Meet our panelists! we are hosting a “To Pivot or Not to Pivot” panel discussion, with speakers from a variety of industries and with diverse experiences. Panelists will share lessons learned and insights from navigating their pivots (or decisions not to pivot) and recommendations on how to create a solid support system to achieve your goals.
- Michelle Carlen -
Panelist
Michelle leverages over 25 years of expertise in hospitality, tourism, and property management to produce value-added results for her clients, including impactful and sustainable strategies, improvements in organizational development, executive presence and communication skills, robust growth cycles and bottom line, and positive growth mindsets.
Michelle is an energetic professional business and career coach, trainer, and facilitator who has worked with hundreds of clients including organization executives, business owners, entrepreneurs, employees, and job seekers. Before joining WEV as an instructor, Michelle had been familiar with the organization and admired its work.
- Julia StewarT Lowndes -
Panelist
Julia Stewart Lowndes, PhD is a marine ecologist working at the intersection of actionable environmental science, data science, and open science. Julia’s main focus is mentoring teams to develop technical and leadership mindsets and skills for data-intensive research, grounded in climate solutions, inclusion, and kindness. She founded Openscapes in 2018 as a Mozilla Fellow and Senior Fellow at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) at UCSB, having earned her PhD from Stanford University in 2012 studying drivers and impacts of Humboldt squid in a changing climate.
- Christina Hamilton -
Panelist
Christina Hamilton is a software engineer at Invoca. After 6 years as a content marketing professional, she enrolled in UCLA's Full Stack Web Development Bootcamp and entered the computer science industry as a quality assurance engineer, before transitioning to software development. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from UC Santa Barbara.
- DEBRA COOK -
Panelist
Debra Cook has a BS in Physics from Humboldt State University and an MS in Physics from University of Washington. She worked in nanotechnology for 20 years (scanning probe microscopy and nanoscale infrared spectroscopy) as an applications scientist and R&D applications manager. Her first career pivot was changing from full time to part-time/contract work when she had children. Her second career pivot four years ago was changing to a new role in a new field, design verification engineering in the medical device industry.
- ROWSHAN RIMA -
Panelist
Hi, I’m Rowshan Rima. I have a master’s in mechanical engineering from University of South Carolina-Columbia, and currently working as a Design Verification Engineer in Karl-Storz. My professional passion lies in conducting research and finding innovative solutions to complex problems. My pivotal moment was when I made the decision to become the primary caregiver for my daughter, and I’ve had the privilege of staying with her for the first 5 years of her life.
In my free time, you can often find me travelling, and taking photographs. I am excited about personal and professional growth, both within the company and as a parent to my daughter.
- RASHI BAHRI -
Panelist
Bio coming soon!
