{"id":1956,"date":"2024-06-21T00:00:59","date_gmt":"2024-06-21T00:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8080\/inwed-2024-female-sk-hynix-engineers-on-breaking-barriers\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T02:10:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T02:10:20","slug":"inwed-2024-female-sk-hynix-engineers-on-breaking-barriers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/inwed-2024-female-sk-hynix-engineers-on-breaking-barriers\/","title":{"rendered":"INWED 2024: Junior & Senior SK hynix Workers Share Their Experiences as Women Breaking Barriers in Engineering"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IINWED<\/p>\n

When 20-year SK hynix veteran Boyeon Kim was in college, she estimated only around 10% of the students in her engineering program were women. The lack of women in engineering classes prompted those on campus to distinguish students into three groups: men, women, and \u201cengineering women\u201d. Despite graduating years after Kim, Yujin Lee, who joined the company in 2022, admitted she did not expect to find female mentors or even work with other women in the engineering field.<\/p>\n

The experiences of Kim and Lee in South Korea are echoed elsewhere around the world. In the U.S., women only accounted for 11.6% of all employed electrical and electronics engineers in 2023<\/span><\/a>. To address this significant imbalance, International Women in Engineering Day (INWED) is celebrated annually on June 23 to raise the profile of women in engineering and inspire more young women to pursue careers in this profession.<\/p>\n

To mark the occasion, Kim and Lee from DRAM Development sat down for a one-on-one discussion at SK hynix\u2019s Icheon headquarters. The pair covered a range of topics including progress for female engineers, their achievements, key lessons, and future goals.<\/p>\n

\"INWED<\/p>\n

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Changes & Progress for Female Engineers<\/h3>\n
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Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cSince you\u2019ve been in this industry for a much longer time than me, I\u2019ve always wondered what it was like back when you first started. Did you ever feel like you were at a disadvantage because you were one of the few women in the office?\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cEven when I was just one of a handful of women in class or at work, I can\u2019t remember ever being explicitly discriminated against because I was a woman. But I did somewhat feel like I had to work harder than other team members to be recognized in a traditional workplace.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cThen, have you experienced any changes since you started your career?\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cWhile the culture was predominantly androcentric when I started out, it feels like it has now shifted toward recognizing and celebrating diversity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cWhen I joined the company, I felt that women in the industry generally didn\u2019t face many obstacles but were still encountering issues in areas such as networking. However, I received a pleasant surprise when I was assigned to my team: two of the leaders were women. It\u2019s encouraging to see experienced female leaders around me who I can learn from. I\u2019ve also benefited significantly from the design schools, mentoring opportunities, and seminars offered by our team\u2019s senior members.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Changes<\/p>\n

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Female Mentors: A Guiding Light for Young Engineers<\/h3>\n
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Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cDid you have female mentors when you were a young engineer?\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cI was fortunate to have a senior female colleague on my team around my fourth year. She helped and supported me as I grew, and she remains a reliable mentor to this day. Even after nearly two decades, I always seek her advice when faced with challenges and still find it beneficial to ask her questions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cI was also lucky enough to meet various mentors. My interest in the semiconductor industry sprouted from meeting a mentor at a university alumni networking event, while I decided to work at SK hynix after meeting another mentor during my internship here. In addition to those mentors, it\u2019s also been so inspiring to work under you and another female team leader. As a leader, what is your approach to mentorship?\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cWhen mentoring junior colleagues, I often discuss their current career status and how they want to progress. People can become somewhat complacent after working for years at a company, so, in order not to get tired, it\u2019s important to keep planning for their future growth and envisioning a bigger picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cI am always grateful when you and my other senior colleagues take the time to help me despite your busy schedules. Often, I feel like I\u2019ve grown significantly after just listening to your thought processes. I also apply many of these lessons to my daily life outside of the office. When I see you balance work and family while living your own life, it makes me think that I can do the same in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cI\u2019m glad that you feel inspired. When it comes to talking with seniors, please don\u2019t hesitate to ask questions. Seniors actually enjoy receiving questions from juniors and are happy to answer them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Female<\/p>\n

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Eye-Opening Lessons That Transformed Perspectives<\/h3>\n
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Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cYou\u2019ve been working at SK hynix for about two years now. What is something that you can say you are proud of accomplishing?\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cAlthough I haven\u2019t worked here for long, I\u2019m satisfied with becoming familiar with my daily tasks. My latest project was regarding peripheral circuit design, and I\u2019ve managed to approach my work intuitively after six months.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cIs there anything you\u2019ve learned from this project?\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cMy logical thinking skills have improved, and this has allowed me to enjoy my work while also feeling a sense of reward. In general, I have also learned that when I hurry to finish work, a problem generally occurs in the end. For example, there was one instance just after I started working here when I didn\u2019t apply all the known conditions to simulations when verifying circuit designs. After a defect occurred during a wafer test, I learned that I needed to apply all relevant conditions to simulations in order to verify them\u2014even if there are more than 1,000 conditions. I\u2019m now more thorough in my approach to work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cYes, there is a lot to learn from our mistakes and failures. Likewise, my most memorable project wasn\u2019t one that was successful from the beginning. On the contrary, I learned the most from a project where we performed quite poorly. Even when our team had to work overtime every day to interpret the malfunctions that occurred in our product design, this tough experience was really valuable as it helped me and my team members develop our skills.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cDo you think the team gained anything unexpected from this experience?\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cIt made us realize the importance of teamwork. We saw first-hand how the skill of each member comes together to become the overall skill of the entire team.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Eye-Opening<\/p>\n

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Welcoming the Next Generation of Female Engineers<\/h3>\n
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Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cLet\u2019s talk about what lies ahead for us now. What is your goal for this year?\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cI think I\u2019ve moved on from merely absorbing knowledge from my senior colleagues to now thinking about the direction I should take by myself. Going forward, I want to become an engineer who works efficiently and uses various tools to enhance my design methodologies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cMy goal is always to become a better leader. As a team leader, I see it as my responsibility to foster members\u2019 growth and development. As SK hynix leads the DDR5 market, our team goal is to ensure the company maintains this position as we move into the DDR6 era.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cLastly, what advice would you give to your younger self or to younger women who want to pursue a career in this field?\u201d<\/p>\n

Boyeon<\/strong>: \u201cLike everyone else, I wanted to immediately be good at my job. This made me become impatient with myself. But I learned that it\u2019s really crucial to be patient and draw a picture of how you want to grow and take small steps every day to reach your destination. What about you?\u201d<\/p>\n

Yujin<\/strong>: \u201cRight, I can see that looking at the big picture is important when it comes to personal development. If I was to give advice, I would say if you\u2019re inspired and motivated to tackle complex but rewarding puzzles, I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll make a great team here at SK hynix.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Welcoming<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When 20-year SK hynix veteran Boyeon Kim was in college, she estimated only around 10% of the students in her engineering program were women. The lack of women in engineering classes prompted those on campus to distinguish students into three groups: men, women, and \u201cengineering women\u201d. Despite graduating years after Kim, Yujin Lee, who joined [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":1949,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_migrated_source_id":15211,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[42,151,438,547,548,549,546,550],"class_list":["post-1956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-story","tag-corporate-culture","tag-diversity","tag-engineers","tag-female-engineers","tag-inclusion","tag-inwed","tag-leadership","tag-mentorship"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1956"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10718,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956\/revisions\/10718"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.skhynix.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}