Swarnima Shrivastava
I grew up in a small town in Madhya Pradesh, India — a place most people in the country wouldn't recognize by name. The education scene was limited, the opportunities were few, and studying abroad was not something girls from my town did. It was not even something I let myself dream about.
But I had found something that lit me up: computer science. I discovered it at exactly the right moment — when the internet was new, when the possibilities felt boundless, when watching a machine do in seconds what would take humans hours felt like witnessing magic. That curiosity never left me.
I graduated with a degree in Computer Science in 2013 — a milestone that felt, at the time, like the ceiling of what was possible for someone from where I came from. Then I pushed past it. I pursued my Master's at Stony Brook University in New York, becoming the first woman in my family to study abroad. My parents' pride in that moment is something I carry with me still.
What followed was 12 years of building software at some of the world's most demanding engineering organizations — AWS, Intel, Oracle, Verizon. Executive business education at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business. A deliberate transition from pure engineering into product thinking and leadership. And now: founding an AI startup, building The PME Club — a community for engineers who want to think beyond the code — and leading a Lean In Circle for South San Jose women community
Looking back, the path looks clean and linear. It wasn't. There were days of deep uncertainty, of figuring things out alone, of not knowing if the next step was the right one. Whenever those moments return, and they do, I go back to that girl in a small town in India who had no roadmap and made one anyway. If she could do it, I can do almost anything. That belief has never failed me.
• Master's in Computer Science from State University of New York at Stony Brook
• Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science from NIT Bhopal
• Certificate of Business Excellence at UC Berkeley, Haas School of Business
• Lean In Community
• ThePMEClub
• LeanIn @ South San Jose, Circle Leader
• The PME Club, Founder
• Braven, Leadership Coach
What do you attribute your success to?
Curiosity and the willingness to operate outside my comfort zone. I grew up in a small town in India where opportunities in tech felt out of reach — I was the first woman in my family to study abroad, and that journey from MP to Stony Brook to leading engineering projects at AWS, Oracle, and Intel taught me that the gap between where you are and where you want to be is mostly mindset. That belief is the foundation of The PME Club — I've seen engineers completely transform how they operate and grow simply by developing product thinking. The technical skills got me in the door. Learning to think like a product leader is what helped me thrive.
What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
Learn the language of the people making decisions. Early in my engineering career, someone told me that technical excellence alone wouldn't get me to the impact I wanted — I needed to understand how business decisions get made, what problems were worth solving, and how to communicate in terms of outcomes, not just outputs. That single shift changed everything for me. It's also the core insight behind The PME Club — we don't teach engineers to become PMs, we teach them to think more completely so they can lead, influence, and build things that actually matter.
What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Don't wait for permission to develop leadership skills — start now, inside the role you already have. I see so many talented women in engineering who are exceptional at their craft but hold back from the strategic, visible work because they feel they haven't earned it yet. You don't need a new title to develop product thinking, to speak up in roadmap conversations, or to connect your work to business outcomes. That proactive mindset is exactly what The PME Club is built around. The engineers — and especially the women — who grow fastest are the ones who decide early that execution is just the baseline, not the ceiling.
What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
The biggest opportunity I see is engineers who are ready to operate at a higher level but don't have the frameworks or community to get there. There's an enormous gap between what engineering education teaches and what actually drives impact and growth in corporate tech environments — product thinking, leadership presence, understanding business context. Most engineers figure this out slowly and alone, if at all. The PME Club exists to accelerate that development intentionally. On the startup side, AI video technology is at an inflection point — the tools to create personalized, intelligent video experiences are finally catching up to the vision, and the applications across education, media, and enterprise are massive.
What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Access, intentionality, and building in community. I grew up where quality education and career opportunity were unevenly distributed, and that shapes everything I build. The PME Club is free in spirit — it exists because I believe every engineer deserves access to the kind of thinking and mentorship that used to only come from being in the right room. Intentionality matters to me because both engineering and leadership require deliberate practice, not just time served. And community, because the best growth I've seen — in myself and in PME Club members — happens when people learn alongside each other, not in isolation.
Locations
thepmeclub.com
San Jose, CA