Influential Woman · Operations Management

Annie Nguyen

Operations Manager, Amazon

Dallas, TX

Her Story

About Annie

My career path took an unexpected turn from where I started. I initially thought I wanted to go into the medical field because I care a lot about people, but I didn't realize the ways that I cared about them. Going into the medical field, you're caring for people when they're not in their best condition or not their best self, and I realized that wasn't the right route for me. What I discovered is that management gave me the ability to be a leader that supports development for others, and that's what I didn't realize about myself. I really enjoy developing others, whether it's big or small - it could be for a promotion, or it just could be for self-growth in their personal career. My biggest motivation is that I enjoy working with people of all different backgrounds and learning from them as well. I learn a lot about people, what they do, how they spend their time, what's valuable to them, and just getting advice from them. I believe that being a leader is someone to look up to, but also always making sure that you're taking care of those around you in a different aspect. That's why I really enjoy what I do.

Her Interview

Ten minutes with Annie

01What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?

I would say definitely be resilient. Understand why you're there, understand the impact that you have, and have that confidence - you're in the room or you're in that position for a reason. The other thing I would say is don't overthink it. I think a lot of the times, being a woman, especially in any type of male-dominating role, you tend to overthink like, okay, how much should I assert myself? How little should I assert myself? Am I gonna be taken serious? Have confidence. You're in the room for a reason, you got the position for a reason. Understand you're gonna make mistakes, be open to making mistakes as well, be open to learning from them. Those are the biggest things - be resilient, have confidence, and then just continue to learn from wherever you think you may have messed up.

02What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?

I would say AI is a challenge in the field. It's a positive, but I also think it might steer people to a negative challenge. Now that AI is in the game, either you learn how to use it and take it to your advantage, or there's a lot of talks about AI being kind of like replacing roles as well. Staying up to date on that has helped me tremendously - it's saving time and also cutting my work in half, having me be more productive in other areas. The other challenge is the competitiveness of knowing how to use that platform and being up-to-date on it is actually steering a lot of people towards that field. A lot of people are saying, hey, if you have experience with this, this is a little bit more preferred now than it was before.

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