Two women employees of Sinclair Interplanetary say their small company, recently acquired by Rocket Lab, benefits from an emphasis on diversity.
Sinclair spoke with SpaceQ during World Space Week, a global celebration that kicks off annually on Oct. 4 – the anniversary of the Sputnik satellite’s launch in 1957, nearly 55 years ago. Rocket Lab acquired Sinclair 18 months ago and recently paid tribute to the small Canadian company’s skill and ability to make reaction wheels, star trackers and other space hardware, saying it has been key in growing Rocket Lab’s business and expertise.
Recent Rocket Lab news includes being selected to launch NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System, winning a $24 million U.S. Space Force contract to develop an upper stage for the Neutron launch vehicle, and posting revenue of $29.5 million USD (237 percent year-over-year growth) in six-month financial results released Sept. 8.
Rocket Lab’s next Electron launch (to send BlackSky 10 and 11 into space) is expected no earlier than this month, following a rocket failure in May that has since been investigated and that the company is working to resolve. The conversation with Sinclair, however, focused more on the value that diversity brings to the space conversation and how embracing a variety of expertise has allowed the company to continue to meet success under Rocket Lab’s stewardship.
SpaceQ spoke with two people at Sinclair. The first was Norah Kerr, head technician and long-time employee with Sinclair since 2009; she builds boards, interfaces with Sinclair’s contract manufacturer and co-manages the electronics manufacturing team. The second was Julia Gibson, an analyst who tests design of equipment and hardware, who works to improve processes, and who performs quantitative analysis.
Founder Doug Sinclair had a broad approach to hiring from the beginning, Kerr said. The company (14 people today, including the interns) has near-equal gender parity among men and women, which is rare among space engineering companies. Gender, however, wasn’t necessarily the driver of hiring, Kerr clarified; it was more looking at individuals who are the right fit for the job.
Take Kerr’s experience, for example. She was not trained as an engineer, but was a goldsmith for a decade before Sinclair Interplanetary hired her. “Doug said it made sense to look at [hiring from] a field that put more value per solder joint than even a spacecraft,” she explained. “It was about throwing the net wide, and actually believing in people hat they can actually do the things that they are good at.”
Gibson also has a diverse background including mathematics, neuroscience and music, and as a younger analyst she said the gender parity creates more normalcy than she has experienced in past positions. “I don’t have to come to work and worry, ‘Am I going to be conspicuous somehow today because of being female?”
She said the ability to come into work and just focus on the job, rather than meeting a workplace standard for appearance sometimes imposed on females, “does kind of feel like a gift, but it really shouldn’t be,” and she added that is a boon as well for the interns she mentors.
While Sinclair Interplanetary has to speak carefully about its work given that announcements flow through Rocket Lab, one of the big tasks the company is engaged in is expanding its set of reaction wheels to target different satellite sizes. The size of the wheels are measured in torque, and Kerr said the current focus is to design wheels with a torque to assist sizes of satellite between a suitcase and a coffee table – a known gap in the torque line.
Gibson added the company continues to increase the reliability of its hardware and the volume of items it produces, which is excellent given that the number of satellites launched into space in the industry generally is greatly increasing (especially on the microsat, CubeSat and small satellite size.)
This approach gives the interns plenty of room to grow as they come in: “We give them real work, and lots of it in variety,” Gibson said. She said she works to be approachable for questions and to “portray normalcy and just be a happy person,” to counter the stereotype about long hours and miserable work-life balance sometimes associated with the space industry.
Kerr added that Sinclair would never have stood for 60- to 70-work weeks for its employees, always insisting its people take on a more normal work schedule and get paid appropriately for their time and skill. “I’ve been around the block a bit, and coming from being a goldsmith, I did spend 10 years as a starving artist. I’ve got to say: groceries, they’re great. Here, I’m technically respected and respected as a human being. I work with great people. I do interesting things. You can’t beat this with a stick.”
Gibson agreed; as an American citizen and lifelong U.S. resident until coming to Canada five years ago, she said the less aggressive nature of the Canadian space market is “super refreshing.” She added that as space continues to internationalize, she sees Canada continuing to occupy a strong niche based on its extensive space heritage. “There’s so much that this country can contribute, and I’m really happy to be working in space in Canada. I hope that a lot of younger Canadian students that there are a lot of jobs here, and they don’t need to leave the country to find meaningful work.”