I didn't start out wanting to be a Leader of Geeks. For most of my formative years, I was absolutely convinced that I was going to be a college professor at a research institution. One of my role models did exactly that, and I desperately wanted to be her or have a job like hers. I was a big nerd, so I had a chance.
So I concentrated in sciences in high school, and joined every non-sports club imaginable. I got bored, so I decided that I didn't need to take a senior year and applied to 5 different colleges (got into 3). I went to MIT when I was 17, and still don't have a high school diploma. Or a GED. I'm a high school drop-out, believe it or not.
At MIT, I became a biology major (minor in writing!), and set my sights on a Ph.D. in protein biochemistry. Then I actually worked in a lab and couldn't stand the isolation of the research environment. As my sister (who is a newly-minted Ph.D. in biomedical engineering) says, I would have made a great principal investigator but a really crummy grad student. I graduated with my B.S. and had no idea what to do.
I became a really lousy medical secretary. Hey, it made more than being a lousy lab tech, and it allowed me to figure out whether to go to medical school. Well, in theory, anyhow. I applied to medical school and figured out during the interview process that I really didn't want to actually be a doctor. (Wish I'd figured that out BEFORE spending all the cash on flying all over the country.)
There was no reason to continue being a lousy medical secretary if I had no future in the field, so I circulated my resume. I was hired as a Computer Training Specialist because I had taught and been a TA in a few classes at MIT, and my boss's husband had a degree from there, too. I flew all over the country and taught social workers how to use Windows 95 and WordPerfect 7. Turns out I was also a lousy trainer--I don't like repeating myself, so it didn't work well. When no one would show up to my classes, I followed the network guy around. The roll-out ended, and I got bored.
That's when I ended up at Burns & Levinson as the Applications Specialist. Finally, something I could do and NOT be lousy! While I was at Burns, Donovan Hatem split off and became its own firm. One day, one of the partners at Donovan Hatem called me into his office, and asked me to sit down and close the door--quite surprising, since I figured he wanted me to fix his Treo. He asked, "Where could you see yourself at Donovan Hatem?"
I thought for a moment and said, "I could be your IT Director."
Six months of negotiation later, I was. I was a 28-year-old leader of geeks, and I got to start a new technology department from scratch. I'm now on my 2nd IT Director position (at Morrison Mahoney), and I have to say that, even on bad days when the systems crash, I love what I do. Oh, and it turns out that I'm not a lousy IT Director--go figure.
So I concentrated in sciences in high school, and joined every non-sports club imaginable. I got bored, so I decided that I didn't need to take a senior year and applied to 5 different colleges (got into 3). I went to MIT when I was 17, and still don't have a high school diploma. Or a GED. I'm a high school drop-out, believe it or not.
At MIT, I became a biology major (minor in writing!), and set my sights on a Ph.D. in protein biochemistry. Then I actually worked in a lab and couldn't stand the isolation of the research environment. As my sister (who is a newly-minted Ph.D. in biomedical engineering) says, I would have made a great principal investigator but a really crummy grad student. I graduated with my B.S. and had no idea what to do.
I became a really lousy medical secretary. Hey, it made more than being a lousy lab tech, and it allowed me to figure out whether to go to medical school. Well, in theory, anyhow. I applied to medical school and figured out during the interview process that I really didn't want to actually be a doctor. (Wish I'd figured that out BEFORE spending all the cash on flying all over the country.)
There was no reason to continue being a lousy medical secretary if I had no future in the field, so I circulated my resume. I was hired as a Computer Training Specialist because I had taught and been a TA in a few classes at MIT, and my boss's husband had a degree from there, too. I flew all over the country and taught social workers how to use Windows 95 and WordPerfect 7. Turns out I was also a lousy trainer--I don't like repeating myself, so it didn't work well. When no one would show up to my classes, I followed the network guy around. The roll-out ended, and I got bored.
That's when I ended up at Burns & Levinson as the Applications Specialist. Finally, something I could do and NOT be lousy! While I was at Burns, Donovan Hatem split off and became its own firm. One day, one of the partners at Donovan Hatem called me into his office, and asked me to sit down and close the door--quite surprising, since I figured he wanted me to fix his Treo. He asked, "Where could you see yourself at Donovan Hatem?"
I thought for a moment and said, "I could be your IT Director."
Six months of negotiation later, I was. I was a 28-year-old leader of geeks, and I got to start a new technology department from scratch. I'm now on my 2nd IT Director position (at Morrison Mahoney), and I have to say that, even on bad days when the systems crash, I love what I do. Oh, and it turns out that I'm not a lousy IT Director--go figure.
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