Karishma Warudkar

Karishma Warudkar serves as the Logistics and Optimization Data Manager at Waste Management, based in Oakland, California. With approximately 12 to 13 years of experience in the data analytics field, she has spent the past year and a half in her current role, where she oversees reporting and analytics for the company's logistics chain, including truck arrivals and departures, fuel levels, and machinery maintenance across thousands of vehicles. Prior to this, her career has focused on data management and analytics domains. She earned a master's degree in business analytics from ASU, which propelled her interest in the field after being inspired by the surge in data analytics around 2012 and 2013 and her exposure to Tableau software. She also holds an undergraduate degree in business management from Cal State Northridge. One of her notable achievements includes establishing an offshore analytics team in India that now serves as the primary partner for reporting needs. Karishma attributes her success to taking opportunities as they arise and emphasizes the importance of kindness in the corporate world. She advises young women entering data analytics to be unapologetic, pursue knowledge, and never assume they are lesser qualified than others in the room. She notes that the biggest challenge in her field is the messy implementation of AI without proper data governance.