Materials Engineering Overview - Overview PDF - PowerPoint - Podcast

	1980 - BS Materials Engineering, Drexel University 1988-1990 - Post-graduate work towards a Ph.D. in Business Management, Rutgers University
	Plant Manager
	"I think the technical degree really gives you a quest to understand things. The business degree develops perspective and breadth and gives you more of a view that the world and organizations and problems are really systems -- and nothing is really independent."

"I think the technical degree really gives you a quest to understand things. Whether the understanding is a labor relations issue, whether the understanding is a cultural issue, whether the understanding is a failure of a part or how to put together a new design of product. It gives you really the quest for knowledge and understanding. So that's what the technical engineering education did. As well as give you the skills of mathematics and science and learning the first principles of how to solve technical problems. But it really gives you the quest for knowledge. So that was the technical degree. The business degree develops perspective and breadth and gives you more of a view that the world and organizations and problems are really systems -- and nothing is really independent. So I think that business education gave me that perspective. The exciting thing about all that is that it really comes to reality when you're running an organization like a plant, which is one big human and technical interacting system."

"Being a woman coming into the U.K. was a very interesting experience. A lot of people were concerned and just questioned how -- how was this going to be accepted, since I was the first woman over there. There were, you know, two issues. The one is gender, you know, being the first woman -- and the second issue is being an American. Because even though we speak a similar language and it's not the same language, there are still many, many cultural differences and issues in what we believe, what our mental models are, how we behave -- so it's the two issues. The gender issue, it was easier being an American woman, than being a British woman, because the British have a preconceived notion that, you know, Americas are aggressive and Americans are frank, and so I think a lot of things on behavior -- it was more of: Well that's what you expect from an American versus a woman issue. So as far as I know, I have encountered no gender issues. I'm a curiosity, which is probably more of an advantage than a disadvantage. I get access to customers just because they're really curious to see who I am. So it's really easy to get meetings when I need to get a meeting, both internal and external, to Ford. So I really didn't experience any gender issues, to my face at all, and if they're not to my face, then I just don't have to deal with them, if they're not impacting what I try -- what I'm trying to get done. And they haven't."

Career Experience:

• 1995-Present: Ford Motor Company, Plant Manager, Enfield
  1994-1995: Ford Motor Company, Assistant Plant Manager, Saline
  1991-1994: Ford Motor Company, Quality Manager, Saline Plant
  1990-1991: Ford Motor Company, Marketing Manager

Download Full Profile as PDF