01. Introductions and a Sneak Peak

Hello, hello, I'm Tiffany and I am so excited to launch my brand new podcast how to be a STEMinist. In this first episode, I'll be sharing what my definition of a STEMinist is why I'm starting this podcast and a little sneak peek into what you can expect from the show.

You'll also learn a little bit about me and the struggles I had to overcome as a woman in STEM.

This is the How to be a STEMinist podcast. I'm your host Tiffany, of proud women in STEM. To me, being a STEMinist means creating a wildly fulfilling career without compromising your family's social life. Because when you love your whole life, you become a living example that a career in STEM is where it's at.

I'm on a mission to equip women in STEM around the world with strategies to

take back control of their career progression. navigate those difficult and awkward gender equality issues, and stop balancing work life and start enjoying it.

If you want to learn all the things no one else teaches you about being a woman instead, you've come to the right place. Let's get stuck in.

I'm gonna start off by telling you just how excited I am to be hosting my very own podcast. For those of you who follow me on any of my social media accounts, you'll know that I am a sucker for a good podcast so this is an absolute dream come true.

Firstly, a little bit about myself if you've not met me before, my name is Tiffany Dawson and I am super passionate about helping women in STEM so science, technology, engineering and maths. women in STEM to create their dream careers and you'll learn about Little bit about why that is today.

But going back even further, who am I, I am from Melbourne, Australia. I lived there for most of my life. I was actually born in Hong Kong spent the first I think eight months of my life there so it's not a big memory of mine. And now I live in Bristol in the UK. So I have parts of my heart all over the world. Now I have been told by friends that I sometimes slip into this weird half Australian half English accent, which I'm highly embarrassed about. So if you ever hear any of that in future podcast episodes, please don't tell me about it.

Okay, so this episode, I'll be talking about what a STEMinist is, well, my definition of a STEMinist anyway, the reason I started this podcast

And a sneak peek into what future episodes are going to be about at the very end. So let's start off with what is a stem honest, he may or may not have heard this word before, but I guess it's an amalgamation of STEM and STEMinist pretty clever and I cannot take credit for that myself. But so stem stands for science, technology, engineering and maths

is something that I'm really passionate about because I spent the first eight years of my career as an engineer. So I guess being a STEMinist is someone who advocates for equality in STEM for both men and women. I think that's a really important distinction to make. As feminist to me, is someone who accepts that everyone is trying to do their best with the information that they have at hand. So when they witness gender inequality

They don't go around telling people off and hating them. What they do is they educate with the information that they do have. So, as a feminist, I never partake in any sort of men shaming. And in fact, I think it's so important that feminists who uplift men as well, because if we're going to change, achieve real equality, we need to uplift both men and women.

So there are three main reasons I started this podcast. The first is, I know how challenging it is to be a woman in STEM, but I also know how to make it a little easier. So as I mentioned before, I worked as a mechanical engineer for about eight years in the construction industry, and that was across Australia and the UK. And this is a job where I designed heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems.

For all sorts of exciting buildings, I think my biggest brag worthy building project was the Stonehenge visitors centre. So if you've ever been there, and you notice how onpoint the room temperature was, when you were in that space, you can thank me for that.

It's a bit of an interesting job because as an H HVAC engineer, the way that you know you've done a good job is if people don't notice your work, so if someone walks into a room and doesn't feel too cold or too warm, you've done your job well.

Anyway, I got to work on heaps of exciting buildings. But I was often the only woman in the room and I didn't have a whole lot of accessible female role models to look up to.

In fact, it actually seemed like the number of female caller I did have were diminishing by the year. I kept watching all these brilliant women leave their STEM careers. And if my managers were really honest about it, I reckon they probably could have seen the cracks forming a long time before each of them left.

So personally, for me, cracks would definitely starting to form in my own STEM career. While I started as a super enthusiastic grad, my confidence and passion for my job was plummeting by the year. I just felt like no matter how hard I tried, both technically and socially, I just couldn't keep up with my peers.

I didn't actually make the connection until much later on that all my peers were male.

The more senior I became, the more incompetent I felt. So I would overcompensate for my I guess perceived lack of ability by working longer and harder.

I'd say I managed to hide this from my colleagues and managers pretty well. So most of them probably didn't know at all that I was feeling this way. I just kept plugging along, hoping that if I progressed to the next level, then I'd finally feel like I knew what I was doing. Just a bit of a spoiler alert, that strategy never worked for me.

My coping strategy for most stressful, stressful situations in my life, is to pretend that it's not happening.

So I ignored all of the signs of burnout. I would get to work super early, leave late. There were days when I was in the office where I didn't have time to eat lunch or even go to the toilet. How terrible is that? work was just always on my mind.

And even when I was home, I'd often wake up in the middle of the night thinking about a task I didn't complete that day. That was so much so that I actually kept a notepad by my bedside table. So I could add to my to do list during the night. I don't know if any of you have done that before. But now that I look back on it, it's not healthy.

I will just constantly felt like my heart was pounding out of my chest and I couldn't control it. Worst of all, I saved up all of my bad energy to unleash on the people I love the most when I came home from work. I actually can't believe my husband put up with my attitude during that period of time. I still feel really, really awful about it. The point is that I really felt like I was massively failing at work and failing At home, it was a really awful feeling. I believed that I was disappointing my colleagues because I thought I wasn't as good as what they expected me to be. I definitely was disappointing my husband because I always put work before him. I even felt like I was disappointing my two dogs because I just didn't have the time or energy to walk and play with them as often as they'd like.

And even with my parents, so I went to my parents house for Sunday dinner every week, and I'd spend that whole time complaining about work to them. They must have been so sick of hearing my complaints even bailed on lots of social gatherings because I was either working late or on the weekends, or I was just tired and stressed and just couldn't muster up energy to go.

All of this contributed to my self loathing, and I finally hit rock bottom.

I remember there was a morning on the way to work. I remember this so clearly Actually,

I just spontaneously burst into tears. Luckily, we travelled to work, Vikas. And my husband was driving, and I was in the passenger seat. But I was crying because the smallest thing I had forgotten to organise what our summer intern was going to do that morning, and I suddenly felt the weight of the whole world on my shoulders.

Now, I don't cry that often. And so crying about something so trivial, was a big thing. Like my best friends tell me that I've got a heart of stone because if we watch a sad movie or TV show scene together, I never cry. So for me to cry about something so small, I knew my body was telling me something was seriously wrong. That was a real turning point for me.

It suddenly just made me stop in my tracks to think, why am I working so hard? If I'm literally getting zero enjoyment out of life. Shortly after this breakdown, I was really lucky. I was selected to attend a women's group workshop for high performing women in the business. It really came at the right time for me. And that was where I finally led that. Well, a couple of things really. So firstly, that it wasn't my fault that I couldn't keep up with my male peers. Secondly, that confidence wasn't just something that people were born with. It was something that I could develop for myself and I could choose to craft a career I enjoy.

So this sparked this massive self discovery journey for me and I managed to turn down the volume of that main voice in my head that kept telling me I was useless. And that meant I could finally respect myself enough to set boundaries at work. So it didn't take over my whole life. I started making time for the people and dogs who I loved the most. And I finally felt like me again, I finally felt free and that I was back in control of my career and my whole life.

For those of you who know me, you'll know that I am an absolute sucker for recommending all good things to my family and friends. This goes for podcasts, books, movies, products, the newest shampoo that I've tried anything at all. So when I found these kind of life changing things that I could do for myself, I had to recommend them to my friends and family and colleagues as well. So I would sit them all down, teach them all the ways they could create a life worth living andI even started to gravitate towards those roles at work. So I moved towards some more line management roles and leadership roles in my engineering work, so that I could help more people reach their own career goals.

Now, this is this was all done because of completely selfish reasons. I just loved doing it. It felt so rewarding to see the difference I could help make to these people's lives. I realised that if we actually want more women to stay in their STEM careers, they all need to learn what I did, which is how to create a wildly fulfilling career without compromising their family or social lives.

I became so passionate about this, that I ended up leaving my engineering role in order to do this full time. So I now work with women in STEM across the world to help them achieve this. And on the other side, I also work with STEM businesses to teach them how to create more female friendly workplaces.

Okay, so that was a really long first reason as to why I'm making this podcast. I can promise you that reasons two and three are a little shorter than that. So let's dive into those. So the second reason I'm making this podcast is because we need more stem analysts. right at this moment, men grossly outnumber the women in STEM. The worst performing field is in fact my home field, which is engineering with only 10.3% female representation in the UK.

You think, okay, it's 2020. We've been working at this cause for ages now. So, you know, we must have made a massive change right already. But the fact is, if you look at the historical figures, We haven't really improved that much. And I can assure you that this isn't just going to sell sort itself out in the future. We need more stimulus to get on board and help drive a positive impact. So I want listeners of this podcast to help spread the word about what is feminist is and how to be one. So if you're willing to help me on this mission, I would love to know about it. So please get in contact with me and tell me, I'll let you know how to do that towards the end of this episode.

So if you've managed to make it this far into the podcast, then you've probably decided, yes, sign me up. I want to be a feminist. But you might also be asking, How do I actually do that? Well, don't worry, I've got you. The third and final reason I started this podcast was because I wanted to create an easily accessible resource for vemales feminists to learn what they can do to advocate for equality in STEM.

It's actually pretty simple. The best way for a woman in STEM to be a feminist is to have a job and lifestyle that other women dream to have. So this podcast will teach you how to take back control of your own career progression, navigate those really tricky and awkward gender equality issues, and to stop balancing work with life and start enjoying it.

That's right, other women are going to look at your life and get a massive case of FOMO because they want in on your STEM career. By looking after yourself, you're actually encouraging more women to be interested in STEM. Now that's a win win if I've ever heard one. I hope that gives you a taste for what a STEMI list is. why I'm so passionate about helping women in STEM create careers they love and what you'll learn from this podcast.

Now, I haven't forgotten, I did promise you a sneak peek of what future episodes are going to be about. So here are just a few. The next episode will be about why you don't need a mentor. I know I've probably gone a little bit controversial pretty early on in this podcast, but I did promise you that I would teach you all the things that other people aren't teaching you about how to be a woman instead. And so next episode why you don't need a mentor. future episodes as well will include why gender inequality still exists in STEM today, how to land a job that doesn't suck. The strategy I use to overcome impostor syndrome, how to have difficult conversations and so much more.

The first 10 episodes are just going to be solar apps. So just me talking to you. And in the next 10 episodes, I will also be alternating with interviews with industry leaders from around the world. So these will be people who either work in STEM industries or have knowledge and expertise in things that might actually help us women in STEM thrive even more. So if you want to be notified about when my next episode is being released, then hit the big subscribe button now. You'll forget to do it later. So do it right now. And to all the feminists who want to join me on my mission to reach gender equality in STEM. I would love to hear from you. If you have any feedback or suggestions of what you want to get out of this podcast. Just let me know.

Now you might be thinking yeah, yeah, podcast hosts are always asking people to get in contact with them. And they don't mean really mean it. But I really mean it, I really want to hear from you. So if you have a suggestion, or you just want to say, Hey, I listened to your podcast, maybe you can make this the very first time you actually do it, I would absolutely love that. So the best way to find out how to get in contact with me is really just to visit my website. All my details are there. And it's pretty simple. It is www.Tiffanydawson.com.

Or you can leave me a review via your favourite podcast app, whatever is easiest.

I'll be releasing episodes two and three at the same time as this first episode. So go ahead and download those as well. So you can tune in whenever you've got a spare moment. I can't wait to meet you at the next episode. And until then, take care