Name: Camilla Ølgaard Jægerholt
Title: Technical Designer Industrial production
Company: Svendborg Brakes ApS
Talk about the culture at your company. What makes it inclusive or supportive of women? What do you enjoy about working there as an engineer?
The culture in Svendborg Brakes is perfect. I feel I am respected and recognized for the work I do by my colleagues, and the projects I work on are exciting and challenging for the level that I am currently at. I graduated as a Technical Designer approximately a year and a half ago, so I still have a lot to learn.
What first drew you to engineering? / When did you first know you wanted to be an engineer?
It was a bit of a coincidence that I became a Technical Designer. I was about to finish my maternity leave and couldn’t find a job in sales and marketing. I sat one day together with my father, discussing what education I might take, something that there would be a good future in, and Technical Designer came up. I thought the education sounded exciting, and that it suited me really well. An education where you learn to use ideas to create, develop and design new products.
Describe your biggest engineering challenge. How did you conquer it or resolve it, or what was the outcome?
The largest assignment I have worked on together with my colleagues was a Machining Tool which is also used in the Wind Turbine industry. My job was to create the 3D model, some of the documentation and machine drawings of all the various parts It was an extremely educational and exciting project for someone like myself that was newly graduated at the time.
The project I am currently working on, is constructing in CAD our new Production Facility that will be built in India and completing drawings and documentation for this project. Again, another very exciting and educational assignment that I am proud to be a part of.
What career advice would you give to your younger self?
With the knowledge I have today, I should have definitely gone this way from the start with my education. I was 25 years old when I started my education as a Technical Designer. Looking back, I should have taken the relevant vocational training after the 10th grade (~ High School / Sophomore ) and from there carried on to Technical Design and / or Engineering from there.
In your opinion, what more can be done to promote greater participation of young women in engineering today?
I certainly think that more young people and especially women should choose this path. Women can easily join the technical world. I think a barrier may be that men often have the basic technical understanding from nature’s side, where as we women must fight a bit more for it — but we can do it. And I love to tell anyone who will listen, about my world as a designer/constructor.
[A condensed version of this sponsored profile appears in the November “Women in Engineering” issue of Design World.]
Filed Under: ALL INDUSTRY NEWS • PROFILES • COMMENTARIES, Women in Engineering
