Chethana Kumar is the Head of Engineering at Nuix and a technology leader with 20 years of experience building platforms, scaling engineering teams, and leading technology transformation. Her career has taken her across India, Singapore, the US, and Australia, shaping her perspective on leadership, culture, migration, and succeeding across different environments. Chethana is passionate about building high-performing teams where people, trust, delivery, and technical excellence can coexist. Her journey is one of reinvention, resilience, and continuous growth, and she is especially committed to creating space for diverse voices and more women to thrive in technology leadership. What you’ll learn in this episode: What happens when you move countries, change technical paths, walk into rooms where you’re sometimes the only woman and refuse to let any of it make you smaller? In this episode of On the Mic WIT Shaz: Women in Tech Leadership — The Upsides, I’m joined by Chethana Krishnakumar, Head of Engineering at Nuix, whose 20-year technology career has taken her across India, Singapore, the US and Australia. Chethana describes her journey as “a migrant with a purpose.” And one of the biggest lessons she learned along the way? Moving countries doesn’t reset your capability. You may be new to the market, but you are not new to excellence. We get into the pressure migrant professionals can feel to take a step backwards for “local experience”, and Chethana offers a brilliant distinction: sometimes a step sideways or down is an investment but only when you know what you’re investing in. Take the learning, build the network, understand the market…but don’t let a temporary move become your ceiling. Then comes one of my favourite moments of the conversation. After moving from QA into development, DevOps transformation and engineering leadership, Chethana found herself questioning whether she was technical enough and whether she belonged in the room. Eventually, she realised the QA background she had been trying to move beyond was actually one of her greatest strengths. So she changed the question. Instead of asking, “Do I belong in this room?” she began asking, “Is this room going to be better with me in there?” Mic. Drop. 🎤 We also talk about quieter voices in technology, why the loudest person in the room isn’t necessarily the most capable, what happens when someone else gets credit for your ideas, the power of genuine sponsorship, and why sometimes you really do need to blow your own trumpet. And Chethana gets beautifully real about ambition, motherhood and flexibility. Choosing flexibility didn’t mean choosing less ambition, it allowed her to keep growing, leading and creating impact while being present for the other parts of her life that mattered. That is exactly why The Upsides exists. Not to pretend careers are perfect, linear journeys. But to show what can happen when we take the uncomfortable moments, the changes, the mistakes and the times we questioned ourselves…and turn them into information, growth and a better way of leading. Chethana’s story is a brilliant reminder: you don’t have to erase where you came from to become who you’re becoming. ✨If this episode resonated with you, please subscribe, leave a review and share it with someone who might need to hear it. Reference Links Kim Payne - Courageous Me https://kimpayne.com.au/book Medium blogs - https://medium.com/@chethana.kumar Atomic Habit - https://jamesclear.com/atomic-habits Get in touch with Chethana: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chethana-krishnakumar-a474416/ Where to find me: Website: Sharon (Shaz) Daly www.techtoexec.com.au LinkedIn: Sharon (Shaz) Daly https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharon-daly/ Instagram: @techtoexec https://www.instagram.com/techtoexec/ Facebook: TechtoExec https://www.facebook.com/techtoexec/ Join the COMMUNITY https://techtoexec.com.au/techtoexec-community/