{"id":345652,"date":"2021-01-08T13:17:49","date_gmt":"2021-01-08T12:17:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/2021\/01\/08\/women-at-stormshield-episode-3-sandy-lambriquet-and-mounia-bouhriz-network-and-security-technical-experts\/"},"modified":"2023-02-16T17:54:51","modified_gmt":"2023-02-16T16:54:51","slug":"women-at-stormshield-episode-3-sandy-lambriquet-and-mounia-bouhriz-network-and-security-technical-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/women-at-stormshield-episode-3-sandy-lambriquet-and-mounia-bouhriz-network-and-security-technical-experts\/","title":{"rendered":"Women at Stormshield – episode 3: Sandy Lambriquet and Mounia Bouhriz, network and security technical experts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mounia and Sandy arrived in 2018 and 2019, and are today the only women in the Stormshield support team (usually referred to internally as the TAC). We jointly interview these two technology lovers from very different backgrounds.<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What does your job at Stormshield involve?<\/h2>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> We work in technical support for the Stormshield Network Security product (our product for protecting computer networks). Practically speaking, we receive calls or tickets from customers who have a problem with their firewall, and do our best to solve their problems.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Why did you choose the IT sector?<\/h2>\n

Sandy:<\/strong> I\u2019ve always been a bit of a geek. I have friends who work in this area, and they have their own computer store. I used to go there regularly to tinker with my PC and learn from them. In the beginning, I was self taught. Then, later on, because I wanted to learn in much more depth, I decided to take a short network training course.<\/p>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> My story is that I\u2019ve always been interested in computers. From when I got my first computer, I was always trying to figure out how it all worked. After that, I took a degree in Maths and Physics, part of which involved classes in computing and algorithms. I started doing some development work, and I enjoyed it. After that, I took a Masters in networking, because I also wanted to understand how people communicate.<\/p>\n

\"Women<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You\u2019re the only women out of around thirty people in Stormshield\u2019s TAC team. Why do you think women are in such a minority here?<\/h2>\n

Sandy:<\/strong> I think it\u2019s mainly down to the prejudices that exist in this sector, which don\u2019t encourage women to get involved. Particularly the clich\u00e9 about geeks working in their own little corner, which can make it hard for some. And a numerical reality: because there aren\u2019t many women in this field, the ones who do venture into it will probably be on their own, surrounded by lots of men. I also think that computer science in college and high school didn\u2019t exactly encourage people. Training courses focused mainly on office apps; that\u2019s really much too narrow. It seems to me that now, people are learning about computing earlier, and through a variety of domains (development, robotics, networks, etc.), and that\u2019s a very good thing.<\/p>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> I come from Morocco, where there\u2019s no real discrepancy: the sector there has an equal balance of women and men! But when I came to France, I was the only girl in my class\u2026<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What could be done to make more women want to join digital professions?<\/h2>\n

Sandy:<\/strong> We need to \u201cbreak\u201d the clich\u00e9d image that only geeks work in IT, and do more to promote the strengths of this sector. We also need to do a better job of introducing the sector at school level\u2026 show the full range of options available, because there are many of them, and all are interesting.<\/p>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> I\u2019m not sure whether introducing the IT sector will increase the number of women in the industry. It\u2019s up to them to acquire an interest, just as men are naturally interested in it. On the other hand, I do believe that we need to make IT a truly everyday thing. And talk more about it with our female friends, to make it a genuine option for them. That\u2019s what I\u2019m trying to do with my little sister.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What were your experiences integrating with the (exclusively male) team?<\/h2>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> It went incredibly well! They really helped me to develop my skills. To tell the truth, I enjoy working with men; they\u2019re calm and collected during the odd stressful moments we can experience in support. We work in a good atmosphere, which is important to me.<\/p>\n

Sandy:<\/strong> Mounia\u2019s right; it\u2019s a great team. I\u2019m learning so much, and there\u2019s a strong element of mutual support. The good atmosphere and support from your colleagues are two things that I really like here, and I think they\u2019re essential. Especially in support.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Would you say that, all in all, the IT sector meets your expectations?<\/h2>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> I didn\u2019t really have a clear idea about the sector in the beginning. But the more I discover, the more I like it.<\/p>\n

Sandy:<\/strong> To be fair, I didn\u2019t start out with a plan to work in technical support; it wasn\u2019t my vocation at all. But there\u2019s a difference between traditional technical support, where the tasks are often simple and repetitive, and technical support at Stormshield. Here, the job description clearly says \u201cnetwork expert\u201d. The interview at Stormshield was really stimulating for me and made me want to get the job, despite my initial reservations. I don\u2019t regret my choice because there\u2019s plenty of complexity, and I\u2019m learning a lot.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Have you ever had moments of doubt?<\/h2>\n

Mounia:<\/strong> Only about my own skills, and not about the sector. But I think it\u2019s pretty standard to question yourself in that way, regardless of the sector you work in. Especially because I still think of myself as a beginner today!<\/p>\n

Sandy:<\/strong> I think that doubt is something everyone goes through at the TAC. There\u2019s always something new to learn, and I still doubt myself from time to time. But that\u2019s the same whether you\u2019re a man or a woman; we all have to deal with that in our own way!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mounia and Sandy arrived in 2018 and 2019, and are today the only women in the Stormshield support team (usually referred to internally as the TAC). We jointly interview these two technology lovers from very different backgrounds.   What does your job at Stormshield involve? Mounia: We work in technical support for the Stormshield Network […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":394,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[57],"class_list":["post-345652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article-en","tag-our-stormshielders"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=345652"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345652\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":346030,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345652\/revisions\/346030"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=345652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=345652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stories.stormshield.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=345652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}