Every day is International Women’s Day at our company, we have talented tech ladies on board. At Barco we encourage and inspire young women to shape their own future and consider a career in technology.
Our next tech girl, Jana De Cock, grew up in an all-girls family. As a child she really engaged creatively through drawing, crafting or building things with Lego®. A visit to the local pharmacy during Career Day in primary school stirred up a new interest in science. What really appealed to her was the balance between the rationale of technology/science in preparing the medicines, and the emotional side of the job in helping and healing people.
At eighteen, Jana chose commercial engineering at university. During her studies, she was selected for an exchange project with a business school in the United States. And once graduated, she added an extra internship to her already impressive resume as management consultant at McKinsey. (Fun fact: that’s also where and how our current CEO Jan de Witte learned the ropes!) In short, Jana is really a Jill of all trades.
Today she works as product manager in the Barco Healthcare division. So not as a pharmacist, but her job gives her the same fulfillment in that it offers the perfect combo of technological challenges and the humane aspect of healthcare. And she’s sure that’s also exactly where the advantage lies of working with mixed-gender teams. Without confirming outdated and one-sided clichés, she does strongly believe that women can bring new perspectives to your technical project. “The best ideas come when men and women think together.”