Alumnus Shares the Systems Behind the Snaps

When Jerry Hunter, SIE alumnus and senior vice president of engineering at Snap Inc., visited the University of Arizona in late March to deliver the final spring 2019 Lessons in Engineering Leadership talk, he offered the audience of students, faculty and staff a few pieces of advice: Learn how to code. If you see a problem, solve a problem. And prioritize the important things in life, including family, friends and your health.

Hunter, who received his bachelor's degree from the UA in systems engineering in 1988 and his master's in the same subject in 1990, came to Snap – best known for the application Snapchat – after 16 years at Sun Microsystems and nine years at Amazon. 

"I thought I was going to be an engineer, doing robotics, writing code,” he said of his rise to leadership positions at those companies. “It turned out that organizations are just big systems, and you manage them the same way you would manage any other systems problems. It’s just inputs and outputs.”

A native Tucsonan, Hunter said when he started at the UA, he didn’t understand why anyone would go anywhere else for school. His fondness for his alma mater hasn’t changed.

“I feel a lot of success in my life came from what I learned here,” he said.