Maria Cortez received her BS in Electrical Engineering from Texas ECE. After holding several leadership positions at Texas Instruments, she joined Advanced Energy as the Senior Vice President, Industrial Power Products in May 2022. We sat down with Maria to learn more about her experiences in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month.

TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE DOING NOW.

Professionally, I am the SVP of Industrial Products at Advanced Energy. We’re a multi-billion-dollar company transforming how power is delivered and managed. Many of my customers have mission-critical applications in semiconductor equipment, smart manufacturing, and medical. It’s exciting to work with my team members across North America, Europe, and Asia. In my personal life, I am the single mother of two boys, Jordan and Justin, who are studying STEM in college. As I watch them, it’s fascinating to see how the academic experience has transformed from my days at UT.

HOW DID YOU END UP AT UT? WHAT PATH LED YOU HERE?

From an early age, I always knew I would study engineering to satisfy my problem-solving obsession. As I was researching colleges, finances were a big factor. My plan was to apply to the best electrical engineering programs and determine where I could get the most scholarship support. I will always be deeply grateful to UT for enabling my education. Initially, I hadn’t decided on an engineering specialty. Then, at orientation, I heard Dr. Ben Streetman lecture on electrical engineering with a passion that was contagious. He also influenced me to specialize in solid-state, which is still part of my job to this day. It wasn’t until I got to college that people pointed out to me that ECE was an unusual choice for me as a Hispanic female. 

WHAT IS ONE OF YOUR PROUDEST MOMENTS IN YOUR CAREER IN ECE?

My peers and I had been working for years with IEEE on advanced knowledge sharing. I was stunned when I was informed someone had shared the effort with Jack Kilby and he wanted to present his Leadership Award. It was surreal to meet with the inventor of the integrated circuit, who I saw as an icon of our industry. He spoke so profoundly about the role we engineers have in changing the world in responsible and ethical ways. He himself invented the integrated circuit primarily over a two-week period when all his coworkers were on vacation and there was a lull at work. Each person in the audience left electrified feeling like they could do something extraordinary too-although Kilby set a pretty high bar! 

WHAT IS AN IMPORTANT LESSON YOU HAVE LEARNED IN YOUR CAREER THAT YOU WISH YOU COULD GO BACK AND TELL YOUR YOUNGER SELF?

I have a Muhammad Ali quote in my office that represents a hard-learned lesson to set the highest standards for myself regardless of people stating my path will be hard or impossible… “Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact.”

Be a leader regardless of your title. It did wonders for my career. I tried to stick it out. Find your voice.

WHO HAS BEEN A MAJOR INFLUENCE ON YOUR LIFE?

My mother, by far. I saw her personify work ethics, empathy, and intelligence under the hardest of circumstances as she raised three children after immigrating from Costa Rica. She never had to lecture me about kindness and hard work because I saw it in her every action whether she was starting her own business, cooking for a women’s shelter, or finding me a math program when my school didn’t offer one. She taught me to be grateful to be working hard.

IF YOU COULD PROVIDE ONE POSITIVE MEMORY OF YOUR TIME AT UT THAT STANDS OUT, WHAT WOULD THAT BE?

That’s easy, I met my engineering thought partner at UT who I still develop ideas with to this day. Dr. Adrian Holmes is a PhD electrical engineer from UT Austin who went on to start his own company. He has been my greatest thought partner for ideas such as corporate restructuring, technology assessments, promotions, and even football for 20 years. 

WHY IS IT IMPORTANT FOR THE UNIVERSITY TO HAVE A DIVERSE COMMUNITY?

As engineers, our teams must reflect the communities for which we are innovating if we want to stay relevant. Of course, diversity is important, but inclusion goes further. That means the university is made up of people who have something unique to offer, but also that those people also feel like they belong and are valued equally. My journey in college was isolating at times because I didn’t see professors or staff who looked like me. Then, that feeling was exacerbated when I had a negative experience with sexual harassment which had me struggling with whether or not to leave. If that happened today, I would handle it differently. But at the time, it was my supportive peers who rallied to make me feel valued.

HOW HAS YOUR HISPANIC HERITAGE AFFECTED YOUR LIFE IN A UNIQUE WAY?

My family immigrated from Costa Rica with limited means but a fierce work ethic. My kids are first-generation Americans. so they’re growing up with a very different paradigm. For me, I grew up hearing the U.S. was a melting pot. As an engineer, I think a melting pot implies that two or more very different elements, let’s say iron and carbon, mix and new material would result…steel…better, harder, stronger than iron. However, the traits, the qualities of the original iron and carbon are now unidentifiable in the shiny new steel. This does not accurately reflect what you see in an American city or within our university. Modern cultural experts now choose to represent America’s multicultural qualities as a “tapestry.” The metaphors for a tapestry are endless but close your eyes and picture a tapestry depicting UT Austin. In your mind you can begin to picture the Tower, Bevo, and the 50,000+ students of every race, color, and creed you can imagine. Now imagine that brilliant scene was rendered in a single color of thread. I think that we would all agree that a scene of a single color, of a single dye, would be lacking…it would not be as beautiful, as valuable, or as STRONG.