Meet our Members: Aarthi Jayaram

LinkedIn WIT is made up of incredible women, each with their own unique story and set of talents. Our Meet our Members series aims to introduce you to our community. Get to know us, expand your network, and build your own community!

What is your current role within WIT at LinkedIn?

I co-lead Women In Tech (WIT) with my friend and ally - Ya Xu. I’ve known her for almost my entire career here at LinkedIn so it’s been a joy partnering with her.

How did you initially get involved with WIT?

When I first joined LinkedIn (around 2011), we didn’t have anything as organized as an official WIT Chapter. Erica Lockheimer was the one who brought all of the women across engineering together - at that time we were a handful, probably in the lower 10s all together. I remember there was one GHC where we were such a small group, we could all huddle together at one table. It’s hard to even imagine now (fortunately). That experience resonated with me and it’s part of the reason Women In Tech is so dear to me now. I think a sense of belonging just naturally lends itself to a happier and more productive workplace. Some might say this is a fungible metric - but we shouldn’t pursue workplace belonging and equality for the sake of a metric. We should do it because it’s the right thing to do.?

Outside of WIT, what is your “official” role at LinkedIn? Could you tell us a bit about it?

I lead Platform and Partner Engineering at LinkedIn. In a nutshell, we focus on providing consistent, compliant, and privacy-preserving access to LinkedIn’s Economic Graph in service of our vision.

Can you tell us a bit about your career journey?

I started off as a mobile engineer building LinkedIn’s first Android application. This was in the era where mobile development was still considered a new skill set and mobile engineers were few and far between. Add diversity into the mix, and the numbers were even smaller. I was the only female mobile engineer for a good two to three years, I would say.?

Within a month of joining the team as an Android developer, both the iOS developers on the team left and my manager asked if I’d be interested in picking it up. After saying yes, my manager threw in the challenge - deliver a redesigned LinkedIn iOS mobile application within 3 months - while simultaneously learning Objective-C (which is a very different style from Java, which is used for Android development). That was one of the best challenges I faced in my professional career - it was a fun ride to be honest and a moment of pride; my first ever LinkedIn iOS application was a smashing success.

I went on to lead the mobile development team at LinkedIn - a centralized team of about 30 people - before an organizational restructure. Post reorg, I decided to transition to Feed (LinkedIn Homepage). Having never done full fledged desktop or backend development, I wanted to learn something new. That was when I first met Ya.?

I’m not sure how many people will remember this but back in ~2014–2015, our feed was a nascent product and could use a stronger sense of direction. We wanted to build a new experience for members that would give the homepage a “personality.” When we first launched the redesign, it didn’t perform against some of the benchmarks we had put on engagement; Ya and I spent many hours together understanding what changes had been made, iteratively bringing them to life while ensuring there was parity with what we had before. Think git bisected with data insights – all in real time!

For the past 3 years, I’ve been doing something completely different - building deeper into the stack and focusing on infrastructure. I’ve gotten to pick up Azure and learn more about the cloud. Looking back on my career, I’ve been able to reinvent myself every couple of years working on different experiences which require different sets of skills. That’s what has kept me at LinkedIn all of these years. Not just having leaders lean in to ask what excites you, but also partnering with you to unlock that excitement.

Did you always know you wanted to transition to management?

I’ll be very honest that being a manager was not a career path I had thought of for myself. I didn’t know I wanted or even could be a manager. I love building applications. I love building engaging user experiences, so for me it was always about “how do I create that?” My manager was the one who noticed this talent in me where I could both get into the details and see the larger picture of why we’re doing what we are doing. He was the one who had a strong belief in my ability to do really well as an engineering manager and leader. I think having his support and conviction was what convinced me to take a shot - and I haven’t looked back since.?

The success I’ve experienced in my professional career is due in large part to the investment that my mentors and sponsors placed in me. Sometimes people have a very different perspective on your potential - listen to them and give it a try. There’s no failure in trying, every experience is a learning experience and only adds to your persona. You can do something new and get uncomfortable without letting go of your strengths. I am intentional and continue to hone my technical skills, in addition to management, because that’s what I really enjoy.

If you could leave everyone with only one takeaway from this interview, what would you want others to know about you?

I’m a builder at heart. I love building value for our members and our customers. You will find that builder in me no matter which team I’m in or what role I’ve taken. That builder is what keeps the mojo alive.?

Want to see more posts like this? Check out past Meet Our Members content HERE