Looking back since the last TechWomen newsletter, I’m wondering where has the year gone?  We are now in July, and the last two months have been all go for us here at TechWomen. On June 13, we were proud winners of the CIO award for ShadowTech where the judges were impressed with TechWomen’s model for connecting, mentoring and building networks to encourage a diverse pipeline of young women into tech careers.  The final ShadowTech event for this year was held on June 26 in Dunedin, and this year alone ShadowTech involved more than 600 girls, 300 mentors and 100 organisations, participating in six regional events around the country.  Thanks to everyone for supporting us to make this event a success.

A couple of weeks ago, I had the honour of contributing to a panel at the 2018 Women in Leadership Conference with amazing women Kari Jones, Mary-Anne McCarthy and Nathalie Gray. Our discussion focused on the possible impacts of AI, and the future of female leadership.

The key takeaways from our discussion, as summed up very well by Kari Jones:

1. Few have the experience of leading through the level of unprecedented change we are likely to see in the coming years – this will present opportunities for new types of leadership to flourish. Female leaders need to position themselves to take advantage of these opportunities.
2. New roles will appear, such as Chief Algorithm Officer, Head of Data Ethics and Bias, Chief Privacy Officer, and Privacy Engineer. There are already opportunities to get to grips with these topics online.
3. Learning agility (learning to learn) is going to be the number one must-have skill for success in the 4th industrial revolution. This includes the ability to acquire new skills, as well as the ability to apply previously acquired knowledge to new situations.

Technology is part of every industry and all industries have women in tech careers.  I would like to take the opportunity to invite staff that are members of TechMarketeers, BioTech and Agritech to register as TechWomen, as you are now part of the Tech Alliance group of NZTech.

Encourage your colleagues to join TechWomen and together let’s make a difference to diversity.

Best regards

Edwina Mistry
Executive Director
TechWomen NZ