Thirty-year-old Tamara White is blazing trails for herself as a woman in the traditionally male-dominated occupation of electrical engineering. As the assistant roaming manager at M3 Wireless she is part of a team responsible for establishing and maintaining relationships with overseas carriers worldwide so that her company’s customers can have crystal clear calls regardless if they are shopping in Atlanta or travelling to Japan on business.

On any given day, Tamara can be found talking to one of the over 200 voice and data carriers who M3 Wireless has partnered with, most of whom she has never laid eyes on.

“I deal with them directly from my office, whether it be on the phone or via e-mail,” she says. “Our aim is for our customers to be able to be able to make and receive calls no matter where they are in the world.”

In her role, which she has held for the last six months, Tamara also spends quite a bit of time conducting technical tests in order to ensure seamless service when customers are travelling outside of Bermuda.

“I love the diversity and global exposure that this job offers,” she reveals. “I enjoy talking to people of different cultures and languages and being able to work effectively with them.”

How did Tamara end up in an occupation where very few women are employed, particularly on the Island? After studying the workforce, she responds.

“After attending Berkeley Institute, I attended St. Johnsbury Academy and then went on to Howard University. At the time I was not sure what I wanted to study so I did General Studies classes at first. I attended a careers fair event while I was home one day on break and I that’s when I met Greg Swan who was an engineer.

“I had a strong math and science background and the industry caught my attention. I even liked the fact that it was technical and male-dominated industry. That made me really want to try and break barriers,” she says, with a chuckle.

As she resumed her studies, Tamara kept in close contact with Mr. Swan and credits him as being her mentor.

Through their professional relationship she says that he cemented her belief that engineering was the field for her to pursue, particularly the electrical aspect of it.

“I also wanted to cater to the needs of Bermuda’s workforce. It was a win/win situation because it was something that I knew I would like and Bermuda could benefit from my expertise,” she adds.

While she studied for her Bachelors of Science in Electrical Engineering, Tamara worked at Belco each summer and, she adds, the company was extremely supportive of her professional endeavours.

The road to success was not always an easy one for Tamara. During the course of her studies she became pregnant with her now nine-year-old daughter, Azari.

While some may have used this as an excuse to drop out of school, Tamara saw her situation as a reason to push ahead even further.

She ended up taking only one semester off to have her daughter before resuming her studies. While she admits it was not easy, she had a goal and she was sticking to it.

With the support of her daughter’s father, who was also studying to be an engineer, and her family, she was going to graduate no matter what.

“They had more faith in me than I had in myself sometimes,” Tamara admits.

She reveals that as time progressed, her desire to graduate intensified, especially as she watched some of her classmates walk across the stage with degrees in hand.

“I wanted that to be me so badly,” she says.

In 2000, Tamara’s dreams were realised when she completed her electrical engineering degree. Six years later, she says, sometimes the reality still has not sunken in.

“Some mornings I wake up thinking that I should be in class,” she reveals with a laugh. “You don’t know how relieved I am that it is over!”

Choosing to gain work experience before returning to the Island, Tamara worked for US telecommunication giant, Nextel.

She then worked for Telecom and Universal Electric before commencing at M3 Wireless six months ago.

Currently working towards her designation as a Registered Professional Electrical Engineer, Tamara encourages more females to join the industry.

But she adds that anyone aspiring to be an electrical engineer should have an unbridled interest in technology and the desire to improve upon it, be able to think analytically and logically, and should always be looking to improve how something operates.

Keen on luring young people into her field, Tamara recommends they attend the Bermuda College and learn the electrical field before attending school overseas.

She adds: “Technical colleges are always great because they are more concentrated but I still encourage people to become immersed in some sort of college environment because it is an experience of a lifetime!”

What started out as a side hustle evolved into a new learning opportunity for Royal Gazette <$>press mechanic supervisor, Paul Henderson. The married father of three has been working for the company since 2000. Already running his own maintenance company, he was initially hired to help with the assembling of a piece of machinery which transported newspapers from the press.

“I told the manager that I could give a hand after the end of my workday and I worked here with a friend from four to midnight every chance I got until we had it together,” he recalls. “It took us about three weeks to put it together.”

Once the job was completed, he was offered a job as a maintenance worker, but says he was not sure if he wanted to take it on.

But, he says, after mulling over it for awhile, he decided to take up the offer. Subsequently, an opportunity arose for him to learn a new trade.

“Whenever the press needed to be serviced, an overseas contractor would arrive on the Island and a few of us here would help out which allowed us to get a better understanding of how it worked,” Paul says. “So when I got the chance to learn under the head press mechanic, Ayra Bhalla, I jumped at it. I always liked to dabble in mechanics, like with my Mobylette when I was younger. I like to see what makes things tick.”

As a press mechanic, Paul’s responsibilities include, but are not limited to, keeping the press in such a condition that it constantly produces high quality newspapers.

He adds: “A press has 13 units, two of which are where process colours are produced. Pressmen also have to make sure that there is a proper balance between ink and water.

“This is important in order for the press to work correctly. Another thing that a press mechanic does is replace ‘blankets’ which are compressed beds of rubber that have air pockets. They transfer the images from plate to paper.”

Paul, who is also a trained interior designer, says that anyone who has a desire to learn and possesses common sense can do the job, even women. “Mechanical aptitude is a must”

And, he warns, the job can be very dirty and physically demanding.

“It can also be dangerous if you are not paying attention,” he adds.

Paul encourages anyone looking at entering the trade to seek technical training and an apprenticeship, especially if one is available overseas.

“There is no better training than that received on the job,” he affirms.

Along with training, Paul firmly believes that anyone entering this field should possess an abundance of patience.

“There can be times when things happen that can delay the printing of the paper and you could be waiting for hours before you can start your work. We have to work with other departments in order to get the paper out daily and things don’t always happen right away. A lot of patience is involved.”

And what does the press mechanic supervisor love the most about his job? The hours he keeps. “I start at two in the afternoon and usually knock off at nine. I can work a long night and still have to come back in until the next afternoon. When I come in to work there is no heavy traffic to worry about and when I am leaving there is even less,” he says with a smile.

Armed with a love of science and maths, Zalika Furbert set out to Howard University several years ago with the intention of becoming a pharmacist, but three months into completing her Pre-Pharmacy programme, she decided the occupation was not for her.

“I enjoyed the social aspect of helping customers but I did not want to to be behind a counter for the rest of my life. I considered education and psychology before determining that information technology is what I wanted to pursue, she says. “I enjoyed learning how computers worked.”

So off she went to CompuCollege in Halifax, Nova Scotia where she subsequently graduated with an Information Systems Specialist with a Cisco Diploma.

Completing a three-month work term was required in order for her to graduate so Zalika returned to Bermuda in search of an opportunity. She landed her first job in her field almost by accident.

She went on an interview with a reinsurance company thinking she was applying for an internship when in actuality, they were looking for new, Bermudian hires.

While the interview process was rigorous, Zalika survived: “The topics ranged from basic desktop support to network administration and IP subnetting.

“It was a gruelling interview which I survived and in the end and I was selected. I did a lot of hands-on learning during my work-term.

“At the completion my work-term I stayed at the reinsurance company on a three-month contract to assist bringing their new help-desk software online. I worked a few non-IT positions before becoming the IT Support Administrator at The Royal Gazette Ltd. in January 2005.”

In her current position she provides desktop support to approximately 70 staff members along with administering a network of 128 workstations and servers. She also liaises with software and hardware vendors to resolve any issues that may arise.

The hardworking mother of one says she loves her job because she is not stuck behind a desk all day and enjoys dealing with different people every day.

She cites one of her biggest one the job challenges as detracting staff members from installing unauthorised software on their hard drives.

Zalika discusses why she believes she has been doing well in her current position: “I am definitely patient. At times I am required to repeat the same information over and over again when training users on new software or the correct procedure to complete tasks.

“I would also say that I am analytical. Troubleshooting problems with workstations, servers and peripherals can be difficult. There so many things that can go wrong but you must remember to start with the basics and work your way up from there.”

She continues: “Being creative, resourceful and determined are good traits a person should have if they are interested in entering this field,” Zalika advises.

“They should also willing to constantly learn and update skills as needed to keep up with rapidly changing technologies.”

Zalika suggests that anyone interested in IT should try to obtain part-time employment in the field which will allow them to broaden their scope of learning.

When asked where she would like to be professionally within the next decade, she responds: “I plan to obtain more certifications such as MCSE, CCNA, CISSP, VSP and a Bachelor’s degree in Information Technology.”