Women in Process Engineering

Janet Baumann is a principal engineer at Eastman Chemical Company. She was initially drawn to engineering for its creativity and later on in her education, she became amazed by the variety of careers practiced by engineering graduates. Like many process engineers, she has had a variety of assignments that exposed her to a variety of different fields such as design, operations, marketing, sales, environmental, and safety.

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Delia Contreras is currently Vice President of Global Engineering at Ecolab. She began her career as a process engineer at a refinery in Colombia. She later held several jobs as a process engineer that enabled her to further grow her technical and analytical skills. Although her career has progressed, she still considers herself to be a process engineer at heart. 

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Jill Craven is a Tool Installation Engineer at Intel. She admires the hands-on aspect of her role which requires a lot of field work. She often finds herself crawling under equipment in order to understand and troubleshoot an equipment issue. When met with challenges, she found that using social connection and empathy greatly enhances technical information flow amongst a team operating in a 24/7 technical environment.  

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Ogochukwu (Ogo) previously held the position of Associate Technical Professional at Kellog, Brown and Root Inc. (KBR), and is currently a postdoctoral associate of Aerosol Microphysics at Brookhaven National Laboratory. In high school, she witnessed a chemistry demonstration on titration and immediately knew she wanted a career in STEM. She developed an appreciation for process engineering during a six-month internship at the national petroleum corporation in her home country of Nigeria. 

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Sara is Chemical Process Safety Engineer at Georgia Pacific. She began her career in appliance manufacturing with an internship in process safety management. After graduating from college, she knew, as part of her long-term goals, that she wanted to work in safety within a chemical-intensive environment. One thing that she always keeps at the front of her mind is how important it is that employees make it home to their families at the end of the day.

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Veronique is founder and technical consultant at Verata Solutions Ltd. Growing up, her natural love for chemistry and performance optimization meant that she would inevitably choose a career in that arena. Throughout her process engineering journey, her family was very supportive, coaching and championing her at every step. Although she has excelled in her career, she continues to encounter challenges, inlcuding non-professional problems such as being Black and a woman. Despite that, she continues to perform her job well, proving that she is as good as any other engineer.

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Yangmu works in R&D process engineering at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). Her dad was the biggest influence on her becoming an engineer. He is currently a retired mechanical engineer in China, and he encouraged her to think about the causes behind everyday phenomena from a very young age. She considers herself very fortunate to be a part of a high-functioning team at GSK where she is able to learn a lot from experts in various fields. 

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Isabel is a doctoral researcher at the University of Manchester in Manchester, England.  Her research involves developing a methodology for the synthesis of advanced reactive distillation technologies. Her first experience as a process engineer took place when she was undertaking thesis work for her undergraduate degree at the largest oil refinery in Ecuador, Refinería Esmeraldas. She has experienced a vast range of roles as a chemical engineer in industry (oil refining, cement production), in research (extractive metallurgy, biodiesel hydrotreating, process intensification) and in academia as a lecturer (biochemical, food and petrochemical engineering).

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Christin works as a process consultant at PrimeStar. Ever since high school, she loved chemistry and problem solving. After graduating from college, she worked for an engineering design firm for the first three years, including some time at Merck. Next, she worked for five years at a manufacturing facility that made biogums in food, pharma, and industrial grades. She gained a lot of knowledge and experience at the facility, but she also encountered difficulties that came with being the only young, woman engineer.

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Rasika came to the United States from India to pursue her master’s degree in chemical engineering in 2010. Her father obtained his Ph.D. in physical chemistry, but he always wanted to be a chemical engineer. He was a main source of inspiration for Rasika and he continually encouraged her to be curious, which resulted in her own chemistry lab at home when she was just 10 years old. In the 9th grade, she participated in a “Homi Bhabha Young Scientist” competition in India and won the gold medal. Afterwards, she felt empowered to pursue her goal to continue studying science. She continues to live by her parent’s mantra that girls can do anything. 

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Kristin is currently a process design engineer at CITGO Petroleum Corporation. At first, she went to college to pursue a degree in biological sciences with a minor in chemistry. As she moved through her senior year, her priorities shifted and she took some time off after graduation to assess different career pathways. Her maternal grandfather and uncle were both engineers and her father was an electrical engineer. As she reviewed her family history and what was available in her area, she decided to go back to school to get a second degree in chemical engineering and join local industry.

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Monica spent over 30 years in process engineering, recently retiring from AkzoNobel where she was a polymer technology manager. She began her path to process engineering in high school when a friend introduced her to a program in her hometown of  Detroit called the Detroit Pre-College Engineering Program (DPCEP). This program was created to introduce underrepresented groups to STEM. Throughout her participation in DPCEP, she learned that she could do mathematics and engineering, which is something that never occurred to her before becoming a part of the program.

Read more about Monica.