Meet Some of the Talented Women in eDiscovery at Nextpoint

Education: Northern Illinois University – BS in Marketing, Minor in Communications

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

I’ve spent most of my career in the litigation consulting field. I started out supporting law firms by creating informational graphics to present on their case. As my career progressed, I moved into many different management roles over the years in client services, recruiting, training and overall operations management. I love working at companies where everyone acts like an entrepreneur – taking their job seriously to support the business while having some fun at the same time. When I left the company where I spent 14 years of my career, I never thought I would find another company like it. Now, here I am at Nextpoint almost 10 years later doing what I love and running operations for a company that has incredibly smart people who are not only colleagues, but my friends.

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

I have always felt supported when I wanted to take on new responsibilities throughout my career. My mentors, both men and women, provided me with guidance to help me grow and pushed me to take on new challenges. At Nextpoint, I feel like I am always supported and I hope my colleagues all feel that I support them. The best way to do this is by giving and receiving feedback to support each other in our professional and personal growth.

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

I would say find a woman mentor – it could be someone in your personal life or at work. My mentor was my first woman boss and still one of my close friends. She always gave me the candid feedback that I needed and I learned so much from her over the years. Another piece of advice: don’t be afraid to try something new. There is so much to learn in the legal tech field and I think taking on new adventures is what makes work so fun!

Education: University of Texas–Pan American – MS in Electrical Engineering | Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University – BS in Electrical and Electronics Engineering | KES Polytechnic for Women – Diploma in ECE

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

I am an award-winning passionate technology leader, a mom, and an engineer at heart with 18 years of tech experience. I help deliver meaningful products by scaling teams and building technology that accelerates business growth.

I am known for building, leading and mentoring high-performing software engineering teams that foster creativity and innovation while maintaining strong team culture. My efficiency helps me to manage multiple deliverables simultaneously. I am high-energy, results-driven, and focused.

I was looking for a new challenge in 2019 and came across a job posting on LinkedIn for Nextpoint. I interviewed for it, spoke with Rakesh Madhava, our founder and CEO, and that solidified my decision to work with Nextpoint.

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

My journey to becoming a technology leader was both challenging and rewarding, particularly as a woman, an immigrant, and a person of color in the tech industry. Growing up in a small town in South India, where societal norms prescribed a different path for girls, I had an unwavering desire and passion to break barriers and pursue a career in technology leadership. As a first generation college student in my family, I moved to the U.S. alone as a young woman to pursue my master’s degree, embarking on my career journey.

Despite facing obstacles and not having dedicated mentors early on, I persevered by seeking advice from everyone around me and learning from their experiences. My persistence and grit have led me to my current position as a leader at Nextpoint, where I continue to make a significant impact.

I take great pride in my journey and experiences, and am determined to help others in their careers and day-to-day lives. I strive to foster a culture of teamwork and collaboration within the team while providing each member with the tools to grow as leaders and innovators. 

Nextpoint has an amazing culture when it comes to embracing female leadership. I have found it easy to take up a leadership role and prove what women are naturally built for here at Nextpoint. Did you know that Nextpoint is such a unique and diverse place where 50% of the executive leadership consists of women? This is very rare to be seen in tech companies.

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Don’t let societal norms define who you are and what you are supposed to be. Follow your heart and if you set your mind to what you want to be and stay focused, anything is possible. Trust me!!!!

Find a leader/company that supports you in your career despite where you come from. I found both at Nextpoint. Find yours!

Education: DePaul University – Bachelors of Business Administration, Finance

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

After a few years of working in the personal financial planning industry, I was ready for something more fast-paced and innovative. Nextpoint allowed me the opportunity to apply my experience to a business setting and expand my knowledge for a new career path.

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

Finance is known for being a male dominated industry, and early in my career it was challenging to navigate the field as a young woman. There was a lack of other women I could turn to for mentorship and guidance. When I started at Nextpoint, it was exciting to have more diversity in the office and specifically to see women in leadership. I’m grateful to have worked closely with several inspiring women at Nextpoint. They’ve built a strong culture of trust, teamwork and transformation – making Nextpoint the great place it is to work and grow your career!

What is one piece of advice you would give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Take advantage of opportunities to stand out and don’t be afraid to showcase your abilities!

Education: Transylvania University – BA in Marketing and Studio Art

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

When I look back on my story as to how I ended up at Nextpoint, I’m amazed at how much can happen in 10 years. When I graduated college in 2009, the job market was tough. I was lucky enough to be introduced to a local law firm that was in need of a new administrative assistant. I spent my first year or two there learning the ropes and better understanding legal processes, and I was eventually offered a Litigation Paralegal role with the firm. For the next three years, I worked in many different practice areas, and eventually, a case with a large volume of electronic data came in the door (at the time, that was 30k documents!).

Enter Nextpoint. We brought Nextpoint into the firm to help support our needs in that first ediscovery case, and we were hooked. Over time, I mastered my way through the platform managing our growing ediscovery efforts, and I loved it. One day, I received a call from Nextpoint, asking me if I would be interested in an interview. Three weeks later, I was moving from Kentucky to Chicago, and have now been with Nextpoint over seven years. I started as a project manager, then segued into Client Success and Community Engagement roles, and now Product Management.

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

I’m very fortunate to be able to say that I don’t feel I have been significantly limited in my career path because I am a woman. I think there are a lot of contributing factors to this: My strong and independent mother who raised me to hold my own and chase my passions no matter what and treated me equally to my two brothers; my circle of friends who are brilliant, ambitious, and kind humans who encourage each other to reach beyond our perceived limits; and the places where my career path have taken me, like Nextpoint.

Spending the majority of my career so far at Nextpoint, I am grateful for a company that supports an individual’s personal goals, passions, and strengths regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, age, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and other diverse backgrounds. I truly feel as though I have been offered the same opportunities to grow in my career as my male counterparts. I know that this sentiment is not shared by every woman in her career, but I can only hope we continue to make progress toward complete equality across the board.

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

You can do hard things. Have confidence in what you know, ask when you don’t, keep a learning mentality, and stand up for yourself and what you know is right.

Education: Iowa State University – BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

I initially got into the Litigation Consulting industry working at a company that specialized in creating graphics and animations for trial presentations (where I met Tricia Boguslawski). After 9 years, I made a career change and joined an international marketing agency (the inspiration for Mad Men!) and worked in social media analytics.

I enjoyed learning all about Big Data (and developed my extreme affinity for pivot tables), but I missed working on the meaningful projects that I was exposed to in the litigation world. After 2.5 years, I once again joined the legal industry working in trial services. All the while, I kept in touch with Tricia (who had since joined Nextpoint) and was curious to learn more about the earlier aspect of the litigation continuum: ediscovery. In 2019, I took the leap to join Nextpoint and haven’t looked back since.

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

It has allowed me to gain a lot of confidence – it takes a strong personality to walk into a room full of high powered attorneys who have been living/breathing a case for many years and to have the guts to say, “I don’t get it.”

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Don’t be afraid to ask questions – no one is born knowing things, and oftentimes, if something isn’t clear, it is because it hasn’t been explained well.

Education: University of Wisconsin-Madison – BS in Mechanical Engineering | John Marshall Law School – JD

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

I worked as a mechanical engineer for a few years after college and specialized in designing custom solutions for biochemical buildings across the country. After that, I went to law school to use my engineering background as a patent attorney. I worked as an IP attorney for a few years before finding Nextpoint on Built In Chicago. I ended up leaving my then job as in house counsel at JP Morgan Chase. When I came to Nextpoint, I knew nothing about the ediscovery/legal tech industry, but I was intrigued, and I’ve never been happier with the jump!

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

Nextpoint is one of the first companies I’ve worked at that is not male dominant. Mechanical engineering and patent law are both fields inherently skewed by a fairly high male to female ratio, which I experienced in school as well as the workplace. When I came to Nextpoint, it was refreshing to see this was not the case. Not only is there a high female population, but many of those women are in management positions. I’ve never felt any hardships in the ability to grow my career; in fact, it’s been fostered by my time here.

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Advocate for yourself. If you’re at the right company, this will go a long way, and you can truly make the most of your career in the exact way you want.

Education: University of Michigan – BA in Sociology with a Concentration in Economics

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

Nextpoint is my professional background! I started working at Nextpoint as soon as I graduated from college.

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

For a long time I was one of the only women who worked at Nextpoint who was actually in the office since most of the team was constantly on trial sites. It’s been great to add so many wonderful women to the team as Nextpoint has grown. I greatly appreciate the guidance Tricia has given me as she was the first woman leader I worked with in my career.

Through working with more women, I have developed deeper relationships with my co-workers, especially as I navigate being a working mom. We spend so much time at work, and it’s great to be surrounded by women you can call friends and count on for more than work needs. We all come from different backgrounds, and it’s been great getting to know so many of them on a personal level and learning from their experiences and expertise. Overall, the women at Nextpoint continue to help shape the company and make the software better. I love watching the women at Nextpoint succeed, and I look forward to continuing to mentor and learn from all of them.

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Find a woman mentor.

Education: Siena College – BA in History

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

My career started in Undergraduate Admissions at two Universities in New Jersey where I traveled extensively around the county to recruit students to attend said Universities. From there, I embraced a more corporate recruiting role in NYC. It was there that I realized I enjoyed many more aspects of People Operations than I initially realized, not just recruiting, so I expanded my horizons and became more of a generalist. After the pandemic, in 2021, I was hoping and wishing for a new opportunity alongside a change of scenery. I was THRILLED to be offered this opportunity here at Nextpoint in Chicago. Can’t believe it has been almost 3 years already!

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

Interestingly enough, People Operations is largely women-dominated. It’s been so fulfilling to be mentored and coached by smart, mindful + talented women in the field over the years.

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Advocate for yourself!! In male-dominated fields like legal and tech, it’s important to advocate for yourself. Don’t be afraid to speak up, ask for opportunities, and assert your worth. Oh and FIND that organization that allows you to do so, as well as fosters that growth. Like Nextpoint… 🙂 (We’re hiring!)

Education: Columbia College Chicago – BFA Fashion Design, Minor Art History

What is your professional background and how did you end up at Nextpoint?

I have worked in retail for most of my professional life. For 10 years, I worked for a small business that was women-owned. I started out in sales and my responsibilities soon grew to include many aspects of running a small business, including people management and operations, ecommerce, fashion buying, marketing, finance, and more. While there, I learned
SO much about the joys and challenges of running a small business.

At that job, I was given the opportunity to spread my wings and take my career in the direction I chose, and that is what has guided me to the People Operations space. I love having the opportunity to positively impact my colleagues’ lives, take on a variety of responsibilities, help shape the company culture, drive organizational success, and support the career growth of others as I have been supported.

Changing industries from retail to tech isn’t easy, but when I found the opportunity to work at Nextpoint, it was a welcome change, however not too unfamiliar. The skills required to be in People Operations are transferable anywhere you go where there are people!

How has being a woman impacted your career path and experiences?

Being a woman has impacted where and who I choose to work with. I have found success in surrounding myself with successful women and allies. I have always been drawn to companies that are more female focused and have healthy diversity and work/life culture. These types of spaces have allowed me to speak my mind, avoid gender bias, find women mentors, use my leadership skills, and balance my work responsibilities with my home responsibilities./p>

What advice would you give to young women pursuing careers in the legal/tech fields?

Advocate for yourself and speak up when you want change: You have good ideas and deserve to be heard no matter where you are in the hierarchy. Show off and be seen: Your best promoter is YOU! Talk about your accomplishments and don’t feel like you are bragging. Don’t be afraid to ask for what you need. Strive for a healthy work/life balance: The balance will never be split half and half and your priorities will change throughout your life, but both areas of your life can co-exist without feeling toxic.

Thank you to our inspiring women in ediscovery for sharing their stories with us. From mechanical engineering to patent law to paralegal roles, these leaders had diverse career paths before joining the Nextpoint team.

But we noticed a common theme throughout their varied experiences: At Nextpoint, they found a culture where women can thrive and form bonds with fellow women, as both friends and mentors. We’re proud to foster this environment, and we’re thankful for the value each woman on our team brings to Nextpoint.

Nextpoint is always growing. If you’re interested in the supportive, uplifting culture these women in ediscovery described, check out the links below to learn more about the roles we’re looking for.

Nextpoint Careers Info >
Nextpoint Open Positions >
Nextpoint Reviews on Glassdoor >