From Migration to Innovation: Leading Tech at Harry Reid Airport with Rishma Khimji

Episode Information

Show Notes

Episode Highlights: Join host Manuel Martinez for an inspiring conversation with Rishma Khimji, the pioneering CIO of Harry Reid International Airport. Her story begins with constant movement – nine cities across two countries – and leads to managing technology systems that serve millions of travelers annually.

Rishma’s career trajectory breaks conventional wisdom about climbing corporate ladders. Starting as a junior programmer debugging code for IBM, she discovered her true calling lay in making technology invisible to end users. Her public sector experience spans water utilities, police departments, and now aviation – each role teaching her how technology should serve humanity, not the other way around.

Key Takeaways:

• Embrace Your Migration Story: Constant change teaches adaptability and opens doors you never imagined
• Failure Equals Course Correction: Build backup plans (A, B, and C) because your primary approach won’t always work
• Technology Should Be Invisible: The best systems are the ones passengers never think about
• Community Amplifies Success: Surround yourself with people who champion your growth
• Apply at 50% Qualification: Stop waiting until you’re 100% ready – most learning happens on the job
• AI as Augmented Influence: Use technology to enhance your capabilities, not replace your humanity

Resources Mentioned:

• “Smart Brevity” book referenced by Manuel
• Airport common-use technology systems
• RFID baggage tracking implementation
• Public sector technology transformation strategies

About Rishma Khimji: Rishma serves as Chief Information Officer for the Clark County Department of Aviation, managing technology operations for Harry Reid International Airport and four general aviation facilities. Her leadership spans over 25 years in technology, with experience transforming operations across utilities, law enforcement, and aviation sectors. She’s recognized for her innovative approaches to making technology serve community needs.

Connect with Our Guest: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rishmakhimji/

Next Steps: Ready to accelerate your tech career? Subscribe to Career Downloads for weekly episodes featuring leaders who’ve navigated unconventional paths to success. Each conversation delivers actionable insights you can implement immediately.

Transcription

Manuel: Welcome everyone, my name is Manuel Martinez and this is another episode of Career Downloads. Where each episode I basically hit the refresh button, bring on a different guest to learn more about their experiences and their background, to really help uncover any actionable advice that you can use as you’re managing your own career. So I’m excited for today’s guest. I have with me Rishma Khimji and I have crossed paths with her close up, I’ve come close to crossing paths with her a few times. She’s worked on the public sector and when I used to work at VMware, covering public sector. So that’s kind of when I first became aware of her. I’ve seen a lot of what she’s done since that time. So I’m really excited to kind of get to know more about her and how she’s kind of continued to navigate her career. So with that, I’ll introduce Rishma.

Rishma: Hi.

Manuel: Hi, I appreciate you coming on and again, being willing to share your experiences.

Rishma: No, absolutely, happy to be here. So, I know we haven’t always crossed paths face to face but there’s always been an intersection of acquaintances for us. And so I’m very excited to be here because those friends that have already been on this podcast have spoken very highly of you and so I feel very honored to be here. So thank you.

Manuel: Thank you, I appreciate that. So if you don’t mind kind of telling people a little bit more about what your current role is and kind of some of the responsibilities that you have to manage.

Rishma: Sure, so I’m the first chief information technology officer for the Harry Reid International Airport, more so the Clark County Department of Aviation. We are a system of five airports. So we have the major airport, which is the Harry Reid Airport. And then we have four general aviation airports. Those are our non-commercial airports. So like the Henderson Executive Airport, the North Las Vegas Airport, Overton and Jean. And so we have these great airport systems that allow all of our guests and visitors come into Vegas. And the fun thing about it is I manage all of the technology that surrounds the passenger experience and the airline airport relationship. So I make sure that the planes are able to come in and the planes are able to go out, that our guests have a easy and seamless experience while they’re at the airport. But my team, which is a fabulous team, I couldn’t do, in fact, I don’t do much. They do all the hard work. And I appreciate them so much for that because I have such a smart and dedicated team. But we manage over 60 systems that pull the guests from the curb to the gate and the gate to the curb. So everything, once you walk into the airport, actually, even on the roadway into the airport, is somehow managed or has a technical component which we have to maintain, support, and do all the good things for. So it’s a really large job. My job is really starting to focus around the strategic implementation of technology because you might have heard we’re gonna actually open a second commercial airport, the Southern Nevada Supplemental Airport. It’s gonna be 20 miles south of us. But it’s actually gonna be an extension of the Harry Reid International Airport. So right now we have Terminal 1, D-Gates, and Terminal 3. We’re going to rename Terminal 3 into Terminal 2, and then down south of us will be Terminal 3. So just by that naming convention, we can see that we’re gonna have one very large airport system just in two very distinct locations, making it a very unique makeup of an airport. And so in order for us to get there, we are going to start using our commercial airport, the Harry Reid International Airport, as an innovative test bed for a lot of the solution building we wanna do once we come across that very unique setup that we’re gonna have in about 10 to 12-ish years. And so that’s very exciting.

Manuel: That is, and again, I think that’s one of the great things that I enjoy about this is, even though I think I have an idea of kind of what your role is, and each guest will kind of give us additional information. Like me being a local to Las Vegas was not aware that you are in charge of, or that they oversee and they’re all connected all these different airports.

Rishma: Right

Manuel: And then this one, it’s not gonna be a different airport, it’s gonna be an extension. So I’m sure there’s, it’s gonna be easy, right? There’s no challenges with something 20 miles away. (both laughing) Fantastic. So now, if you wouldn’t mind, what I’d like to do is kind of get to know a little bit more about you and just what, kind of where you grew up, and then eventually what got you interested in technology and eventually got you started in your career.

Manuel: Sure, so it’s kind of a long story. This is my ninth city. I come from a family of migrants. And so I think just travel and finding home is in our blood, and finding home is really where the love is, not necessarily where the house is, right? So my parents are from East Africa. They traversed over the ocean, landed in Canada, and actually met in Canada, got married there. And then, coming from East Africa, my mom being from Uganda, my dad being from Tanzania, the landscape is very different than it is in Canada, right? So they go through their first winter and they’re like, “Where in the hell am I?” Right? After a few years, my dad had an opportunity to kind of engage in some business ventures with his brothers, and they traveled south from Calgary, came into the States, reached Albuquerque, New Mexico, and was like, “Okay, this is somewhat reminiscent of home.” And that’s where we all moved. So I grew up in a community of about 150 to 200 people that are either centered around us through familiar relationships or through generational relationships, right? So these are people that my dad or my mom or my uncles have known, previous generation, like their parents knew each other, their grandparents, right? It’s like this whole thing. So I come from a very networked community. But with that also came opportunities for my dad and my mom to kind of venture out and see what else was available. And so in this cooperation with his brothers, right, we moved to different cities, looking for the right mix of work and family life. My parents, workaholics, but I mean, if you think about it, those immigrants that come in are always looking for the better opportunities for their children, not necessarily themselves, right? So they center themselves around being very, very strong workhorses, if I can use that term, but my parents worked their butts off. And so we moved a lot. And then once I graduated from college, I had already been to four or five cities by then, but then I moved to New York City all on my own, got a job at IBM, 9-11 happened, moved back to Albuquerque. And then from there, just started building my career a little bit more and more and more, got a job in Reno, so moved to Reno, then to San Francisco and out here. So nine cities later, I’ve figured out some of what I want to do with my life. I don’t think I’ll ever figure out where that pinnacle will be, but it’s been an adventure nonetheless. I don’t see challenges a