In May 2019, I met Sara Sargent. She was the Engineering Manager at VSI Labs, and I was starting a new role as VSI’s head of marketing. For some reason, and I can’t tell you why per se, I really thought we would dislike each other. If you told me that she would be speaking at my wedding four years later, I would’ve laughed. As it turns out, Sara and I didn’t hate each other at all. In fact, we became great friends, and for the record, she did speak at my wedding this year.
Sara and I are very different. We have different jobs, we have different skills, and we disagree on one important thing: breakfast food. Sara will eat anything for breakfast. Soup, leftover pasta, you name it. I, a breakfast purist, find this deeply troubling. Despite our differences, I consider Sara an amazing friend and role model both in the automotive industry and beyond. So when Breaking Barriers was born, I knew I had to interview her.
On Growing Up & Changing Careers
Sara and I first talked about her upbringing. She considered herself an enthusiastic student who enjoyed learning. “The one negative comment my parents got at parent-teacher conferences was that I talked too much. I was too social. Surprise,” she recalled. I was, of course, not surprised to hear this. At 19, Sara started working in retail store management as the head of a 15-person team. She has endless stories from her tenure in retail, some comical and others that highlight how difficult these jobs can be.
After several years, Sara decided to go back to school for an electrical engineering degree. She credits a couple of friends who were studying electrical engineering at the time for piquing her interest. These friends saw how curious Sara was about the topic and spent time introducing her to different engineering concepts. “They ultimately are the ones who persuaded me to leave retail and get my engineering degree. Shout out to John Bartholomew and Tim Nelson!”
Making Connections & Finding Mentors
Upon graduating from the University of St. Thomas, Sara knew she had chosen the right field, but her job search wasn’t easy. She applied for over 60 roles, not receiving any callbacks until she knew someone at the company. “I found that really discouraging, especially since I had great grades and professional experience,” she said, adding that this experience taught her a valuable lesson – it matters who you know. And if you’ve ever attended a professional event with Sara, she really knows everyone.
Sara found an opportunity at VSI Labs, an autonomous vehicle technology research and analyst firm, where she was first exposed to automotive tech. “I fell in love with the industry,” she said. This role allowed Sara to combine her engineering knowledge with her unique ability to connect with people. She led the engineering department while serving as a point person for clients, contracts, demonstrations, and many other areas of the business.
Looking back, Sara credits several mentors throughout her career for giving her the freedom and encouragement to try new things. These mentors looked for opportunities for Sara to improve her skills, give her exposure, and discover new ideas. Today, Sara is surrounded by positive leaders in her role as Business Development Executive for Sense Media. She talks about Rob Stead, the company’s founder, and Richard Powell, the Commercial Director. “My current leaders are really encouraging and put a lot of faith in me to deliver on projects that I am passionate about, and that benefit my growth,” she said, adding that this support keeps her motivated and makes her love what she does.
“My current leaders are really encouraging and put a lot of faith in me to deliver on projects that I am passionate about and that benefit my growth.”
Sara Sargent, Business Development Executive, Sense Media
The Guys & Sara
Sara’s unique journey to engineering gives her an interesting but refreshing perspective on being a woman in her field: “I am in my mid-30s, and since I was 23, I’ve spent most of my non-home life with 19- to 22-year-old engineering guys,” she said. In college, Sara was the only woman out of 30 students in her Intro to C++ class, but instead of being intimidated, she embraced the opportunity. “The professor addressed us as ‘guys and Sara,’ which I thought was really funny and made it easier for me to approach people to ask for help because they all knew me,” she said.
Sara didn’t let being outnumbered hold her back. She served as the President of her school’s Rocket Team, Engineering Club, as well as IEEE. She often served as a project manager in group projects and built bonds with her male classmates. While she experienced periodic sexism among other male students and colleagues, it was few and far between.
Standing Out & Industry Trends
In the professional world, Sara encourages men to be allies to women and minority colleagues and suggests women can also ask for support. “Normalize these types of conversations among your colleagues who are different from you. You never know what little efforts you could make that could have a positive impact on your colleague!”
She also has an important lesson for women in tech: to go into your career with a picture of how to handle standing out. “Do you want to be seen as a go-to person? As a great networker? As someone who focuses on their role? Think about this and then plan for it.” This is something I hadn’t considered, but Sara is right. Women do stand out in this industry – and while that may be a product of the gender imbalance, we can leverage that attention to elevate ourselves.
Fresh off AutoSens Detroit 2023, I was curious to hear Sara’s thoughts on the trends she’s seeing in the industry, particularly the in-cabin space. “Data has become a huge subject with a lot of competitors,” she said, adding that there are both real-world and synthetic datasets, and the quality of the data has proven to be an important subject. She also talked about how security has become an important component of in-cabin technologies. Given that onboard data will contain identifying information, like facial recognition, data must be secure at the hardware level.
Sara concluded with a mention of her upcoming InCabin event, which will be collocated with AutoSens next year.
Thank you to Sara for sharing her story with us. To hear more stories from women in the industry, follow us on LinkedIn or subscribe to the AutoVision News newsletter. Or, to be featured, email info@autovisionnews.com.
