Celebrating the international day of women and girls in science

11 February 2021

On February 11, the world celebrates the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, established by the United Nations to recognize the critical role women and girls play in science and technology.

As an active player in the technology and digital fields, we feel strongly about this topic. So we decided to celebrate it in our own way, by bringing to the forefront our own amazing women in science.

We asked them to share the reason behind their choice of a path in science, and what was the biggest challenge they had to face in their careers. Some of them replied in private, some agreed to go public. Here they are – three from Italy and one from Spain.

Laura Zanella, Engineering Associate Manager

“Born into a family of humanities teachers, I always knew my heart went to science. I remember playing with computers and loving videogames from a very early age.

When choosing my path, I considered going for a women’s classic and be a Math teacher. Then I heard of the wonderful career options a Computer Science degree would unlock – and I placed my bet on it.

I hardly knew a thing about Computer Science, and immediately fell in love with it. My work expectations have not been disappointed – two months after graduating, in 1999, I got my first permanent job, and I’ve never been unemployed since.

The greatest challenge I have faced? To grow into a Technical Team Leader and People Manager at MailUp”.

Laura Zanella is Engineering Associate Manager at MailUp. The newspaper picture above shows her twenty years ago, in one of her very first jobs. Today she holds the role of People Manager and Technical Team Leader in cross-functional teams.

Cinzia Marini, Senior Data & Analytics Manager

“Be a fast thinker. Connect information. Derive – not follow – rules. This was me as a little girl, already sure I would be a scientist when I grew up. I did years of lab experimentation in high school, then graduated in Theoretical Physics. My life has always been based on numbers, even though my passion for understanding things has brought me to many other places.

Every problem is a challenge I tackle enthusiastically – and the greatest one is yet to come!”

Cinzia Marini today is Senior Data & Analytics Manager at Growens. She leads a team of data scientists and engineers that enable a data-informed approach to all business decisions within the Group.

Laura Gutiérrez, Fullstack Engineer

“When I was a kid, I didn’t know what I wanted to be when growing up (apart from looking for Neverland). I never had a favorite subject in school and I came to think there was something wrong with me.

Just before finishing high school, my future looked to me as unclear as when I was younger. So after a moment of panic, I decided to take all the evidence about myself and to have the courage to ask the right questions: which way can I follow to have the chance to be creative? And maybe to discover new things? And to work on solutions that are practical and useful for people regardless of a specific study area?

After some research, I came to a hypothesis: Computer Science could be my way! This has been finally validated after years of study and professional development. So yes, applying a scientific method was useful even before studying a scientific career.

I have not faced any real difficulties from other people, but my own fears. So to improve, you never have to compare yourself with others, just challenge yourself!”

Laura Gutiérrez today is a Fullstack Engineer at Acumbamail, our Spanish business unit. She takes part in the development team, both participating in the corrective and perfective maintenance of Acumbamail and the design and programming of new software applications, like Gumbamail. In addition, she rolls as the scrum master in the team’s sprint planning meetings.

Annamaria Rozzi, QA & Process Engineer

“I’ve always been curious about the ways things are made, about technology and logic. At school, my eternal dilemma was choosing between humanities and science – I liked it all! At last, I chose science – namely computer science.