 Hello everyone, my name is Jason Klein, I'm the Director of P20 Initiatives at Northern Illinois University, and we're excited to be back with you for another episode of Career Pathways Virtual Trailheads. I've got our host today and our guest, I'm going to turn things over to Jamoke to run us through the rest of today's episode. Hello everyone, my name is Adejima Keolokpade, I am an international graduate student here at Northern Illinois University where I'm studying public health and I'm really excited to be part of this initiative. I'm going to have Kora introduce herself briefly before I go on to the questions for today. Hi, thank you guys. My name is Kora Polly, I am an electrical engineer, project manager at HPK Engineering, and I mainly do utility design work. Sounds good, thank you for that Kora. I'm super tempted to ask you before I go into the questions I had already planned. How did you or how does it feel to be a woman in the STEM field? That's a really good question, there are not many of us and that's definitely a very cool different part of my job, I would say it is a predominantly male field. So similar in school, there is mostly guys as well. So yeah, it's very exciting in a field that I'm a minority in and can still excel in I guess. That sounds amazing. So how did you work while in school and now that you work, how did you manage being like a minority in a class full of guys? Yeah, I actually was pretty lucky. My first year of school, I became good friends with someone that was just like lived in my dorm hallway or whatever and then she ended up being in the same major as me and we kind of stuck together the whole rest of college and scheduled all our classes together. Not that I couldn't have done it being the only girl, but it definitely helped having like a friend in general that was also a woman to kind of stick with throughout school. And then in my career, it really hasn't been that big of a deal I would say. It was a little intimidating at first, I think maybe just being a beginner in the field in general, not only just a woman. But as you get more comfortable and more experience, I think it's less intimidating and was easier. You realize everyone's nice out there for the most part. You always have a difficult person here or there, but there's plenty of people that helped me along the way and it really wasn't that big of a deal or that intimidating once I got into it. I can completely relate to that. While I was in college, I had this best friend who was in agricultural engineering. That was what she majored in and there were just four girls in our class. And so our first class, I remember she begged me to go with her because she was wondering what would be like being the only girl. And so yeah, I mean she survived and she graduated. She spent five years in the program, but I know how challenging it was for her. So thank you so much for sharing that. At this point, I'd like you to please tell us a little bit about the job you do and the organization you work with. Sure. So my company is called HBK Engineering. We are a consulting utility engineering firm. So we work in the power sector, gas, telecom, water. Specifically, I'm in the power sector of our company. So my main job, I guess, or my main projects that I work on are with ComEd, which is the electric utility here in Chicago. So we work on distribution designs for ComEd. So we are an engineer of choice for them, which is an EOC, they call it. So we are one of three engineering firms that they consider their like top three contractors to contract out that engineering work that they don't have time for. So that must be really fulfilling. So just out of curiosity, you did mention that your organization is involved in a lot of different sectors. So I'm just wondering, do you guys have rotations? Do you work with strictly the power sector, or do you have to do a bit of power sector this week and a little bit of gas the next week? Oh, yeah, that's a really good question for me. Since I'm an electrical engineer, I kind of stay within that power group. All those projects are more related to like my background. But I would say there are some of our civil engineers that would kind of dive into different groups because that civil engineering is more worked on like under the ground. So that could be, there could be underground power that they work on or water or gas and things like that. So yeah, me specifically, I stick with the power stuff, but there are others who get to kind of bounce around more. Can I jump in with a quick question about the projects you do, about what kind of design work you do? So, you know, I live just a few houses away from big power lines that transverse like the suburbs. And especially when I'm riding my bike, I can see where those power lines go from miles in every direction. And by miles, I mean tens of miles in every direction. And then I'm also partially as a result of the bike riding experience, I see these power substations all over the place. And then of course, you know, somehow power gets into each of our buildings, right? Into a school, into our homes, into apartment buildings, other businesses. What elements of design, like which of the stages, and we've had a nuclear power plant engineer on our series as well. So, you know, there's that end of the power generation too, and how you get power from the nuclear power plant out to the rest of the grid. Where does your work tend to fall along that whole spectrum of power travel? That's a really good question. And that's one of the cool things that I didn't even understand fully before even going to school for engineering, just how that power gets to your home or your business. So I'm on the distribution side. If I were to explain it super super quickly, the power would be generated and then travel along those big transmission lines that you mentioned that are typically along like bike paths or highways. Those are those big steel structures that you would see. So that's very high voltages that travel along those transmission lines to substations. And there the voltages transform down to distribution level voltages, which is my space. And so those would be what you would see like the wood, smaller wooden poles you would see in alleys or along the sides of the roads. There's also underground as well. So that distribution space basically from the substation to the transformers that bring power into your home is kind of my area. So that's 34 KV and 12 KV that those are the voltages I work with. And then projects, it could be anywhere from new business and your business coming in and we have to figure out how to get them the power that they need system improvements. So there's a lot of like smart switches that go in. It's like radio so we can talk to each other and automatically switch things on or off during power outages and stuff like that. Grid resiliency so strengthening the system if there's storms and things like that. So all kind of things to improve upon the electrical system. Cool. Thanks. That's really interesting. Yeah, yeah, that's a great answer. So I know with the pandemic yet a lot of jobs have been impacted. Not positively and negatively for some people. You know, some people enjoy working from home. So my question is, how's this, how's the pandemic? How's that influenced or how's that? Well, how's that influenced your job or the working style you have at your organization? Sure. Yeah, we've I've actually been been super fortunate. I know a lot of people have lost their jobs throughout all this and the utility industry is not going anywhere. So fortunately for us, we've all we've all had jobs we're actually hiring like crazy right now. So people still need their power and that keeps me working. As far as my day to day, though, yeah, we are all working from home now. At first it was a little bit of a transition, but I have gotten used to it and enjoy it now. I sort of miss being in the office sometimes just like joking around with people and being face to face. But yeah, we've we've been able to adjust pretty well and work together through through teams like this or screen sharing and make it make it work with what we have. So I mean, I think we've done a pretty good job of of adjusting. To be honest, I think everybody has had to do a good job with adjusting because I personally would never sign up for an online class. You know, I just I just couldn't stand them. I just felt like I want to be in class, you know, talk to my classmates and interact with everybody. But I pretty much had to adjust to that because that's the only option we have. And I've been doing really good at it. So I say I say we've all had to adjust at some points. Um, you mentioned employing you guys have been employing like crazy, you know, because of the pandemic. So if you were to employ somebody who will say fresh out of college, what qualities or what skills would you be looking for in this person? Um, sure. So so coming right out of school, we don't really expect anybody to kind of know anything really. I mean, you have those basic the basics that you learned in school, but pretty much everything that we do for our job. Now you're going to learn on the job. So we typically just kind of look for for people that are going to fit like our culture and and that we think we would work well with. I would say skills to have would be like good problem problem solving skills, having like a questioning attitude. I'm always a little concerned when newer people have no questions. You know, it's something that we've never done before. Like, you should have a lot of questions. And then communication skills, we do have to work with clients or contractors like people, the construction guys in the field sometimes will call you with questions. So so we look for people who who can communicate well with others on our team and like external team. So yeah, just just if we get get like a good feel for you, if you think you're going to fit in and and work well with the team. How would you describe the culture of your of your workplace environment? I would say it's pretty laid back. I guess that's the best word. But I have have worked at other places where it was a little more like serious and things like that. We do have a lot of a big younger group of people. We do a lot of like fun events, social stuff as well as you know, working hard at actual projects. So yeah, I would say we're fun, but we're also very, very, very hardworking at the same time. I want to know, how do you think the culture of your organization has improved productivity for like members of staff? Yeah, that definitely is a big thing that that keeps me at at my job. I mean, I like I like the work that I do as far as the engineering side of it, but the people that I work with are a big reason of like why I stick around to. I think it really helps to have people that you like and respect that you have to work with and every single day. I completely agree with you. I'll just say to Jason think last week was telling me how important work life balance is to me and whatever organization at end of the. It has to be really big and work life balance. So I'm glad your organization put stats into consideration. So my next question to you would be what do you enjoy most about your job? I would say just just the whole idea of being able to understand how how power gets to your house and then like everything that that goes into making those projects happen. So there's a lot of I guess you could say behind the scenes type of stuff that that we do that maybe not everyone's aware of. So it's the understanding how that power gets to in the first place and then also as far as the projects go. There's like pre design work that we do we would go look at stuff out in the field and then we'll take take that information back to the design from the office. And then there's a lot of like permitting things that are involved in real estate needs to make sure we have the rights to be where we are to do certain types of work and stuff like that. So I guess yeah just in general understanding how that whole process works from like start to finish. So in a normal five day week how often are you out in the field looking at sites and how often are you well and then is there. Are those the two places you are in the field and and then working in the office previously at home right now etc on what you've learned from the site and doing the design work. Because those are two main settings and how often are you in the field. Yeah that's a good question yeah it's those are the two main settings and it depends on the project I would say maybe like once a week at the most in the field and the rest is in the office it sort of depends on how big the project is. So if you're going to have a bunch of smaller projects you're going to have to be out there more a longer bigger project maybe you're going out there at the beginning of the design take a couple months and design and then go back out at the end. So yeah it's it's kind of maybe 20% in field. What and what's the the most interesting you don't have to be specific if you know we're not asking you to disclose a client or anything. Maybe the most interesting setting in the field you've been in or experience you've had in the field because it's a lot different than being in the office all the time. Yeah for sure. It might be exciting to me but like I think going into substations is really cool and seeing all of the different electrical equipment and how all of that works. And a lot of the locations in the city can be really interesting. You know if you're out in the cornfields it's kind of just like a pole or along the side of the road. But in the city there's a lot more challenges as far as being in an alley there's a piece of equipment on every single pole and like figuring out how you're going to fit in this new thing that you need to do and stuff like that. So yeah. And so in that kind of work I'd imagine you've also had some projects where you had to work around some some stuff that's been there for a long time and that that might present some challenges or maybe not I don't know. Yeah for sure we we also have to do some underground stuff I haven't done this for a while actually but they get into manholes and look at all of all of the underground cable and that like you said a lot of old stuff so you're dealing with like lead cable. Trying to get rid of but you have to be really careful and just don't touch anything and make sure you're like up to date with all of your like safety classes and stuff like that. So that's maybe not the most glamorous thing I could be doing out in the field is dirty and wet usually but I think still kind of cool to see that kind of stuff too. That's awesome. So while you guys were talking something popped into my head is you clearly enjoyed what you do. Yeah. And I'm just curious when did you at what point did you realize this is what I want to do what shaped your interest what are things that actually contributed to you deciding hey I do want to be an electrical engineer you know. Yeah so in like back in high school when I was trying to decide what to go to college for I think I was just always good at math and science and I had an advisor who was actually also my swim coach that was like you should do engineering and I was like OK I'll try it. So I kind of just listened to him I really respected him and maybe was a little scared of him too. I was like OK I'll try this and then just stuck with it and then honestly through through college I didn't always love all my classes is there's a lot of more like electronics types engineering that we learned in school that I was into. And then I ended up being through like an internship that I got in college that was doing more of this like power design and auto CAD drawings and I was like OK I like this you know and that kind of made me realize like I'm OK with sticking with with this thing in school and I'm going to like the job I get. And so yeah I did more like building design types up before my current job and then switch into utilities which I've been really enjoying. Sounds awesome so I'd say that I mean to perhaps be successful in this kind of career you probably need to be good with numbers would you agree with me on that. Yeah I would say so definitely first school to get through that a lot of once once you get to your job there's a lot of like. Calculators we can use their tools I guess so we're not like sitting here by hand doing math or anything for my job but you do you do need to understand the background. The basics of those engineering like things you learned in school to kind of like pick things up I guess quicker at your job. So you know I was thinking before we got on this call I'm growing up I mean I'm from a path of the world where there's still a lot of gender roles and things like that. And so while I was growing up my dad well I've got two brothers and one sister I remember my dad but my brother's two bicycles and both my sister and I jump ropes right. And and I just made me think what if my dad bought me a bicycle do you think someday perhaps my bicycle that stopped working and I've been curious to see. Hey why is my bicycle not working and that might have sparked an interest in mechanical engineering or some kind of engineering you know. And so it's making me like think right now what would you say to I mean I am hoping that there will be parents out there who will be watching this what would you say to parents like my parents. About encouraging their kids or like the female kids to you know just basically giving them the same opportunities you know what do you think about situations like that. Yeah I think it's really important right now like the STEM fields in general are are tough to get any kid interested in and girls. But if you I guess notice that that your kid is at all interested in how things work or or how to figure something out you know like a puzzle or things like that like they have they have those those skills already and to I guess try to make it fun. You know to keep to keep kids interested in it and talk to people like me or whoever if we could at all like excite people with that because that's that's the first thing I think just getting them that first step like excited about it and involved and then to stick with it. Thank you so much for sharing that my last question to you would be how do you think your job as a engineer makes the world a better place. This is a very tricky one and we just ask everybody we have on the show. Yeah I think I like I mean getting people electricity is needed it's a necessity now right it's not even. I guess it's making the world better but I mean if we don't have it it's not we're not going to get through get through our days anymore. I think making those improvements on those electrical systems that we all need is is super important and. A big positive impact I would say on the world. You know I completely agree with you because I'm from Nigeria by the way and. But so far we don't have constant electricity like we don't have two for seven electricity and I'm just thinking if we supported more girls to get involved in stem and more younger people to get involved in stem. Maybe this younger generations would actually be dedicated to their work and get us out of this phase that we're in and into like you know where there's constant electricity so yes I do agree that your job as an electrical engineer, especially in places without constant electricity goes a long way. You're making the world a better place so thank you so much for doing this with us. That's all the questions I had for Kora if you have any pain. This was this was awesome it is incredibly important I mean certainly we wouldn't function in this home right now without electricity with two high school students as we're recording this in class using electricity I'm using electricity and. And obviously there's a lot of challenges for us with making sure that we're doing it moving forward in a way that conserves our resources and takes advantage of renewable resources as well so. To your point earlier I think that for students watching this there is going to continue to be an enormous amount of opportunity to engage in in lucrative well paying jobs that are fun and interesting as you've described. And, and that can make the world a better place. And so, so thank you for not only being with us today but for what you're doing every day and for sharing with us today we really appreciate it. No problem thank you you hit a spot on there. Thank you so much. Thank you. For those of you watching, please connect with us on Twitter if you have ideas for guests for a show or careers that you would like to see featured that you have questions about you can connect with us at p20 p20 network on Twitter or on our website p20network.niu.edu. And thank you so much we'll be back with more episodes.