The Power Shift Podcast – The Power of Creatives in Tech with Julie Bonner
Dr. Sharon Melnick
Julie Bonner is the Marketing Director for FreeFall Aerospace, which develops intelligent antenna systems for space and 5G. She’s currently active as the Co-Chair of the Arizona Technology Council’s Women in the Workforce. She’s also a fine artist and helps organize Creative Mornings Tucson. Julie Bonner, welcome to the Power Shift Podcast.
Julie Bonner:
Thank you, Sharon, for having me today. I’m excited to talk with you more.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
So, let’s just kind of get started with some context here. So, you’re a woman leader and as we’re going to talk about in a pretty male dominated environment, so what does it mean to you to be in your power? Like what does power mean to you?
Julie Bonner:
Power, to me, means when I am performing or speaking or communicating and it feels effortless almost. I think of it also, I’m an athlete. I play tennis. So, I think of it is feeling as like in the zone. So, I feel the most powerful when I am using my strengths and it feels not like work. It feels really good and it also actually inspires others.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
You know, it’s a really good definition of being in your power, and I hear that from a lot of professionals. It’s like that flow, that effortlessness, and it gives you a sense of energy. Love that.
Julie Bonner:
Yes, and it always feels good to be in your power.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Right. That’s what we’re here for. Right? Is to kind of redefine power because a lot of times, and in particular if I talk to women leaders about power, sometimes one of the first things I hear is like, “Oh, I don’t want power.” We think of it as that kind of forcing other people. It’s something that like a few people have at the top of the organization and everyone else is sort of disgruntled facing it. So, what are the experiences that you have coming up through the ladder or maybe in your organizations around like power and your experience of it?
Julie Bonner:
I feel like I have a pretty diverse career where I’ve worked in-house as an art director for two different national chains, but I also went back and got my Master’s in Business and had my own business for 10 years. Then a few years ago went back in-house again. So, I can relate to I’m sure many of your listeners, whether they work in-house or have their own business. There’s different feelings of power. But one thing that I bring to organizations now through my experience, I think, of almost running my own business is that I am very self-motivated. I figure out what I’m going to do that day, what our goals are, and that makes me feel powerful. I also believe in my abilities, and at the end of the day, I feel really good about what I accomplished. So, to me, it’s a very powerful feeling. Then, what I’m doing on a daily basis helps the companies I’m working for. So, whether it’s in-house for that big chain, or it was all of my clients when I had my own graphic design business. Using my power the right way, not only made me happy, but it made them happy.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Yeah.
Julie Bonner:
Win-win. Yeah.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Absolutely. It’s been a theme that we’ve talked about on the Power Shift Podcast, and especially last week’s episode where what you’re talking about is like that motivation, that pride that you bring to it. It’s like every one of your employees potentially, like there’s such a, kind of a massive collective source of power. When leaders think of it in terms of like, “I’m the one who has power and I have to do the thinking for everyone.” It’s like your choice, like a total missed opportunity, right? When you have people like you, who are kind of ready to bring all of you. One thing that you just talked about here is being a creative and now you’re in a very technical… We’re going to talk about that in a minute. You’re literally like at an engineering role putting antennas in space. What is it like being a creative maybe when you’re kind of not a part of the majority culture let’s say, and it’s just another form of diversity dimension?
Julie Bonner:
Definitely. So, I can for a fact say that if FreeFall Aerospace when I started, not only was I the only female, but also, I’m the only one with a creative background. So basically, everyone else at my company is an engineer. So, you’d think that that would be so different, but one thing I can tell you, because my background is as a graphic designer. Graphic designers are problem-solvers, just like engineers are, and we want to communicate things in a better way. So visually, verbally, we want things to be clear and you hone that down. It reminds me of the engineering process, having a prototype and a concept, and then working it and then having a mock two version and then testing it. So, there actually is more similarities than you’d realize between kind of these engineers, and then me than I would have known. I didn’t know that coming in.
You don’t know exactly what to expect, but I was lucky because Doug Stetson, who’s the CEO of FreeFall Aerospace, I actually worked with him as a contractor in the beginning. That is a fantastic way to see if you like working with someone, and I did. Because he was really good at communicating what their needs were, and I was really good at taking that and using my business background along with my design background and helping them rebrand and then create new marketing materials. Fast forward when he brought up, “Hey, I really value how you helped us. You went above and beyond what I had asked you to do. Would you ever think of coming to work for FreeFall?” I just hadn’t even thought about it, and then I was like, “Wow, like here’s a client, he was a client, that I really enjoyed working with values what I do.” He is the reason that I went in-house with FreeFall Aerospace, for feeling valued, and then I could help what they were trying to do.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
So, what you’re saying there is that the way that he interacted with you actually enabled you to bring forth all of that power that you have to bring. Right? All that creative juice, and all of that motivation. Like I’m sure listeners are just nodding their heads saying what an interesting pathway to get to where you are to be in a company. So, we want to hear more about that. I just wanted to ask you before you maybe talk about your role as an engineer and as a woman leader, you were the Innovator of the Year Startup Company in 2019, and out of curiosity, what do you do?
Julie Bonner:
What does FreeFall Aerospace do? FreeFall is developing new antenna technology for space and also ground and terrestrial communications. So that basically means it’s a new hardware that’s being developed. It actually came out of the University of Arizona and they went through a incubator program, and that’s when I got connected. They knew about my branding background, and then I connected with them to help get the word out about what they’re doing. Fast forward, this telecommunication technology will help move data quicker. So, from space back to earth and back, and then also we have a branch called FreeFall 5G that is developing new antennas for 5G. So, for cell servicing, and speeding up that more data, that’s the name of the game right now. So, it’s new technology developing right here in Tucson, Arizona.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Wow. Mind blowing. Okay. Well, that’s just helpful as context. So, we have a good understanding how you came into the company. So, you said then you were the only woman. Yes? Is that right when you came into the company?
Julie Bonner:
Yes.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
So, what was that like? I mean, there’s many women who even to this day are still the only, whether they’re the only woman or maybe the only woman of color on teams. We probably know many women including yourself who are in that situation and the sense of isolation and the sense of how you can second guess yourself. We know from the McKinsey Report year after year that this is stressful and puts an extra kind of burden on the woman to create those teachable moments. We’ll talk about that. So just, what was it like for you? Then we’ll hear your journey.
Julie Bonner:
I think I was fortunate that I had the experience of working with Doug solely for a while, as a contractor, and realizing that if I were to work with them, he would be the one I would be working with. So, I feel like a head start that sometimes women don’t always have when they’re applying to a new job and they look on the team page and there’s no other women that would be daunting. But I think I had already built a good communicative relationship with him. So, I feel like I was fortunate to start that way, and then through team meetings, I got to know the other engineers. I’d have to say, I’m not a very shy person. So, I feel that I exerted myself pretty quickly and I ask a lot of questions and I wanted to learn because I don’t come from the science and engineering background.
You know, I come from a creative graphic design and business background. So, I think a tip would be for anyone coming in is something like that though is just start asking questions and talking to them. They quickly realize that I was there to help the company to communicate this really technical stuff they’re doing. But to make it in an easier… How would I say this? I don’t want to say dumb it down, but make it so the general population could understand a little bit better about what we’re doing and for whom and why. So, we became a team very quickly so I feel fortunate. I do want to bring up prior, I had worked for a different company for a short period. It was actually, I had a female boss and I thought that was going to be fantastic, and you just, that’s the thing you never know.
One thing I realized, and I think it helped me appreciate what happened with Doug even more was that she just couldn’t relate to my creative background. So, I remember helping a company with a logo and I was at my desk sketching, which is, my background is also fine artist. So, I was sketching first before I go to the computer. That’s how my best ideas come out. She walked by and she’s like, “What are you doodling?” and I was like, “No, I’m helping brand this company that reached out to us that they need all this, dah, dah, dah.” You know, and it was just such to me, it was just kind of deflating. That the person that hired me to help with marketing and all these things literally kind of put down one of my skills, one of my really good skills.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Yeah. I love that. It’s just a really good reminder that sometimes we use these terms of kind of more masculine forms of leadership or “feminine” forms of leadership, but they are really meant to, I think we need to find better words that it’s really not about men bosses or women bosses, per se. It’s really about the quality of the person’s leadership. I think that we see this is kind of the new model of leadership and we sort of call it a more “feminine” style of leadership. We’ve seen this especially during the pandemic where leaders really need to be, as I say, kind of combining both completion of the work with compassion for their people. That’s just the new skillset for being a leader and an effective leader and a leader that can create engagement amongst your people. That’s sort of a good story to illustrate that. She just wasn’t someone who could have empathy or understanding for other people regardless of her gender.
Julie Bonner:
Yes, and I think it’s important in leadership in general to lift people up and to support them, but be lifting them up and not the taking down or that wears down on people in general. You eventually don’t want to come into work, like not, not coming in to work, but it just kind of tears away and like, and so that’s a great thing is I was lucky, but Hey, starting as a contractor somewhere, I think that’s a great idea. That’s a great way to really work with someone before you take the full plunge into full-time, like working with somebody.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Yeah. That’s great advice. Burnout of course is kind of the number one issue that people are facing these days, and I agree with you. My background is as being a stress expert as part of it, and I think it’s definitely from the too much to do, not enough time. Of course, we’re all kind of overwhelmed, but I think it’s this kind of churn that people face inside where they don’t feel valued or they’re questioning if their value is understood and there’s just a lot of kind of misunderstandings and then all of that inner reactivity, that inner noise that happens. I just call it churn because I don’t know what else to call it, but I think that that’s really what it is that burns people out. It’s that emotional wear and tear, and just the way that you talked about made you less and less motivated, someone who’s full of self-motivation to be engaged and bring your best. This is, I think, happening on a mass scale.
Julie Bonner:
Yeah. I bet many people listening can relate to that.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Yeah. So, there you were. You integrated yourself well because of your proactive efforts and it sounds like you had air cover from the head of the company, which is terrific. So, you were integrated into the company, but it still sounds like, so you realize you were the only woman. Okay? So, tell us where you went with that because I heard a good success story from you.
Julie Bonner:
Sure. So as a small startup in the beginning, a few people then eventually get to grow and we had investor funding. Then as you grow, one of the roles that was needed was a systems engineer. My background is not as a recruiter, but in my town, I tend to know a lot of people. So, basically it was like, okay, let me see if I can help find someone to fulfill this role. So, I ended up using actually LinkedIn’s tools, but was looking for, and I had the background of what we’re looking for, like a systems engineer, at least 10 years of experience, didn’t have to be local, but that’s always great if, you know, it’s someone in Tucson already. I went through and I was specifically hoping to bring some diversity in too.
So, I was looking people and then narrowed it down to a few people. We had some interviews and then I am so excited, but we hired Manet last summer as our Systems Engineer. She was previously working at Raytheon, a talented person, communicative, and is now doing a great job for our company, and the unfortunate part is this all happened during a pandemic. So, it was just, I feel bad. We finally, we both been vaccine now. We’ve gotten our second vaccine, and so we’ve gotten to hang out socially now, which is really exciting. So, but I would check in with her throughout the time we, you know, we’ve all been working from home, but I’m so excited that she’s a part of our team. She’s doing a great job and I will help continue to help diversify our company along with the support of Doug and Chris who are our two co-founders. They believe in that as well. So, I’m excited as we grow, have more funding and opportunities, we will bring more diversity to our team.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Yeah. So, it’s interesting. So, you sort of just took it on and sourced candidates and it was a small company, so it was different from having to go through a whole bureaucracy so that was different. It enabled you to just be proactive and roll up your sleeves and say, well, I’m going to be able to have a say in this by just kind of taking the charge. I love that.
Julie Bonner:
Yes. Yes. I’m sure that Doug and Chris appreciated I was basically doing the intro kind of work and emailing with them and talking to them ahead of time. I was kind of like, I don’t know that the intro basically, and I was kind of weeding out, like do I think they seem experienced in this and do I think they would fit well into our company culture, like all that. I was trying to do that all ahead of time. So, by the time they finally had a meeting with Doug and Chris, I felt confident in like, oh yeah, I want them to be a part of our team.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Fantastic.
Julie Bonner:
Yeah.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
So, tell us how you’re now doing this at a broader scale, kind of with women in STEM.
Julie Bonner:
Yes. Yes. So, I’m excited. So, one of my goals for working at FreeFall Aerospace is to bring help. We’re going to support the community in general. So, we’re supporting the community, but I’m focusing on education, and education of the youth about science. Especially females, exposing them to the really cool opportunities in the science and engineering and technical fields. By doing that, we are working with events coming up, for example, SheTech is coming up, actually it’s next week. And it’s high school female students. This year will be virtual, but it’s for one day, and so we’re exposing them to all these interesting jobs and opportunities in the STEM fields.
Doug is speaking about space. His background is at NASA. He was at NASA JPL for almost 30 years. We’re talking about space. We’re relating it to how our cell phones are connected, and we use all these things in space without even realizing it. Then I’m focusing on talking about art, but digital design for art. So, if any of these students have an artistic sense about them, creative sense, there’s ways they can channel that and use the technology of today to create new media, animations, you name it, that can help any company in the future.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
Yeah. I love that. Thank you for being a role model. Thank you for giving back and creating that continuity of bringing up the next generation in STEM. I think a great message as well, that you really embody is that there are many different skills and passions and interests that you can have that can bring you into a technology field. Right? So here you are combining your really ultra-creative abilities and passions, and bringing it to bear on the most technological of products that you could get.
Julie Bonner:
Yeah. Who would have thought, I never would have guessed. At the age of three, I said, I wanted to be an artist and some of my jobs relate more closely with that, but who would have thought in the future that I would be working for this tech company talking about space. Our technology is actually going up next April on a rocket. So, it’s a really exciting thing, and I’m so curious. I love learning about what we’re doing and why, but I never would have guessed this for myself, but it’s fun. I’m happy to be a part of it.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
And I just want to highlight there what it is that you say that you are bringing is creativity and communication and curiosity. Right? And so that those are really fertile. That’s really fertile soil for someone to go into whether it’s a creative field or even for young women who are in STEM. If you think that that’s going to exclude you from having a technology career, then Julie Bonner is here in the flesh to be an example that that is not the case for you, and there could be a path for you.
Julie Bonner:
Yes. A hundred percent. I think we don’t even know all the opportunities that are happening right now and are going to be coming. There’s so many new jobs, new technologies that need creative thinkers, that need different perspectives to bring to the table, because that’s how sometimes you solve problems. You get new out of the box solutions. So, I think it’s a strength. It’s a strength to come into something with a little bit of a different perspective than maybe the norm.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
I think that that’s so important for young people, I mean, I guess, especially for women, just because we’re trying to get more women into STEM so that products can reflect how women think, and move, and what their needs are. And I think it’s really important what you say, because we could be tempted to say to ourselves, “Oh, I don’t have that background.” Right? Or I’m not smart enough or whatever we might say to ourselves, and what you’re saying is you’re totally flipping that on its head. You’re saying, actually, it’s good for you to have an outsider perspective or to have a creative lens, and that this is very valued in a technology field.
Julie Bonner:
Yes. In fact, I was speaking about our exciting news about finally our technology going up on the rocket next April on a radio show coming up. One of the things I want to do is explain CubeSats, what a CubeSat is to the general public listening to this radio show. Now my background, like I said, is not in space. It’s not in science, but I love to learn.
Through research, I found out that a CubeSat which is basically the small box that you put your technology in and it goes up on a, you know, it’s a small satellite, goes into space, was actually developed by a professor in California that wanted his students to be able to complete a one-to-two-year project of actually developing antenna and get a satellite and actually getting it into orbit while they’re in college, and he was like, “How can we make this affordable?”
Because this was in the late nineties when antennas were three meters, or sorry, eight meters long and like three tons. And he came up with the idea because he saw a beanie baby box and was like, let’s make this small. Let’s have the students develop something that actually fits in a small little package. It’s going to weigh less. It’s going to cost less. And we’re going to get that in this space. So, I brought that up on the show and my boss who’s worked for NASA JPL for 30 years. He’s like, “I didn’t know that.”
Then later, he’s like, asking me about it. I was like, “Yeah, here’s all my references.” Like I even found an interview with the professor that talking about how this came up. So, I didn’t have to know all this from college or like birth or anything, but I cared enough to research it, and want to explain it to others. So, I think if anyone can, if you have that drive and you’re interested in something, I mean, I think you can learn anything. You know? Especially, obviously your company will be happy if it’s something that benefits them. So, it’s once again a win-win situation.
Dr. Sharon Melnick:
I think that’s absolutely right, and you have more power than you think, or there are things about you that are just natural to you that are your sources of power. Right? So, like for you, it was this curiosity. It was self-motivation. This is your power, and also this has been a source of a company’s power. Right? To leverage that, to grow that in you, to bring that out and unleash it and tap that potential in you. So, it’s such a great example of how power can be kind of grown and can be used in the services of something that’s greater than you, and will benefit all of us. That’s when I say it’s like, “When a woman is in her power, she raises everyone around her.” You have done that, Julie Bonner, in your company. It’s really been great to learn about your story, and thank you for appearing on the Power Shift Podcast.
Julie Bonner:
Thank you for having me be a part of it, and I really appreciate your podcast. I think it’s very inspiring and empowering to other people. So, thanks, Sharon. I appreciate talking with you today.
