Meet Lana Najera, a Senior Infrastructure Security TPM Manager for Google. Lana recently completed her Master of Science in Informatics degree in 2024 at San José State University’s School of Information—with a specialization in Cybersecurity and Privacy. In this interview, Lana shares how the master’s degree program helped her reframe her career, enhance her impact, and gain confidence as a woman in tech.

Q: Can you tell us your title, about your current role, and what a typical day looks like as a Senior Infrastructure Security TPM Manager?
A: “I’m a Senior Technical Program Manager for Infrastructure Security at Google’s Sunnyvale campus.”

“As an Infrastructure Security TPM—what we call TPM—what I do is a lot of meetings, a lot of human interaction because we work on creative, complex problem solving. And once we are done with those types of activities, all of us have what we call IC work, which is individual contributor work.”

“Typically, because we’re spread across the globe, we try to find time zone–friendly blocks where we can all meet. That usually lands early in the morning and can go until about 2 or 3 in the afternoon for the West Coast. So on the West Coast, that’s when we get our individual contributor work done for the last three, four hours of the day.”

Q: What do you love most about your work in infrastructure security and technical program management?
A: “What I like most about what I do is the scale of the problem. It is the thing that gets me to bound out of bed every morning… Just the thought of how much QPS is hitting our systems—queries per second—and what we have to do to scale for the needs of Google as a company and Google Cloud in particular.”

“These problems have never been solved before… you really have to bring a good creative, open mind and stay centered creatively and be very resilient… Never bored.”

Q: What are some of the biggest challenges you face in your role—and how do you approach them?
A: “One of the biggest challenges that we face is how can we move quickly and confidently… How do you secure that space at the speed that the market’s changing in a way that you’re satisfied with? That’s a hard problem.”

“You definitely need people who are in it to win it with you… But what you also need is for folks to have a good, healthy life balance. Because when we are not balanced, that’s when we make mistakes. So we’re really trying to support each other and prop each other up.”

Q: What advice would you give to someone considering a career in informatics, cybersecurity, or infrastructure security?
A: “You need to be ready for how competitive the market is. It requires a lot of sustained energy every day because the problems that are facing the technical industry now are new and big.”

“But they’re exciting. They’re not boring—and they won’t stop. Try and keep an open mind.”

Q: What kind of person thrives in this career path?
A: “The TPMs who I relate to the most… are those of us who really have an instinct for how long something will take, driving it to completion. If you care about getting things done—like you feel good—that makes you feel good… TPM is a good place for you.”

Q: How did the Master of Science in Informatics program improve or elevate your skills?
A: “What I found is in the first semester, it made me a better employee immediately.”

“It immediately taught me to zoom out, look at the big picture. Think about your information structure. As a TPM, we are information brokers. We want to give the business high-quality information.”

Q: What skills or experiences from the program do you use most in your job today?
A: “What I use most in my job today is the program really helped me to understand the different options you have and the importance of things—the presentation layer of the data.”

“What is the presentation layer to take your audience through that narrative so they could see the recommendation the way you see it, but also lift the narrative up just a little bit so they could form their own opinions.”

Q: Why did you choose to pursue your degree at San José State University?
A: “The total cost at San José State for the exact same credits, the exact same hours, high-quality teaching, was less than other schools that were farther away… I wanted to be somehow close culturally to the school.”

“And from the very beginning, the School of Information was accessible… The total cost of the program, really, I thought, was fair. And I have to say I was not disappointed. The quality of the teachers and the professors was through the roof.”

Q: Would you recommend the SJSU Informatics program to others—and if so, why?
A: “I have recommended this program to others… I think the cost of the program is very fair, super reasonable. I think the teachers are amazing. The structure of the class… is well structured and it’s done in such a way that you can work full time and get through it.”

“There was a really good mixture of group classes… Pay attention to this experience. This is what actual work is like. You’re never doing anything by yourself.”

Q: What was your favorite part of the program, or something that surprised you about the experience?
A: “My favorite part of the program was that every class didn’t start where things are today… For example, a class on basic coding in Python had us go back to setting up your development environment.”

“That is what it really means to understand development. All of these things are not push button. You do need to know how it all works so then you can build on top of it.”

Q: Looking back, how has earning this degree changed your career path or opened new opportunities for you?
A: “This degree has made me competitive on paper… I gained a different type of respect at work. Not more respect… but a different type.”

“I got to join the ranks of folks who have done the same thing—or I got to be a beacon for people who want to do this, but haven’t really taken the plunge yet.”

Q: Do you work mostly from home or on-site?
A: “I work 50/50. I go into the office for half the week, sometimes a little bit more depending, and then home for half the week. Today I happen to be working at home.”

“Working at home, I am a little bit more productive because I can just plow through work and get it done. But in the office, I get to see people in the hallway or at the coffee bar and have those side conversations… It’s valuable to have both.”

Q: Outside of work, what do you like to do?
A: “I go to the gym four days a week. I’m really into physical fitness. I try and eat healthy… and I recently took up gardening. I need a place where there are no screens… It’s just me and the birds and the flowers.”