Lisa Smith, PMP, CSM

I attribute my success to several key factors. First, I've had really good leaders throughout my career here. Sapna Patel, who is now our CIO, has been a big part of that mentorship. But I've also grown from my team members - LaToya Smith started with the company before I did and has been there for 25 years, and watching her path grow has been inspirational and motivational to me. Beyond the people, I think my background as a competitive swimmer when I was younger taught me discipline that has carried over into my professional role. That same work ethic and dedication I brought to swimming, I bring to my job, and that's allowed me to excel. I come to work 100% dedicated to the teams that I have here. I also didn't want to struggle like my family has in the past - I wanted to be successful, and I had to go to work at a very young age. Everything I've learned has been through on-the-job training and self-directed learning, pulling from resources and experiences throughout my career. My certifications in QA, PMP, and Scrum Master have opened doors, but it's really that discipline and dedication that have been the foundation of my success.

I would say absolutely dive in. IT is still somewhat of a male-dominated field, but more and more women are coming into it, and it's exciting to see females coming into the engineering field and the security field. I'm gonna be honest and say it's not always easy - it's very demanding. But if it's something that you're passionate about, I'm there to support and encourage you. You don't have to go out and have that college degree to be successful in this field. I'm coming in with just a high school education, and everything I've learned, I've learned on the job. There's a lot going on with the question of do you go to college or not, and you have a lot of people coming out of college who struggle to find jobs and then they're stuck with the bills. My family just didn't have it financially, so I had to go to work at a very young age. But that experience of having to be disciplined, that work ethic I developed, has carried over into my professional role. You can enter a field that isn't typical for a lot of females and be successful. IT's here to stay, and it's a fantastic field to get into.

The biggest challenges in this field include managing large-scale system outages, navigating disruptions from events like pandemics and mergers, and leading teams through periods of uncertainty such as bankruptcy and restructuring. At the same time, there are strong opportunities in the growing role of IT as a core business driver and the increasing representation of women in engineering and cybersecurity.

The values most important to me center around mentoring, developing people, and making a lasting impact on others' lives. One of the biggest things I'm proud of professionally is growing and mentoring individuals who come into my QA team at entry-level positions, and watching them move to other departments and grow their own IT skill sets and careers. Whether they stayed at Spirit or moved on to different positions, being able to watch them professionally grow is something I'm really proud of. We did a thing not too long ago on who has inspired you, and it was humbling to have team members reach out and let me know the impact I've had on their lives. That's probably the most rewarding part of my job. Outside of work, animals are my passion, specifically dogs. I'm a huge animal activist and highly involved in local animal rescues. I focus on the dogs that aren't the cute, fluffy ones - the ones that are hard to adopt and need medical care. Through my Christmas display and individual fundraisers, I've helped bring in over $100,000 for rescue efforts. There's an epidemic here in South Florida where dogs are getting abandoned and shelters are full, so being able to help these animals that need it most is incredibly important to me.