March 27, 2024
Paige Haehlke
Erica Ochs ’02 breaks barriers in male-dominated technical industry with humanities education
Erica Ochs ’02 has spent her 20-year career in the male-dominated automotive industry fighting stereotypes both as a woman and as someone without a technical degree, demonstrating the wide range of career possibilities that are available with an education in the humanities.
Originally from Plymouth, Michigan outside of Detroit, Ochs came to Lake Forest College in 1998 never imagining that she would spend her career working with mechanical and electrical engineers. Ochs is currently the Vice President of Corporate Sales and Business Development at TASKING, a company that develops software for automotive supplies and car manufacturers.
She came to Lake Forest College in search of a small, picturesque, and welcoming school. Ochs already knew she wanted to study English, and after taking an elective politics class, she discovered a new passion and added a politics major to her plan. Also wanting to set herself up for success in the future with skills to navigate the rapidly evolving technology landscape, she minored in computer science.
“Lake Forest offered me the flexibility to pursue my academic passions,” Ochs said. “I was confident I would be learning skills and learning about topics that personally interested me, and it was an interdisciplinary approach—all hallmarks of a liberal arts education.”
After graduation, she moved back home to Detroit and sought out sales roles within the automotive industry, where she would explain complex topics in ways that non-technical people could understand them.
“My English degree and my computer science minor helped me in these positions,” Ochs said. “I gravitated toward sales because I knew how to present and communicate things. What I learned is how to bring people together, collect their feedback, and translate it into something else.”
Ochs’s English degree has often been the subject of conversation, with people asking her how her degree helps her in the automotive industry or how it makes her qualified for certain positions. Her career success shows the advantages of having a non-technical degree in this industry.
“Engineers develop and test the products, but buyers are the ones who decide which supplier to purchase parts from,” Ochs said. “They don’t always know what these products do, and they need someone to explain to them why prices may differ from those of competitors so they can make an informed decision. I've built my career on being able to take technical topics and explain them in more simple terms to other people.”
"Thinking through challenges and being able to comfortably make decisions is sometimes harder for my peers who only have technical degrees."
Ochs’s degree in politics has also served her well when working with large companies like General Motors or Ford as customers, as well as internally with her own employers.
“Studying politics enabled me to better navigate the multiple departments in large corporations, as well as the different management and leadership styles that you will inevitably encounter there,” Ochs said.
As her career has moved from task-oriented, entry-level roles to management-level positions that involve more critical thinking, her liberal arts education has continued to put her at an advantage among her peers.
“My liberal arts background has helped me be able to walk engineers through what options are available to us and arrive at what we think is the best solution for the company,” Ochs said. “Thinking through challenges and being able to comfortably make decisions is sometimes harder for my peers who only have technical degrees.”
Not only is Ochs someone with humanities degrees in a technical industry, but she has also spent her career as a woman in a male-dominated industry. For most of her career, she was the only woman in meetings and the only woman in the office who was not in an administrative role. The first time she had a female peer was in 2018.
“It was tough in the beginning,” Ochs said. “There were times when I was younger that I felt like some of the men weren't taking me seriously because I was a woman. It’s probably toughened me up a little bit and maybe even made me tougher than I need to be.”
Despite these challenges, she looks on the bright side and welcomes the change that her presence as a woman is bringing to the industry.
“I try to embrace the change that I bring to this environment by being the only woman and a woman without a technical degree,” Ochs said. “Part of it is demonstrating that even though I don’t have a technical degree, I can still bring value to this team and this company with other skills that help us solve business challenges.”
One thing that Ochs is particularly proud of is her role as President of Kappa Alpha Theta, a women’s fraternity focused on academic excellence and offering opportunities for intellectual and personal growth.
“Kappa Alpha Theta means a lot to me because it contrasts to my professional work in a male-dominated industry,” Ochs said. “It means a lot to have the opportunity to develop programming for young women to have leadership skills and confidence so they can go out into the world and support the things that they care about.”
Both Kappa Alpha Theta and Lake Forest College have been extremely important for Ochs, and her career success and personal development would not be possible without either.
“There are two things that I support in life repeatedly: Lake Forest College and Kappa Alpha Theta,” Ochs said. “Both of those institutions helped me become the leader that I am today.”