways to go. And Jacob, so I am the global co-chair for an employee network that focuses on cultural inclusion and diversity, which is often overlooked. And this is an area that became one of my favorite topics over the course of like maybe the past year. It is interesting to really start understanding and I didn't realize how much your culture and how much your ethnic background influences your daily perceptions. I'll just give one example. Just think of a grasshopper. What is a grasshopper to you? It's a little bug that jumps around, right? It is. Well, a grasshopper is a pet in China. A grasshopper is an appetizer in Thailand. So this is just like a simple, simple way how culture influences, how you perceive things. If we perceive a grasshopper so differently, just imagine what, how our interpersonal behaviors, communication skills, and all of those are open to being misinterpreted. So it's really understanding and we always nowadays we talk about emotional intelligence, but now that we are becoming global, whether you work in a global company or not, we are working with people who are coming from different cultures. Maybe they are, they might have different time references, they might have different way of working, they might have, which is very important, different way of forming trust. So if you do not understand those and expect everyone to be like you and treat everyone like you want to be treated, you are just missing all those opportunities on top of it. You're excluding some. You're making them not feel like they can be their authentic selves while they're at work, while they're in the professional organization, while they're contributing and eventually people lose them. Wow. And I don't think we can afford to lose the diapers talent. No, we cannot. We cannot. Wow. Really good stuff, that man's a really good stuff. And we talked about a little bit before we hinted about the movie Dream Big. If you want to know more about Dream Big engineering our world, there's a movie about it. So we won't give any spoilers, but what would you, you know, what's your advice for how young people or people that are aspiring to be engineers or people that are aspiring to, you know, do something big in the planet, you know, what's your advice to them? How can they dream big? Well, I think one of the great ways of dreaming big is getting into our industry. Right. So because it's, it is so amazing, Dredd, I'm pretty sure you can talk to this too. You can contribute to changing New York City's skyline. Yeah. You can bring clean water to people that are in need. You can make sure that 17,000 people won't die after an earthquake. So the impact that we do as an industry to the society is unbelievable. So if you want to dream big, if you want to make a change, this is a great place. But of course, getting into that people might look different than you. It is very important to be able to stay true to yourself and to understand that there is a space for you in this industry, whether it is in any engineering or the STEM industry. So what we wanted to achieve with dream big was to really inspire the next generation to go and see themselves as a part of the STEM. And I want to actually change it to steam builds and engineering. Most of the time people might feel like, oh, I'm not smart enough, or I'm not good enough, or I'm not fit enough. There are not many people that looks like me. And that's why we wanted to give those opportunities. I'm just like, there are a variety of people within this industry and they're doing better and better each year, but we will need them to be able to do even better. I always give like the three, like the short advices. It starts with believing in yourself. And I know it is very difficult to believe in yourself because there are times that you can't. You just thought to yourself, it's called imposter syndrome. I have a big time. I feel like a failure every there's there's at least a couple times during a week that I would feel that way. It's just like I suffer from it many people. So what's really important is to have some other person to believe in you when you can't believe in yourself. And there is what I want to suggest for everyone, you should have a code. So you would have a series of mentors, but like it is not just a mentor. You should have sponsors. You should have coaches and you should have mentors. So like the end, all these three should be combined as you grow up in your profession. So really looking into finding those people is very important. And the second one is just like really aim high. Like, I mean, if you don't get there, you don't get there, but there is no way of like, why wouldn't you? I whenever I say my whatever I want to be there, I've heard so many times just like, I mean, I'll just give one example and then I'll go up there. So it was around the time that I was graduating with my PhD from the University of Texas at Elson. I was doing the job interviews. And they asked me, so what do you want to be like in the future? Who do you want to be like? And I said, like, well, I don't know why I want to be like, I know what I don't want to be like. And it's always my answer whenever they say like, what do you want to be like? I'm like, I know what I don't want. I can tell you that what I want is limitless. But one thing that it's just I came to that realization the other day, when I was interviewing, they asked like just the similar question, but he pushed on like for me to answer. And I said, you know, I mean, I don't know if I ever get to, but I really want to be someone influential in this industry. I don't want to be just no one. I want to be able to go up to that stage, give the toll and like, no name this profession and bring change to this profession. That was 2013. When I was graduating, I wouldn't have imagined Dream Bake or I wouldn't have imagined like all the other things that I have done. And I said, like, you know, I go up on the stage just to give 15 minute presentations now, but I want to do more than that. I want to be on the stage in front of the whole group and everything. In the past three to four years, I don't know how many times I've done that. Yeah. So it is just like really setting the ideas of just like, dream, dream big. And that's, that's, I think it all starts there dreaming thing. That's awesome. I agree. I agree. Well, that's a good point to pause on. We're going to take a quick pause when we'll be back. But men's there in our career factor safety in segment. Stick around. Welcome back. It's time for our career factor of safety in segment and Geo technical engineering, like with many disciplines of engineering, it's important to incorporate a factor of safety into your design. What about incorporating a factor of safety into your career? Today, of course, we're speaking with Dr. Menzar Pellevan, PE. Menzar, you've achieved so much success at such a young age and you're serving in several leadership positions within the Geo technical engineering space. What advice would you give to our listeners out there as far as being an aspiring leader in the field? How can they build security into their careers and give themselves a factor of safety when considering this? It starts with saying yes and taking on the challenge rather than shying away. It also starts with knowing your personal brand. What is your personal brand? And it might be difficult for many to really understand that. I have an easy trick. So just start paying attention to the activities, what you're doing, which ones you have energy for, which ones you don't really have energy. The ones you have the energy for are the ones that really builds up on your personal brand and stay true to it and try to really work on it. Having mentors really help to stay, to keep you on check. But everything comes with sacrifice. So how much you are willing to sacrifice to build your personal brand and what you want to accomplish. And in order to be able to do that, if you are not really passionate about it, you're not going to be it. And that brings me to the main point is be yourself. Because you cannot be anybody else. You cannot follow the road of anybody else because then you wouldn't be unique and you wouldn't be bringing a change. Find ways where you can make change. You can be the change. And I think then it just flourishes. Awesome. Menzar, thank you so much. So inspirational. Thank you for coming on and thank you for sharing the insights that you have. And we thank you for all that you do as an engineer and seriously what you do for the society. We really appreciate it. You shared some great information and advice for our listeners. But how can our listeners find you? What's the best way for them to find you? They want to know more. So I'm building up the website, www.menzarpayment.com, which will include all the previous talks that I gave and like the upcoming talks that I will be giving and some of the information about the projects that I work on, about Dream Big and about diversity and inclusion. So look out for that. Also, you can find me on Twitter. It's MNZDR is my Twitter account. And I'm also on Instagram and LinkedIn. So it's menzarpayment. Excellent. Thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed the show today. We would love to hear your feedback, comments, and or questions. Please feel free to go to geotechnicalengineeringpodcast.com where you'll find a summary of the key points discussed in today's episode, as well as links to any of the resources, websites, or books mentioned during this episode. Until next time, we wish you the very best in all your geotechnical engineering endeavors.