IE Rewire Magazine
After carving out a career in architecture and international economic development, Nalisha Men took a 180-degree career change. She’s now pursuing a Master in Business Analytics & Big Data at the IE School of Human Sciences & Technology, and looks forward to serving as the Tech + Digital Area Editor for Rewire Mag. Learn her story.
I believe that the role of digital tech is to seriously examine the problems present across business and society in order to spark change.
My baptism in technology and innovation happened eight years ago when I was volunteering with an NGO that provides free cleft palate surgery in South China. The mother of a five-year-old boy who had just received the surgery asked me, “Why can my child still not speak properly?”
Like the mother, I assumed these patients would recover from the surgery with the ability to speak. But it wasn’t so simple. My research led me to identify the niche but increasing demand for accessible speech pathology in China.
To bridge the gap between post-operative cleft-palate patients and speech therapists, I was inspired to design a remote speech-therapy platform. This would enable patients to undergo speech therapy from the comfort of their home, their progress being tracked and evaluated by speech pathologists in real time.
Technology has been guiding me ever since.
Tech-driven innovation isn’t just about the future. It’s about right now. It’s about figuring out who we really are and envisioning a future collectively, at a time in which we’ve become fragmented and individualistic, unable to recognize the deep root that unites us all.
Innovation bridges sectors, industries, and disciplines to unify the fragments. And this is what I want to bring to my role as Tech + Digital Area Editor for Rewire Mag. I want to show that technology is not an island.
At Rewire Mag, we do this by looking at disruptive technologies and digital innovation through a human lens. We encourage tech-driven change, without losing sight of how it might impact urban dwellers in megacities, or nomadic tribes at the edge of the desert. My aim with this project is to build a community of entrepreneurs, tech innovators, and social scientists who actively reflect on and work to improve today’s world.
I’m beyond excited to meet the human faces behind technology and digital innovation in our IE community and beyond.
If you’re interested in collaborating and sharing your in-depth tech insights with us, don’t hesitate to write me: nalisha.men@student.ie.edu.
Nalisha is also an urban sketcher, documenting the familiar spaces of her everyday life on paper. Check out her work on IG: @nalishamen
Headshot photographer: Bayan Daou, MVDM Student. IG: @bayandaou