>> Narrator: Live from Orlando, Florida.
It's theCube.
Covering Grace Hopper's Celebration of Women In Computing.
Brought to you by, SiliconANGLE Media.
>> Welcome back to theCube's coverage
of the Grace Hopper conference here in Orlando, Florida.
I'm your host, Rebecca Knight.
We are joined by Raji Arasu,
she is the CTO of Development at Intuit.
And also, by Marianna Tessel.
She is the Chief Product Officer at Intuit.
So thank you both for joining us.
>> I think you got the title wrong.
>> Oh no!
(laughter)
Please correct me!
>> It's SVP.
>> SVP.
>> SVP of our organization is called CTO Dev,
and I manage the platform
and infrastructure services for our...
>> Great.
>> So now we've got that under control.
>> Wonderful.
>> So tell a little bit about your background.
We'll start with you Raji,
how you got into this business.
>> I have been about 27 years in the
consumer and retail space.
And a ton of background on ecommerce and payments.
This actually my first job sort of focusing on
platform and core services for the company.
A huge responsibility, my job is not just
to provide and you know, delightful services
for both my internal and external customers.
But to really make sure that we are
really thinking about the future
and the capabilities that we're
building for the future.
So, super excited about my role at Intuit.
>> How about you, Marianna?
>> First of all, thanks for having me here.
>> Yes.
>> And I have to confess, this is my first time
at the Grace Hopper Conference.
>> That's wonderful!
That's, that's great!
>> And I'm completely blown away from
the wonderful people here and
the representation and the energy.
So, I'm now a fan.
So, anyway, just wanted to say that.
You know, my background has always been
engineering, I've done multiple engineering roles.
I actually, before this, I spent a lot of time
in systems and infrastructure
and I really get a kick right now
out of using some of the products I built.
And actually using them in other products.
And seeing how customers are using it.
So, that's an interesting kind of journey,
and interesting to see kind of full picture,
of kind of the industry.
>> Both of you, and we are here at Grace Hopper,
which is the celebration of women in computing.
And both of you are passionate about
creating a more inclusive engineering culture.
Can you talk about why,
why this is a passion project of yours.
And then also, what you're doing
to make, to help that happen.
Raji?
>> I think, I mean, Grace Hopper.
This is my seventh year in the conference and I love it.
>> So you're a veteran.
She's a virgin, you're a veteran.
>> I'm definitely a veteran, absolutely.
(laughter)
>> And I think it's such a joy because
it not only, I have started to
recognize some familiar faces.
It's a fantastic opportunity for us to network,
with women in technology, and talk about
actually, what's cool, is not just the issue
around fixing the numbers, but actually,
we talk about capabilities and
building, you know, what's really
important for our craft.
And so I'm actually excited about that.
The more and more I see, you know we have
about 112 people attending from Intuit.
And you know, a ton of men as well,
participating in that but a lot
of people are going to be talking
about things that are very core to us.
Like, data engineering, data science,
architecture, services-oriented journey,
and all of that which is awesome.
Because I think, that's what people want
to hear, the work that we do.
And they want to understand, what it
would be like to work at Intuit.
So, there's a ton of opportunity
for companies and for individuals
who work there to really show
what they do everyday.
And really connect in a very authentic way.
And show off their work.
More than actually be, you know,
really talking about the Uber problem
that many of us do care about that as well.
But I see, down here,
especially where we are sitting,
everybody's connecting on where they work,
what is the work that I'm going to do,
or what is the stuff that actually interests me.
Which I think is pretty cool.
>> During the keynote, Melinda Gates
had a very quotable quote and she said,
"Not every idea is wrapped in a hoodie,"
not every good idea is wrapped in a hoodie.
And this is really bemoaning the brogrammer culture.
Is that message getting through,
do you think, to young women?
In the sense of, this is not all
the sea of white dudes.
>> You know, I, I think it is but
there's still like work to do.
Both for like, women that enter the field,
as well as women that been here for, for awhile.
And, you know, there's still plenty of opportunity.
So, you know, the culture is definitely,
at least, I'll have to tell you that,
again, being
a bit in the industry now,
and gaining a bit of a perspective,
just the fact that it's being talked about
and the fact that there's more energy
towards solving it is already,
you know, a great win.
And, you know, to your question before,
if I can jump on that as well.
>> Knight: Yes! Absolutely.
>> You know, this whole idea of
diversity in the work place,
there is nothing, I don't know if
there's much to say there beyond
what's already said about how
it's good for businesses,
how the customers at many of the of,
I know definitely for us, in the small businesses,
a lot of our customers are diverse.
And we want to have diverse people
build product for our customers, right?
You know, so all of these are true,
it makes sense for the business.
But now I can tell you from my own lens,
and my own kind of perspective and experience,
you know, women are just awesome.
And they make like, outstanding engineers,
outstanding leaders, and every time
I have a group of, you know, that has
all sorts of people, again all kinds of diversity
it's just a stronger group.
So, some of it, you know, I love to have
a diverse team selfishly, because
it's an awesome team and that's kind
of what I think we should all be pursuing.
Just, be awesome, not just diverse.
>> So you're passionate about getting
more women into this industry,
keeping them, retaining them in the industry.
But, tell me a little bit about the tech.
I mean, because that is, that was obviously
your first love and that's why you do what you do.
So tell me about what you're working on
that's really exciting to you at Intuit.
>> I think, you know, as I look at my past,
one of the things that always excited me
is to work on complex stuff that actually
makes a difference in the world.
And it started fairly early on
in my career where I started to,
when I worked at eBay it was about
actually connecting to our customers
and sellers and having that sort of
a social impact.
Moving on to StubHub it was a lot about
actually entertainment and how do you
really get people to the game and that
perfect evening they were looking for.
And then moving on to Intuit,
it's about making that financial freedom
possible for many of our customers.
And I think when I look at that,
for Intuit, there's a huge opportunity.
Which we are actively working on is,
to start looking at our data and
be able to create some delightful
customer experiences for our people.
And to, to really give them more time
and more money at the end of the day.
And I think, and that sort of confidence
in our own products, about the decisions
we make for them and the expertise
that we provide, and so as part of that,
a lot of that can only come alive with technology.
So, when we start to look at that,
you know, there's a huge focus
within the company on building
great tools for developers so
they can move faster.
There's a huge focus on trying to do
AI and machine learning on our data
and looking at what we can do to personalize
our experiences for our customers and
reduce friction in the flow.
There's a ton of work that's being done there.
And I also think that we, we're very excited
about our journey to the cloud.
And having gone through the whole
services-oriented architecture,
re-architecture that we are being
embarked on for many years.
So, I think really, really there's
a ton of good work that's happening
inside with all towards the focus
of servicing the customer.
So there's a ton of conversations
that we have around customer empathy.
And then all of the technology
towards making the lives of our customers
better from a financial perspective.
>> And giving them back time and money as you said, yes.
Yes, absolutely.
>> If I can add, to that, like our
mission as a company is to power
prosperity around the world and
you know, and that's like a great mission.
But, as Raji was saying, it's even awesome
when you get to connect technology to a mission
that is really inspiring like this.
>> Knight: Yes.
>> And is really something we put in practice.
You know, I'll talk specifically
in one of my products, Quick Books Online, QBO.
You know, we have,
a lot of the problems that,
a lot of the challenges,
we shouldn't call them problems.
Challenges that many of the SAS companies
are facing in terms of scale,
in terms of velocity, how are we doing
DEV ops in the most modern way?
What's our CICD pipeline look like?
How do we use, we have all this great data,
how do we use the right data?
Because, obviously we want to respect privacy.
How do we use the right data to
giving even more value to our,
getting more value to our customers?
How do we apply machine learning and AI?
And, you know et cetera, to make it even
more interesting because we have
some touch with financial data.
There's a lot of view on security
and what we do there.
So, lots of problems to solve
that are deep technical problems.
Lots of modern technology.
Some that other, that you know,
we have to look at but you know,
really interesting set of challenges.
From all the way to, in close to
the infrastructure, all the way to the UI
and some really cool things that we're doing there.
>> I think that's a really great point,
and the fact that, you know, as
you're women technologists so you face
issues of biases and sexism in the industry.
But as technologists, as human technologists,
you face questions about, am I looking at
the right data, is this data secure,
am I doing enough around privacy?
Do you think that this conference
does enough to acknowledge both
sides of this coin in the sense that
you are technical leaders in your field
and you are here, at a tech conference,
but then you're also here to rally around
this issue of getting more women and
retaining more women in the industry?
What do you think?
>> I think, I think that I am in this,
in these booths here, I sense it.
I sense that we're talking about
the real problems around technology.
The conversations around the specialties
that are required in data science or
maybe architecture, maybe engineering.
I mean any parts of that,
we do have those conversations.
I think at the keynotes and maybe
at the higher level, it's a lot more
about developing women and addressing
the problem and probably building leadership.
So, there's probably two flavors
that you find in this conference.
Which I think cater to different
sets of women and some about staying in the field
and not sort of, you know,
dealing with the problems that we have.
So I think it does.
But I think it'd be awesome to have
a panel where we have very different
points of view on a technology,
and having a really good debate about that.
Which would be really cool I think,
if we had something like that.
I don't know if it's in our curriculum.
I'm definitely not aware of everything
in our curriculum but it would be cool
to have a panel like that.
>> I want to wrap up here but I want to ask,
what is your best advice for
aspiring women in this field?
And it could be someone who is
just starting her computer science journey
in college, or it could be someone who
maybe is feeling as though, do I stay
in this field, I don't know if this is for me.
What would you say to that young woman?
>> You know, again, maybe something that
she heard before, but I would say, you know,
go for it, stick with it, be ready to fall down.
And come back up and be ready,
be open-minded, know that you can learn anything.
And, you know, but stick with it.
>> Just stay, stick with it.
(laughter)
>> Yes, through hard and through easy.
>> I love that.
I mean, I want to definitely second
Marianna saying don't be afraid of failures.
Take it on, and use that as an opportunity
to convert that into success in the
next opportunity that you have.
I think the part that I would also say,
is protect being a leader in tech
and staying true to it.
You got to have a learning mindset.
Every single day you come in,
you got to learn new skills,
you have to open to change,
and constant change.
And if you learn, and every one of us
has different ways to learn.
You know, some of us learn through conversation,
some of us learn through reading papers,
whatever that might be.
But if you do that, you will stay
as a credible and relevant leader
for the longer run.
>> Knight: The growth mindset.
>> Absolutely.
>> Well Raji, Marianna, thank you so much for joining us.
It's been a lot of fun.
>> Thank you. >> Thanks for having us.
>> I'm Rebecca Knight, here at the Grace Hopper Conference,
we will have more, just after this.
(electronic music)