ACT-W 2021 Rewind

Join us for a Conference Rewind where you get the opportunity to dive deeper into some of our favorite sessions from the 2021 ACT-W Conference! Register for free here!

Rewind Schedule & Sessions
10:00am – 10:10am
Welcome to ACT-W 2021 Rewind!
with Renee Gonzalez – ACT-W Program Manager @ ChickTech

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10:10am – 10:35am
How to Find the Right Mentors for Your Career Goals
with Amy King – Senior Program Manager @ Amazon

There are a lot of articles about the importance of mentors, but how do you go about finding mentors that complement your situation and career goals? Join this session to find out 1) How to assess your career to identify gaps that a mentor could fill 2) How to start conversations with a potential mentor 3) How to formalize and advance the relationship. I will also share tangible examples of how mentors have helped me and my career development

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10:40am – 11:05am
Builders, Breakers & Spies: My Cybersecurity Journey
with Traci Esteve – Director of IT Risk and Compliance @ The Standard

There are many ways to travel around the world and for Traci it started in Midwest America with stopovers in Asia and Europe and led to her current home in Portland, OR. She takes you on her journey off the beaten path and shares the surprising lessons she has learned from starting out in tech, to being a mother, to transforming into a cybersecurity leader. Along the way you will meet the builders, breakers, and spies that challenged her to explore other cultures, the unknown, and herself. Will you be inspired to combat our world’s threat actors?
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11:10am – 11:35am
The Future of Technology
with Camille Eddy – Senior Product Engineer @ Sector Software

We can promote a culturally informed technologist community that understands the evolution of tech is deeply intertwined with creativity and unconscious bias. Since last year we have learned even more of unwanted “bias blind spots” in the tech industry. We can attempt to understand the unfolding story by examining where unwanted bias has filtered through consumer products and where it has impacted our pandemic recovery for months and years to come. Our community’s active work in crafting a world with equitable technology is what this talk will highlight. And it will also center the voices of women and women of color, whose technical expertise will take us to new ground with the conversation on bias in technology.

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11:35am – 12:00pm
ACT-W+ Membership Overview and Tour
with Renee Gonzalez – ACT-W Program Manager at ChickTech

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1:00pm – 1:25pm
Why a Diverse Team is Crucial to Startup Success
with Melissa Jurkoic – CXO/Cofounder @ addapptation/Diversify Thinking

Team diversity refers to differences between members of startup team. Those differences can include demographic differences (like age, race, sex, ethnicity), personality (extrovert, introvert, and differing Myers-Briggs types) and functional (as in skill sets, like engineering, design, copywriting, and marketing).

How does team diversity impact your customers’ experience from the moment they learn about you through their journey with you?
You will attract and relate to customers how look like you. They will understand your messaging and you will understand their needs. If you don’t represent the right dimensions of diversity, you are leaving an amazing experience behind.

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1:30pm – 1:55pm
I Have to Be It So They Can See It!
with Starr-Marea Johnson – Vice President of IT Strategy & Delivery @ PetIQ

As a lesbian leader who has worked in two different male-dominated fields, I have realized that I have a responsibility to be visible as my authentic self, both professionally and personally, to set an example for folks earlier in their careers. They need to see they can be their authentic selves and see people who look like them doing things they might want to do. I know this because, at one point, I didn’t see anyone who looked like me doing what I wanted to do, so I changed fields. Much later, I realized I am now the person who less experienced people can see. In my talk, I will tell the story of my journey to recognize this responsibility and how I have endeavored to live up to it. I will share examples of opportunities missed because companies failed to embrace the full spectrum of diversity in their people.

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1:55pm – 2:10pm
Closing & Membership Giveaway!
with Renee Gonzalez – ACT-W Program Manager at ChickTech