Silicon Valley Internships and Wesleyan

Bhaskar Ghosh, P’20Tech Exec, Investor, Advisor

Silicon Valley?

BG P’20

Yale CS PhD ‘95

Wrote lots of (database) software

Built, grew, and led tech and product teams

Staying engaged: Products, Investing, Advising

Outcome

Q&A: Throughout + End

Students become curious about Tech related changes outside New skills Cultural learnings

Be a part of Wesleyan’s growing relationship with tech and SV

Stuff to Cover

Tech, Software, and You!

NCG and Internships in SV

Tech and Non-Tech Roles

Skill Building

Where to look?

Entrepreneurship Culture

Beyond Wesleyan

Tech and Software

Two drivers of change: Globalization and Technology

Integral to business, work and play

Interactions and complex sharing through mobile, online

Rapid growth, changes

New business models (e.g. On-Demand, Networks), Data/AI

The ”On-Demand” Phenomenon

Response to inefficiency of taxi monopoly

Supply side: unutilized time and cars

4 key tech building blocks: Cloud, Big-Data, Mobile, Payments

Platforms (DoorDash, Thumbtack, …)

Quick tour of SV

To convince yourself of what the crazy kitchen of this disruption looks like.

Fly to SFO, and drive 45 miles on Rt. 101 from San Francisco to San Jose

Tech, Software and You

Current 18-25 year-olds as well as next generation will constitute 75% of global workforce by 2025

How these generations learn, adapt, work will be different from previous generations’

Some Quotes

“Software is eating the world.” – Marc Andreessen

“Finding happiness in work is a combination of calculation and serendipity” – Clayton Christensen

"Dime con quién andas, y te diré quién eres.” – Spanish Proverb

"Technology [driven] companies are not just for tech-nerds.” -- Anonymous

Some Quotes. Some Implications

“Software is eating the world.” Affects what one works towards?

“Finding happiness in work is a combination of calculation and serendipity” The calculation part can be worked on.

Show me who you walk with and I’ll tell you who you are Network! Wisely.

Technology (driven) companies are not just for tech nerds. A business needs a lot beyond coding to run

But… internships?

Internship is an exploration

Learning: culture, teamwork, impact

Rapidly build new skills, hone familiar ones

Learn roles, develop interests

My NCG and Intern Experiences

LinkedIn, Nerdwallet SWE Programs

Which schools?

Career-Fairs and Hackathons Diversity initiatives Relationships and departmental

connections

Value to company

Value to students

Internships lead to roles

Two broad paths

Join a company

Be an entrepreneur

Tech Roles

Software Engineer

Product (UI/UX, FE, Mobile, BE) Infra, Mobile, Ops, Data, Security

Data Science and M/L Engineer

Analytics: Product, Marketing, Sales, Biz

Non-Tech Roles

Product Management (*) Design (User, Creative) Biz Operations (*) Product and Biz Strategy Digital Marketing (SEO, SEM)Analytics: Biz, Sales, Marketing,

Product [People Ops, Sales, Recruiting]

CriticalMid-large start-up, company Multi-disciplinary2/3 of roles

Non-Tech Roles (PM and Biz Ops)

Product Management

CEO of the product Leadership Domain expertise

Biz Operations and Strategy

Paths: Analyst, Consultant to BizOps Feeder into: Marketing, Product, Sales Mid to large sized companies

No coding! Lots of common skills across these roles Cross-Team Influencing, Communication, Data-driven, People skills

Preparing for these roles? Skills. Learning.

Non-Tech Majors

Data exploration Build a simple app Statistics (e.g. R, Stata) EQ, People Management, Interdisciplinary team-work

Wes: QAC, KAI Social Change through Tech, Patricelli Center

Preparing for these roles? Skills. Learning.

Tech Majors

Systems (e.g. databases) Mobile and Web FE Stats ML, D/M and AI Software Engg practices Building on public clouds

Where to Look?

Wesleyan Career Center and Speaker Series

Accelerators (e.g. 500S, YC, Hive, AngelPad) VC’s and Incubation funds (e.g. AngelList) Late stage start-ups (e.g. PLT, AB, U, P) Mid to large companies: (e.g. GOOG, FB, LNKD, GE) Hackathons, Conferences, Meet-ups, Piazza Civic Tech

Where to Look? Civic Tech

Growing grass-roots efforts with Social Movement bent Top Goals: Government transparency, Open Data SF, NYC, DC, and more!

Models: Centralized e.g. Code for America De-centralized e.g. Open Oakland, Smart Chicago

Mostly (a) non-profit (b) for programmers (till now?) Wes students: (a) Entrepreneurship, (b) Internships

Govt

Civic Consc

Tech

Liberal Arts, as seen by Silicon Valley

SV beginning to recognize the fit between biz-product-leadership roles and multi-disciplinary ethos and creative drive from LAC students

LAC producing entrepreneurs. Causes mind-shift in SV.

MBA? Evolution: LAC students directly going to non-tech roles

SV Entrepreneurship and Growth Culture

Mature technology unleashes entrepreneurship

Tec and Non-tech founders alike (E.g. Airbnb, Pinterest).

Hyper-growth and rapid innovation becoming common.

Implications on personal values and group culture

Taking risk and right-till-proven-wrong

Scrappiness amidst adversity and lack of resources

Continuous learning (e.g. Tour of Duty)

Wesleyan and beyond

Caveat: What we talked about is not for everyone.

LAC provides unique strengths

(passion, skills, culture, people) > (career)

Amazing Wes examples: Wesleyan to Entrepreneurship?, Molly, Shivani, Jonathan

Looking Forward

Wesleyan Career Center, Events and Support Structures

I am here to help

You will find your passion as you learn, act and adapt.

Thank you!

Wesleyan: Jennifer O, Jim K, Nikhil, .. Palo Alto: Brinda, Milind, DD, Nerdwallet: Rajat, Geoff, Kelly, Yoni … and everyone else

Q&A