Her Story
About Grazia
Grazia Russo Lasner followed an intellectual journey starting with linguistics and literature for languages, then computational linguistics, software engineering, and AI. She graduated with a BA at the University of Catania in Sicily, attended Ohio State University, and earned a Master in Computational Linguistics at Georgetown University. She learned to program and began her career as a software engineer. She spent five years at AWS, gaining intense professional growth as a consultant supporting Fortune 100 engagements across industries including energy, finance, insurance, and airlines. She is currently in between jobs while finalizing a new position.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Grazia
01What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I received was from a professor of artificial intelligence at Georgetown who said you have a good paper only when you can read it from the first line back to the first, and it totally makes sense. I have applied that concept ever since whether writing code or research papers.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Keep going and learning one little piece of the puzzle at a time. Follow what you actually like because IT is really vast. Choose the things that you want to know about and pursue them with passion and follow your curiosity. Have breadth but also gain depth in what you like.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
Opportunities include intense professional growth from five years at AWS supporting Fortune 100 engagements across industries. Challenges include it remaining a male-dominated world where many well-prepared women are not getting to the very top, earning authority in high-stakes rooms, keeping up with a rapidly changing field, remote work and building influence without living in a tech hub, and career transitions not being easy even within companies.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Honesty and intellectual integrity are priorities. I have no space or tolerance for lies because if you have to lie about something it means you have not the courage to defend your decisions. Those are the most important things whether in personal relationships or the professional world.
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