The Making the Move series strives to inspire those who come from different (non-tech) backgrounds and want to break into the world of tech. Here’s a secret… You don’t need to be a computer science or software engineering major! This is the second #MakingTheMove featuring someone who came from a chemical engineering background.

Today, I am sharing the career journey of Minnie Lahoti who did both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemical engineering — back-to-back! She thought she would have a linear career trajectory, but realized that totally was not the case. Today, she is a Technical PM at Microsoft, where she owns a product in the Azure Compute space.

Chemical engineering consulting in the automotive industry

Minnie started off earning her chemical engineering degree at the University of Alabama and then decided to pursue a master’s to further understand the depths of the subject. With this knowledge, she started her career in R&D within the automotive industry around catalytic chemistry. When she encountered a bad manager, she decided to leave the role and join a boutique consulting firm in Houston. Although she did not enjoy it that much because she didn’t really get to leverage her skills, she decided to keep working and save money for her MBA.

Side hustling + MBA during the pandemic

Then COVID-19 hit and her team got laid off in the spring of 2020. After spending a few months without work, Minnie saw an opportunity that was in high demand — tutoring students in organic chemistry and calculus. Before she knew it, she was working 40-50 hour weeks while also studying for her GRE to apply for an MBA program.

She started her MBA at Darden (University of Virginia) in the Fall 2021 semester and met an entrepreneurship professor who heard about her tutoring gig and recommended that she start her own company. Minnie decided to start up ML STEM Prep, where she continues to tutor from time-to-time, and now has a team of 10 tutors!

Self-learning for big tech opportunities

As she tackled her MBA and tutoring duties, Minnie decided she wanted to work in big tech because of the huge hiring wave during the pandemic and the big opportunity to develop new skills. She analyzed what some of her gaps in experience were and then took many courses in SQL, Python, Power BI and more through Udemy. She also interned part time as a Data Scientist to leverage the newly learned skills and apply them in a real-world setting. 

It’s up to you to connect the dots from your old role to the role you want to transition into. By filling the knowledge gaps, you can make it happen.

minnie lahoti

Her self-learning paid off and she landed a summer internship at Microsoft, where she and the team tried to determine how to make Azure the platform of choice for startups and digital native companies. This experience led to a return offer for the following year, where she became a Technical Program Manager as part of the Aspire MBA Program!

Career transition tips

1. Look at the hard skills needed for the role you want and learn those skills. Take courses and volunteer to gain experiences to fill in skilling gaps while recognizing that you have other transferable skills that complement.
2. Be comfortable with ambiguity. Oftentimes, jobs are not that structured. Even if you have the same job title as another person, you’re likely working on different things. Be adaptable and flexible so you can do what needs to be done.
3. Consistency is the key to self-learning, not motivation. Be disciplined by taking it one day at a time. Be patient with yourself because topics can get very technical and take time to understand.
4. It’s OK to not know what you want. Go explore different jobs every few years because you will learn a lot more from immersing yourself in new environments. You may eventually plateau if you stay at the same job for too long.

Thanks for reading!

Thank you so much to Minnie for sharing her journey and insights to inspire those who studied chemical engineering. You can learn more about her on LinkedIn and visit mlstemprep.com for more details about her tutoring business.

Read more inspiring #MakingTheMove stories here.