Daniela Fragoso Diaz

I think the people around me have been crucial to my success. You can do so much as an individual, but if you have the right team backing you up, not only at work but in your personal life, I think that puts you in the right path to succeed. The support I get from my family has been invaluable. When there are late-night coding sessions or when I have to pull an all-nighter because I didn't have enough time to work on a project for my master's, my mom cooks me my meal and I have my home-cooked meal ready for me, and I don't have to worry about it. Without that support, I would probably succeed as well, but it would take me longer and be twice as hard to do it. I have also had wonderful mentors and people around me during college who gave me great opportunities and backed me up, and they all emphasized the same thing: keep learning. This field never stops evolving, so you must keep learning constantly.

Recently, my manager told me something that has really stuck with me: think about what makes you irreplaceable. What can you do that will put you in a position where the impact is unquestionable? He advised me to not only analyze my current role, but to think about what's ahead and identify the key components of my next role's responsibilities that I can start doing right now. By the time I am in the pipeline to advance in my career, it will be unquestionable. That's basically what I am taking to heart these days. I have also had wonderful mentors throughout college who all landed on the same message: keep learning. This never stops. You're in a field of work and study that never stops, so the evolution is constant and you must keep learning.

Surround yourself with the right people. You don't always know if they're the right people at first, but what I have learned is that if you have the right support around you, they can help push you forward. Find your mentor, find someone that can advocate for you, and surround yourself with people that can put you in places and help you move ahead. I am a firm believer that you can only do so much yourself. You must create a strong network, and the people around you will help you find the opportunities. That's how it's been my entire life since I came to the country.

Oh my god, the fear of missing out on something, or the fear of not knowing enough. At least for me, because there is so much to learn, and especially now with the AI revolution. Not only are you learning new concepts, but you are trying to understand new technology, new tools, how to use them, and how to maximize their potential to increase your productivity. So you are not only learning your tooling, but you also have to become the architect of your project now with the AI revolution. Given my experience in the field as a new grad, even though I have been working for four years, you can only grow so much given the experience that you have. I feel like, yeah sure, I'm an architect, but I have to know what I am building and designing. It is not only the tooling and the concepts, but also understanding the infrastructure that you are building that feature into. Things are progressing so fast, and features now more than ever have to be delivered quickly. I am always left with the feeling of, I feel like I need to study this more, but I don't have time. I feel like it ties into imposter syndrome a little bit. It changes throughout your time, each quarter brings a new challenge.

Being punctual is very important to me. I also value accountability and being reliable for the people around me. If I say I'm going to be there and I'm going to do something, then I do it, unless something extreme happens. Keeping my word with my friends and colleagues matters a lot to me, because I feel like if people around you know that they can count on you, that's really important. That's one value I would say is important to me.