WI Tech Month Presents Women in Tech Week: Vanitha Suresh

This “Women in Tech Week” feature is dedicated to Vanitha Suresh, Senior Vice President, Technical Product Owner at Associated Bank 

Vanitha is currently an SVP – Technical Product Owner at Associated Bank, and leads the workforce automation team.  

She has a wide variety of experience in technical and leadership roles for over 20+ years in various industries. Vanitha was the first engineer in several generations of her family, and one of three women in her undergrad engineering class of 72. 

She broke the glass ceiling when she secured a job in the Siemens Projects division as the first woman engineer in 10 years, straight after her Undergrad. She migrated to the US in 1998, has two Masters degrees (Drexel University & UW Madison), and a joint patent & journal paper for her innovative application of Dijkstra’s algorithm for the optimal design of thermally stable proteins. She played an active role in the “WICS”(Women in Computer Science) group while at UW, Madison and initiated and organized monthly discussion forums for female employees to meet and exchange personal growth topics and best practices when she was a Senior Software Engineer at Philips.

Vanitha also volunteers her spare time as the Executive Director of two non-profits – SciArt Services & Melharmony Foundation, in the greater Madison area. Through SciArt Services, Vanitha actively helps disseminate computer programming through CADJs amongst youth, with a special emphasis on girls and other minorities and underprivileged students in the Boys and Girls Club of Dane County. She has initiated annual scholarships for underprivileged girls in India to pay for school/arts education, and to help underprivileged single women with children.

Vanitha is also a professional South Indian Classical Vocalist and protégé of Maestro Chitravina N Ravikiran, and in 2013, she became the first Indian Immigrant to become Master Trainer through the Wisconsin Arts Board’s Folk/Traditional Apprenticeship Program. In 2015, Vanitha was one among 5 women invited by the “Wisconsin Women of Color Network” to represent Asian American leaders, during the 31st networking conference of “The Power of Unity” in 2015. Vanitha was the first recipient of the Amy Award in 2021 recognizing her contributions to the community-at-large, and was featured on the cover of the prestigious Madison Magazine. Vanitha considers herself extremely blessed to have family, friends, and mentors who have always encouraged and supported her in all her endeavors.

She believes in dreaming big, and in the power of passion, perseverance, patience, and positivity to achieve her dreams 😊

Vanitha Suresh – https://www.linkedin.com/in/vanithasuresh/