vol. XIX no. 1 Page 1 2 GETTING MORE WOMEN INTO HIGH-TECH LEADERSHIP POSITIONS IS THE GOAL OF A ROBINSON ALUM AND ONE OF THE TOP COMPUTER SECURITY THOUGHT LEADERS IN THE COUNTRY. Sandra Bergeron, BBA ’82, learned the hard way that things in business don’t always go as planned. She was running an engineering unit at McAfee, a leading security technology company, when her team missed a product delivery deadline. The result: Bergeron was “moved aside” into what she calls “an undesirable job.” But rather than give up or move to another company, she dug in and did that new assignment so well that she got another slightly better, but still undesirable, position in the company. She kept on going until she eventually rose to lead a division, reporting to the same CEO who had once given her those undesirable positions. Tenacity is one of the first leadership lessons, says Bergeron, who is one of the nation’s most successful women in technology. At McAfee, she rose to executive vice president of strategy and research and served as president of PGP Security, a company division. She was one of Information Security magazine’s Top 25 Women of Vision in 2003. She has testified before Congress on how government and private industry can work together to prepare for computer virus attacks. And she has served on the Silicon Valley Blue Ribbon Task Force on Aviation Security and Technology, which delivered recommendations to increase aviation security after 9/11. Today Bergeron is touted as a top computer security thought leader. She finds the designation interesting. “I guess I tend to focus on the future, to think strategically about how things might evolve,” she says. “I don’t have a crystal ball, but I do have a solid foundation in technology and understanding security issues.” Bergeron attributes her rise in the high-tech world – in fact, even her interest in the field in the first place – to serendipity. While working as a grocery store cashier, she put herself through Georgia State, planning to major in medical technology. Then she happened to take a computer programming course as an elective. “I got hooked,” she said. “I was amazed that I could write a software program to allow a computer to solve a business problem.” Continued on next page Top | Next Page

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