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Advice from an Industry Professional: OSA Ambassador Interview Series

Jelena Pesic, OSA Ambassador, NOKIA Bell Labs, France

I have an engineering degree (MSc) in optics from Institut d’Optique Graduate School of Palaiseau in France and a PhD in physics.

When I was a teenager, I was always curious about how things were working and liked the sense of power that I was feeling when I was repairing broken objects.

By mistake! I did not know what optics was really about and enjoyed electronics more. I was distracted the day of the nationwide competitive exam in electronics and I brought one of my 7 written folders home… and ended up failing the admission by 1 point out of 500. Without that mistake, I would most likely be doing a different job now.

Général Ferrié. He is one of the fathers of telecom science. He managed to turn the Eiffel Tower into an antenna, saving it from demolition.

What motivates you in the morning to go to work every day and to push the limits?

If you could use a time machine to get back in time, what advice would you follow to get yourself through your studies?

I am not looking back to the past, more to the future. If I was, I would have fun with electronics right now, wouldn’t I?

Everyone should pick up the sector where they feel attracted to. I chose industry because creating knowledge was not good enough for me. I had to go beyond and prove that my ideas could make a true impact.

When we were students, we all had moments when we thought, ‘why do I need to learn this’, ‘when will I ever use this in life?’ Did you experience moments like these? How did you overcome them?

Always. But I do not remember being bored. I guess that I somehow trusted my professors / parents when they were explaining to me that it would be useful sooner or later.

From your point of view, what is the difference between research in university/institute and research in industry?

When I was at school, it was commonplace to segment research in industry and research in academia according to “applied” research against “fundamental” research. I do not think that it is where the actual split is. Both types come with knowledge creation, otherwise they would just be R&D. However, researchers in industry are often expected to push their ideas one step further, to work out a would-be application space by themselves, even though the actual applications could change several times until they come out. It takes time and efforts, but it can make them truly impactful.