Dona Sarkar
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ABOUT
Background & Mission
Dona Sarkar is the luckiest girl on the planet. She has not one, not two, but THREE jobs she absolutely loves.
She is a Seattle-based engineering manager at Microsoft, an author, a fashion blogger and designer. She joined Microsoft in 2005 and currently works on the HoloLens team, bringing the ability to easily build holographic apps to the masses.
She has more than 13 years of experience in the tech industry and has been involved in building products and customer experiences that are used by more than a billion people, starting from Oracle databases to multiple versions of Windows and and holograms! She has previously completed a Data Science cert as well as a Digital Marketing MBA program at Rutgers so she can better understand how her company can reach more customers.
Dona is a passionate advocate of hiring and retaining diverse talent into the tech industry. She spends several months every year leading technical roadshows and conducting interviews in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Australia and Argentina.
She has been requested by universities (Oxford, Cambridge, Stanford, Harvard, University of Michigan), business schools (INSEAD, Oxford, IE, ESADE,McCombs School of Business) and large organizattion such as Grace Hopper, WISE and Tapia to keynote and speak at various conferences and events, as well as being the Grace Hopper Industry track chair for Microsoft.
She lives in Seattle, Washington with her handsome husband and a very bossy grey tabby named Ash.
Author
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Dona started writing in 2002 purely by accident. Brand new to Seattle, Washington, she realized the only way to make new friends was by taking classes. She enrolled at Bellevue College for Pottery 101. Very excitedly, she arrived on the first day of class to see that...Pottery was cancelled. No one else had signed up. The kindly registrar encouraged her to try Creative Writing...great teacher, fun subject...and most importantly, *not cancelled*.
Dona fell in love with "making stuff up" and wrote not one, not two, not three, but FOUR manuscripts before her novel HOW TO SALSA IN A SARI, a story of an African-Indian-Cuban culture clash was published in 2008 from HarperCollins/Harlequin's Kimani Tru Line. SHRINK TO FIT, a story of a high school athlete who stuggles with an eating disorder, quickly followed. To Dona's surprise, HOW TO SALSA IN A SARI was also released in India and spent several weeks on the best-seller lists.
Dona's 2014 novella HAUTE DATE is centered around using technology to further fashion and is a love story to her three passions: tech, fashion and story.
AUTHOR
A Way With Words
Dona's latest is near and dear to her heart: a non-fiction titled YOU HAD ME AT HELLO WORLD: Mentoring lessons with industry leaders at Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, Google, Zynga which is now available. This is a culmination of 25 interviews Dona did with her role models and mentors around what career advice they would give to the next generation.
Dona recently signed with Kensington Publishing for a 3 book deal in Adult Contemporary fiction due to release in late 2016 though 2017.
She is represented by the infinitely patient Elaine Spencer at The Knight Agency.
Engineer
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ENGINEER
Technical Talks
Dona went on a Tech Roadshow at the University of Wollongong in Australia and talked about the many layers of customer data and how they're used to make product decisions (2014): http://media.uow.edu.au/news/UOW168326.html
Dona continued the Tech Roadshow at The University of Adelaide in Australia and shared how to ace a technical interview as well as discussing the importance of the many layers of customer data (2014): Microsoft at Adelaide March 18th
Microsoft Jobs Ad (2009) http://microsoftjobsblog.com/windows-7-dona-sarkar/
Software Validation and Advocating for the Customer (2008): Dona Sarkar: Testing Software and Advocating Customers
Dona is frequently called on to participate in tech talks and interviews promoting the importance of listening to the customer, using the customer's data for good, the future of tech and the value of a diverse engineering staff.
This fall, she will be speaking at MBA schools (IE, IESE, ESADE, INSEAD, Oxford, and LSE), MIT, a series of schools in the LA area, and Georgia Tech.
Earlier in 2015, she spoke at:
- Keynoted PearlHacks at the University of North Carolina - Spring 2015
- Spoke on a technical roadshow across the UK: Imperial College, Uni of Edinburgh, Cambridge, Oxford - Spring 2015
- Keynote at the WECode Conference at Harvard University - February 7, 2015
- Spoke at the University of Michigan about Tech++ - January 26th, 2015
- Spoke at U-T Austin's Engineering school about Tech++ - January 26, 2016
McCombs School of Business fall conference: Dona spoke about how to be poised to "seize opportunities" and the formula for success she learned while writing You Had Me at, 'Hello World'.
Tech++ at Stanford: Dona spoke about how tech is poised to "disrupt" other industries such as medicine, education and fashion. https://medium.com/@sheplusplus/a-jill-of-all-trades-a9d76609b543
Speaker
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SPEAKER & MENTOR
She the first person in IWantHerJob history to have a 2-part feature on her story:
Part I - How I Failed My First Computer Science Class Yet Scored An Awesome Internship
Part II - How ANYONE can become a coder--and should!
Featured as a successful, multi-dimensonal woman in tech for Microsoft Women's Day Article (2014): http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/features/2014/mar14/03-06internationalwomensday.aspx
Dona spoke about her job in data-driven customer delight as well as her passions both in and out of work (2014): Wired for Success Panel for International Women's Day
She and her team were featured in an article for #ILookLikeAnEngineer after their tweets went viral.
Dona was incredibly flattered to be featured in Glamour magazine talking about being a woman
in tech.
Dona loves to mentor, grow and hire the next generation of women and minorities. She's often interviewed on these topics and always finds it very flattering to be asked. Here are some of her favorite moments:
Diversity Events
Talking about how to create opportunities for yourself when it seems like none exist at the Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) Keynote at the University of Washington (2014). This talk is the inspiration for the upcoming YOU HAD ME AT HELLO WORLD book: WiSE Conference 2014: An Inspiring Event for Students and Professionals in Science and Engineering
Fashion Designer
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FASHION DESIGN
She was asked to participate in a charity fashion show for Jolkona in October of 20143 where she styled several models, showcased some of her creations and walked the runway. Not falling off the runway in 6 inch heels is one of the greatest achievements of her life.
Two years after enrolling herself in fashion school, Dona loves to travel the world collecting unique fabrics and creating one-of-a-kind couture for customers. She is very excited to use holographic technology to disrupt the fashion design world. She was recently featured on Microsoft's Instagram Channel for her background in engineering and fashion.
Dona has always wanted to start a fashion blog, but doesn't actually love how she looks in pictures, and wanted to feature other people instead,. She along with her co-worker Beth Crane, decided to start a fashion blog that celebrates and showcases the awesome personal style of people who work in STEM fields like so many of their co-workers and friends. You can see what they're up to at Fibonacci Sequins Blog.
During her first patternmaking class, Dona realized the concepts were fairly simple, due to her innate sense of 3D visualization. Dona credits this ability to her engineering degree :) She was able to take Garmet Duplication, a more senior class within a few weeks and was unbelievable impressed by the quality of the teachers and advanced students at the school.
A few months later, Dona was independently creating patterns, draping fabric and sewing garments with ease. Okay, maybe not ease, but at least proficiency.
WIthin half an hour, Dona quickly realized that sewing was a needed skill for this new endeavor. Unfortunately, she'd never seen a sewing machine in real life and had no idea how to thread a needle and realized she needed professional help! She signed up for private lessons and after a month of stabbing herself repeatedly with a needle, had created her first project: a farmer's market tote bag. It was quite ugly, but it was hers, beginning to end.
Dona was walking through the picturesque Ballard neighborhood of Seattle one day while apartment-hunting and she noticed the New York Fashion Academy. Having been curious about the fashion industry for many years, she walked in and applied.
Passion for Fashion
Contact
Contact Dona Sarkar
CONTACT
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Dona loves talking to people about tech, fashion and writing...and loves meeting passionate individuals about any or all of these things!
You can reach her on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or email.
© 2014 DONA SARKAR KONCEPT CREATIVE