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What an unbelievable 5-day at the Grace Hopper Celebration!

I am proud to work for a company that is truly committed to fostering a culture of diversity and inclusion, giving employees professional development opportunities to succeed in their careers. This year, my business unit, System & Verification Group (SVG), is sending 150 women around the world to attend regional women-in-tech events.

Last week we had the chance to attend the Grace Hopper Celebration (GHC), which was the most exciting event for us. GHC was founded in 1994 in honor of Grace Hopper’s legacy and inspires future women in tech generations. The virtual celebration was held from Monday, September 27, to Friday, October 1, and provided opportunities for attendees to network with peers and mentors, and celebrate women in tech globally.

Cadence SVG women engineers spanning from the US, Brazil, India, Korea, and Israel joined this 5-day celebration. The GHC offered featured sessions, keynotes, on-demand content, networking lounges, track meetups, around 200+ sessions covering 15 tracks in Data Science, Artificial Intelligence, Software Engineering, Computer System Engineering, Hardware, Open Source, VR/AR/XR, Emerging Technology and more. The participants took the opportunities to hear from inspiring speakers, connect with peers and mentors, recognize the importance of diversity in tech, gain essential resources for professional development to succeed in the career.

This year’s theme is “Dare to Transform.” Being mindful of “Dare to be inspired,” “Dare to grow your career,” and “Dare to make connections,” we believe we can shape the future and continue creating the movement to build a world of inclusive technology.

We were fortunate to have amazing SVG women from the Project Management, Hardware, Software R&D and Customer Engagement domains share their experience at the GHC. Here’s what they have to say about this unforgettable conference.

Lois Lee, Customer Engagement, Korea

"I think it's really amazing to see people who are like me, who may have seen similar experiences and gone through similar challenges and to learn from that. I think the power is so incredible to really feel like I'm included and to really feel like I'm a part of a community that reflects and represents me."

Shruthi Yashavanth, R&D, US

“The talks were very informative and inspiring. Learning about an organization that uses art and creativity to encourage young girls to explore coding and listening to Haben Girma talk about how she views disability as an opportunity for innovation were some of the highlight moments for me. I also watched their informative on-demand videos streaming throughout the day. I learned about code refactoring using graph theory which I found to be very fascinating.”

Shu Wang, R&D, US

“The GHC was informative and inspiring, and I am so excited to have this opportunity to spend one week to learn, discuss, and celebrate with female professionals. The keynotes, features, and on-demand sessions allowed attendees to share their experiences, expertise, and opinions, allowing us to learn from different domains. These sessions showed me a different angle to think about the challenges or failures and made me excited to come out of my comfort zone to explore and improve. People everywhere get together with the same goals: to learn from each other, be inspired by each other, and empower each other. I was deeply touched and enlightened by them, believing that everything I learned from the past week will play an important role in my career path!”

Ayala Makmel, Program Management, Israel

“I would say GHC is an excellent opportunity for women in technology to inspire each other and learn of the latest and greatest in various technical domains. A thought about Cadence's presence and involvement is very important as all other major tech companies had a strong presence. Current and future engineers attend this conference and we can impress them early on with a strong presence. I was in one ‘networking’ session on HW where 4 out of 10 in the room were from Microsoft.”

Somya Bansal, R&D, India

“I consider myself fortunate enough to belong to an organization like Cadence which truly cares and supports their employees’ interests and growth. Recently, I got a chance to be a part of a prestigious virtual Grace Hopper Celebration 2021, the world’s largest gathering of women technologists. This was my very first experience interacting and learning with leaders of technology who are very passionate to help the women community excel in their careers. I am thrilled with this experience, just one of a kind!

Some things I walked away with are: “Does everyone have a seat at the table?” “Getting a seat is just the beginning.” “Tech is a force for good in the world.”

Luiza Trindade, Product Validation, Brazil

“I really appreciate the opportunity to participate in events aimed at women in technology given by SVG D&I initiative for us. The Grace Hopper Celebration was a great event with some meetups and sessions with diverse and important themes. The sessions I enjoyed the most were: Creating Accessible and Inclusive Digital Content: Best Practices and Examples presented by Dr. Elodie Fichet, Building Your Own Table: Making Strategic Moves in Your Career, presented by: Michelle Thompson-Dolberry and Minda Harts and So Fresh and So Clean, Clean: Eliminating Code Smells presented by: Hannah Reed and Lanae Blethen Kawa. I learned a lot from GHC21, some tips I received to eliminate code smells I am already using in my daily life while writing tests. I hope to participate in the next editions.”