When CDN requested Nancy Kierstead how a lot progress ladies have made in the channel throughout her profession, her thoughts went again to at least one explicit room at her firm.
And no, it’s not the boardroom.
Nancy Kierstead – Director of Corporate Services, Bulletproof
“I went months, possibly even a 12 months or extra earlier than I ever met up with anyone else in the girls’ washroom,” Kierstead instructed CDN in an interview from Fredericton, N.B.
As she swiftly identified, that was 14 years in the past when she had simply joined a small New Brunswick firm known as Bulletproof. Kierstead famous that since then, ladies have made vital strides in the channel and at Bulletproof itself.
“Now I work with a number of actually nice ladies all through the firm and all of us carry such a unique perspective to our roles,” she mentioned. “We even have three of our VPs which are feminine and I’m seeing the identical presence of ladies in management roles inside different firms as nicely. So I feel we should have a methods to go however we’ve made a lot progress that it actually must be celebrated.”
On Tuesday, CDN celebrated Kierstead by inducting her into the Women in the IT Channel (WITC) Hall of Fame.
Love of math
Kierstead’s path to the channel began along with her pursuit of a childhood ardour.
“As a child I actually beloved math. When I used to be in highschool I obtained the alternative to take a programming course and I simply actually beloved the logic in it,” she recalled.
She graduated from the University of New Brunswick with two levels that will serve her notably nicely in the channel: a bachelor of enterprise administration and a masters in pc science.
Armed with that twin data base, Kierstead obtained her first job in the channel recent out of college as a enterprise analyst and mission supervisor at Xwave. After 12 years there, she joined Bulletproof in 2007 and is now director of company providers at the firm.
Founded in Fredericton in 2000, Bulletproof now employs near 300 individuals and helps greater than 50,000 customers in over 300 consumer areas round the world. Originally centered on safety consulting, Bulletproof expanded its choices to broader IT providers and was acquired by Gaming Laboratories International (GLI Group) in 2016.
Bulletproof was named Microsoft’s Global Security Partner of the Year for 2021 and is a earlier winner of Dell Canada’s Partner of the Year award.
Regional range
The theme of this 12 months’s WITC Recognition Luncheon is Come Together, a nod to tumultuous social and political change throughout the Sixties and Nineteen Seventies. Calls for extra range and inclusion throughout these a long time finally paved the means for progress in civil rights, ladies’s rights and homosexual rights.
Kierstead mentioned Bulletproof’s success highlights regional range, exhibiting how regional strengths can bolster the Canadian channel as an entire.
“I look again and I’m reminded that this firm was began simply 20 years in the past by three very good minds in little, little Fredericton, New Brunswick. And now, by the collective contribution of quite a few individuals, we’re a global firm of 300 individuals profitable Microsoft associate awards. So that’s actually thrilling to be part of and I’m extremely happy with what this group has completed,” she mentioned.
WITC Awards
CDN celebrated Kierstead and 4 different ladies at this 12 months’s WITC Recognition Luncheon. Kierstead was inducted into the WITC Hall of Fame together with Noémi Labelle of ITI, Rose Marcello of VMware and Joanne C. Wilson of The Trainer’s Advisory Network.
At the identical digital occasion, Wilson was named Mentor of the Year and Pallavi Ramdanchani of Cognizant Microsoft Business Group was named Rising Star of the Year.
