Leadership is not simply a role that you fill; it is an action that you take each day. It is this philosophy that guides Dell Technologies’ Global Channel Chief, Rola Dagher. Over her career of more than two decades, Dagher has worked with some of the brightest minds in the technology industry while honing her natural leadership style.

Dagher returns to Dell Technologies after leading as President of Cisco Canada for three years. Prior to this, she held various sales leadership roles at Dell and Bell Canada. While Dagher is a proven sales and channel champion, she will be the first to say that her success is a direct reflection of the dedication and drive of the entire sales organization.

Dagher believes in diversity of thought and has made it her mission to empower, support, and foster diverse talent. Her commitment to empowering women is shown through her recognition as one of the 2020 Top 25 Women of InfluenceTM, by WXN as one of Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100TM, and by Women in Communications and Technology (WCT) as the 2019 Woman of the Year. She was selected as one of RBC’s Top 25 Canadian Immigrant winners for 2019, was named the “Lady of the Cedar” by the Lebanese Embassy, and received a 2018 Leadership Award from the Lebanese Chamber Business of Commerce

• Rola Dagher, Global Channel Chief, Dell Technologies

This guided breathwork practice will connect you to calming energy, enhance your focus and inspire deeper clarity and connection throughout the day.

• Jessica Thurman, Founder & CEO, Nourish by Jessica

Women make up 57 percent of all employed adults in the U.S., but as of 2020 they hold only 25 percent of computing roles. The panel will take a deep dive into this year’s event theme “For Women | For All” and explore how investing in women – and diversity overall – benefits everyone. This is an especially important conversation as we navigate the “Shecession” created by the COVID-19 pandemic where from February 2020 – February 2021 more than three million women dropped out of the workforce due to the challenges presented by the pandemic. Join us to hear from this panel of experts on strategies to support diversity on your teams, in your workplace, and beyond.

• Moderator – Renita Smith, Principal, Thought Ensemble
• Susan Mitnick, CHRO, Pax8
• Channing Jones, Chief Diversity & Social Responsibility Officer, CSG
• Zaneta Kelsey, Founder, Delightsum

Leadership is not about titles or the corner office. It’s about the willingness to step up, put yourself out there, and lean into courage. The world is desperate for braver leaders. It’s time for all of us to step up. – Brené Brown

The greatest barrier to courageous leadership is not fear—it’s how we respond to our fear. Our armor—the thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that we use to protect ourselves when we aren’t willing and able to rumble with vulnerability—move us out of alignment with our values, corrode trust with our colleagues and teams, and prevent us from being our most courageous selves.

Built on Brené Brown’s seven year study of brave leadership, this session will focus on building our tolerance for vulnerability, deepening our wisdom around building trust with ourselves and others, and embedding resilience in the face of challenge and stumbles.

Please come prepared to participate in the workshop and engage in the discussion.

• Laurel Smylie, Managing Partner, Four Letter Consulting

Exploring the Absent, A Review of Laissez Fair Leadership
Even with the laissez-faire leadership style emerging as a predominantly used leadership style, it is still understudied compared to its counterparts, such as transformative and transactional leadership styles. This session provides an integrative and comprehensive review of 945 articles on laissez-faire leadership spanning almost a century (1939 – 2020). It will review historical approaches used to measure laissez-faire leadership and provides a recommendation for new measures. It maps the theoretical and nomological network of laissez-faire leadership concerning its antecedents, outcomes, moderators, and mediators. It then concludes by providing recommendations to scholars and practitioners for future advancement on the topic

• Lekshmy Sankar, PhD Candidate, Daniels School of Business & Adjunct Prfessor, University College

How Data can help you Build an Inclusive Workspace
Join this session to learn the most recent developments in creating a thriving workplace culture, and techniques you can immediately implement to increase employee retention and attraction. This session will help you identify how you can pinpoint the exact needs of women in your organization.

• Meredith Marshall, CEO, Uncharted

How a Non-Profit can be a Technology Innovator
Conservation non-profits are known for their small budgets and have missions that do not explicitly include advancing technology. How, then, can these organizations push the state of the art of technology? We will walk through a case study at the National Audubon Society, where we are advancing enterprise data technology while emphasizing equity, diversity and inclusion. Some specific advancements we will cover relate to integrating spatial and non-spatial enterprise data, as well as improving gender data practices to be more inclusive of nonbinary and trans* individuals. This includes influencing technology vendors to support these efforts. 

• Gadalia O’Bryan, VP of Data & Analytics, National Audobon Society

Path to the C-Suite in Tech
Female Executives share their career journeys, lessons learned, advice for succeeding in tech, and the ways in which the tech industry is trying to support women in their careers.

• Ginna Raahauge, Chief Information Officer, Zayo
• Kim Storin, Chief Marketing Officer, Zayo
• Julie Tschida Brown, Chief People and Culture Officer, Zayo
• Katie Curtis, AVP Enterprise Applications (BSA), Zayo

Meet with our event Luminaries at a Luminary Mentor Hour. Luminaries are female-identifying technology executives and community leaders who join the event to meet our attendees and share their stories through a guided small group discussion. Space is limited – please sign up for a session in advance through the event platform.

Meet with our event Luminaries at a Luminary Mentor Hour. Luminaries are female-identifying technology executives and community leaders who join the event to meet our attendees and share their stories through a guided small group discussion. Space is limited – please sign up for a session in advance through the event platform.

Join us for a fireside chat with Marissa King, Professor of Organizational Behavior at Yale School of Management and author of Social Chemistry: Decoding the Patterns of Human Connection. Explore a path to a better network that goes well beyond, and sometimes counter to, traditional networking advice. Identify your network signature, and take a personalized approach to building connections that work for you, all while considering the role gender plays in how you network and what your network looks like.

Marissa King is the author of the new book Social Chemistry. She is also Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Yale School of Management, where she developed and teaches a popular course entitled Managing Strategic Networks. Over the past fifteen years, King has studied how people’s social networks evolve, what they look like, and why that’s significant. King’s research and book have been featured in outlets such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The Atlantic, and on National Public Radio.

• Moderator – Frannie Matthews, President & CEO, Colorado Technology Association
• Marissa King, Professor of Organizational Behavior, Yale School of Management; Author, Social Chemistry: Decoding the Patterns of Human Connection

There are many forms of stress. Anxious is different than frustrated, which is different than stuck. And none of them should rule your life. Learn some simple tools to meet each specific stress reaction appropriately. Expect some simple movement and meditations.

• Amy Harris, Integration and Embodiment Coach

While many of the principles of marketing have stayed the same, the tools that drive marketing have changed dramatically. From data analytics to user experience to the use of AI, hear of this panel of experts on the evolving world of technology within customer experience and marketing

• Moderator – Ann Boyd, CMO, Stoplight
• Lyn Chassagne, Senior Director, Brand, Strategy & Corporate Marketing, Maxar Technologies
• Kiesha King-Brown, SVP of AI Growth and Strategic Relations, ADMD Solutions

Join us for virtual small group networking to connect with your fellow women in tech!

Despite our good intentions to be inclusive managers, our unconscious biases can sometimes cause us to act in harmful and demeaning ways without giving it a second thought. Microaggressions and micro-inequities are products of implicit bias. It’s not about walking on eggshells when having conversations but rather recognizing how the things we say and do either perpetuate the inclusion or exclusion of marginalized groups. Great managers and leaders make all the difference in breaking down barriers in the workplace.

In this interactive session, participants will develop the ability to understand the impact of unchecked biases, identify different forms of microaggressions and learn helpful language to address and practice allyship when witnessing or committing a microaggression. Culture Energized is a black and queer-owned company that provides consulting and training services to build and transform inclusive organizational and team cultures. They specialize in providing foundational education on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging *(DEI&B) for all levels to support holistic and sustainable growth.

Please come prepared to participate in the workshop and engage in the discussion.

• Mo Abdullah, Founder & Owner, Culture Energized
• Ebony Wilkinson, Director of Learning, Culture Energized

Creating a Career You Love
In this session, participants will gain access to a Career Planning Toolkit to help advocate and take charge of their future. Whether you’re new to career planning or a seasoned pro, exercises in this session are meant to clarify your vision and develop a plan for the career you want now and in the future.

• Kelly Maguire, Data & Analytics Consultant, Slalom Consulting & CTA Young Professionals Board Member

How to Drive Change within your Organization
The pandemic affected women more than men for a variety of reasons; since the onset of COVID-19, 400,000 women have left the workforce. In tech, recent data from Dice’s Equality in Tech Report tells a fairly dismal story:
• 57% of technologists identifying as women have experienced discrimination in the tech industry
• 49% of technologists identifying as women believe they are underpaid relative to others in the same job and occupation
• 31% of technologists identifying as women are likely to change employers, with 32% saying they’re leaving because they want a job that better aligns with their personal values
• 17% of technologists identifying as women are not at all impressed with their organization’s action to date/response to gender diversity and inclusion movements – 9% more are only slightly impressed
• 59% of technologists identifying as women say that a company’s reputation regarding D, E and I is either moderately or extremely influential in their decision to work there, with 49% saying that it is extremely important that their company makes changes in policies or practices to help support gender diversity and inclusion movements

Everyone in the “room” is aware of the data we’ve outlined, and most have experienced these things firsthand – the question is, what we can we do about it? In this half hour, we won’t focus as heavily on the attrition problem, although it’s significant. Instead, what can we do to help other women survive and thrive in work situations and cultures that are simply not set up to support us. This isn’t to say that many organizations are not trying – many are – but these things take time at a company level, and there’s work we can do as individuals to help ourselves and, importantly, those around us. That’s the crux of the panel discussion – we believe that change happens when every individual commits to doing something, and with that in mind, our panelists will discuss a few concrete ways we can make an impact in our organizations, regardless of our level, role and tenure.

• Michelle Marian, CMO, DHI Group, Inc

Women are the Future of Tech – Mentorship and Action are the Solution
Tech companies need women leaders. As we enter a new phase of the pandemic, the tech sector is taking stock of critical success factors moving forward. The consensus is that new times demand a new type of leadership, and women’s skills and expertise are deemed more valuable than ever. Yet the pandemic set women’s employment back 2 years more than their male counterparts — it won’t recover to pre-pandemic levels until 2024. In the tech sector, only 10% of executives are women.

We need to double down on efforts to close the gender gap in tech leadership. In this panel, Accela SVP of Marketing Heidi Lorenzen, Hitachi Solutions VP Strategic Alliances North America Sharan Hildebrand, and Meylah Co-Founder and CMO Chaitra Vedullapalli will outline the liabilities and risks of low female representation in tech leadership, and what companies can do to start turning the tide. They, and other women executives from tech companies of all sizes, partnered to found the Women’s Executive Channel Advisory Board (WECAB) to provide direct action for tech companies, mentorship to female leaders in tech, and future opportunities for women in tech leadership who want to get involved.

• Heidi Lorenzen, SVP of Marketing, Accela
• Sharan Hildebrand, VP Strategic Alliances North America, Hitachi Solutions
• Chaitra Vedullapalli, Co-Founder & CMO, Meylah Tech

SheTheChange to LeadHerShip: Investing in Women in Technology
Depending on the statistics you look up, the voice of women is often underrepresented. For example, per the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics, women represent only 10.9% of the Construction workforce. Additionally, only 20% of tech jobs are held by women and on and on it goes. So the question becomes, what is your workplace doing to help close these gaps and what can you as a leader/individual contributor do to help reduce the gap? In this session, women of Trimble share their personal journeys, experiences and discuss the culture in transforming the landscape and leading change across our groups, businesses, and the industry.

• Evangelia Tripolitis, Sales Engineer, Major Accounts, Trimble
• Shelly Nooner, GM, Civil Construction, Trimble
• Mala Gosakan, Director, PM (Construction Platform), Trimble
• Allyson McDuffie, Director, Education & Outreach, Trimble
• Lisa Wetherbee, GM, Advanced Positioning, Trimble

It’s no secret that today’s professionals feel pulled in too many directions. Too often, we find ourselves racing from one emergency to another, without the time to think strategically (or even breathe). In this talk, Dorie Clark – Harvard Business Review author and Duke University Fuqua School of Business executive education professor – will share concrete strategies to help you sharpen your strategic thinking and embrace a long-term perspective that pays future business and career dividends.

You’ll learn how to:
· Create priorities with the future in mind
· Understand what we’re optimizing for
· Make the right kind of tradeoffs
· Achieve ‘strategic patience’
· Place little bets to identify promising leads and emergent possibilities

• Dorie Clark, Communication Coach // Author // Professor, Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and Columbia Business School

Hear from these Colorado tech leaders on their perspective of a variety of leadership topics, including leading through a challenging year, navigating career development, supporting a diverse tech workforce, how women rise and much more.

• Amy Zupon, CEO, Vertafore
• Angie Klein, CEO, Visible

During this session we will connect to conscious breath and start the day from a place of inspiration and empowerment. This transformative practice is a way to connect more deeply to the creativity and expression within.

• Jessica Thurman, Founder & CEO, Nourish by Jessica

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing the way we do business. Building an AI roadmap includes identifying goals, knowing what to prioritize, analyzing data and implementation. It is also important that implementing an AI strategy is done so responsibly. Hear from this panel of AI experts to scale impact and maximize the value of AI in your organization.

• Moderator – Beth Rudden, IBM
• Dr. Kamelia Aryafar, Director of Engineering, Cloud Artificial l Intelligence, Google
• Esther Friend, VP Sales Efficiency and Transformation, Five9
• Poornima Ramaswamy, Executive Vice President, Strategic Clients, Qlik Technologies 

Dr. Tarika Barrett is the CEO of Girls Who Code, an international non-profit organization working to close the gender gap in technology that has served over 450,000 students to date. As the proud daughter of Jamaican immigrants, she learned early on how issues of race, class, and gender can inform access to education, and has dedicated her career to fighting for equity and making change for marginalized communities. Tarika started her career as an educator and has spent two decades building educational pathways for young people at organizations like iMentor, the New York City Department of Education, New Visions for Public Schools, and New York University’s Center for Research on Teaching and Learning. She brings this wealth of experience to her role at Girls Who Code, where she tackles the cultural forces that keep young women, and particularly young women of color, from seeking careers in technology, and, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, has worked to maximize access to coding education, ensuring that no girl is left behind.

• Dr. Tarika Barrett, CEO, Girls Who Code

Join fellow attendees and members at this Community Happy Hour to celebrate the last day of the WIT Conference and network with Colorado Technology Association members and partners.

This event will take place in-person, at Blanchard Family Wines, located in the Dairy Block! . Click here to register to attend.