SWE-OC Professional Development Conference:
Discovering Your Potential
Thank you to the 50+ attendees of our Professional Development Conference! We had such a wonderful time hearing from Erin McConahey, Shawna Klein, Charlotte Wagner, and our panelists Marayam Asghari, Nadia Mugisha, Dr. A. Abdelmessih, and Jessica Gearhart. Special thanks to our sponsors Amazon, Parker Aerospace, and Exxon Mobil for enabling us to make sure our participants had DoorDash refreshments and for supporting SWE Orange County overall.
We have several resources that our speakers wanted to share with you publicly. I've uploaded all three slide decks that were used during our sessions (as PDFs) as well as the Individual Development Plan Charlotte referenced during her session. Links below:
SWE OC PDC Slides
Erin McConahey - Managing your Future
Charlotte Wagner - Ask a Manager
Charlotte Wagner - Individual Development Plan
We also have a recording of the entire session in the Zoom cloud - skip to about 10:40 for the start of the conference! This recording also includes the chat messages so you can review the answers and resources in there as well.
Once again, thank you for your support of SWE Orange County! We really enjoyed bringing the PDC to you at long last!
Natalie White
SWE OC FY21 President
Society of Women Engineers Orange County Professional Section
We have several resources that our speakers wanted to share with you publicly. I've uploaded all three slide decks that were used during our sessions (as PDFs) as well as the Individual Development Plan Charlotte referenced during her session. Links below:
SWE OC PDC Slides
Erin McConahey - Managing your Future
Charlotte Wagner - Ask a Manager
Charlotte Wagner - Individual Development Plan
We also have a recording of the entire session in the Zoom cloud - skip to about 10:40 for the start of the conference! This recording also includes the chat messages so you can review the answers and resources in there as well.
Once again, thank you for your support of SWE Orange County! We really enjoyed bringing the PDC to you at long last!
Natalie White
SWE OC FY21 President
Society of Women Engineers Orange County Professional Section
Sessions and Speakers
Keynote by Erin McConahey

Erin McConahey will provide the keynote presentation at the Professional Development Conference. Erin McConahey, PE FASHRAE LEED BD+C, is an accomplished Mechanical Engineer with over 20 years of work in the Los Angeles office of Arup, a global engineering firm. Recent projects include the Broad Museum, Stevens Hall at USC, the California Science Center Oschin Pavilion, and the LA Memorial Coliseum. In addition to her design and project management duties, she has spent over 6 years as Arup’s Diversity and Inclusion Advocate for the Americas Region. During that time she developed a no-nonsense, no blame way of helping people understand how unconscious bias has created practices that predispose only some people for success and what to do to reverse patterns of microinequity by changing organizational systems.
“Ask A Manager" by Charlotte Wagner

Charlotte Wagner is the General Manager of the Southern California Branch, building automation for Schneider Electric. She has her BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Maryland, and has her PE, CEM, and LEED AP BD+C. She has been a people manager for 13 years. She has been in SWE for over 30 years holding numerous positions including President of two local sections, national membership chair, and the first Section Vitality chair (now Leadership Coaching). She is a Fellow, Life Member, and Distinguished Service Award recipient. Her current SWE position is the co-chair of the Senior Member Engagement Affinity Group.
Panel Session
Nadia Mugisha, EIT, Design Engineer at PACE Advanced Water Engineering
Dr. A. Abdelmessih, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Cal Baptist University
Jessica Gearhart, Process Development Engineering Manager at Applied Medical
Maryam Asghari, PhD student in the Advanced Power and Energy Program at UC Irvine
The conference will conclude with a panel session. The panel will include a variety of speakers with a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. Meet engineers who will share challenges they have faced in the workplace and how they overcame them. This interactive panel will engage the audience and provide insight as to how they can approach obstacles they may encounter throughout their career and how they used them as stepping stones to get to the next level.
Dr. A. Abdelmessih, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Cal Baptist University
Jessica Gearhart, Process Development Engineering Manager at Applied Medical
Maryam Asghari, PhD student in the Advanced Power and Energy Program at UC Irvine
The conference will conclude with a panel session. The panel will include a variety of speakers with a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. Meet engineers who will share challenges they have faced in the workplace and how they overcame them. This interactive panel will engage the audience and provide insight as to how they can approach obstacles they may encounter throughout their career and how they used them as stepping stones to get to the next level.