Katherine D.

I'M DOING ANOTHER CRAZY THING.
A lot of you guys are starting LinkedIn coffee chats in your city and tagging me in the posts. I love it. Connect with people! I promise you won't regret it. In 2018, I'm taking it a step further and I've been inspired by a sophomore at UW.

While I'm no longer in university recruiting, I naturally have a heart for helping students. Mostly because I remember being there, I had no idea what I was doing, I accepted the first place that would take me in Seattle, and didn't realize the impact my job would have on all aspects of my life.

As a student, it's hard to connect, reach out, be taken seriously, and feel like you are bringing some sort of value to the scary corporate world. The corporate world isn't that scary and I'm here to prove that it's filled with amazing people who would love to share about what they do, their day to day, their life experiences, their company culture and so on. You can learn a lot by just listening to others experiences. SO, if you are in the Seattle area and you are interested in a company, a certain field, want to meet someone, don't know how to strike up the conversation, LET ME CONNECT YOU. I'm up for grabbing coffee and am up for equipping you with the knowledge I didn't have. Tag people who might benefit.

Positivity of the day - my fiance stopped to help a random lady in the parking lot change her tire. No one was around to witness it. The woman came over to our house today because she’s into canning, has a garden, and wanted to say thank you. She brought over all of this delicious food and it completely made my day. It’s interesting to see what happens when you do something for someone else with absolutely no expectation of anything in return. The world has a way of giving you more than you could ever need or desire. I’m so excited to try out these jams, fresh produce, fresh dips, and think it’s a reminder small acts of kindness matter to people.

I was my biological parents 3rd unwanted pregnancy. The first 2 didn’t happen, I did. Selfishly, I am glad they didn’t have access to an abortion clinic because I don’t think I’d be here right now. I spent a few months in an orphanage and was eventually adopted by a family in the US that wanted a child. Going through with the pregnancy, giving me up, and giving me a chance at life - was the right choice in this instance.

With that being said … there are so many other scenarios that aren’t like mine. There are health risks with pregnancies, abortions aren’t always about whether you want a baby or not. Sometimes it’s literally life or death for the mother. I also can’t imagine carrying a child for 9 months if I was a victim of sexual assault. One thing I like is that the company I work for … supports BOTH sides. They provide adoption assistance, insane IVF benefits for those trying to conceive, AND will be providing assistance for those in states where access to an abortion isn’t an option.

At the end of the day, what a woman does with her body is HER choice. The choice isn’t always an easy one to make. It’s not black and white. It’s not something anyone else can decide. There’s also no way of knowing what could happen to you, someone you love, someone you know during a pregnancy. Having access to information, resources, and safe medical procedures is necessary.

I came out to my mom in a text message at 11pm after attending a Bible study. I was scared to wake up the next day, I wasn’t sure what she’d say, but I wanted her opinion. I didn’t want to live a double life, didn’t want to lie, and wanted to hear from her. When I think of someone who embodies Christ and is loving .. I think of my mom. \n\nI lucked out because I grew up in a split household where religion was never forced on me. I had a parent who attended church regularly, wanted me to be exposed to Christianity and another who wasn’t into organized religion. This made it easier for me to CHOOSE what I wanted for my life, what my faith looked like, and made coming out easier. Growing up in the south though .. I really had no idea. I grew up dating men, had a bf in hs, had a long term one in college and then stopped seriously dating men after that. I’d go on dates, but something was off. I wanted to be best friends, hike, hang out, talk but never wanted to go home at the end of the night. I saw my friends marry guys, obsess over them, and realized … I couldnt ever get there personally. When I visited Seattle, it was the first time I realized … you don’t have to marry a man if you don’t want to. You can explore and so I did that for 3 years. \n\nI dated women. Tried to date some men and made friends out of that. The best thing that came from trying to date men was getting really solid hiking buddies (I did The Enchantments / 23 miles in a day with a guy from Tinder - will never forget that😂) Most people assume that because I prefer women, am marrying a woman, I must be a lesbian. I never correct anyone, I don’t really care, but I self identify as bi-sexual. I feel like it’s almost worse to be bi because you’re over sexualized by the straight community, not quite accepted by the gay community. People assume that you’re not comfortable with yourself. Also .. why would you CHOOSE a harder life?!\n\nI personally see sexuality as a spectrum. Straight and Gay are the two extremes. I believe more people fall in the middle than are aware or open to admit to themselves / others. You can also lean more towards one gender, your preferences can change throughout your lifetime, and ultimately only you know what’s right for you. Who you spend your life with is no one else’s decision to make. For me personally, I never get offended when people assume I’m straight, assume I have a husband, assume I’m a lesbian, stereotype, or think they have me all figured out. Sometimes it’s just easier to let people make their assumptions and move on. \n\nWho you marry is the single most important decision in your life. You can always quit a job, move, back out of commitments, but the person you spend every day with will impact all those other areas. I’m proud to be spending my life with someone who is honest, trustworthy, kind, silly, low maintenance, loves the outdoors as much as me, encourages my faith, and believes in me. Lifes gets more fun when you’re honest. \n\n#pridemonth

Whoever made the call on the Microsoft merch …. did good. A HAMMOCK????😍😍😍😍

Looks like I’ll be recruiting for Microsoft’s Data Centers all across the US😝 Here are the locations:

-Bothell, WA
-Quincy, WA
-Wenatchee, WA
-Dulles, VA
-Blu Ridge, VA
-Boydton, VA
-San Antonio, TX
-Santa Clara, CA
-Phoenix, AZ
-Cheyenne, WY
-Chicago, IL
-Des Moines, IA

Feel free to share my contact if you know of anyone interested in working at our Data Centers!

Got this message from a Microsoft employee on our internal chat and it made my day. Inadvertently recruiting for Microsoft even when I'm not. Firm believer in updating your LinkedIn profile and letting people come to you. That’s how I got my job.. and it’s been the best one so far!

✌🏼

EXCITING NEWS!!!! The other week I asked my manager if I could take on recruiting for extra roles. I found out today, they’re letting me take on FOUR additional specialty CIA roles as one of my teammates transitions into a new role.

Do I have any idea what they are? Not really. Supposedly outpost consulting roles, compute and storage. I kind of like the fact that I don’t have to be a subject matter expert, but I am trusted to help various different teams and learn as I go.

This will be a new challenge on top of my 4+ CIA hires a month and I’m determined to just figure it out. It’ll give me an opportunity to grow my network, bring more people to Amazon, build new relationships and I’m getting to work on changing how we prep candidates too. July will be an exciting month and I’m happy to finally have some stretch projects! 😝