How Do We Move From Good Intentions – Gender Parity at Conferences

How Do We Move From Good Intention to Gender Parity At Conferences?

Wednesday 10G

Convener: Wendy Hanamura

Notes-taker(s): Wendy Hanamura

Tags for the session - technology discussed/ideas considered:

Discussion notes, key understandings, outstanding questions, observations, and, if appropriate to this discussion: action items, next steps:

Notes received from Wendy Hanamura:

<italics>HOW CAN WE CREATE GREATER VISIBILITY FOR WOMEN/Non-Binary/People of Color WITHIN TECH CONFERENCES? </italics>

- Mandate that panels have at least one woman who is not the moderator

- Request that questions alternate between male/non-binary speakers

- Make all emcee roles be diversity enhancing

- Set aside XXX spots for invited guests who represent diversity

- Create structural mechanisms (small groups, working groups) that bring different sectors together

- How do we work with Open Space formats so that women are not intimidated, run over, etc?

- We’re seeing a proliferation of Women in XX Niche groups, but no sea change; Women Coding Ruby; Black Women in Blockchain; but no momentum. They need funding, paid work;

- Women who can sometimes less technical don’t want to look like idiots? How do we overcome those barriers?

- Discounted tickets or free tickets for women to attend***(Getting companies to attend)

- We know founders—can we request that they nominate a woman to attend and pay for them?

- Swap—same presentation delivered to and by two different groups of people (for/by devs and for/by marketers)

- At the end of the day we are building for general users; how do we get them to relate and communicate to the end user instead of dev to dev?

- 1 session per day: you must go to what you pulled

- In order to attend X—you must come with 2 other people from a different sector

- Moushimi: has come for 10 years to IIW; she’s on a working group for Hyperledger; been with Oracle for 14 years; used to being the only woman in the group, only woman of color, only person who has to leave at 5 p.m. to relieve the nanny; don’t socialize post-work; it’s good to meet

- Do Co-branded events DWeb Meet Ups + Women in Identity + Hyperledger Ambassadors + Token Women (Blockchain)

- What type of Event would they want:

- New protocols

- Explainers and demo

- You have to show up to the next event with someone:

- A different height than you

- A different gender than you

- Wearing same color shoes than you

- Who works in a different sector than you

- You are assigned to rooms—the person gives a presentation you didn’t pick

- Coffeebreaks with new people (speed dating)

Moushimi Banerjee Nutanix