Her Story
About Adrienne
Leadership has been a part of my entire life, from sports to choir and many other activities where I would find myself either being the lead or the captain. I played basketball and was a captain of the team pretty much the majority of years that I played, so I got the chance to really define a lot of the leadership qualities for myself ever since I was a teen, young child. I've been in IT since about 2013, and I got into IT leadership in 2021. As a services supervisor, I have a team of about 13 team members directly and a little over 30 indirectly. I manage everything a person would need, from training to ensuring that they're able to do their job, even on the days that they don't want to, leading them through that and helping them navigate through those types of things. I also handle the system perspective because you have to have leadership with direction of a system that you manage. I lean on ITIL structure and use a lot of the guiding principles that are used in ITIL, which helps me navigate through situations with people and making decisions, and also when you tie over into the technology side of it, just how you would design things. It really helps to keep that baseline because nothing is ever the same - not one person and not one system. You have to have core concepts that you really just understand. Interestingly, I didn't go to school for IT. I got a psychology degree, a BS degree, because I wanted to do counseling to some degree. I didn't go back and get the master's or any of the actual certifications around counseling. I found myself getting into trades more, and I got into IT at the right time as a trainee. I started at the actual first level in Help Desk and then moved into application support.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Adrienne
01What do you attribute your success to?
I gotta say my mother. She actually had a little bit of unfinished business. She went to college, she got everything except for a few hours in her last year, so she didn't actually get the degree, and she ended up transitioning over to the Army, but she had some health issues, so she ended up getting discharged. I feel like she had a lot of unfinished business, and so, you know, we talked about a lot of the things that she got to do. She got to travel before she had her kids, and just a lot of the things that she's gone through since those things that she got to experience. It's really motivated me to live life to the fullest before anything happens. No regrets. And then also, a lot of things have been to, to this day, to make it better for her. I just picked her up, and we stay in different states, so I just picked her up, she's gonna stay like 2 weeks for me in my state, Georgia. I love my mommy.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
My advice would definitely be make sure that you come up with a routine of learning. You can get into IT, and you get a hold of something, or you develop a skill really well, but you have to continue to be a student with IT, because it's going to continue to change. I would definitely keep a routine of learning and continuously building on top of the skills and just all the information that you've already obtained. Never stop. And never think that you're just like, that's it. It's always gonna be something new that you have to learn. I also want to say this: look at how many women are really juggling life and in survival mode, because we wear so many hats. Mother, wife, you know, we're still trying to have ourselves, me time, and just any woman that's out here trying to provide for their family, and also feed their family. I encourage them to be the best version of themselves as much as possible, and keep fighting to keep their identity, because it's so easy to lose it.
Keep Exploring
More Influential Women · Georgia
Join Influential Women and start making an impact. Register now.