The energy industry is undergoing rapid changes, with significant transitions happening in both the traditional and new energy sectors. To help professionals navigate these shifts, our monthly webinar featured Meha Jha, Senior Offerings Manager for New Energies at Honeywell. In this session, Meha shares her journey from traditional oil and gas roles to her current position in sustainable energy and software solutions, offering valuable tips and strategies for career transitions.
Key Takeaways from the Webinar:
1. Strategies for Career Transitions: Meha offers practical advice for professionals looking to pivot within their company or transition to a new sector. Key strategies include leveraging existing skills, gaining new knowledge, and participating in cross-functional projects and working groups.
2. Staying Marketable: In today's competitive job market, staying marketable is crucial. Meha shares her approach to continuous learning and professional growth, including subscribing to industry publications, attending conferences, and following key trends and technologies.
4. Embracing Software and Digital Solutions: As the energy industry evolves, digital solutions and software are becoming increasingly important. Meha explains the differences between marketing hardware and software, emphasizing the need to focus on outcomes and user adoption in the software space.
7. Practical Tips for Continuous Learning: Meha shares her favorite tools and resources for staying up-to-date with industry trends, including Coursera, Owler, and LinkedIn. She also underscores the value of mentorship and networking in career development.
Navigating career transitions in the energy industry can be challenging, but with the right strategies and mindset, it's possible to thrive in this dynamic field. Meha Jha's insights offer a valuable roadmap for professionals looking to transition successfully. By leveraging existing skills, embracing new technologies, and continuously learning, you can stay relevant and marketable in the ever-evolving energy landscape.
Watch the Webinar:
Transcript:
Jason Assir: Alright, good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Good day to everyone. Thank you for joining in this month's energy gigs! Webinar.
Jason Assir: Super excited to have our esteemed guest. Meha Jha, Senior Offerings Manager for New Energies from Honeywell, we're really excited to have you on. Thank you so much for joining. Before we get into the topic of today's session, a quick blurb about energy gigs for those who don't know. Energy gigs is a talent and workforce management platform, most like a freelance platform for the energy industry. We connect energy companies to talent over hourly fixed fee just in time. Temp-to-perm projects.
Jason Assir: And we’re excited to get into today's topic. Today's topic is all about transitioning, transitioning from one sector of the energy industry to another sector of the energy industry, also transitioning from one role in the energy industry to another role. Welcome, Meha. Thank you so much for joining us today.
Meha Jha: Yeah, thanks so much, Jason, for having me. I'm very excited about this topic.
Jason Assir: So I, you know, as I do with these types of webinars, I stalk people beforehand. So I was checking out your LinkedIn profile. And you have a lot of different experience in the energy sector, you know, upstream oil and gas, downstream refineries, on the automation side. Do you mind just sharing a little bit about the high level of your journey to this point, to where you are at Honeywell?
Meha Jha: Yes, just wanna say I'm glad you only left your stalking to just LinkedIn, and not my Instagram or something. So yeah. I would say, why I really love this topic. And I feel like there's a couple of big transitions going on.
Meha Jha: And so you know, we hear the word like energy transition, and then you might hear, like industry 4.0, right, which is the whole digital transformation and digitalization. And so where I really tried to kind of as I move my career is according to those two trends, or one of those two trends, right? And so I feel like if you're really trying to be relevant with where the opportunities are, you'll be kind of tethered to one of those two. So I kind of originally started typical chemical engineer. Where like, you really only think, okay, I'm going into oil and gas in Texas, right? And I grew up in Alabama, Georgia, and I had just the big dream. And I lived in Texas for like 8 years. And so that was kind of the natural. How I figured and stumbled into oil and gas originally, and I did both upstream and downstream like you said, and the operation side. But in college, I did a lot of leadership.
Meha Jha: And so I really wanted something where I didn't have to just be purely technical and could be kind of commercial. And so I was able to kind of do a development program that allowed me to leverage engineering, but also try the commercial side, and that was really heavily in the automation space.
Meha Jha: And I would say, as I've been in the automation space for 10 years, I've seen, probably, I think, two big pivots sustainability. And then this sort of digitalization like come through in my career so far, and so I kept trying to kind of align functionally, I think I've remained pretty consistent the last 5 or 6 years with doing sort of the product industry marketing sort of offering management side of things. But as the industry trended on, that's where I pivoted, so I think some of the big pivots I had was originally starting and refining.
Meha Jha: Focused in my career just cause it aligned with a typical chemical engineering background, my internships. And then there was sort of this natural progression that refineries started converting over themselves a good amount in the US. They either had to close down, or they started converting over to biofuels or adding biofuels. A good amount of refineries did catch on that wave as sustainability took off, and all these government regulations did so. That gave me sort of a natural pivot into the sustainability world. And then I discovered there's so much more at play. With this overall energy transition, and it's even beyond the energy transition when we talk about sustainability as a whole.
Meha Jha: But for us, in the energy industry there is already enough there, with the energy transition alone. From an aspect of sustainability so pivoted there and then. One of the big evolutions I had, and this was kind of a couple of years ago, I realized so I was always on the hardware side instrumentation predominantly, and I would see that my company as well as competitors. We're always kind of focused. And starting to say, software is the future software we're investing in software. We're wanting to acquire software. You would hear things like Cloud AI/ML. Not as much, I would say. In the last year. I feel like that has really taken off. When the Gen. AI. Kind of came on the scene, but I kinda recognized I call it like my like spidey senses where I was like, okay, the hardware side is not getting as much focus attention, development investment, whether that's from a new product development standpoint, whether that is from a acquisition standpoint.
Meha Jha: And so I then it took me a couple of steps, but then I eventually pivoted to where I am now, where I'm more on the software side. So we're, you know, the all the buzz words of SaaS, cyber, cloud, AI/ML and that was kind of something that I realized. You know a bit longer term was what a move I needed to make to be kind of where the industry is headed.
Jason Assir: Wow, that's that's that's really cool, like, so I I'd like to dive into a little bit more. Into the couple the couple of steps. You pivot over a couple of steps, because I know we talked to a lot of people in the energy industry. Let's say people that are like, you know, the professional upstream oil and gas drillers, and they want to get in a geothermal. And they but they don't. They don't know those couple of steps so like. What was what were those little couple of steps? Was it small projects, or like what? What? How did you?
Meha Jha: Yeah, no great question. So there's a couple of ways, I think, that have helped me pivot each time you set a keyword with, oh, you know projects. And so I think the thing. Sometimes we think it's a all in one jump. But I think it's kind of very similar. If you remember your like middle school high school days and lab like in your lab classes or in college where you're like, okay, what are my control variables. What are my manipulative variables? Right? And so what I think of whenever you're going through any sort of transition.
Meha Jha: The more you can actually keep constant, the easier the transition is right. So if you can try to pivot and test out one thing. And so for me, I typically kept function consistent. So if you have a domain functional expertise, or if there's a particular technology you work with, or know really well. Like one of those two categories. Ideally, if you keep that consistent that helps you more marketable to pivot, to kind of make a transition of saying, Well, I have this domain. How know how I may not know this domain. Know how. The other was exactly what you said. So, as some of these things emerged, I noticed whether it was in my company, or whether it was being part of like external organizations that like related to an industry segment that working groups, things like that there's different design councils, different people making, you know, like API, that make design standards that try to co collect best practices. A lot of this in the merging space or the academic space. There's usually some window you can plug into, and usually at your company level.
Meha Jha: You will likely see that there's some sort of tiger team forming some sort of you know it exactly what you said, small project. It may not be a very large, and so I kinda got lucky because I was in the refining space. And then sustainability. They formed this sort of informal working team. I think there was like one head count at the company that was like focused on it. And she wasn't even sustainability dedicated. It was like industry marketing. And then they realized sustainability was gonna become an opportunity. And so they started forming cross business unit teams to collect the knowledge and try to pull together and think together and try to make some initial material. So usually you'll maybe see exactly what you said. If you can hold your at least functional or technology know how consistent, and then either find a project, find a working group, or a sort of educational kind of conference, or something, where you can start to gain and share that knowledge within your organization as a start, put together a perspective. We like to use that term like at Honeywell sometimes for that. So that looks like a white paper that we just test out externally. Right? We kind of write. Put our thoughts together sometimes. That's a pitch deck, sometimes that's educating during a like lunch and learn that we have internally. So sometimes it's a little bit of a pilot that just starts to build the knowledge.
Jason Assir: That's no, that's great. And so it you. It were. You kind of volunteering like, just because you took your your interest, would would allow you to get to get into these sort of working groups is that sort of what what you think.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So it's kinda like similar to like, you know, during, I think pretty much any company I've worked out. We've always had on your employee development plan like a stretch project or things like that so often it gets like either your manager or people become aware of you. And so I was pretty much when it came to the sustainability kind of team. That was not my core. What would you call it? Core? A job function, and that was at what? Across business unit level. So it was not even within necessarily my own business group, but it expanded. And then, probably after a year I ended up they ended up modifying my job title to include sustainability. So it became refining and sustainability at the time. And I remember one of my mentors in a previous company. She always kinda gave me or told me this advice where she's like. Often you should do the role regardless of your title, so like informally do it regardless of your title. So if you see an opportunity, I think one of the most common ones. We can probably see working in our companies as where there's a lot of synergy, whether it's cross business unit, cross portfolio, cross technology, and we all are chasing the same industry. But we go very disjointed. Right? We go and focus on our one technology. But we don't carry the big picture.
Meha Jha: And so she she often said, if you start doing the role like it maybe should be, or should how it should be expanded, it eventually catches up, and the titles it usually often catches up. And I would say the other thing is a little kind of tactical tip for everyone in the audience. So when I expanded my role to have the sustainability title, I had no idea how marketable that would be. Because I guess, when it was probably 2020 and 2021, when I think they end of 21, when they modify the title 2022 was when a wave of sustainability. Talent was being hired in the energy industry. So 21 and 22. And so I didn't even have like my linkedin activated looking. But I started getting so many recruiters reaching out because it was such a buzz word, and there wasn't as much talent out there. And so sometimes you don't realize like a tactic that can help is, how are you flagging or tagging yourself? And can you broaden it in a certain way? That is a little bit and I'm not saying being deceiving or anything like that. But it's just like it does actually help. So, for example.
Meha Jha: in the past I always used to say I was industrial automation. And I realized that was like very, very limiting. And so if I was wanting to, maybe go into refining. Then I would just tag refining right. And even though that was my background. So sometimes you don't realize that maybe you're in refining, but you can broaden your sort of tag or your industry doesn't have to be so specific. And that actually helps open doors. Same thing right now, even though I'm industrial automation. I put industrial software. And I get like, you know how LinkedIn will just show jobs in general to you suggested jobs. A lot of the stuff is even beyond energy. Now of what I get right. And so I think we don't realize what we how we can limit ourselves right by being just either so energy, specific or so. Segment specific? So that's, I think, a tactic that has helped me and also help me see what else I could go into that I maybe didn't know.
Jason Assir: That's interesting. So like on the personal sort of keeping the domain or the function consistent. So that would have been automation for you. Is that right? Is, that would have been.
Meha Jha: So, yeah, so actually, that's a great point. Automation as well as I would say, like, kind of the product industry marketing sort of B2B, marketing function as well. Those two, yeah.
Jason Assir: Gotcha, and and then within your organization, try, you know. Go start doing the work that you want to do, even if even if it's not quote in your job description, I guess. Would you say.
Meha Jha: Yeah. And I think the big thing is it doesn't have to be this big thing you take on sometimes it's just even putting like, if you think about it like, I know, you went to business school. It's like, if you think about putting us a business case together, right? That's usually the start of where these things go, and I'm sure that's where the start of energy gigs and how it just continued to evolve. And sometimes, like, you know, I've had bosses. Tell me like. Even if you put anything down like people can respond to, people can't respond well to a blank whiteboard like they can to something you initially frame up, even if it's 60 to 80% there, right? And that's, I think the thing with some of these new energy spaces. I remember carbon capture. It was biofuels, and it was like green hydrogen, and everything was kind of foreign to us. We didn't have much exposure. We had some biofuel projects that we could reference but I remember everything was kind of like educated guessing honestly. So you put an initial out there, and you test it out and see so doesn't have to be this big rollout of big program. But one content piece like if it's a white paper, if it's saying, Oh, I think this is what maps and this is what it could be. And you get people to start responding and testing it out. So I think that's the key thing, is it? It doesn't have to be such a grand. I'm taking on this huge capital investment project or this that right? It's if you can think of a pilot or simple way to test out, or a simple piece of content or business case you can put together. That really gets you going too.
Jason Assir: That's that's great. I think that's those are gold nuggets, I think. Well, so for anyone on the call that that has a question. Please do you know. Ask through the chat we'll we'll ask ask it a Maya. May. I guess the question for me is like, you know. I'm sure it wasn't smooth sailing. I'm sure you reach sort of choppy waters like. What were some of the big obstacles that you encountered? Or were there big obstacles. Maybe maybe it was pretty easy like.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So I think one of the best or easiest ways to because. I have this conversation a lot with people like I've spoken out different conferences around this topic. The big obstacles I usually see is it's hard to make a pivot outside of your company when you're trying to really change right? Like it usually can be pretty tough to sell one to a new company that you will do a job function you've never done before. And you know an industry that you've never done right. So typically if you're trying to make a pivot first, I would say. do it at your existing company. Right? As much as you can. That would be kind of the ideal where you've already kind of proven yourself. You have a reputation, you know culturally how that works. The second is, I think I would say, especially with these new energies. So much is still so new. And so this has been a big difference coming from refining, which is a super well established, well documented, pretty standard industry with how it operates. So one of the big challenges became, how do I acquire knowledge? Which is like, why I really like when we talked about energy gigs a month or so ago? Because it creates opportunities or a pool of access to experts or even baby projects, that you can expand your resource externally because a lot of times like when we ran into the sustainability stuff there wasn't much knowledge internally like there was like less than 10 people that we could maybe call on. And so sometimes, then it becomes figuring out those external resources like academics. Trying to get funding for a conference to test out and see what you can learn and validate. One of the things, I think another little kind of tidbit. I love giving little nuggets. I think one of the big things that helped me was so some of this new energy technology, it's been around actually for a while, like it's been an R&D for 10-15 years the challenge has been actually scaling it up, right? Making it economically feasible. And that's where, you know. Now, backed with a lot of government regulations, the pressures from investors like that sort of focus on sustainability is why we're seeing more of a take off. But this stuff has been actually around quite a bit of time. And so one of the big things that helps beyond looking at academic resources is looking at technology licenses. So, for example, like at Honeywell, we have Honeywell Uop, and when I moved over to this side of the organization they have been making a sustainable aviation fuel for, like at least 15 years, you know. And I like the technology had been around initially when I was Internet. And I was like, so surprised because from the outside, you don't realize that right, that this has been something their R&D team has been looking at for a while. And so I think that's the thing. Those if you can figure out those process licenses for carbon, tech, carbon capture or geothermal, or whatever right that equipment that gets licensed, and a lot of times. Honeywell Up was dominant and is dominant, continues to be in the refining space with what they license. So some of these are core already in our space right? Their licenses we've maybe worked with. We just don't realize they've been in this space other areas for a while. So they usually have really good knowledge. That is a lot longer than us on the technology provider side or us. So even on an operating side, has.
Jason Assir: So for those that maybe aren't familiar with sort of that licensing process. What is what is that exactly? Do you mind explaining that a little more.
Meha Jha: Sure. Yeah. So if you think about, I kind of think of it the same way, like a different style value chain, right of like when you think of like a capital project which is so big in the energy industry, we have so many of those right. If you think about the actual process design of how am I gonna take this feedstock, convert it over to whatever final product? Right? It is all the actual equipment. So I'm not talking about your heat exchangers or your pumps. Right? I'm talking about your reactors, your separators, your distillation columns, your heavy core chemical engineering, or whatever that mechanism or technology is to do that. So those technology licenses, they patent that process. And there may be 2 or 3 that are competing for just carbon capture. There may be more, but it just kind of depends on the technology. But they're very specialized in developing. So like, for example, when I was in the the biofuel space. There was mainly like 3 or 4 players for green Diesel technology. So they designed the reactor for it. And everyone. Every licensor has their own secret sauce or variation. Of how they do it. But they would be selling to like the Major Oil and Gas company, saying, if you're gonna build a plant. Take my process that I have designed and how I've speced it out and then then goes into. Then you start feeding further downstream into the supply chain that you need for energy right where you then have to add your piping, your pumps right, your distal or your your heat exchangers. You know where you start going to equipment vendors, then your instrumentation, your controls, your software. Your vendors for catalyst for chemicals. Right? So if you think about how our industry works right, it really starts with that process design, right? Whatever that is, whether it's upstream, downstream, a new energy. Everything has some sort of typically licensed processor piece to it.
Jason Assir: That's no, that's that's great. I mean. So so we're like in terms of outreach. So if you're let's just say maybe unemployed, or you just left because you wanted to do something different. like looking at the licenses as possible. Employ, you know. For projects or for employment opportunities. Is that another way to to, so that someone use it right.
Meha Jha: Yeah, I guess it's a great question. Cause I would say the licensers tend to be earlier in the project cycle. Right? So the project goes through like the feasibility assessment. Right? It goes through this selecting the technology. So they kind of almost have first look of like, is this project gonna happen or not, they influence the project heavily on the technology selection, and then it comes to the rest of us vendors right on the later stages as it gets oper either gets built under construction or operational right? There's so many design phases, as we know in the energy industry that it has to pass through each phase. but really like, if you go back again to like the route. Yes, the licenser starts there. They're very, very technical, as you can understand. So it's really good for heavily technical talent in terms of opportunity. There, I would say but yes, just with the way that it it goes. I would also say. some areas that I was surprised. So I've done some work with the American petrochemical and fuels manufacturing machine. So afpm, they build a community heavily around refining petrochemical, and they do a lot of policy. But they do a lot of working with refinery. So sometimes it's going adjacent into your space. So it's not an operating company, right? But it's some of these trade media or these working groups councils that also hire people from industry? So maybe it's not necessarily a long term. But you're like you said, because our organization tends to be cyclical, volunteering or working on those working committees, whether you're employed or not, can help either build your network or help contribute in a way as well. Yeah.
Jason Assir: That's great. Alright, I mean in. on, on a, on a like very practical level. It it translates to a bullet or 2 on your resume that, or you know a project you know, on your resume that you can. Then you can broadcast right.
Meha Jha: Well, and even the network cause doing the Afp like working council. So I did one. And it doesn't always like necessarily have to be very technical. I did. One related to something that was like passion about which was really around like they had a committee that was like, how do I make the energy industry attractive to like people of like my generation? Right? And how do we retain talent? And so it was solving a different problem, right? Not necessarily technical. But they have definitely technical groups policy groups. So quite a bit. But that helps also with you're typically around other peers at different companies. So it helps with building your network as well.
Jason Assir: No, that's well, that's that's awesome. What? What would you say? Like skills from your previous industry were most transferable to the industry that you're you are in now like.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So I would say one of the things that you know, as I mentioned for me specifically, I kept a couple of domains consistent. Right? So it was a technology. Know how? That I kept pretty consistent. The process may have changed right? So as you move the value chain. You know the how you process the crude oil from when it's first being drilled on the upstream side to where you get it to refinery. You know it varies the processing capabilities. But I kept my, you know, domain terms of technology, of being in maybe an automation technology provider consistent. And I kept my functional like my marketing functional, consistent but what kind of the new domain, or how to get the new domain? Know how a lot of it? Keeping those 2. The same is figuring out. Okay, then where do I go? Like? What are the events that I can like? Either learn from where vendors are at, where customers are at that keep up with the market trends. What publications do I subscribe to? So there's so many in the energy energy industry, and so it's like, you know, am I focused on downstream? Am I focused on upstream? Am I focused on sustainability technology? And so being able to Google search those. So I think it's really about how you get started right? Cause once you're in it and know how a lot of it becomes the same way you approach. Those functional domains. Right? That doesn't necessarily change. But it comes to how do I gain the new knowledge? To go after this space right? And I think a lot of that comes with having to kind of read. If you can't afford conferences virtually, or attending right trying to find ways that the content is repurposed or published externally. Sometimes they do that right and getting access. So it's reading up. And I think something like this like an energy gigs. I either wish I knew, or had even sooner in my career, because if there's an opportunity to do a pilot project like you said, where they're looking at certain talent or help where you can take your skills and help in these things. Cause like I said, I think so many any company I've been at, especially on the marketing side. We've always had us at some point, lean externally like, just because we don't have the bandwidth internally, the resource, the budget, or something like that. And so I think there is always opportunity, especially in these new emerging spaces with climate tech. So many of those are startups. And so they're really not having the head count. And so they're leaning heavily, externally on especially creative talent even, I'm sure, other types of talent. So I think, like a platform like this is so timely. Because it would give like. I wish when I was doing the biofuel stuff like we've tried to define consultants that we could like pay to just initially validate what we were putting together right. And so, I think, being able to have a platform like this that aggregates that resource, even if you're doing your own personal project, if it's like affordable right, and you're able to put together that point of view that you need to try to sell an idea to your customer or on an interview. So I would. The one thing I would say that I think, is changing is the last couple interviews I've had to do. I've had to put together like a proposal on how I would market sustainability for them, or what I think, Sis, this definition of sustainability would be and so that's also something I'm seeing change in our space, where sometimes you're even asked now to do a mini project as you're interviewing for companies, which is honestly, it's kind of, you know, some people view it differently. I actually view it as a positive, because if you don't have the domain knowledge, it gives you a chance to at least research. They understand you don't have the domain knowledge, but they see the way you think, and they see the way you kind of approach and figure it out, and often they're doing it, asking you to do it and put together, cause they don't know. So it's actually a good. It's actually a good kind of 2 way thing, cause they get a little bit of a oh, this is an interesting idea. Hadn't considered. So I actually think the trend of going that way. Some people kind of view it negatively like this is so much work just to get a job in an interview. But it's a really good exercise, and it actually can give you an opportunity to actually pitch or show at least a way. You think, even if it's not a space that you've been in before.
Jason Assir: I mean, I think that's great. I'm I'm glad to hear that some companies are doing that. It it reminds me a lot of like the the and consulting. There's always the case case question which you know in consulting you. You never know what sort of problem you're gonna be faced with. But can you figure out a way to organize chaos and and come do something? And so I feel like that's a that does sort of level, the playing field for people that don't have industry, knowledge. Maybe.
Meha Jha: Exactly. Yeah. And I'm starting to see. Like I said, more industrial companies kind of adopt that mindset, especially in these new spaces, because it goes beyond just looking at a resume. Right? It's cause some of these spaces are so new and not as established. So it goes to. How would you approach or think about this, what would you consider? What do you think is applicable? And so I think it's it actually creates an opportunity. If you get that chance to not be discouraged, that you have to pull something together, but actually realize this is almost like doing that initial Mini project or Mini point of view that you can bring in to try to prove and get yourself in the door. Yeah.
Jason Assir: W. So I'm I mean you you went from so you're doing the marketing and that was sort of a a, a, a functional consistent sort of area. But like the the, the technical aspect of the work of that your that your marketing was different, like, how did you get up to speed on the te. The technical aspects of the work. What did you do for that? Like.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So this is what's nice about the energy industry is. As I was kind of mentioning, there's certain trade associations like you could literally find a trade association for everything. So lately I've been taking on the asset reliability space that one's kind of been new for me. And so there. I've done just like a quick research. So like, for example, there's like a website called like Real Reliability dot web, pretty much from that website. I could see every other reliability related publication, every reliability event. So often I have found whether it's like hydrocarbon processing some of these like just different domains that if you know and evaluate and do a quick Google search, you could typically find a website that will have. Here's all the events we know. Here's other recommended publications. I usually try to always follow on LinkedIn whether it is my company. Competing companies, companies related to that segment customers. So you get a kind of a daily feed, because I would say, there's a lot of reading, and it can seem overwhelming. But once you start getting familiar, in the space you start to see, a lot repeats. And so you start to realize, okay, my knowledge is up to date. This is not net new for me.
Meha Jha: So I'm able to kind of keep up the other tool I really like is a tool called Owler OWLER. So Owler is one where you can, for free. They have different subscription models, but you could follow competitors. You could follow like a certain type of company if you wanted just oil and gas majors, and you can pick 3, and it pings me. You can set it daily or weekly, but it pings me any news alert. That kind of comes on Google or something like that. And so there's some of these platforms, even like Google alerts that you can set if you're like interested in geothermal, for example, right? And so some of that is a way of you have to pick and understand the domains. And it's not just necessarily industry specific, it may be a type of technology. So for in my case, I also subscribe to just AI/ML or SaaS, even if it's not relevant to my industry to try to continue to learn. So I think those are kind of we have so much access. Even now, I guess in the past I used to have to do the extensive Google searching. But now I can probably use something like Microsoft Bing like the ChatGPT version to just tell me what are the publications and X industry? What are the working associations? So that knowledge, I think, is like, especially in our space, is like needed consistently cause. We're not in a commercial space where you know the trends from social media right? And from what you're purchasing. and so subscribing and continuing to subscribe to those lists of whatever publications following on LinkedIn. Whatever you use to regularly read or get into your inbox helps.
Jason Assir: I mean, I think that that that that message I think is is really really almost critical to underscore is that you're you're actively also trying to learn the new things. What's happening in the industry? You're actively going to events. What about mentors or either internal to your organization or external, like, like reaching out to people on LinkedIn like, did did you do any of that to to help you get to that, navigate that path, or.
Meha Jha: Yeah, I would say internally, predominantly, more so than externally. However, I will say I usually get a lot of LinkedIn and Chris, and I'm sure you do as well that people will be like a third connection. But they'll just be like, oh, I see you're in this space. I'd love to connect and chat, you know, or I'm also doing this. But I've mainly had internal mentors. And then I've maybe met people through trade associations or different things that I connected without an event. I am more of like I prefer, like relationship building, more so than just like a handshake. That's like my preference, and I prefer to work with people on a project. But I've done, especially in the Houston community, like I said, I've I've lived there 8 years, and we had this conversation with your colleague Juliana earlier, of how I knew her was through like women's energy network doing those events. They've got great mentoring circles. I did women's net master's network as well. They have a really awesome signature event where I remember we got to go to Conico Phillips, and it was like this executive Round Table, and we got to meet around with like different people. And so I prefer that, like in Houston has a great. I know a lot of people, probably from Houston. That are gonna be watching this and so Houston has such a great like so many different events and networks where you can like actually access and meet people in person. And like I watched the geothermal webinar that you'll had someone on for on your YouTube channel as well. And so I feel like the nice thing is the Webinar series you guys do is like helping me identify some people that if I'm like, I need to know something I will like shoot them a message on LinkedIn as well. And so I think that's what's nice is like, you guys are actually creating a bit more of a public space to actually like humanize some of this new energy stuff, you know, because sometimes when we watch webinars, it's very technical, it's not as personal. It's very slide, intensive. And so I really like the series that y'all are doing here as well as with women's Masters Network, because I'm pretty sure, after I watch the webinars or the recordings, I can probably shoot them a message and connect as needed to. So I really appreciate that as well.
Jason Assir: No, that's cool, thank you. We'll we'll take it. We'll take it. Well, so I mean going from physical product marketing to now marketing a SaaS product. I mean. So you know, I I know I used to work at a at a consulting firm where the VP of HR was like, I don't even know like how to hire people for this, because it's not a physical product like. So were there any challenges with going from a product marketing in a physical sense, to something that's in bits and bites in the.
Meha Jha: Yeah, so many for me that I'm having to learn going in the software like software so new to me, because there's so many technical terms that I don't know that are like programming related like very software engineering related. And I didn't study software engineering. Then I've got to add the data science piece with AI/ML. Then I have to add whatever cloud is, you know, ever figured that out, you know, and and so there's like there's so much, I think one of the big differences. There's a couple of huge differences that I've noticed between going from your typical hardware technology to software number one is the pace. Because I felt like we if we were doing a next Gen. Meter, like a huge overhaul on our like metering, low, metering technology. It was like at every 5 to 10 year thing here. It's like every quarter. I see the product managers are. You know, cranking out the next set of features. Developments like it is so fast paced. how software goes, and then you have to tend to respond quicker as bugs or issues come up right like they have to be responded to in real time. It's not like something like, Oh, yeah, in our next revision, and 6 months, a few years will will improve. This, like it is very, very quick and fast paced. So the roadmap management I feel like is so tough. And there's so much capability. It's not like these are mature products like our flow meters valve so many of those things it just becomes. Maybe we need a new material, a new line size, like, yeah, there's a lot more stability. Whereas in software it's like, Oh, Gen AI now has come, and they've now made it more cost effective. How are we incorporating that in against all these other things? So the pace is so much faster. I think the second thing I would say is a big difference I noticed with software is, you'll hear, sort of outcome. People talk about what outcome does it deliver? So it's not as much about the technology itself, the software itself, the features and benefits. You're usually selling some sort of outcome. So in my case, I focus a lot on reliability and maybe emissions management, which is sustainability. And so there's a lot more. And when it comes to selling this sort of outcome. And this software and software as a service, right? It's this sort of ongoing having to prove the benefit. It's also, how do you adopt the product. So it's not like a flow meter where you install it in the field. And you know it's adopted right? And you know, it's ideally working right? There is so much more on the organizational side that's required change management, side adoption side user interface, that has to continually evolve and make it easier for people to use cause like I think, just like the other day I had I was pulling my work phone so I don't know, like, I was putting these phones together, my work phone and my personal phone. And it keeps asking me, Do I want to share or receive contact info? And I was like, Oh, I didn't know that you could just put two iPhones together, and it just shares the numbers automatically. You don't have to contact and add anymore, right? I don't know if you knew that, but I.
Jason Assir: I know that's that's new.
Meha Jha: Yeah, so yeah, this is like a new. I don't know if it's in the latest IOS I'm tired of how many times I have to update my iPhone. But yeah, so basically, I just discovered you try it out. Anyone try it out with an iPhone. You don't have to type in contact if it just shares automatically. Now, when you just touch two iPhones together. And I think that's my point is like with software, even when it comes to my car when it comes to my phone. There are so many new enhancements that iPhone releases, and I am too overwhelmed to even like pay attention to what all can be done right. There's just certain core things. But it's the same way in the industrial software space of there's so many different features and capabilities you can add on. But how do you make it simplified? Communicate in a way that people are aware, and they're able to use it right and know that they can use it. There's way too much on my iPhone that I'm probably able to do that. I just don't want to figure out. I want it to be so intuitive. Right? So it's the same thing with software. It's it's very different than like you said a physical hardware that you know you set it, and you can kind of forget it right? Or you know how it works. But so the software industry requires quite a bit more of really thinking about process people, technology and connecting the three together. So you're you're you're addressing all three problems, not just one. I realize my hand, set up this. By the way, I know I was like, this is a Hannah from. I had an event, a cultural event.
Jason Assir: No, that's cool like a wedding or some yeah.
Meha Jha: It was not a wedding, but it was like an Indian event. I know it would have been fun if it was. But yeah.
Jason Assir: Cool, very cool, very cool. Well, so could you briefly like, what? What? What does? What product are? Do you? Are you marketing? I mean.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So I am focused right now on in particular asset reliability. So asset performance management. APM is often what it was known in the industry. So basically, there's so much to the reliability maintenance, maintenance space when you really think about it. And so in the past. people maybe used to go out in the field and manually inspect right and check the condition. Put it on clipboards, and then it's progressed to where. Okay, they put certain instrumentation around it, they could monitor it continuously versus intermittent. And then they put analytics to it. But there's a lot of disparate systems. So that's like another thing when it comes to software is your often also trying to aggregate so many different data sources and see how you can make it meaningful and insightful. And so in this case, a lot of assets like your pumps. Compressors, those are really critical, often critical equipment. They're monitored differently. Or a different extent than your static, like your heat exchangers, or or or fired heaters, or so it's there's different modeling techniques that are deployed depending on the asset type. There's a different top, often level of instrumentation. And so Education. Protocols right like Scada or. Different systems. So yeah, different control systems. Historians, lab data, so many different sources. You also deal with data quality which I think is any software issue of like, do we actually even have the data? And that's also a challenge for AI and machine learning is, do you even have enough data to make the models work to train the models good quality data. So there's all these sort of challenges. But what our software focuses on is. it takes the data from all these different sources. We figure out and apply the correct modeling techniques depending on like the used case. So depending on the asset type, depending how critical it is, the criticality of it depending on your data availability. What type of model can we go with? And and so we try to cover the balance of plant, so that would be instruments as well. Valves not just not just rotating and plant assets. How do you do it when you have different OEMs. That's another thing that manufacture this equipment and what they're monitoring capabilities are. So a lot of this is this true digitalization of how do you take all of that process? Put it into a single unified platform? Then how do you advance the analytics to improve the prediction, because the big thing about reliability and maintenance and what they're trying to achieve is you don't want unplanned downtime in our industry, right? It's extremely costly can be also dangerous, depending on what causes the fault and what type of equipment it is. And so our goal is really, how do we keep improving that prediction. And there's 2 ways right? There's accuracy as well as giving enough advance. Notice that you have time to actually do something about it right? Before a failure come occurs or safety incident. So that's kind of the core. And then we integrate. So this is the whole digitalization piece, where? Okay? You take the data, you model it, you get a notification. You embed it with insights. Right? That you help guide and say, Okay, this is based on history. This is what you do. This is a recommended action. This is what we think the causes, and then you integrate it into your workflows of. Okay, then, how do I tell my maintenance team what to do? Right? So it's streamlining so many of these cross functional capabilities. Giving them those insights right. And so this isn't really like an easy technology in terms of right? It's it's it's solving so many different things. That's why it's really a programmatic approach. Right? It's really about selling the outcome of how do we enable you to do asset reliability and maintenance? It's not just a singular software, right. It's having to understand and recommend and consult on all these areas to truly do. Do it. And I know you have a consulting background, so you can totally probably like, understand a lot of is, it's actually a project or a program, right? And it's an ongoing journey. It's not as simple as I buy like Microsoft office, and I download it, and it's like there, right. Industry. It's much more complex. Yeah.
Jason Assir: Yeah, the the the number of very different types of inputs into your system to then have a unified experience. That's that's great user experience. I mean, that's that's pretty. That's all very complicated, right like. And.
Meha Jha: And yeah, and in your solving it's not just like a what I should say, an automation tool, right? It's not just a tool that's gonna like I think about like a, you know, I use like budgeting tools, right? And they aggregate all my transactions. And they budget for me. It's not simple as just automating, right? It's really having to integrate into the workflow process, provide insights and expertise as well, you know. So it's not. Our software is not as simple as the ones we use at home, right where it's like, okay, can you just make this more efficient for me? There's a lot more to it. Yeah.
Jason Assir: Yeah, it's that's really interesting. Cause, like, I think. in the enterprise we're we're so used to well as consumers. We're so used to like these, really easy to use consumer products. And then you go on the enterprise. Then you're you're forced to. Let's just say use SAP, you know. It's stop all production, right? Like, like, you know, clunky user interfaces. And and slowly, you're starting to see that that the the consumer products are influencing the UX design user experience for com. You know, commercial products, and we as users both in enterprise and and consumers. We now expect a seamless user experience, right? Like. Yes, and to be super intuitive. And that's that's the opportunity that AI/ML is helping with that we're seeing on the software side is ideally simplifying that user interface for people, making it a little bit more intuitive, making it more intelligent with like being able to provide. Okay, like, you give me a result or an answer. But then, what do I do next? Right. Helping guide kind of thing. So there's a lot of opportunities. But, as I said, it is such a fast and evolving space. And you know, when the energy industry we operate usually traditionally at a different pace. So this is taking off a lot faster. Then I would say, like the AI/ML stuff, that it was end of November 2022, when the the sort of ChatGPT became like very for public use, and I was on the previous webinar that I did with women's master network, the energy gig sponsored I had shared. How I don't think I've seen more end users and oil and gas reach out to us? To ask, how can we either embed this in products? Or how can we use this? And so like, that's the fastest I've seen. You know, people really thinking about trying to adopt a new technology in our space. Yeah. And and so I was surprised to think it's only been November 2022, like really, maybe a year and a half right? And then so many people are pilot like piloting even at the companies that I've been working at. They're piloting different ways to already use Gen. AI in our own workflows and functions. So that's like the fastest. I've seen something come out right. And so it's been, you know, very, very interesting to see this pace in our field.
Jason Assir: Yeah, I mean, that's that's that is the truth. I think when Version 4 came out I I I think I wouldn't be exaggerating if I said I didn't sleep, stay up in the middle of the night and like what? What's gonna happen? You know? Because it was just like the face of change. Well, so what I mean. So you you read up on a lot of material you sign up to for newsletters. What else did you do for it to get up to speed on? Sort of how software is built? I mean, did you have any? Did you ever dabble in building software yourself to get better sense of it, or what what.
Meha Jha: My goodness, absolutely not. Luckily, I sit here some software engineers and I can ask and I'm still learning. So I think I just joined about a year ago on the software side. And so I still have a lot to honestly learn. Luckily, like there are trainings. I think so many companies have been at subscribe to like Coursera. Different resources like that. There's stuff that, whether it is pure software or AI/ML companies or things like that that, like, you know, content marketing. I feel like in the last like since I started, my career started growing more and more right. So where you gate content, you gate white papers, you gate ebooks. And so there's a lot of good domain like knowledge out there, actually like for free, that is actually more relevant to our space. And so sometimes like whether it's competitors or previous companies, I've been at that I'll like, look at and see what they're saying to help my learning. My own company has stuff as well. So again, it's a lot of uptake and reading, and like I have to block. My calendar. like usually like Friday, is a good time that I'm like, okay, all my emails that are not, you know. Company related, or Job related that I subscribe to for info, like I have to kind of make it a weekly habit to try to read it then, and flag it then, so that I'm making sure I'm keeping up to speed for me, though I will say I think this is one of the important things in roles for me. Learning how software developed is is not necessarily as critical for me as learning SaaS models cloud, what does that mean? Reliability? AI/ML? And how does that like? What does that look like for the product like? What can that help with, or you know some of these new markets or different industries that we could potentially take this product. So you know, I think that's one of the key things. Whatever role you transition, there's always so much you can learn. But how do you prioritize? What are the bigger things for you to learn right away? Like, I think that's also critical to recognize especially if people are wanting to transition to a new industry, what do you need to know about that industry? Right? Is like a really critical question to ask yourself, because you may not need to know all the technical. how the product works. But do you need to know who the job personages who the key companies are, how do you figure that out? And there's other things to like market analyst reports, I'm sure, like, you all know. The nice thing about the software space, I will say. is like Gartner, some of these analysts they do a quadrant ranking on software capabilities. So they have, like a buyers guide or things like that. So you start to see some of these resources that maybe you didn't have access to before depending on the technology you worked on. Yeah.
Jason Assir: No, that's that's that's great, I and then I I guess, like. So you also, I mean, this is another sort of part of your journey is you. You lived in Houston. Then you moved to Atlanta and. And then that's where you're from. Originally like, not like, are there lots of other people in the energy space? I know there's probably more people on the tech side, maybe, than an energy like. Or what what is that.
Meha Jha: Correct. Yeah, I think if I think about the major like I remember, cause in the past I've always thought of. Oh, I'd love to like, live in Atlanta. closer to home, and I always told my parents I was like, there's no one in the energy really industry like super out there. There's like utilities companies. And then there is actually pipeline a pipeline company out of here. But it was very, very like kind of limited. And this is, I think, what kind of surprised me. As I've been out here to learn that there's like, actually like more. There's a corrosion chapter out here for the southeast, right at Elena's, like kind of the biggest city in the southeast. And so there's actually more than I realized that is available out here. I think. you know, but coming from a Houston, it's a bit scary, because most of my background is Houston and energy in Texas in general, and so I would say, yes, it surprisingly, though, like the company I currently work for started a big operation out here. And it was part of. You know. They have a huge operation in Houston as well. But even though we service my technology service a good amount of you know the companies in Houston? It was that AI/ML that needed software expertise where they built an office in Atlanta right? And built it. So so it is kind of cool to be on this side and see. And that's what I think is like. Important about this conversation is seeing how our technology is evolving right? Whether that's a new energy technology or this sort of software, right? And like, I think I'm started this conversation with, there's 2 transitions going on. There's this sort of energy transition to new sources. But there's also this technology transition and trying to tether your career to one of those two, because it's likely gonna come at you one way or the other, right. Need to stay relevant and so if you're tethered to at least one, you're in a good spot.
Jason Assir: No, that's well, that's that's very cool. Well, I I'm gonna I don't wanna monopolize the entire conversation. If you have any more. Anyone has any questions may have. Please to ask them. We have little time left, and so I'm I'm gonna keep going on. But please do ask in the chat, we'll we'll be happy to to to answer any questions you might have. What was, did you? Your motivation to to moving to different industries. Was it the OP. Just the opportunities, like, what? What was the underlying? Yeah.
Meha Jha: Great question. To be completely honest, I think it kind of goes back to the same way as the technology move is certain. Industries become very stable, very mature. The investment isn't as much there, and for me, I think a big thing is like, how am I staying like relevant and marketable like my, you know, being really marketable. And so sometimes you have to maybe realize if you just stay in a certain segment, you may be limiting your know how your expertise you're only tailored to that segment. And so for me, it's like, I think, die industry. Diversification is really important. So I've predominantly worked in the energy industry, but I also had a role where I had the opportunity to be exposed to hybrid and discrete manufacturing so very outside of the process industries and even with the current technology that I'm working on, there's potential like we sell into metals and mining, which is like not something I've ever touched before. So I'm having to like. Learn a little bit about those applications. And so to me, I think the industry diversification piece. Is very, very kind of critical especially as you know all this talk about new energies and this pivoting. So I think that is where I see better career opportunities like come up as as you're chasing what is actually evolving because it's tends to be less competitive in a sense of not many people maybe have that know how. If you keep trying to move to something new, right? Versus if you're in some of the core legacy spaces. The market can be pretty saturated.
Jason Assir: and I mean, with your chemical engineering background, do you find that you're that? You still have a touch point to that work like in in the work that you're doing now like, do you find you finding it? You switch.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So the particular software that I'm focused on now heavily has a lot more mechanical engineering to it. I have found that, regardless of what engineering I do. I end up having to become all types of engineers. In the way that the energy industry works. It's so cross, functional, disciplined that you tend to have a little bit of awareness. But yes, there's also capabilities. And the software that I work on that are thermodynamic for like performance, monitoring of assets very like stuff I had to learn in school. And so yes, I do find like biofuels, very similar chemical engineering knowledge. So I do find again that even though functionally, I do marketing on a technical side, having to learn or understand processes. or manufacturing in general, and how it works having that background has helped for sure. As well. But yes, all this new stuff, like I told you, software is maybe one of the disciplines I've never had exposure to in my field, right? That I'm like now, having to like, maybe understand a little bit more about how certain things work or like what what technicalities of a product right? And like the features and what that means? Maybe more so from that side. Not necessarily the nuts and bolts of how you code our program. But just what features do people look at when they're looking at software right.
Jason Assir: So did you? In terms of like training and for anyone else listening that that maybe wants to get into software that maybe has a technical background or wants to start doing something. I mean, would you recommend, like Coursera like, where those are the things that? Did you use any of that, or.
Meha Jha: Yeah. So I guess when you say software, are you saying more? So software engineering or being commercially like getting more involved with software like selling it, marketing it.
Jason Assir: More of like what you're doing now, and sort of selling.
Meha Jha: Yeah, great question. I think the big thing it kind of goes back to like, we said with any transition, seeing what you can hold constant. So if you could hold, like your product marketing constant. But then do you have industry? Know how that would be? The second thing. So for example, this software that this asset performance reliability software. it sells into oil and gas. It sells into refineries. And so like, it sells into some markets that I've already have knowledge. So if you can ideally find a software that is supporting an industry, you already know, that would be so. It's like kind of finding that little wedge or pivot point right where you're overlapping on a certain way. And there are so many software like different types of software that are going into some of these legacy oil and gas, or, I shouldn't say legacy. But traditional oil and gas sources or spaces, right? And so so many different types of software, like in the portfolio that I work on, not including our sustainability and our cyber, it's already like 16 different products, software products that we're selling into industrials, which is like heavily oil and gas and refining chemical and so I think that's the thing is, when you think of a pivot trying to kind of go step by step. So it's like, okay, let me keep function the same. Do I know an industry? I may not know the software, but I actually know the industry, and I can probably understand the pain, the challenges and so for me, like, when I was at the instrumentation level. It was like at the field level. And I was just moving up the technology stack when I was doing it right. So I kept the base knowledge the same, but worked my way up.
Jason Assir: I mean, I think that's a very tactical, very good plan of attack. You know, I think. You know I I do apologize. That may I think we I blew through our allotted time, and I really really enjoyed the conversation today. Thank you so much for sharing your time, your wisdom. If anyone has any additional questions. Can they reach out to you?
Meha Jha: Absolutely. Please, please do. And I know this is like, honestly, I think this is such a great topic you picked. I think your platform helps with being a tool or bridge to also helping people connect that we maybe didn't have in the past as a resource. So I'm like, really excited for energy gigs, and like all that, it'll like, bring as well to help. But yeah, this is something that I often like when I've given talks at conferences. So many people come up saying they want to make some sort of transition, whether it's like functional within their company, a different department, different division. So I think you know this is like awesome, and I hope that the audience has some tidbits that they can like, take and be practical and help them out. So thank you for this time.
Jason Assir: No? Well, yeah, it it's super excited. Thank you so much for for for joining again. Thank you. Everyone for for joining we we'll we'll be recording. I mean, we have been recording this session. We'll be posting the show notes and seeing, sending it out to everyone that that join. And yeah, Meha thanks again. Have a great rest of your day.
Meha Jha: Yeah, thank, you.
Jason Assir: Bye. Oh, bye.
