Celebrating women engineers who #MakeSafetySeen

To celebrate this year's International Women in Engineering Day, power systems control company Fundamentals is celebrating the women on their team making an impact and who #MakeSafetySeen.

Here are their stories...

Elizabeth Macharia, AVR Product Manager – Elizabeth has a degree in in Electrical and Electronic Engineering and an MSc in Electrical Power Systems. She was inspired to pursue a career in engineering due to female role models Elizabeth has encountered throughout her training. She believes it is vitally important for women engineers to inspire other women.

Role: working with customers and colleagues on the continuous development of Fundamentals’ SuperTAPP SG automatic voltage controller and other AVR products, to ensure they meet the present and future needs of users, in a changing network environment.

Skills: Elizabeth has been a professional engineer for six years. She describes her work in AVR as ‘very much a partnership with customers’; listening to their feedback and keeping them up to date with new features and functionality, as substations evolve from analogue to digital.

Background: Elizabeth gained her first degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the University of Brighton, followed by an MSc in Electrical Power Systems at Bath University. She started her career as an engineer with a start-up company in Edinburgh, before joining Fundamentals as a Product Application Engineer three years ago.

Elizabeth said: “When I was about 13, a lamp in my room stopped working, so I opened up the fusebox with a pair of scissors, worked out how the circuits operated and found a loose copper wire. When I fixed that with some electrical tape and the lamp worked, I thought ‘this is interesting – I could be good at this!’.

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“I was good at maths and science at school, but one of my inspirations was a woman physics tutor with a PhD. She encouraged me and I thought ‘if she can go far, so can I’. Plus I also had a woman chemistry tutor. Then at university I was encouraged by talks from women in industry. So I believe it is vitally important for women engineers, including me, to inspire others – and for those who aspire to join the profession to talk with people they can look up to.

“Since joining Fundamentals I have learned and grown a lot, and been given a great deal of responsibility, thanks to the encouragement and support I have received from everyone I have met. For example, the induction process was brilliant, working in every department and on-site to learn from people and understand exactly what the company does.

“Fundamentals says it wants to be a great place to work – and in my experience, that is very much the case.”

Lauryn Bailey, Trainee Electronics Engineer – Lauryn is in the last months of her five-year apprenticeship with Fundamentals. Her advice “to any young woman who wants to be an engineer is: get to know people who can help you – and never be afraid to ask questions.”

Role: In the last months of her five-year apprenticeship with Fundamentals. Currently working with our Hardware Manager in the Product Engineering Team, on the design of new printed circuit boards (PCBs).

Skills: Since 2018, Lauryn has rotated through virtually every department at Fundamentals, gaining experience and developing a multitude of skills. Her present work on PCB design started with a small board, progressing to larger and more complex units with help from her colleagues.

Background: Lauryn’s path into engineering started when she transferred from a regular school to UTC Swindon – a University Technical College, described as ‘an innovative, employer-focused, high-tech school for students aged from 14 to 19, specialising in engineering and digital technologies’. After specialising in engineering and computer science and taking her A levels, she joined Fundamentals as an apprentice, simultaneously studying at Newbury College and working towards a BSc, which is accredited by Buckinghamshire University

Lauryn said: “When did I get interested in engineering? Well, my mother always said I was nosey: taking things apart to see how they worked - and in some cases managing to put them back together again! The transfer to UTC Swindon really got me on track, because it was so focused on practical engineering skills. Tutors had industry backgrounds, there were excellent links with industry partners and a lot of preparation for actual job roles.

Billur Ozkılınc, Application Engineer – a professional engineer for 11 years, Billur is also studying part time for a master’s degree in data science at Queen Mary University, London. Engineering has provided Billur the opportunity to work in different countries, including Turkey, Germany and Qatar.

Role: providing technical support for customers to optimise their use of Fundamentals technologies, including the SuperTAPP SG automatic voltage controller, to make their networks more efficient, safer and reliable.

Skills: Billur has been a professional engineer for 11 years. A graduate in both electrical and mechanical engineering, she has a wealth of practical as well technical expertise in power system protection, control and automation.

Background: Billur gained her first degree at Yil University in Istanbul, during which she took part in a student exchange at Kaiserslautern Technical University in Germany, including an internship working in power plants. After working for three years with ABB in Turkey as an MV/LV network designer and site maintenance specialist, she spent four years with Siemens in Qatar as a substation control system engineer. She has also worked as factory maintenance engineer. Billur is currently studying part time for a master’s degree in data science at Queen Mary University, London.

Billur said: “I always wanted to be an engineer. As a child I loved mathematics and have always liked understanding concepts. I am not an expert in everything, but I enjoy learning and I am ambitious. That’s what drew me to power engineering, because it involves so many technologies. I very much enjoy my role in technical support, because I can use a lot of my experience to help people in different ways.

“I am very interested in Fundamentals’ developments in artificial intelligence, which I think is going to be a big thing in the industry.

“Fundamentals is the best company I have worked for. The atmosphere is really supportive and I am learning so many things to develop my identity as an engineer. I couldn’t be happier.”

Aneela Nasim , Growth Industries Lead, EuroNorth, Dassault Systemes, said in a statement: "It is imperative to actively promote and endorse the participation of women in STEM fields on this year's International Women's Engineering Day. Despite the engineering sector advancing in many ways – such as with the shift towards net-zero – it still lacks equal gender representation.

"Female engineers are crucial to creating a more balanced and representative workforce and to bring forth a wealth of new perspectives and ideas. By encouraging and supporting women to pursue careers in engineering, we can help to build a more robust, more innovative industry that benefits us all.

"By encouraging and empowering women to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, we can foster a more equitable and innovative society that leverages the full potential of all its members. This day serves as a reminder of the past women who fought for us to have equal access to pursue our passions, regardless of gender stereotypes. Moving forwards, the industry needs to remain focused on closing the gender gap in STEM – as this will be a key measure of progress and growth for our society as a whole."