Enrich Your Engineering Career With These SessionsEnrich Your Engineering Career With These Sessions

Engineers will share their career stories during several sessions at MD&M West and the Sustainable Manufacturing Expo. Come listen to your peers to get inspired!

Daphne Allen, Editor-in-Chief

January 28, 2025

2 Min Read
MD&M West career building sessions
Conference attendees at a past IME West.Informa Markets Engineering

Sustainable Manufacturing Expo and MD&M West 2025 feature several panel discussions that will explore engineering career opportunities and challenges. You’ll hear directly from engineers working in a number of industries.

Check out the following career-building sessions at these upcoming shows. We've also included a few business and tech-focused sessions on market trends and workforce challenges to help prepare engineers for the future.

Sustainable Manufacturing Expo

Feb. 4

1:30-2:15 pm

Lessons in Sustainability Product Development to Expand Your Business Opportunities

Speaker: John Crombie, President at UpStart Product Development

MD&M West 2025

Feb. 4

11:00-11:45 am

A Medtech Industry Update

Speaker: Omar Ford, Editor-in-Chief, MD+DI

11:15 am-noon

Leadership and Change Management in the Age of Industry 4.0: Strategies for Leading a Digital Transformation Journey in Manufacturing and Overcoming Resistance to Change and Fostering a Culture of Innovation

Speakers:

  • Lauren Dunford, CEO and Co-Founder at Guidewheel

  • Lisa Huett, Director of Sustainability at Pretium Packaging

1:00-1:45 pm

Speaker: Kate Magill, Lead Editor at Manufacturing Dive

Feb. 5

10:15–11:00 am

Labor 4.0: Rebuilding Today's Workforce for Tomorrow's Manufacturing

Speakers:

  • Anthony Turgman, Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Live Solutions

  • Cassandra Turgman, Vice President of Operations at Live Solutions

11:00 am-11:45

How to Build a Better Engineering Career: A Conversation with John Crombie

Moderator: Daphne Allen, Editor-in-Chief, Design News

Speaker: John Crombie, President at UpStart Product Development

1:00-1:45 pm

Driving Leadership for Women in Engineering

Moderator: Carol Mitchell-Lin

Creative Services Manager, Joanne Gore Communications

Panelists:

  • Brandyl Hutzel, Systems Engineering Manager, Northrop Grumman

  • Charlotte Wagner, executive coach

  • Mia M. Fujii, Country Business Development Executive, Siemens Digital Industries Software

  • Yvette Espinoza, Principal Software Engineer, Northrop Grumman

3:00-3:45 pm

Develop Your Skills. Expand Your Network. Advance Your Career

Speaker: Santosh Suggu, Manufacturing Quality Manager at Neocis Inc.

3:15–5:00 pm

Society of Women Engineers Panel & Networking Reception

Feb. 6

1:15-2:00 pm

Generative AI Factory Copilots: The Solution to Manufacturing's Labor Challenges

Speaker: Chris Kuntz, VP of Strategic Operations at Augmentir

Last week DesignCon offered these sessions:

DesignCon

Thursday Jan. 30

2:15-3:00 pm

Panel—Women in Engineering

Moderator: Daphne Allen, editor-in-chief,Design News

Panelists:

  • Pegah Alavi, Senior Applications Engineer, Keysight Technologies; 

  • Beth Kochuparambil, Principal Engineer, Cisco’s Common Hardware Group

  • Cathy Liu, Distinguished Engineer, Broadcom, and a past DesignCon Engineer of the Year

3:15-4:15 pm

Panel—Tips to Achieve a Successful, Impactful Career

Moderator: Janet O'Neil, Vice President – Member Services at IEEE EMC Society Board of Governors

Panelists: 

  • Praveena Anand-Kumar, Managing Director, CETECOM INC.

  • Beth Kochuparambil, Principal Engineer, Cisco’s Common Hardware Group

  • Biyao Zhao, Senior SIPI Engineer, Nvidia

4:35-5:15 pm

Women in Engineering Networking Reception

About the Author

Daphne Allen

Editor-in-Chief, Design News

Daphne Allen is editor-in-chief of Design News. She previously served as editor-in-chief of MD+DI and of Pharmaceutical & Medical Packaging News and also served as an editor for Packaging Digest. Daphne has covered design, manufacturing, materials, packaging, labeling, and regulatory issues for more than 20 years. She has also presented on these topics in several webinars and conferences, most recently discussing design and engineering trends at MD&M West 2024 and leading an Industry ShopTalk discussion during the show on artificial intelligence. She will be moderating the upcoming webinar, Best Practices in Medical Device Engineering and will be leading an Automation Tour at Advanced Manufacturing Minneapolis. She will also be attending DesignCon and MD&M West 2025.

Daphne has previously participated in meetings of the IoPP Medical Device Packaging Technical Committee and served as a judge in awards programs held by The Tube Council and the Healthcare Compliance Packaging Council. She also received the Bert Moore Excellence in Journalism Award in the AIM Awards in 2012.

Follow Daphne on X at @daphneallen and reach her at [email protected].

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