LaMiah Tysinger

And while she was still learning, she also found herself teaching.

As a college STEM intern with Abbott, she received career mentorship from a full-time employee while also helping a high school STEM mentee acclimate to her new professional settings and plan her educational path.

Tysinger's biggest piece of advice for other young women? "Don't be afraid to ask for help," she says.

She encourages students to take advantage of knowledge shared by those around them. Tysinger says students should know that even if they aren't immediately great at something, they have the capacity – with practice and learning – to excel at it.

PURSUING STEM SUCCESS

Fresh out of college, Tysinger joined Abbott's Operations Professional Development Program as a full-time enterprise excellence trainer – and found herself teaching on the unprecedented stage of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Her role was training workers to efficiently and reliably produce Abbott’s BinaxNOW cards, which provide rapid-result COVID-19 test results. Tysinger sometimes worked nine to ten hours per day, to educate assembly operators on life-saving technologies and protocols, and on critical site-improvement projects.

Tysinger now is a front line leader in the microbiology lab at Abbott's nutrition facility in Altavista, Va. Even with her latest success, she admits sometimes wrestling with imposter syndrome.

But she reminds herself that her training and preparation have been key to forging ahead.

"I've had to check myself, pull back and tell myself I'm very capable," she says.

Then, she's able to fully appreciate what she's doing.

"The fact that I have a hand in making life-changing technologies – and a pretty significant hand in it – is motivating," she says. "It makes me feel empowered."