THE SECRET TO MAKING AN IMPACT Samira Khan

WHO AM I? Samira Khan Post Doctorate in CMU PhD from UT San Antonio Assistant Professor samirakhan@virginia.edu https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~smk9u/ Post Doctorate in CMU PhD from UT San Antonio Worked at Intel, AMD, EPFL Research Interest Building system support for new technologies Research group ShiftLab Committed to building open-source artifacts

RESEARCH GROUP: ShiftLab The name is inspired by the term “Paradigm Shift”, popularized by Thomas Kuhn Our mission is to make fundamental change to computing

End-to-End System for New Technologies SPECIALIZED CORES NONO-DRONES PROBLEM What interface to expose to applications? APPLICATION Software OS How to partition and offload task? RUNTIME PERSISTENT MEMORY How to manage memory and storage? ARCHITECTURE How to provide efficient Hardware support? Hardware CIRCUITS MEMORY WITH LOGIC Basically a whole system stack problem My group works on hardware, systems, compiler, application

How to Build an Impactful Group? DISCLAIMER SECRET: BE A DRAGON SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION MENTORING: TRAIN YOUR DRAGONS MY OWN PERILS

DISCLAIMER: ADVICES ARE TRICKY SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION Many different paths People tend to suggest a superset of wish list from all paths

How to Build an Impactful Group? DISCLAIMER SECRET: BE A DRAGON SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION MENTORING TRAIN YOUR DRAGONS MY OWN PERILS

THE SECRET TO MAKING AN IMPACT You are a dragon. Be a dragon. Don’t be a sheep. You are a dragon. Be a dragon.

HOW TO BE A DRAGON Do not follow, find your own path Be bold, be courageous, have a vision for your work “Once you get your courage up and believe that you can do important problems, then you can. If you think you can't, almost surely you are not going to.” Incredible opportunity to make an impact Complete freedom to work on anything you want. Why waste it on smaller things? “Shoot for the moon and even if you miss you will land among the stars!”

WHAT ARE THE DIFFICULTIES? Want to change the world, But first need to train students

How to Build an Impactful Group? DISCLAIMER SECRET: BE A DRAGON SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION MENTORING: TRAIN YOUR DRAGONS MY OWN PERILS

BE A DRAGON: IMPORTANCE OF MENTORING Train your own dragons!!! The best leaders only listen and ask questions They do not impose They do not rule Train students to find their own path Students need ownership to flourish

BE A DRAGON: IMPORTANCE OF MENTORING Facilitate an environment where students lead Active group discussion and brainstorming Train students to avoid being a sound absorber Avoid people who merely say “Yes, yes, yes” Students need to learn to defend and push back Critical mass in action, stimulate students right back “Yes, that reminds me of so and so” “Have you thought about that or this?”

How to Build an Impactful Group? DISCLAIMER SECRET: BE A DRAGON SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION MENTORING: TRAIN YOUR DRAGONS MY OWN PERILS

MY OWN PERILS: SELECTING STUDENTS Goal: Find students who want to be dragons Only qualities that I look for Motivated Hard working Background/research experience does not matter that much Students pick up skills along the way if they are motivated and hard working

MY OWN PERILS: PROVE YOURSELF Things that worked for others may not work for me Each person is different, circumstance is different Example: Junior vs. established professor Had written 10+ successful proposals during my postdoc Proposals under my name was getting “Not Competitive” – which means do not work on it Resulted in top conference papers in ASPLOS, ISCA, HPCA Know your vision and push for it

The secret to creating an impactful group AND TRAIN YOUR OWN DRAGONS SUMMARY The secret to creating an impactful group BE A DRAGON AND TRAIN YOUR OWN DRAGONS

THE SECRET TO MAKING AN IMPACT Samira Khan