A Q&A With The First Canadian Woman To Have An Engineering School Named After Her

At Diff, we pride ourselves on working with the best creatives and developers in the biz (P.S. we’re hiring!), so I was excited when I recently got the chance to speak to a true leader in this space: a woman who is enriching tech by making engineering and computer science more inclusive.

Gina Parvaneh Cody is a Canadian-Iranian engineer and business leader with more than 30 years of professional engineering experience. Like me, she’s an alumnus of Montreal’s Concordia University. But she’s also a woman of many firsts. In 1989 she became the first woman in Concordia’s history to earn a PhD in building engineering –– three decades later, her alma mater’s engineering faculty is now named after her, making it the first in Canada to be named after a woman. Under her leadership, Toronto-based firm CCI Group Inc. was one of Canada’s most profitable companies owned by a woman. She’s now retired, but giving back is a big part of her day-to-day life. I was thrilled to host Gina as a guest speaker at one of our team’s recent town hall meetings, and I’m grateful to share some of her insights from our conversation here. 

First things first: Why did you go into engineering? In Iran, we had these old fashioned TVs. So if the TV stopped working I would tear it apart, take the bulbs out, go out and buy the replacement. Or if the wire was broken? I’d open it up. I was the youngest of five people, and as the youngest, I had no patience for waiting for things to happen so I had to make the change myself. That was what intrigued me about engineering. 

You moved from Iran to Canada as a young woman. Can you tell us a bit about what that experience was like? I left Iran in 1979 during the revolution. So, it was chaos in the country. I had finished my undergraduate in engineering and I wanted to do my master’s and PhD. At that time, there was no ability to get your PhD in Iran, they didn’t have the programs, so I wanted to leave. 

It was a bit of a difficult time, obviously, because the borders were closed and I came to Canada as a student. I had only $2,000 in my pocket when I arrived.

You’ve made your mark on Concordia as an alumnus and a patron. But how did you end up there as a student? I was supposed to actually go to the neighboring university, but my brother had just finished his engineering degree at Concordia. Days before I was supposed to register at the other school, he told me his professor wanted to meet me. So first thing in the morning, I met this professor named Cedric Marsh. He looked at my marks and said, “Wow, why would you go anywhere else? Do your masters with me here at Concordia and I’ll give you a scholarship.” 

For me, it was kind of a big flashlight, a change of direction. He took me to the registrar and I got my acceptance within seconds. Then he gave me documentation to get a work permit. By noon, I was all done. That afternoon I started working in the lab at Concordia University. 

I had been worried about just making it and surviving. What a transformation to get my scholarship and work permit, and to be working in the lab with Professor Marsh.

You must have felt like you had won the lottery! It was better than the lottery because they give you money with no direction. Here I got the direction, which was actually a transformation for my life, my well-being and my future. 

At the time, there were so few women in the field. What sparked your passion for engineering that you were confident enough to leave your home to pursue it? I have to give credit to my father for that. He was motivating me all the time and he used to say: “You have to survive in a man’s world if you want to succeed.” He had a private boys’ high school and when I was 16 I would teach summer classes to 14- and 15-year-old boys. And he used to say, “If you can manage these kids, you can manage anybody.” That was the push I got from childhood. My brothers became engineers, and my father wanted me to get into engineering, too. 

What role do you think higher education plays in reducing inequalities? My mom never finished high school. She married young. But she knew how important it is for women to get educated. She used to tell me and my sister constantly, "I want you girls to succeed and be independent." And to be independent as a woman, especially in Iran, is done through higher education. So, pursue your education, go as high as you can, don’t stop. A life of independence is more valued and much happier than if you’re dependent on someone else. That was ingrained in my brain from childhood. Going for my master’s and PhD was just written in my being. I had to work hard, I had to be better and I had to be independent. Education to me is an equalizer. Pursue an education, and the rest will follow. 

Thanks to you, Concordia is the first Canadian university with an engineering faculty named after a woman. What did that honour mean to you? For me, the university was transformational and one of the things that always bothered me was being the only woman in the room. I was in construction and 40 years ago women –– well, women still today aren’t respected on a job site. I was conscious of that and I thought, “How do I bring change?” And that was the whole discussion of giving to the school and renaming the school –– it wasn’t about me. I really don’t care about the name, but I wanted it to be a female’s name so that the women relate to engineering, the women feel that they belong. That was the message I wanted to send. It was a message that every girl and young woman belong to engineering and can make a better life for themselves through engineering.

How do you think the experience of (often) being the only woman in the room affected your work? I always took advantage of being the only woman in the room. I always say that I changed the gear by myself, because I was a bit oblivious so I didn’t see that sexism or prejudice towards me. My education spoke for me, because I had a PhD. I was Dr. Cody and they would listen to me when I spoke up. I would go to meetings and since I was the only woman, they’d all look at me –– “Who’s going to take the minutes?” I’d say, “OK, I’ll take the minutes.” And then I’d say, “Do you want me to prepare the agenda for our next meeting?” 

In the third meeting, I was the chair. Because it was my meeting now, I was setting the agenda and I was doing the minutes. So, it doesn’t matter how you’re perceived, and it’s a cliché, but you need to turn the negative into a positive. And I think that goes for any job, any work, just be persistent, do it. 

There’s still a way to go towards equality in STEM –– but how have things changed in business since you started your career? It has definitely improved, but the pool of women engineers is still small. It’s easy to say go 50/50, but it’s not going to happen. You have to have the pool to choose from. The perception is still I think that women have difficulty in the job force. They are not taken as seriously as their male counterparts so there’s still room for improvement. 

The pandemic has pushed women back half a decade. So we can’t be complacent, we can’t take things for granted. The schools have been closed, the day cares have been closed, and between couples, the women tend to give up their jobs first. In Canada, a large number of women are anticipating quitting their jobs or downshifting to part time, so these are all affecting the women in the workforce and leadership.

Did you always know you wanted to be a leader? I never set my goals too high. My fear is when you set your goals too high, you miss the opportunities that come to you because you have set your goal for specifics. So my vision was survival. I’m a doer –– maybe at times a bit of a control freak –– I try not to be. But being a doer gives you the chance to grow, people looking to you and then all of a sudden you’re president of the company. Every organization I joined, after a year or two I became the chair.

Why is philanthropy and giving back so important to you? There are so many people who do things for us and we take it for granted and we forget it. And that’s an obligation upon us, to pave the road for those coming after us. We cannot just take it for granted and use it and forget about what made us who we are. I always say that giving back is not a desire rather than an obligation. We all have that obligation to make life better for those coming after us. You know, as a woman, look how many women fought for me to have my freedom and do whatever I want to do –– so what am I going to do with that freedom? 

What difference has philanthropy made in your life? I think empathy helps you be a better leader, to understand your colleagues and makes you a kinder person. Kindness is to me, the number one, the most important thing for any leader, any person who wants to succeed in life. It’s not just for the sake of kindness, it builds character. 

Thank you to Dr. Gina Cody for sharing your incredible experiences and perspective with us — and thanks to you for reading along. If you liked this Q&A, follow me on Linkedin for more. And, by all means, please share this with an engineer, computer scientist or philanthropist you know who’s looking to up their game or wants to share their journey –– better business, better world!