Her Story
About Khyati ("Khee-yah-tee")
Throughout my career, I've worked across different sectors and countries as part of an expat family, which has given me a unique perspective on global business. I've worked in start-ups, educational institutes as well as large organizations. In my current role leading sustainability communications at Baker Hughes, I work within a global team at a large company to drive real-world impact at scale, through strategic communications, change management, stakeholder engagements and showing up everyday to do my best in everything I do.
I'm originally from India, have lived in 12 global cities, worked in four countries and as a first-generation immigrant to United States and an expatriate, I don't have a linear career graph - with breaks throughout my career for traveling, raising a family or personal growth. I strongly believe that post-Covid, career journeys like mine are increasingly more common. Being raised in a generally patriarchal society, working in historically male-dominated industry, and in a field that is pre-dominantly female occupied, I identify as a strong feminist and am looking forward to contributing to the Influential Women community!
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Khyati ("Khee-yah-tee")
01What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Two things stand out for me. First, be intellectually curious. Asking the right questions is so much more important than having all the answers. Being intellectually curious for everything you do in life also inherently shows you're willing to do more. Second, no job is too small. This generation, including my younger self, we all have these preconceived ideas about what we should be doing based on our education. My first internship after finishing my master's at NYU was getting coffee for the Chief Communications Officer at 30 Rockefeller Center. My family hated it and asked what I was doing with my life, but I saw that it gave me access to the top floors of executive offices every single day for face time. Every time I would go, we would talk, and then my next job came from those discussions. I tell this to my kids too - there's no job that's too small. A job is what you make out of it, regardless of what it looks like on paper. Access is everything when you're starting off in a career - being in the rooms and having access to people. Back in the day, the top 7 floors at 30 Rockefeller were locked out for anybody, even deliveries weren't allowed because it was all the executive leaders. To go walking there every day with coffee, going to offices, having people say hello and building relationships was invaluable. The coffee was so much more than coffee.
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