Today is International Women in Engineering Day, an event aimed at giving a profile to women engineers around the world and to highlight their under-representation in their professions.
We have lots of talented female engineering colleagues at Ofcom, so to mark the day we spoke to one of them – Armelle Boisset, director of spectrum engineering.
She told us a bit about her background and why she enjoys being in an engineering role at Ofcom.
What’s your career background?
As a newly minted electrical engineer I started working in the telecoms sector, primarily wireline and mobile, working in technical roles then moving into project and programme management.
What brought you to Ofcom?
I’d worked in the private sector until this point and welcomed the opportunity to join the industry regulator. This turned out much broader than I anticipated, as previously I’d focused mainly on one technology, mobile phones, whereas the Spectrum division I am in covers literally all wireless services - from radio to radar to satellites and up to the latest technologies such as 6G.
I’ve also gained great insight into policy making to add to my technical and commercial perspective.
What does your job involve?
I lead the Engineering team within the Spectrum Group. We provide technical analysis and measurements to ensure various wireless services can coexist, and work with our policy colleagues to translate this knowledge into regulations that then apply across different sectors. In my role I develop strategy and direction, and support my team in developing their capabilities and in delivering a range of concurrent projects.
What do you enjoy most about your role?
In previous roles I’ve mainly engaged with technical and sales counterparts, at Ofcom our project teams also encompass policy, legal, and economist colleagues and the interplay across these groups makes for stimulating and challenging work. This gives us the ability to take a systemic view across a range of sectors and assess interactions between existing and nascent technologies.
I also enjoy time spent in our labs where we test various antenna-receiver configurations or investigate operating parameters of devices such as drones or Wi-Fi routers. It brings complex systems to life and provides an essential complement to our modelling activities.
What’s the best thing about working for Ofcom?
It’s the opportunity to work across a range of projects and the committed, knowledgeable people that make Ofcom a great place to be.
There’s much more to Ofcom than the TV content aspect that many people are aware of, communications pervades all we do and we have some great technical roles. Knowing that our work directly influences services we all use every day, such as mobile phones or satnav is a privilege but also a responsibility.
What would be your advice to women thinking about a career in engineering?
It’s an ongoing journey, the experiences you build along the way all contribute. Each branch in the road leads to another one, look forward not back. I would also add that we need more women in engineering, it’s a brilliant career.
Want to read more?
For more on this topic, see some of our other colleague interviews: Cristina Data, Ofcom’s director of spectrum policy and analysis; and Janelle Jones, formerly a spectrum planner in our programme-making and special events (PMSE) team.