“Every single one of you, find what makes you exceptional and build upon it. And when you find it, trust me, you will feel the type of incredible high and exhilaration, and a wild sense of achievement.”
This line shared with Santa Clara University’s graduating Class of 2025 by Jayshree Ullal captures a message I often return to when I’m feeling anxious about the future. Her words stuck with me because they articulate something most students feel at some point: the tension between ability and self‑doubt. Yet, beyond the quote itself, Jayshree Ullal’s life shows that “exceptional” isn’t a fixed label bestowed upon a select few. “Exceptional” is something discovered, developed, and strengthened through experience and support. And when you grow into it, you don’t just change your own trajectory; you widen the path for others to follow.
Ullal’s life, extraordinary by every measure, embodies her advice. She grew up in India and the United Kingdom before moving to the United States where she earned her bachelor’s in electrical engineering and a master’s in engineering management. In 2008, she became the CEO and Chairperson of Arista Networks, guiding the company from a tiny startup to a multibillion-dollar S&P 500 leader in cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) networking. Her leadership style, focused on people, innovation, collaboration, and respect, has earned her wide recognition, including honors as one of the world’s best CEOs and Global Indian of the Year. She has also been named the wealthiest Indian‑origin professional executive in the world on the 2025 Hurun India Rich List, surpassing household names like Satya Nadella and Sundar Pichai.
A good way to understand what Ullal helped build at Arista is through a simple analogy I came across: imagine a data center as a massive brain. The processors and GPUs are like neurons, powerful on their own, but without connections between them, they can’t communicate, coordinate, or create meaning. Arista’s networking technology acts like the synapses of that brain and are key to delivering the cloud, AI, and data services we rely on today.
Even more than her professional success, I was most inspired by how Ullal encourages more female presence in STEM. Ullal has spoken publicly about how we need to encourage girls to pursue science and math if they are passionate about those fields, emphasizing that the representation gap in STEM starts long before college or careers. Her advocacy highlights that technology and engineering will only be stronger when a wider diversity of voices participates.
My own journey with STEM has always been complicated in a way that is familiar to many girls and young women. Both of my parents have engineering degrees, and my grandparents worked in science or technology fields. I watched my mother, often the only woman in semiconductor-industry meetings, and my grandmother, one of the few female professors at her university thrive in their respective fields, passionate about what they were doing and mentoring others in the process. Their presence was powerful and inspiring, but it also reminded me how women’s representation was still rare in these fields that I was interested in. Moreover, I grappled with an annoyingly persistent question: “Am I good enough?” Although I took advanced classes, I would stay rooted to my seat while the boys rushed to the whiteboard, eagerly solving problems because I was afraid I’d say something dumb.
However, sometimes the only way forward is to plunge right in and step up to the whiteboard. Ullal has emphasized that success is not driven by individual achievement alone but by recognizing others’ strengths and uplifting those around you as you pursue a common goal. One of her guiding beliefs is that leaders should “cultivate their peers’ strengths and harness their full potential.” For girls in STEM who are often taught to shrink themselves or compete for limited space, her example shows that every perspective is necessary to strengthen the whole and that innovation depends on collaboration. Just as synapses connect neurons to create thought, diverse people with different experiences connect to drive creativity, resilience, and impact.
This idea has shaped how I think about teamwork and collaboration in my own life. At a school like Andover with many high achievers, it’s easy to measure yourself by comparison instead of curiosity. Ullal’s message challenges that instinct. She invites us to look inward, to identify what genuinely excites us, and then build confidence through persistence and collaboration rather than perfection. Growth does not come from proving brilliance alone, but from learning from each other, contributing, and belonging. That lesson is at the core of Jayshree Ullal’s influence on me, and it is precisely why her leadership matters for girls entering STEM fields that often emphasize individual brilliance over shared success.
Looking at Ullal’s story helped me recognize myself as someone who belongs within the field of STEM. I’ve become more determined to pursue STEM — not because I think it’s guaranteed to be easy but because I find joy and purpose in it. If one day a girl sees me working on important yet challenging scientific research and feels inspired to explore the field herself, I will feel thrilled knowing I helped create connections through representation and mentorship that make future leaders feel welcome, just as Ullal did for me.
