Turning Big Ideas into Reality: Kristie Wilkerson’s Story

At Jacobs, we operate at the forefront-helping our clients solve some of the world's biggest challenges with solutions that will shape generations and communities to come.

In 2024, we're showcasing how our people deliver on our strategy by embedding a digital-first way of thinking across Jacobs.

We connected with Kristie Wilkerson, strategy and innovation subject matter expert and leader of our Beyond If innovation community, to learn about her passion for Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cloud technologies, the highlights of her career thus far and what sparked her interest in innovation and digital.

Hi, Kristie. You work in strategy and innovation. What does that involve?

My focus is on designing and delivering solutions that solve enterprise problems and maximize client satisfaction. This involves:

• Gaining an understanding of and shaping strategies and vision for both organizations and their clients.
• Building and implementing a strategic plan/roadmap to realize the strategy and vision.
• Networking across the company, with the client and with strategic partners.
• Developing business cases to gain stakeholder buy-in.
• Leading and coaching teams to realize strategic initiatives.
• Establishing and managing innovation programs.
• Mentoring innovators, cloud and AI users and developers, as well as women in technology.

At the end of the day, I get to work with amazing people to turn big ideas and visions into reality.

Your LinkedIn bio says that you help organizations achieve the impossible with the power of cloud and AI. What does this mean-and how do you do it?

Very early in my career, I had an incredible experience that has shaped the trajectory of my career and my outlook on what's possible. I was working for a large semiconductor corporation at the time, and the company decided to bring in a team of consultants to help with production and delivering work more efficiently. The consultants trained me and the other process engineers as the core lean manufacturing implementation team. We, in turn, began training everyone else in the factory on how to implement these new processes to improve efficiency and productivity and, ultimately, make our product and operations better. In doing this, we were able to reduce production time from 64 days to 16 days, increase quality from 78% to 98%, and cut production costs by 40% in under one year. Nobody thought this was possible until we did it.

I help organizations achieve the impossible with the power of cloud and AI using an approach similar to this one. I learn and shape the vision and strategy, gain an understanding of the enterprise problems that need solving and get to know the people, processes, technologies and information I'm working with, and I collaborate with stakeholders to ensure they see for themselves what's possible and how we can achieve it-together.