12 Questions with Iman Jeddi

For Iman Jeddi, growing up in the Middle East, evacuating Kuwait during the first Gulf War, spending her teen years in Iran, attending university in Vancouver, Canada, and advancing her career in the Silicon Valley, life has been challenging, exciting, and meaningful. I recently sat down with the self-described introvert to hear how she became the youngest Vice President and one of the first women VPs in tech at Intuitive. Iman shared her journey, motivations, her vision for the future of her teams, and how she feels about being named by the Silicon Valley Business Journal as a 2019 40 Under 40 honoree.

1) What do you do at Intuitive?

My current role is Vice President, Systems Manufacturing & Sustaining Engineering at Intuitive. There are two main branches of my team. One group is responsible for setting up the assembly and test processes to manufacture our surgical robotic systems. The other group implements design and process changes to improve the quality, reliability, and manufacturability of our products. 

2) What motivates you to come to work every day?

It’s really hard not to fall in love with the mission. I come to work knowing that everything I’m doing contributes to another person’s wellbeing. One of our founding principles is Patients first, always, and we live by that. Often times, the role of Quality is to police other people to do the right thing, but not here. Our principles are engrained in us; no one is trying to cut corners. It also helps that our executive team are primarily engineers; our CEO is an engineer. They understand and believe in the importance of designing for quality and reliability.

Above all else, my son is my primary motivator. It’s a very different experience having a child; things shift, and you gain a new type of motivation—to be the best mother possible.

3) What are you the proudest of at Intuitive?

I’m proud of my team and the way that we’ve been able to build connections that work well together. As a team, we’ve been able to foster open communication and work cross-functionally with other areas of the business. My team is so inspiring; they’re all passionate about doing the right thing, delivering the best product possible, and meeting our deliverables. They show up, and they just get it done every day. I’m very fortunate to be working with such a great group of people.

4) You don’t know this, but we actually reached out to your direct reports on your team to get the “inside scoop” about you. They described you as intelligent, focused, strategic, pragmatic, open minded, a great negotiator, and most of all, supportive of them. In what ways do you support your team?

My team really delivers. They are in the thick of it every day. As my role becomes less technical over the years, less in the weeds, I see my role as the “un-blocker”. Proactively, I try to clear the pathway so they can do their jobs a little easier. Sometimes I’m successful, and sometimes I’m not, but that’s what I try to do.

5) What is your vision for the future of your team?

We just created a new team whose role is to evaluate the parts obtained from our suppliers. That team is forming and growing; we’re hiring aggressively. The goal across my whole team is to get to that stabilization curve sooner with our product launches and to continue to provide reliable, manufacturable, and high-quality products. Because of our growth, we’re frequently hiring lots of mechanical, electrical, test software, manufacturing, (and other) engineering roles.

6) What are characteristics that make someone successful on your team at Intuitive?

It depends on your personal definition of success, but overall, I think that when we go to school for engineering, we’re highly focused on the technical skills. They don’t really teach us the “soft skills” needed in the corporate world—negotiation, effective communication, aligning across functions, and building synergies. When I see engineers do well (inside and outside of Intuitive) is when they bring technical skills together with those softer skills. That can be very powerful because you need to be able to not just execute on those highly technical aspects, but also implement them. As an engineer, you really need those other skills—the ability to align with Regulatory, Quality, Purchasing, etc.—to make sure your changes are implemented.

7) If you could shadow any other person or job role within the Company for a day, who/what would that be and why?

I would love to go on a field engineer ride along! I’ve never been, and it’s been on my list for a while. It would be interesting to go with them as they’re out in the field servicing our products.

8) Let’s go back to the very beginning. You had an interesting upbringing. How do you feel your upbringing made you the woman you are today?

Through all of my international moves (Kuwait, Iran, Canada, the US), I became more resilient to change and more adaptable. Those skills are very important in the corporate world—to have the ability to respond to changing business needs. I was also able to learn new languages, something I try to foster with my son. With every new language comes a completely new understanding of that culture, and it allows you to think in new ways and see things from different people’s perspectives.

9) What was it like to attend a university on the other side of the world?

My undergraduate in Vancouver was challenging. While I appeared to speak English fluently and without an accent, I missed some of the advanced vocabulary that one learns in middle/high school because I had moved back to Iran after the Gulf War. I spent lots of time trying to catch up to my peers’ language skills. But I mostly focused on my grades and co-op. I took a five-year course of study—eight months of classes, eight months of work co-op, no summers off—and because of that, I was able to graduate with two years of work experience. Unlike today, most universities didn’t offer medical engineering paths, so I chose a mechanical engineering degree, but I really tried to target my placements for the co-op to gain medical device experience.

10) What prompted your move to Intuitive?

While working at Abbott, I was comfortable in my career. I was on a great trajectory, enjoyed my work, and really enjoyed the people I worked with. Then, I met Viorica Filimon, who invited me to see the da Vinci in person. The technology really impressed me, but I was truly convinced that Intuitive was the place I wanted to be when I met the people and the leadership team. I worked my way through multiple roles in product quality and operations at Intuitive, and it’s exciting to have the opportunity to lead and grow my team.   

11) When you aren’t wearing your VP/mom/wife hats, what else do you like to do?

I’m an Angel investor, and I try to put some investments in a few startups each year. My career began in startups, and I’ve always had that itch. But I really love my career at Intuitive, so I scratch the itch with investing. I think it’s also a way for me to give back. I choose startups that are early-stage medical device companies, and many women-founded startups. It’s exciting to help be the catalyst for other women, and to be there for them in other capacities, like if they need help negotiating agreements, defining their IP strategy, or setting up manufacturing.

I also try to stay active with the Pars Equality Center, and am a founding member. We’re a community-based organization helping to integrate Iranian immigrants into the community. The organization does lots of social work, legal work, and they give out scholarships. Being an immigrant myself, I think it’s important to stay connected and help others in this way.

12) One last question—What do you think of being nominated for and awarded the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s Top 40 Under 40?

That’s a funny story because it started out as sort of a joke. I was telling someone that I was turning 40 this year, and they submitted the nomination. I didn't think anything would come from it—just something trivial and silly to do, but then I got a phone call. As someone who is naturally an introvert, it was a little weird and nerve wrecking at first, but overall, it was fun.

Iman Jeddi is the Vice President of Manufacturing & Sustaining Engineering at Intuitive. She grew up in Kuwait before evacuating to her parents’ home country of Iran during the first Gulf War. Iman received a Bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from The University of British Columbia, a Master’s degree in biomedical/medical engineering from the University of Washington, and a PhD in biomedical engineering from the University of California, Davis. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband and son.

Iman was also a panelist at our women in tech networking event on October 23, 2019 hosted by Intuitive and PowerToFly (read more about it below).