Meeting the 2012 TechWomen Mentors!

Heather Ramsey, Director of TechWomen at IIESF, presents the TechWomen emerging leaders stats to a crowd of 2012 Professional and Cultural Mentors.

The 2012 TechWomen season has officially begun! We opened with a fantastic Mentor Workshop on Tuesday, August 7^th hosted by Walmart Global eCommerce in San Bruno, CA. The workshop aimed to prepare the new TechWomen mentors for the three weeks they will spend mentoring emerging women leaders in technology from the Middle East and North Africa. More than 60 mentors attended the event, representing 50+ leading technology companies in the San Francisco Bay Area. The participants were welcomed by Walmart Global eCommerce CTO, Jeremy King, followed by Trish Tierney, Executive Director of IIE San Francisco. Representatives from the U.S. Department of State—Lee Satterfield, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, and Sheila Casey, Deputy Director of the Office of Citizen Exchanges, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs—also spoke to the mentors via live video conference.

Katy Dickinson, a local mentoring expert and Professional Mentor for TechWomen, presented best and worst mentoring practices and challenged the audience to think about the concept of being a change agent. Among the participants were mentors from the 2011 TechWomen program, who participated in a Q&A panel. Panelist Fabiola Addamo presented her formula for TechWomen success: “Connect, listen, understand. This is all you need to succeed as a TechWomen Mentor.”

Fabiola Addamo, pictured speaking, shares her experience during Q&A. Also pictured are Larissa Shapiro, Christine Duran, Taghrid Samak, and Trish Tierney (from left to right).

After the general panel, alumni mentors led breakout sessions specifically geared toward Cultural and Professional Mentors. The Twittersphere was abuzz with excitement for the program:

@techwomen: “I think the thing that struck me most was the impact the program had on the American participants” DAS Lee Satterfield #tw2012 @StateDept

@jfinlayson: #Techwomen will make you “want to step into new roles” and help you “reconnect with what matters” @TechWomenMENA alumni on #mentor rewards

@taliareyesortiz: @NetApp is very excited to be a @TechWomen technical #mentor for the 2nd year in a row  #TW2012 #NetAppCTO

@stephanieblock: Super excited to kick off #TechWomen #tw2012 my mentee is from Yemen yay! @IIESF @StateDept

@katy_dickinson: In mentor training for 80 @TechWomen, 12 of whom were with me for 2011 initial program.  Exciting and heart warming to see so many friends.

@ericalockheimer: Looking forward to being a mentor for @TechWomen. Thanks @LinkedIn #in :-) pic.twitter.com/G2QoPYdv

Stay tuned for more TechWomen updates. The Mentees arrive in less than four weeks!

Cultural Mentor Breakout Session

TechWomen Will Participate in the 2012 Grace Hopper Celebration

The 2011 TechWomen were also honored at last year’s GHC Conference in Portland, Oregon.

We are thrilled to announce that the TechWomen Emerging Leaders will participate in the 2012 Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in Baltimore this fall, after their three-week mentorship in the Bay Area.

The Anita Borg Institute’s Grace Hopper Celebration (GHC) Of Women In Computing Conference is the largest technical conference for women in computing. It aims to recognize the contributions of women in computing and bring their research to the forefront in order to help them engage in collaborative networking and mentoring opportunities. Conference presenters are leaders in their respective fields, representing industry, academia and government. Top researchers present their work while special sessions focus on the role of women in today’s technology fields.

This year’s theme, “Are We There Yet,” features innovative sessions focused on helping women impact many domains, including key technology areas such as Big Data, security, and social collaboration. This year’s confirmed keynote speakers are Nora Denzel, Senior Vice President of Intuit and Professor Anita K. Jones from the University of Virginia’s School of Engineering and Applied Science. The Conference will take place in Baltimore, Maryland, October 3-6, 2012.