Amy Tantchou

I attribute my success to the values my father instilled in me growing up. I was born in Cameroon in a very patriarchal society where my grandfather didn't see the value of sending girls to school, but my dad focused on my sister and me, telling us that we should never be limited by what society put on us or even some internal cultural things. That was way back 40 years ago, and that really holds me. When I came to the United States and studied mathematics, I was always maybe the only girl in my class in college and during my graduate studies. Even in my job, being a woman, a woman of color, in a very male-dominated field, I constantly have to prove myself, but I do that for me and for my kids so that they understand that they're not limited by anything. Math is for girls as well - you can do whatever you want to do without any limit. The best career advice I received was to build relationships. A mentor told me midway through my career that I was brilliant and very good at what I do, but the best thing I could do for myself was building relationships wherever I find myself. As a data scientist, we tend to be very nerdy and just want to stay in our space with our heads locked down in our computer solving problems and building models, but you easily forget that you're trying to build this for end users to use it. The advice was to not just bury my head in the sand solving the problem, but to connect and build relationships, network with people, and understand what their problem is so I can better build a solution for them. That changed me from being the statistician in the basement to being a thought leader on the decision table upstairs, and that really changed the trajectory of my career.

The best career advice I ever received was to build relationships. Midway through my career, I had a mentor who told me that I was brilliant and very good at what I do, but the best thing I could do for myself was building relationships wherever I find myself in the company. The reason it's super important, especially for someone like me as a data scientist or for anyone with a technical background, is that we tend to be very nerdy and just want to stay in our space, get our heads locked down in our computer, and solve problems and build models. You easily forget that you're trying to build this for end users to use it. So the best advice I got was to not just bury my head in the sand solving the problem, but to connect and build relationships, network with people, and understand what their problem is so I can better build a solution for them. This changed me from being the statistician in the basement to being a thought leader on the decision table upstairs. That was the best advice I was given, and I used it, and it really changed the trajectory of my career a lot.

Don’t be limited by societal or cultural expectations; build your personal brand; pursue mathematics and technical fields — math is for girls too.

One of the biggest challenges is that we are constantly evolving in terms of technology, and with that comes a lot of saturation with data. As a data scientist, it's really the science behind being able to understand that complexity and bring insight out of that saturation of data that can be useful for a business leader to make decisions and also for our customers so that we can better serve our customers. The constant evolution of technology means I have to continuously reinvent myself and make sure I get the necessary training to keep pace with how things are evolving. When I started my career as a statistician, I was using software like SAS to develop my models, then Python came in as an open source giving us more flexibility, so I had to learn it and take certification in that. Now with the evolution of AI, I'm taking classes with Claude, Topic, Gemini, and ChatGPT, really leveraging the power of agents and not just building models with Python but building agents. I couldn't learn this in school, and I don't have to go to school to learn this - I can take certificates and trainings. So really continuing to invest in myself to stay up to date has been very powerful and influential to me.

The most important value I have starts with my personal life and family. I'm a mom of three - I have a 7-year-old girl and two boys - and every day when I look up, I just want to leave this world in a better place than I found it. That translates into the way I do everything. I'm very intentional to show them the value of kindness and determination. My husband says I'm very driven, and I don't think it's because I want to be driven, it's just that I'm always living life through the lens of my children and I want them to see an example to emulate. I grew up in a very patriarchal society in Cameroon, West Africa, where my grandfather didn't see the value of sending girls to school, but my dad told my sister and me that we should never be limited by what society put on us or even some internal cultural things. That was way back 40 years ago, and that really holds me. As a woman, a woman of color, in a very male-dominated field, I constantly have to prove myself, but doing that for me and for my kids so that they understand that they're not limited by anything - math is for girls as well, you can do whatever you want to do without any limit - is what really drives me. Professionally, when I get up every morning, one of the things that I love is that I am doing what I love. I'm really feeling that I'm part of something that is bigger than myself - I'm here to help, I'm here to make the world a better place. With cybersecurity and all the risks happening now with the expansion of AI and bad actors creating something nefarious, when I get up every day and realize that what I'm building can actually help make the world a safer place and make our customers feel safe with their data, it makes me happy because I know it's the world I'm creating for my kids as well. Both my personal and professional values are connected in that sense.