I have a bunch of posts to write up from GHC last week, which was as usual, awesome. But the question I was interested in people I went with answering was – what are you going to do differently when you get back?
For me, it was a reminder about the takeaway I got from Whistling Vivaldi – that whilst women have it bad, they are not the only minority (or the smallest!), and our efforts in that direction would benefit from being more inclusive of other minorities.
So my change – make my own diversity efforts more inclusive.
How about you?
4 replies on “GHC13 – What Are You Going to Do Differently?”
For me at Grace Hopper this year, I realized that as an older woman in CS, I have a responsibility to show that a career in tech can be a long one – and perhaps I should let the grey hairs show instead of dyeing my hair (once I find a job again, but that’s another story). There are many of us, when you look around. We have not all had the careers we thought we would, but we are here.
That’s awesome – I hope we get to connect next year if you go?
A while ago, I realized that while I admire the great women-in-cs work out there, I don’t want to be remembered for that: I want to be remembered as a scientist and a maker. So I resolved to spend more of my energy on being awesome.
But that’s not new from GHC: what’s new from GHC is that I spent more time attending talks by successful women as individuals and less time attending panel talks, and it was really inspiring to me to see scientists and artists and borad members talk. I came away feeling inspired and wanting to be more like the women I saw speak, who seemed to be focusing their energy on things they wanted to do.
What GHC reinforced for me this year is that we need technical women role models as much or maybe even more than we need future ABI advisory board members. So I’m resolving to feel less guilty about turning down women-in-cs opportunities that don’t suit me, and resolving to view my pursuit of awesome as a choice that will not only make me happier, but also a way I am aiming for a longer-range impact on technical diversity.
Thanks for sharing that, Terri – you’re right. I’m trying to be more makery too, and this is another compelling reason.