WITWA Blog
Event in Review – Ron Gibson, Networking
Our last event, co-hosted by our friends at the Australian Web Industry Association's Port80 group, featured Ron Gibson, Managing Director of Go Networking, as our speaker.
Event In Review – Dee Roche, The Art of Mentoring
“Mentoring is a two-way street; a beautiful reciprocity.” This is the message Dee Roche, Senior Management Consultant at AIM-UWA Business School Executive Education, so eloquently delivered in her presentation at our recent women-only breakfast event at the Parmelia Hilton.
Top 10 Irks and Perks of Conferences
Of the conferences I’ve attended, the majority have been far more good than bad, and I’ll attend many more expecting to be educated, entertained and enlightened more than I expect to be bored or disappointed. And I don’t think for a moment that conference organising is an easy job: organising one presentation as a speaker is hard enough! But, there’s got to be something said about the good (and bad) of professionally-run conferences.
Will Social Media End Gender Bias?
An article published in Fast Company, Is LinkedIn a Gender Equalizer?, ponders whether social media will level the playing field for women in business. Women, by nature, are more social and more conversational than men. Social media is a perfect forum for those strengths.
Dear WA Miners: Let's grow our own IT professionals
Did you see the article in ITWire titled, “IT professionals in high demand through the mining boom”? If you didn’t, you might want to click on that link and give it a read. Senator Chris Evans, the Federal Minister working with an education, skills and workplace relations portfolio, made it very clear the country faced a technology “skills challenge”. Senator Evans estimates the need for at least 3000 jobs in Perth to support the resources sector including professional occupations such as IT and engineering. So we invite you, Mining Industry in WA, to walk alongside us as we tackle this problem.
Social Media and Privacy
Social Media and Privacy is a hot topic. Our women-only event on 27 May 2011 discussed the paradigm shift in how we communicate and the impact it has on our personal privacy. Women, in particular, need to be aware of how the information flows and is distributed in social networks. Our gender posts and shares more personal information than men do. Unfortunately, women and children are also more likely to experience privacy breaches.
A Call to Action for the Australian ICT Industry
Last week I attended a panel discussion organised by the ACS-Women titled, Where are all the women in technology? There’s no disputing the number of women in technology is diminishing even though we’re earning more university degrees and advanced degrees than the guys. While the whole IT sector is shrinking, it’s especially worrying to think women are no longer considering technology as a viable career path. The event didn’t cover any new ground and, in my mind, probably took a step towards reinforcing some of the problems in our industry.
Why Women Make Better Innovators
Our WITWA Chair, Marjolein Towler, had the opportunity to speak about Innovation at the IEEE-WISE conference held in Perth last month. For those of you that couldn’t make the event, Marjolein has generously shared her notes on her view of innovation and why she believes women hold more promise when it comes to innovative thinking.
What it means
Let’s start with the Wikipedia definition:
Event in Review: Disaster Recovery with Angela Pak from KPMG
When Angela Pak from KPMG spoke at our last event about disaster recovery - Preparing for an IT Disaster: It's not just about the technology - she did it from the voice of experience. Winning the crowd over with a detailed analysis of the Queensland floods, the insight provided left the room with plenty of food for thought.
techtrails: It's All About Tech-Knowledge-Y
The WITWA committee recently spent a morning at Scitech to get a closer look at how they’ll be contributing to our techtrails program. Scitech are collaborating with techtrails using the techno truck to deliver the hands-on part of our program. We were especially excited about getting our own hands on the equipment after listening to Russell Hammond speak at our techtrails launch in November. Going in with high expectations, we were blown away by the end of the morning.