Girls In Tech

Global Technology Symposium was held on March 23- 25 in Menlo Park, California. The symposium was served to promote and educate Russian and American companies and VCs in the area of  technology.

For Russian tech companies, Silicon Valley is the center of the world for innovation, entrepreneurial investment opportunities and technological progress. President of Russia, Mr. Medvedev, is eager to develop Russia’s impact in technology for growth in its economy. His previous visit to Stanford in the summer of 2010, clearly indicates the necessity of collaboration between Russian (Scolkovo based program) and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs in the area of high-tech experience, management and planning in order to modernize Russia’s economy.

Mr.Sitnikov, Director of International Development at the Skolkovo Foundation, announced the launch of the Russian Innovation Center at the 8th Annual Global Technology Symposium. This is the leading investment conference on venture capital, technology, and entrepreneurship in emerging markets. “Russia as a Cradle for Innovation” was the theme for the first day of the conference (www.usrts.org).

President Obama has identified entrepreneurship as “an area…where America can share our experience as a society that empowers the inventor and the innovator.” I am glad that Global Technology Symposium brought together innovators from Russia and United States. However, I noticed that 95 percent of the participants were males. I hope next year we will see more women-entrepreneurs. Maybe Russia needs a program like Girls in Tech to support women in technology to advance Russia’s progress?

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Blackbox is a seed accelerator for technology startups in the heart of Silicon Valley. Blackbox connects entrepreneurs with a global network of seed investors, mentors and market entrance partners, and helps entrepreneurs run their startups more effectively by providing cutting edge technology tools and frameworks based on the emerging science of entrepreneurship.

Each month blackbox is offering a series of workshops and talks for the entrepreneurs in the Bay Area in order to help their companies to accelerate. We want to give you all the skills and knowledge necessary to become a successful entrepreneur and founder. We are partnering up with Girls in Tech for this event to reach out for women entrepreneurs and support them in starting their own business.

Hack your elevator pitch workshop @blackbox will take place on February 21. During this workshop you can learn how to put the 5 minute pitch presentation together
-Guidance and feedback on delivery skills
-Overcoming nerves and speaking effectively

Angelika Blendstrup will be heading the session. Angelika is the founder of Professional Business Communications. She holds a Ph.D. in Bilingual, Bicultural Education from Stanford University.  Angelika teaches US business communications skills to international executives as well as classes and workshops at Stanford University, Haas Business School, UC Berkeley and Anderson School of Business and UCLA.
There are only 15 places available. Girls in Tech save 20% with “girlsintech” discount password and registering here

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In 1966 Ewing Kauffman, the founder of a multimillion-dollar company Marion Laboratories, launched the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to build and support entrepreneurship. The foundation runs many programs and develops support to high-growth start-ups. Kauffman Labs research shows that about one-third of the nation’s gross domestic product comes from companies that are less than 30 years old. The foundation’s mission is to help entrepreneurs to create high growth firms in order to foster economic progress. Kauffman Labs is recognizing that women still have negative societal and personal pressures to become entrepreneurs. However, the number of highly educated women is growing and it is a time to give them the support to create new ventures.

Kauffman Labs is seeking to find ambitious women scientists and engineers who have entrepreneurial ideas that can change the word. The foundation is looking for female applicants to participate in Women in Science and Engineering Business Idea Competition. The purpose of the competition is to discover the women who have a potential to start scalable science- and engineering-related ventures. The prize is an all-expenses-paid trip to the annual TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) conferences. TED conference brings together the world’s most fascinating doers like Al Gore, Jane Goodall, Brian Green, etc. The mission of the conference is to offer free knowledge and inspiration from the world’s most inspired thinkers and a community of curious souls to engage ideas with each other.

This competition is a great opportunity for women to take their ideas to another level and get closer to their dreams. The deadline to apply is January 15, 2011.  For more info visit Kauffman Labs website.

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Dating industry is a very competitive marketplace. Currently, an online dating is a 700 million dollar industry. People are trying to meet through friends, telephone chat lines, matchmakers, or online. Internet dating services are the most popular way to find a match. However, there are so many website to choose from! At present, the US market consists of over 1000 dating websites. From the consumer stand point, it is very hard to decide which service to use. Dating websites look alike and have very little in service differentiation points. Most of them are catering to the same public audience. They require filling out a long application and you have to pay a monthly fee. More daters are migrating to the social network sites like Facebook, where they can find more personal approach in dating communications. As a result, the industry faced a decline in growth from 70% a year to just 10% a year.

According to Census data, in the United States, 58% women and 48% men use online dating services and the demographics is one of the main factors affecting the demand.

San Francisco based website GetDateCandy is offering a new, creative, and more “human” dating concept. If you are a female in the San Francisco area, on GetDateCandy website you can find a cute, fun, intelligent, and already prescreened guy. The GetDateCandy team not only writes a “review” about a potential dating candidate, it also posts information about him from his female friends. This valuable information gives you a chance to see a candidate from a female point of view. The website even provides you with an “Advice Candy” along with a profile! To contact a guy you need just to send your Facebook link and GetDateCandy.com team will do the rest.

This new startup launched its operations a little more that a month ago. They found a unique customer niche to serve. GetDateCandy is trying to change the dating industry. It is looking into understanding the consumer’s needs and finding new ways to create a five-star service.

So far the search on GetDateCandy website is free of charge. Just submit your email address and find yourself a date!

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We like to think that the US is one of the most progressive countries in the world,especially in relations to human rights and labor diversity. We are proud that currently women make up more than half the workforce. However, a recent Calvert’s study shows that females continue to be significantly underrepresented on corporate boards and in C-level executive positions.  They study 100 companies and found out that “non-white, non-male officers are rare.  Over half—56 companies—in the S&P 100 have no female and/or minority representation in their highest paid executive positions”.

According to Forbes magazine, women account for only 3% of the CEOs at the helm of the biggest 500 U.S. companies, and that number hasn’t budged over the last three years.

What accounts for this?

Most of the companies do not disclose demographic data of their employees. Therefore, there is no knowledge about a company profile in terms of race, ethnicity and gender. The Calvert report found that 37% of the S&P 100 companies disclose no demographic data on employees, such as race, ethnicity and gender. Only 8 companies disclose full EEO-1 data, that is, a full breakdown of the workforce by race and gender across employment categories.

Therefore, if there is no disclosure, there is no accountability!

The lead author of the Calvert report and analyst, Aditi Mohapatra said:  “We are concerned about the lack of disclosure, because data is critical to demonstrating progress in female and minority representation”.

Recent study by Catalyst.com shows that progressive companies understand the impact of gender and race diversity on the bottom line. “Companies with the highest percentage of women in top management have a financial performance that is 35 percent higher than companies with the lowest percentage of female managers”.

Barbara J. Krumsiek, President & CEO of Calvert Group, Ltd. thinks that “Without a pipeline of female and minority executives in highly-paid, highly responsible positions, it will be very difficult to achieve board diversity, which is critical to strong governance and good management.”

However, for some corporations with old minded thinking it is hard to admit that a high level of diversity brings a higher Return on Investment and added significant value to their shareholders. Therefore, an evaluation of the effectiveness of diversity initiatives is crucial for maintaining profitability.

Fortunately, there are a few companies that lead the diversity movement. They model a behavior of progressive thinking that leads to financial success.  Among the top-scoring companies were Chevron Corp., Citigroup Inc., Coca-Cola Co., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Sara Lee Corp.

For a full copy of the Calvert 2010 report, click here

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Just a couple decades ago, women were not really noticed in technology related fields. Today, we can say that more and more women are entering the world of technology. According to the analytical website Gartner.com, corporate IT increasingly needed the skill set typically associated with women. Gartner says, “women are better at listening with both the left brain and the right brain; this has implications for roles such as business analyst and team leader.” In 2009, for the first time ever, three women won a Nobel prize. Before that only twelve women had won in the more than century-long history of the Nobel prize.

However, presently high school girls represent only 17 percent of computer science Advanced Placement test takers. College-educated women earned only 18 percent of computer and information sciences bachelor’s degrees. The Obama Administration recognized this issue and created The White House Council on Women and Girls. The large part of their focus is how to draw more girls and young women into science, technology, engineering and math educational programs. Many organizations have been encouraging and supporting women to earn IT education. Girls Inc – Operation Smart: SMART has reached over 500,000 girls across the country, boosting their interest in studying science and math, as well opening their eyes to the existence and importance of these subjects in all aspects of their lives. Cyber Sisters – An educational tele-mentoring program in science, math and technology for middle school girls. Design Your Future – A Web site is designed to encourage girls to explore careers related to science, math, and technology containing e-mentoring, information about working women, and more.

Progressive companies are recognizing women as creative minds of technology. On January 12, 2010, in New York, Jody Zhang and Elise Sugarman from Mountain View, California won the grand final of the fourth annual DemandTec Retail Challenge. They were awarded $10,000 in college scholarship funds.  DemandTec, Inc, a leading provider of on-demand optimization solutions for retailers and consumer products manufacturers. It is well known for organizing nationwide community outreach scholarship competition for high school seniors designed to promote the practical applications of math in a business environment.

Over the past few years, the DemandTec Retail Challenge, a math and science scholarship competition, has noticed a trend of more female students enrolling in the math-based competition as well as more winning the overall contest at 50 percent.

Next competition will be on January 10, 2011, when the top 10 finalist teams complete for a scholarship prize of $10,000 and a chance to ring the NASDAQ closing bell on January 10, 2011 in New York City.

You can learn more by visiting http://www.demandtecretailchallenge.com

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We live in the world where women entrepreneurs are exposed to many opportunities to create, launch, and develop their businesses. On November 18, 2010 in San Francisco, there will be held the first Amplify Business Pitch Competition to Award women-led start-ups. Vator.tv, a social network for entrepreneurs in a partnership with Girls in Tech, a social network enterprise focused on the engagement, education and empowerment of intelligent women in technology, will host the event.

The keynote speaker is Esther Dyson, a journalist, an entrepreneur, an investor, and a philanthropist. She is also an active member of advisory boards for-profit and non-profit organizations. She was named by Forbes magazine as one of the most powerful women in American business.

Esther Dyson was born in Switzerland to a family of a mother mathematician and a father physicist. She always had a passion for technology. Dyson has a degree in economics from Harvard. She started her career as a fact checker, and later a reporter at Forbes magazine. However, she was always seeking challenges and was deeply interested in start-ups. In 1983 she joined Rosen Research and bought the company from her employer Ben Rosen. She renamed it EDventure Holdings. This was later sold to CNET Network. By selling EDventure Holdings to CNET Networks in 2004, Dyson broadened her new business opportunities.

Now her record of involvement includes multiple areas: health care, private aviation & space, and IT. She is an investor or sits on the board of companies like MeetUp Inc. (US), Midentity (UK), Flickr (US, sold to Yahoo!), del.icio.us (US, sold to Yahoo!), Evernote (US), Boxbe (US), 23andMe (US), Airship Ventures (US), Eventful.com (US), Sunlight Foundation (US). This is not the complete list of the companies that Esther Dyson is involved in.

Her vast interests and vision goes beyond the United States boarders. She sees opportunities in the emerging markets of Russia, Hungary and Belarus. She is currently investing in CVO Group (Hungary), Epam (Belarus), IBS Group (Russia, advisory board), Vatera (Hungary), and Yandex (Russia).

Despite her busy schedule she is an active journalist and a writer. She publishes one of the most intellectual articles on technology, the monthly newsletter Release 1.0. In 1997, Dyson published Release 2.0. A book on how the Internet affects individuals’ lives. Her other work includes Release 3.0, her bimonthly column for the New York Times. She has a weblog Release 4.0 and an occasional contributor to online Huffington Post as Release 0.9.

Dyson travels a great deal. She is lives without a telephone at home and prefers not to drive a car. She is a remarkable individual who thinks large and has a unique vision of the future.

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The Internet successfully changed the way people communicate and interact. In the past, the phone interaction, personal meetings and printed articles were the main communication channels. Today, things have changed dramatically.

Social media is a fantastic way to build and grow your business. Unfortunately, many people are not aware of the best online strategies. It is hard for them to figure out how to create the right image, monitor it, and deliver the message to the audience.

The article of Fauzia Burke, the founder and President of FSB Associates, explains five online tools that can help to navigate the media world, build a digital reputation, and leverage web-based communication. If you are an entrepreneur, nonprofit, consultant or even a church, you can find this article very helpful and learn a great deal of information. In the article Fauzia discusses the five online tools that can help everyone in building, maintaining, and protecting their reputation in the cyberspace.

#1 Set Goals

First do a search on Google for your name in quotation marks. It is important to see what comes up on the first page. Once you have the numbers you can then decide on your goals.

#2 Learn

To accomplish any of these goals, you are going to need to learn. The new world of communication is moving quickly, which naturally lends itself to a couple of advantages. First, there is a lot of room for experimentation, so use your talents and skills to communicate in your own unique way. Second, this experimentation has led to collaboration, and smart people are sharing information all the time. Make sure you make time every day for “learning.” Look over sites and information to keep up with the developments in social media.

#3 Develop Content

To communicate 24/7, which is now the expectation and the norm, you need to develop different types of content. Blogging is a great way to share your knowledge and collaborate with others.

#4 Build Relationships

Building and maintaining relationships has never been easier. Those of us in sales and marketing have always known the value of relationship building, but now everyone needs to make it a priority. Make sure you have profiles on LinkedIn, and Facebook. Twitter is a fantastic source of information, and an excellent place to learn.

#5 Monitor

Social media alerts are a great way to monitor your name and/or industry. If something important happens in your industry you’ll know about it and can comment. If someone says something positive, a thank you goes a long way. If there is negative chatter starting up around your name or company, alerts keep you on top of it and you can jump in and take care of things quickly. Read more…

Follow Fauzia on a new Twitter feed: @WebSnapshot, Facebook and The Huffington Post.

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Pakistan is a country that still ruled by ancient tribal traditions. Women in Pakistan are discriminated financially and socially. They work as hard as men, but have to obey their fathers, husbands and brothers. The women have no right to make their own decisions. Thousands of women are killed in Pakistan for their refusal to submit to an arranged marriage, seeking a divorce, separation, and perceived flirtatious behavior. Honour killings, Karo-Kari, is an old tradition in Pakistan. Karo-Kari is an ordinary murder but police and prosecutors often ignore it.

Khalida Brohi, is a young women from Balochistan, a remarkable activists who wants to change women’s life in Pakistan. In 2004, she built the foundation of Participatory Development Initiatives (PDI) to fight abuse of women. PDI aims to promote equal opportunities and benefits for all genders. Khalida is deeply passionate about her mission and opportunities that she can bring to her country.

On July 7 at the Unreasonable Institute in Boulder, Khalida Brohi was presenting her work against honour killings, in Pakistan. It is amazing, how much was PDI accomplished just for few years of it existence! PDA organized computer centers, sewing centers, a language centers and offer certificate courses. PDI also runs cultural preservation projects to preserve and protect the positive sides of the tribal traditions. Khalida’s presentation was able to raise awareness about her cause and brought hope of positive change.

Follow Khalida’s blog Kaleidoscope of Life or Participatory Development Initiatives website for future updates.

Tags: Khalida Brohi, Participatory Development Initiatives, pdi, women abuse Pakistan
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Are you passionate about starting a startup, but have no idea how to do it? You are lucky, because this summer Women 2.0 Labs are running an exciting program for business developers, engineers, designers, and marketing experts to develop high-growth technology ventures in San Francisco. The good news is that this unique program is available to both women and men. The schedule will allow applicants to keep their day job and meet every Thursday nights from 6pm to 9pm from July 6th through August 5^th. It will be conveniently located at True Venues at Pier 38 on The Embarcadero.

The Schedule:

Week 0 – Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

Idea Brainstorming and Team Formation.

Week 1 – Thursday, July 8th, 2010

Visiting Advisors: Ann Miura-Ko (Partner, FLOODGATE) and Steve Blank (Creator, Customer Development).

Week 2 – Thursday, July 15th, 2010

Visiting Advisors: Eric Ries (Creator, Lean Startup) and Rebecca Lynn (Principal, Morganthaler Ventures).

Week 3 – Thursday, July 22nd, 2010

Visiting Advisors: Ryan Spoon (Senior Associate, Polaris Ventures) and Saad Khan (Partner, CMEA Capital).

Week 4 – Thursday, July 29th, 2010

Visiting Advisors: Dave McClure (Investor, FF Angel LLC) and Mari Baker (President & CEO, PlayFirst).

Week 5 – Thursday, August 5th, 2010 — Final Pitch Day

Visiting Advisors: Sukhinder Singh Cassidy (CEO, Polyvore), Julia Hartz (President, Eventbrite), and Theresia Gouw Ranzetta (Partner, Accel Partners).

The cost of the program is only $555. Make your dream about creating your start up come through! Click here to apply!

Tags: launch start up, women 2.0 Labs
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