May 9, 2024

On May 9, Girls in STEMM (GIS) visited ExxonMobil Shanghai technology center. 21 girls from Dulwich College and Nord Anglia International School followed the lead of brilliant technologists to tour three different labs, and did a speed networking session with six role model employees from ExxonMobil . This visit informed the girls of the research effort and the diverse team behind ExxonMobil’s amazing products.

Before heading out to the labs, the students were invited to the newly built exhibition hall to learn about ExxonMobil’s footprint in China.

EM Shanghai technology center has multitude of capacities including R&D, testing, and processing. Equipment of all kind attracted the student’s attention. Seniors, recalling what they’ve learned at school, were interested to learn more about the procedures of the tests, and the reactions took place. Younger students sometimes found it challenging to understand the terms and the complex lab setup. But the lab tour leaders were very thoughtful to prepare some EM product that could be touched and interacted with to engage the students. Students were surprised to see items they took in granted in daily lives in their pre-packaged forms being mass produced here at EM’s labs.

A student commented that although other labs have similar setup in previous GIS visits, EM’s labs demonstrated to her what a product must go through from its raw state in the nature to what was ready to be sold in the market. During the tour, a tour leader told editor that, ‘here at EM everyone can participate in DEI. It is not about an organization, or a title. Every employee you see participating in today’s GIS visit has his/her “real job”, the one he/she applied to get in the company. But we also take on the responsibilities to participate in DEI. This is something I think is really cool. I can sense that my colleagues, who are actively involved in DEI like I do, are really enjoying themselves during this process.’

Besides the top-notch labs, students were also able to connect with EM employees coming from different STEM backgrounds, different seniority, and different departments. Synpact divided the girls into three groups, and in the form of speed networking, girls got the chance to ask questions to all the employee role models as they rotated around the room. Some students were curious about a typical day of an Engineer working at EM, others were seeking advice on STEM course selection in the university. We also heard creative questions from the girls, such as, ‘based on the popular MBTI personality test, which roles are P people and J people more suitable for?’

When they learned that they were matched with employees who have worked for more than 10 years at EM, girls in group 2 asked whether they have thought about working at another company in their careers. Haiyin Hua shared an advice she received as a young professional, which was to ‘go towards what you want, not away from it’. She said, ‘when you first start working, you are always assigned simple tasks. But even when you are in a junior role, you can always try to capture the opportunities to learn and push boundaries to eventually get to where you wanted to be.’

The visit closed with EM’s Technology Planning Manager Hedy Fan’s speech. She encouraged students to explore STEM related subjects, more importantly to grow skills such as independent problem solving, critical thinking, and logical planning. We believe her and all participating EM employee’s sharing would leave the students a deep impression.

Last but not least, Synpact would like to extend our appreciation to the ExxonMobil Shanghai team for their great support in time, location, personnel and resources, and to teachers and faculties at Dulwich and Nord Anglia for being so responsive and accommodating.