Her Story
About Nahanie
I am currently an Environmental Health and Safety Coordinator at Owens Corning in Talmadge, Ohio, a position I've held for 4 months. In this role, my main purpose is to comply with all the safety and environmental rules and laws, but mainly to keep everyone safe around the plant. I'm responsible for 86 people, most of them men - in fact, we are only 3 women in the plant. It's really important to be in the head of this role because they're not used to having a woman in this position. I've been in environmental health and safety for around 7 years and in aviation for about 3 years. My aviation journey began when I won the first scholarship in the history of Mexico for a woman to become a pilot. It was something really big - around 2,000 girls applied for this scholarship, and they were requesting a lot of requirements. I went to Dallas to study and finished my training, and probably like 10 days after I finished, I got hired by SkyJet and Support and started flying their jets as a second in command. I moved to the States because I got married and had a kid, and we wanted to give my kid a better life and a better future. To work in the States, I need around 1,500 hours, so I'm currently working on my time building. Right now I have around 700 hours, so I'm almost there. I'm working in this position so I can pay for my hours, and hopefully soon I can go back to the sky. I think I want to go back to private aviation - I was flying in a private jet and I really like the private aviation more than commercial, but I'm open to all possibilities right now.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Nahanie
01What do you attribute your success to?
I think my biggest professional achievement is to work currently here in the States, because I come from Mexico. That's a really huge gap. I'm an environmental technology engineer, which means basically nothing in the States because you have to start from zero. Actually being in this position helped me to have hope that all my knowledge and all the things that I've been working, all those many years, has been a really good thing, because right now they value my knowledge and they value my experience in this position. Something that helps me a lot is that I prepare myself before I give an indication or if I need to lead a project. I prepare myself really good, so if they have any technical questions or questions in general, I can be prepared so they don't doubt that I know, that I have the knowledge to lead it.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
I would tell her that she is capable, that all women have the ability to do whatever we want. If we want to be housewives, if we want to be astronauts, determination, discipline, and a lot of passion is what we need to achieve our biggest dreams. I'm from a really small community back in Mexico, it is literally a ranch, and these girls are growing with the mentality that they need to grow, get married with someone, and have kids, and that's life for them. Being able to open their minds and to let them know that there is a world out there waiting for them is really, really satisfying for me. I know a few girls that are actually starting to become flight attendants or to become pilots just because they had this talk with me.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
I think the biggest challenge is that, even if it's sad, I think this gap between genders is still existing. When someone arrives and tells you what to do and tells you indications, and this comes from a woman, they refuse to do it because they think that we don't have the capacity to lead something. To lead projects, to lead people, it's still this conflict that they don't want to follow indications sometimes. But I think that something that helps me a lot is that I prepare myself before I give an indication or if I need to lead a project. I prepare myself really good, so if they have any technical questions or if they have questions in general, I can be prepared so they don't doubt that I know, that I have the knowledge to lead it.
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