Alumna Cassandra Robinson, specializing in data systems, finds success in different industries
Author: Kelly Chan
Date: 05.06.21
Cassandra Robinson’s computer science degree (BSCS ‘04) has paved the way for a diverse career path, first driven by her dream of becoming a game designer in Japan. Since that initial aspiration, she has watched her career evolve in other directions, pursuing several different roles, from software development to management in the food service industry.
Now, Robinson is the manager of advanced analytics at Ventura Foods, a food service manufacturing company in southern California, and she believes she’s achieved some of her biggest career accomplishments in this role.
“I had all these ideas for what I would end up doing, and ultimately, I didn’t do any of them,” Robinson said, laughing. “I think we definitely go in having this big vision, but you never know what the journey is going to bring. It depends where you end up and you’ll find all these paths as you go along.”
Looking back at her undergraduate years, Cassandra Robinson (BSCS ’04) hopes to tell current Khoury College students that there are no limitations in their career path and to be open to opportunities in all industries: “There is data everywhere — it’s in everything you do.” Photo provided by Cassandra Robinson.
With over 10 plants, Ventura Foods serves to create and supply sauces, mayonnaise, dressings and oils for a variety of food corporations, such as popular fast food chains. Ventura is also the manufacturer behind select retail brands of food products and provides products to different food distribution companies.
Creating a new analytics platform for Ventura
Working at Ventura Foods for over five years, Robinson has focused on building out both the commercial and operations sides by revamping the company’s older data systems. In creating a new analytics platform, she has been able to help Ventura create a single source of truth—or an aggregation of all the company’s data into one reference point. She said this will ultimately allow Ventura to appropriately assess their growth using key performance indicators, or KPIs, and also inform how they can approach any challenges.
“It’s exciting to see all different users start to get interested in what analytics means for the company, seeing that they can discover answers to their use cases by going beyond grid reports and seeing how important it is for the company,” she said, explaining how the platform has been used to manage production capacity, lower inventory cost, and find sales campaign opportunities.
As she continues her tenure at Ventura, she wants to further modernize her company’s analytics applications. Robinson enjoys how her role as an analyst can remain relevant as the fields of computer science and data analytics are constantly evolving.
“With analytics, there’s always new technology,” she said, hoping one day to implement machine learning and artificial intelligence into the company’s data systems. “It keeps it fresh, and I always feel like I have something to do.”
At the same time, Robinson said she is thrilled to see the lasting impact of her work, especially in learning how her software programs at past companies are still applicable to their operations now.
“Every now and then, I’ll run into someone I’ve worked with in the past, and I would be surprised to see that my small database applications are still being used, even five or 10 years after,” she said. “It was nice to hear, since back then, some things were even harder to unravel and build into an actual application.”
Recalling her time on co-op and early career at Apple
Coming to Northeastern with a scholarship from HP Inc. (formerly known as Hewlett-Packard), Robinson ended up working on several co-ops there in different office locations, first as a software developer and eventually a business analyst. Her experience then led her to her first post-graduate position at Robert Half International, a staffing firm in the Bay Area, and eventually Apple.
“I ultimately created a niche of building these little database applications with access for the business,” she said, commenting on her custom programming work. “It’s interesting how in a business, you have a bigger impact than if you’re on the R & D side since you’re working on this big nebulous software where people don’t see all the pieces that you do.”
Robinson recalls her time at Apple, from 2007 to 2016, as the biggest turning point in her career—the role equipped her with the proper technical and leadership skills to thrive at Ventura.
“Usually when products are coming out, a product ramp might take about a year or a year and a half. But at Apple, it was about six to nine months,” she said. “It was pretty short, so there was a lot of urgency, which was really important. I learned how to communicate, keep things precise, … so I felt the time I had there really helped prepare me for the leadership role I have now and definitely helped me grow.”
Her education at Northeastern as a whole enabled her to build her foundational skills, but most importantly, it taught her how to adapt to different computer-science-related situations. She even credits her senior year software development class with Professor Karl Lieberherr as a key moment in her growth that helped her solidify her path in computer science.
“A lot of times you have to work backwards, and this class taught me how to take generic information from the business and translate it to the development side. Then if something goes wrong, [I learned] how to troubleshoot,” she said. “I always think about that class every couple of years, and I’m like, ‘Wow, that really did make a difference.’”
Looking back at her undergraduate years, Robinson hopes to tell current Khoury College students that there are no limitations in their career path and to be open to opportunities in all industries.
“[Computer science students] aren’t stuck at working in technology,” she said. “There is a need out there for someone in computer science across all types of industries. There is data everywhere — it’s in everything you do.”