Monday, December 19, 2016

Top 100 Global Women in Technology Organizations



I was recently honored to be nominated to the Executive Council of CompTIA's Advancing Women in Technology community. As an important part of the world's largest technology association, the group looks to empower women with resources and information to positively impact their technology careers as well as inspiration to choose careers in technology.

My beautiful wife, Michelle Ragusa-McBain, is the chair and I was happy she helped me compile this list. I think it is critical to build bridges with other organizations that have similar goals.

This is the most comprehensive listing of Women in Technology groups found anywhere on the internet

The research was focused on 8 categories:

1. Professional Organizations
2. Media & Community
3. Empowering Younger Women
4. Regional Groups
5. Coding
6. Education
7. Accelerators / Investors
8. Creative Spaces

Additionally, these Top 100 Women in Technology Organizations can be followed in this Twitter list.

If you are female and thinking about entering the technology field, this is the place to start! Each of these organizations have shown success utilizing innovative methods of encouraging, enabling and empowering women in technology.

Here are the Top 100 Global Women in Technology Organizations:




PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS





IEEE Women In Engineering (WIE) 

The mission of IEEE Women In Engineering (WIE) is to facilitate the global inspiration, engagement and advancement of women in technical disciplines. IEEE WIE envisions a vibrant community of IEEE women and men collectively using their diverse talents to innovate for the benefit of humanity.

Contact 1: Takako Hashimoto
Contact 2: Nita Patel
Contact 3: Bozenna Pasik-Duncan

Website: http://www.ieee.org/women
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ieeewie

Scope: International

Employees: 5802



United Nations Women 

All human development and human rights issues have gender dimensions. UN Women focuses on priority areas that are fundamental to women’s equality, and that can unlock progress across the board.

Contact 1: Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka 
Contact 2: Lakshmi Puri 
Contact 3: Yannick Glemarec

Website: http://www.unwomen.org/en 
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/UN_Women

Scope: International 
Employees: 1573



CompTIA Advancing Women in Technology 

The Advancing Women in Technology Community works to: Empower women with resources and information to positively impact their technology careers. Inspire women to choose careers in technology. Help technology businesses create cultures that support a diverse workforce

Contact 1: Michelle Ragusa-McBain 
Contact 2: Cristina Greysman 
Contact 3: Cathy Alper 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CompTIA_AWIT

Scope: International 
Employees: 609



Association for Computing Machinery – Women (ACM-W) 


ACM-W supports, celebrates, and advocates internationally for the full engagement of women in all aspects of the computing field, providing a wide range of programs and services to Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) members and working in the larger community to advance the contributions of technical women.

Contact 1: Valerie Barr 
Contact 2: Jodi TIms 
Contact 3: Yuqing Melanie Wu

Website: http://women.acm.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ACMwomENcourage

Scope: International 
Employees: 286 



AAUW

The American Association of University Women (AAUW) is the nation’s leading voice promoting equity and education for women and girls. Since our founding in 1881, AAUW members have examined and taken positions on the fundamental issues of the day — educational, social, economic, and political

Contact 1: Mark Hopkins 
Contact 2: Christy Jones 
Contact 3: Cordy Galligan

Website: http://www.aauw.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/aauw

Scope: International 
Employees: 263



Educause Women in IT Constituent Group 

The Women in IT Constituent Group collects and disseminates effective practices in the recruitment, retention, and advancement of women in higher education IT. Through both virtual and face-to-face networking opportunities and by making good use of its affiliation with the National Center for Women & IT, this group provides a venue for addressing a wide range of issues affecting women IT professionals in colleges and universities, including securing high level leadership roles in higher education.

Contact 1: Brenda Spychalla 
Contact 2: Bernadette Williams 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/educause

Scope: International 
Employees: 127



Society for Info Management (SIM) Women

SIM is an association of over 3500 senior IT executives, prominent academicians, selected consultants, and other IT thought leaders built on the foundation of local chapters, who come together to share and enhance their rich intellectual capital for the benefit of its members and their organizations.

Contact 1: Kristen Lamoreau 
Contact 2: Deborah Decorrevont 
Contact 3: ​​Nanci Schimizzi

Website: http://www.simnet.org/default.asp?page=SIM_Women 

Scope: North American 
Employees: 73



Colorado Technology Association

Founded in 1994, the Colorado Technology Association is a 501(c)(6) not-for-profit organization dedicated to advancing the technology industry. Their mission is to foster growth and opportunity for the technology industry

Contact 1: Andrea Young 
Contact 2: Monica Coughlin 
Contact 3: Amy Regnier

Website: http://www.coloradotechnology.org

Scope: Colorado 
Employees: 62



Women in Technology International

A network of women working in technology fields who provide support to each other through networking meetups, career services, events, and other offerings.

Contact 1: Carolyn Leighton 
Contact 2: David Leighton 
Contact 3: Lisa Flom

Website: http://www.witi.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/witi

Scope: International 
Employees: 60



TechWomen

TechWomen empowers, connects and supports the next generation of women leaders in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) from Africa, Central and South Asia, and the Middle East by providing them the access and opportunity needed to advance their careers, pursue their dreams, and inspire women and girls in their communities.

Contact 1: Arezoo Riahi 
Contact 2: Jillian Scott 
Contact 3: Joanne Liou

Website: http://www.techwomen.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/techwomen

Scope: International 
Employees: 56



Women in Technology 

A not-for-profit organization that aims to help women advance in technology fields. They provide education in technology and leadership, networking events, mentoring, and awards.

Contact 1: Kathryn Harris 
Contact 2: Lisa Dezzutti 
Contact 3: Trish Barber

Website: http://www.womenintechnology.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WITWomen

Scope: International 
Employees: 53



Society of Women Engineers (SWE) 

The Society of Women Engineers (SWE) is a non-profit educational and service organization that gives women the tools they need to succeed and advance in the field of engineering, and to be recognized for their contributions as engineers and leaders. SWE provides an array of training and development programs, networking opportunities, scholarships, and outreach and advocacy activities that help make engineering a desirable career choice for women.

Contact 1: Jessica Rannow 
Contact 2: Jonna Gerken 
Contact 3: Karen Horting

Website: http://societyofwomenengineers.swe.org/ 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/SWETalk

Scope: International 
Employees: 50



National Center for Women & Info Tech (NCWIT) 

The National Center for Women & Information Technology is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization chartered in 2004 by the National Science Foundation. NCWIT is a “collective impact” effort, a community of more than 700 prominent corporations, academic institutions, government agencies, and non-profits working to increase girls' and women's participation in technology and computing.

Contact 1: Lucy Sanders 
Contact 2: Terry Morreale 
Contact 3: Dori Farah

Website: https://www.ncwit.org 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/NCWIT

Scope: National 
Employees: 50



Google Women TechMakers 


From 2014 to present, Women Techmakers is continually launching global scalable initiatives and piloting new programs to support and empower women in the industry.

Contact 1: Natalie Villalobos 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/womentechmakers

Scope: International 
Employees: 10



Association for Women in Computing 

The Association for Women in Computing is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to promoting the advancement of women in computing profession. Our members are a diverse group of professionals in careers that touch every aspect of the computer industry. You’ll discover a camaraderie with our group that you won’t find in other professional organizations.

Contact 1: Cindy Jones 
Contact 2: Katie Bedney 
Contact 3: Jane Sheedy

Website: http://www.awctc.org/

Scope: Twin Cities 
Employees: 10



EdTechWomen

EdTechWomen is a network of educators, technologists, and business experts focused on leadership development for women in education technology. Its mission is to create an inclusive community of women and their supporters from all aspects of the education technology industry in order to build and enhance the leadership capacity of women.

Contact 1: Sehreen Noor Ali 
Contact 2: Margaret Roth

Website: http://edtechwomen.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/edtechwomen

Scope: International 
Employees: 7



ITWomen 

ITWomen is a non-profit organization with the mission of increasing the number of girls and women in the fields of technology and engineering and to provide professional development, student education and scholarships through a supportive network.

Contact 1: Claire Marrero 
Contact 2: Patricia Mundarain

Website: http://www.itwomen.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/itwomen

Scope: Florida 
Employees: 5



BPDA 

BDPA is a global member-focused technology organization that delivers programs and services for the professional well-being of its stakeholders. Founded in 1975, BDPA currently has 2400 members and wishes to be a powerful advocate for their stakeholders' interests within the global technology industry.

Contact 1: Earl Pace 
Contact 2: Mike Williams 
Contact 3: Pamela Mathews

Website: http://www.bdpa.org/ 
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/BDPA

Scope: National
Employees: 3



Women's High Tech Coalition 

The Women’s High Tech Coalition (WHTC) is a non-profit, 501(c)(3), non-partisan organization that promotes the exchange of ideas among leaders in the public and private sectors whose focus is technology, innovation and the development of public policy related to technology.

Contact 1: Melissa Foxman 
Contact 2: Sarah Akbar

Website: http://www.womenshightech.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WomensHighTech

Scope: National 
Employees: 2




MEDIA & COMMUNITY



Internet Society - Shine the Light 


Shine The Light is an international campaign that encourages people to boost the profile of incredible women around the world who are pushing boundaries using technology.

Contact 1: Kathryn Brown 
Contact 2: Mark Buell 
Contact 3: Karen Rose

Website: http://www.internetsociety.org/shinethelight 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/internetsociety

Scope: International 
Employees: 270



CRN Women of the Channel 

Women of the Channel Online celebrates and fosters female leadership across the IT channel year-round, continuing and building on the conversations and ideas sparked at our industry-leading Women of the Channel events. This site provides a forum for sharing perspectives on life and work, recognizing the unique contributions of the women shaping today’s channel, and finding the tools and knowledge to grow and advance both personally and professionally.

Contact 1: Lisa McKenzie 
Contact 2: Doris Branscombe 
Contact 3: Robert DeMarzo

Website: http://wotc.crn.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WOTChannel

Scope: National 
Employees: 152



Anita Borg Institute 

Organizes conferences for women and awards for influential female leaders. Their goal is to not only help women thrive in technology fields, but make sure technologies are built to help women thrive.

Contact 1: Telle Whitney 
Contact 2: James Beck 
Contact 3: Elizabeth Ames

Website: http://anitaborg.org/ 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/anitaborg_org

Scope: International 
Employees: 124



Girls in Tech 

An organization with 60 local chapters around the world that host events. Girls in Tech University brings workshops and resources to female college students pursuing a career in technology, and they also have mentorship programs for grade-school students.

Contact 1: Adriana Gascoigne

Website: http://www.girlsintech.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/girlsintech

Scope: International 
Employees: 82


Women in Wireless 

An organization that promotes female leaders in mobile and digital through events in DC, New York, and San Francisco and spotlights on influential women.

Contact 1: Aurelie Guerrieri 
Contact 2: Emily McInerney
Contact 3: Jeni Gridley

Website: http://womeninwireless.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WomenInWireless

Scope: International 
Employees: 56



Scientista Foundation 

The Scientista Foundation is a national organization that empowers pre-professional women in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) through content, communities, and conferences. Currently the largest network of campus women across STEM disciplines, Scientista serves to connect all communities of women in STEM at campuses across the nation, giving such important organizations more visibility and resources, and building a strong, cohesive network of women in science that can act as one voice.

Contact 1: Julia Tartaglia 
Contact 2: Christina Tartaglia 
Contact 3: Amanda Applebaum

Website: http://www.scientistafoundation.com

Scope: National 
Employees: 32



Baptie Women's Leadership Council 

The Women’s Leadership Council is a community of women who join together regularly to learn how to raise the overall success rate of enabling their success and leadership potential. This council share best practices, hear from industry leaders, and form other initiatives that drive successful women in Technology!

Contact 1: Rod Baptie 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/cfocuscommunity

Scope: National 
Employees: 29



Opportunity@Work 

Based at New America in Washington DC, Opportunity@Work is a civic enterprise whose mission is to re-wire the U.S. labor market to enable more Americans to achieve upward mobility in the job market and workplace, to facilitate actions by U.S. employers to develop the talent they collectively need to succeed and grow, and to scale up innovations that unlock more fully all people’s potential for higher-value, meaningful work as a source of economic opportunity and national competitive advantage.

Contact 1: Byron Auguste 
Contact 2: Karan Chopra 
Contact 3: Tyra Mariani

Website: http://www.opportunityatwork.org/ 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/opportunityatwork/

Scope: National 
Employees: 22



Women 2.0

A media organization highlighting female entrepreneurship. Organizers of Founder Friday meetups and the PITCH conferences in Silicon Valley and New York. Their sister organization in Latin America is Ellas 2.0. See our interview with CEO Shaherose Charania.

Contact 1: Kate Brodock 
Contact 2: Elisa Miller-Out 
Contact 3: Shaherose Charania

Website: http://www.women2.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/women2

Scope: International 
Employees: 18



Feminist Approach to Technology (FAT) 

For us, a feminist approach to technology is a gendered critique of the design, use and impact of technology, as well as empowering women to participate in its future. We believe that equal participation of women in producing and decision-making regarding technology is important to ensure that widely used technologies do not affect women adversely.

Contact 1: Aakriti Gupta 
Contact 2: Anita Sonawane 
Contact 3: Ankita Rawat

Website: http://www.fat-net.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/fattechy

Scope: India 
Employees: 16



#BrainBabe

#brainbabe is a thought leadership platform founded by Deidre Kashou Diamond dedicated to increasing the hiring of women in the Cyber Security and Technology professions, while also supporting those already in the professions with a communication framework that will advance and empower both women and men in the workplace.

Contact 1: Deidra Diamond 
Contact 2: Kyle Kennedy 
Contact 3: Lisa Kendall

Website: http://www.brainbabe.org 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/brain_babe

Scope: National 
Employees: 16



Lesbians Who Tech 

Lesbians Who Tech is a Community of Queer Women in or around tech (and the people who love them).

Contact 1: Leanne Pittsford 
Contact 2: Dom Brassey 
Contact 3: Brianna Boles

Website: http://lesbianswhotech.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/lesbiantech

Scope: International 
Employees: 12



Girl Geek Dinners 

A community that holds dinner events for women in STEM and helps them find inspiration and mentorship.

Contact 1: Sarah Lamb

Website: http://girlgeekdinners.com/ 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ggdworldwide

Scope: International 
Employees: 11



Wonder Women Tech

Wonder Women Tech (WWT) is a non-profit organization which produces an annual conference and series of educational programming and initiatives that highlights, educates, and celebrates women and diversity in STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts & Mathematics) innovation and entrepreneurialism. Our conferences and programming offer a variety of speakers, panel discussions, coding classes, community inclusion activities and other dynamic initiatives geared towards empowering women and diverse demographics.

Contact 1: Lisa Mae Brunson 
Contact 2: Brianna Machado 
Contact 3: Kimberly King

Website: https://wonderwomentech.com/ 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wonderwomentech/

Scope: International 
Employees: 9



Change Catalyst Tech Inclusion 


Change Catalyst empowers diverse, inclusive and sustainable tech innovation – through education, mentorship and funding. Our Tech Inclusion programs explore and develop innovative solutions to tech diversity and inclusion. We partner with the tech community to solve diversity and inclusion together through conferences, career fairs, strategic consulting and training. Our work spans the full tech ecosystem, including: Education, Workplace, Entrepreneurship and Policy.

Contact 1: Melinda Epler 
Contact 2: Wayne Sutton 
Contact 3: Susan Cooney

Website: http://changecatalyst.co
Twitter: http://twitter.com/techinclusionco

Scope: International 
Employees: 8



Femgineer 

We empower Female Engineers and provide courses and workshops to: educate, encourage professionals in the high-tech industry.

Contact 1: Poornima Vijayashanker 
Contact 2: Karen Catlin 
Contact 3: Fernando Garrido Vaz

Website: http://femgineer.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/femgineer

Scope: International 
Employees: 5



STEM for Her

STEM for Her, formerly known as Women in Technology Education Foundation, is a 501(c)(3) non-profit foundation, based in the Maryland, Virginia, and Washington D.C. area that promotes education to create awareness, excitement, and opportunities among girls and young women to pursue successful STEM-related careers.

Contact 1: Marian McKee 
Contact 2: Marguerete Luter 
Contact 3: Nanci Schimizzi

Website: http://www.stemforher.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/STEMForHer

Scope: National 
Employees: 5



Webgrrls 

A global organization with local chapter events, discussion boards, and job listings. Organizers of TechSpeak for Entrepreneurs, a two-day conference in New York to teach entrepreneurs to communicate with and manage their technical employees.

Contact 1: Kevin Kennedy 
Contact 2: Nelly Yusupov 
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/Webgrrls

Scope: International 
Employees: 4



Girl Geek Coffees (GGC) 

The sole purpose of Girl Geek Coffees (GGC) is to pursue charitable purposes of advancing the interests of minority females in Information Technology and related Science, Engineering & Mathematics fields, particularly at the development stages of student and early career.

Contact 1: Miriam Hochwald 
Contact 2: Felicity Cunningham 
Contact 3: Mahtab Mirmomeni

Website: https://sites.google.com/site/girlgeekcoffees
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GirlGeekCoffees

Scope: Australia/US 
Employees: 3



Channel Partners Women in the Channel (WIC) 

Women in the Channel connects female leaders in the telecom and IT channels for the purpose of collaborating to grow our businesses, support each other as women and mentor each other.

Contact 1: Hilary Gadda 
Contact 2: Nancy Ridge 
Contact 3: Khali Henderson

Website: https://womeninthechannel.org/ 
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/WomenInChannel

Scope: National 
Employees: 3



Global Tech Women 

We are Global Tech Women. Our mission is to create a global network of inspired, connected and self-actualized women in tech.

Contact 1: Deanna Kosaraju 
Contact 2: Jerri Barrett 
Contact 3: Lisa C. Kaczmarczyk

Website: http://www.globaltechwomen.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GlobalTechWomen

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



The RAISE Project 

Created by the Society for Women’s Health Research, it helps women find and apply for awards and grants in science, technology, engineering, math, and mathematics.

Contact 1: Stephanie Pincus 
Contact 2: Donna J. Dean 
Contact 3: W. Sue Shafer

Website: http://www.raiseproject.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/RAISEProject

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



Tech LadyMafia 


Tech LadyMafia supports women who work in and around the internet. We are astrophysicists and developers, writers and digital strategists. We believe in very inclusive definitions of the words “women” and “ladies”. TLM is open is to anyone who identifies as a woman.

Contact 1: Erie Meyer 
Contact 2: Aminatou Sow 
Contact 3: Merici Vinton

Website: http://techladymafia.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/techladymafia

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



Women Catalysts 

Our events and online community are the place to get motivation, resources, and encouragement to make your dreams a reality. Because you can do it, and you don't have to do it alone.

Contact 1: Kim Hunter 
Contact 2: Lindsay Jean Thomson 
Contact 3: Leo Hunter Thomson

Website: http://www.womencatalysts.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WomenCatalysts

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



Blacks in Technology 

The Blacks in Technology mission: Deliver the most relevant and beneficial information and network for African Americans in the technology field or pursuing a career in Technology. Focus on creating a community in which African Americans are comfortable, motivated and inspired to pursue careers in Technology.

Contact 1: Greg Greenlee 
Contact 2: Jennifer Epperson 
Contact 3: Ayori Selassi

Website: http://www.blacksintechnology.net
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/blkintechnology

Scope: National 
Employees: 3



TechWorldsHalf 


This is a private group to collaborate on encouraging and keeping half of the total workforce - women - in this amazing industry! Goals: 1. Share best practices to stay in tech. 2. Provide a forum to connect mentors and mentees for women in tech, and connecting them with the right opportunities. 3. Create a group of females in tech who can advocate more programs and services that keep women in the industry.

Contact 1: Janet Schijns 
Contact 2: Quinnie Wong 
Contact 3: Rokeya Jones/Jo Peterson

Website: https://twitter.com/techworldshalf 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/techworldshalf

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



She's Geeky 


She’s Geeky provides a safe, friendly place for women in STEM to “geek out” and talk about their jobs, their passions, their lives and their hobbies in a supportive, non-competitive environment.

Contact 1: Kaliya Young 
Contact 2: Estee Solomon-Gray 
Contact 3: Shannon Casey

Website: http://www.shesgeeky.org
Twitter: http://twitter.com/@shesgeeky

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



Latinas in Computing 

A community created by and for the Latinas in computing with a mission of promoting their representation and success in computing-related fields.

Contact 1: Patty Lopez 
Contact 2: Gilda Garreton 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/LatinasInC

Scope: International 
Employees: 2



Chicago Women Developers 

Chicago Women Developers is run by a group of women from a variety of backgrounds and technical expertise, who are all passionate about coding and women in technology. They want to provide a place where all questions are OK and where everyone can learn in a supportive environment.

Contact 1: Nicole L. 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CWDevs

Scope: Chicago 
Employees: 1



Tech Savvy Women 


Tech Savvy Women is an organization that brings Technology focused Women across various industries and disciplines together to create and foster relationships while enhancing their knowledge of technology.

Contact 1: JJ DiGeronimo 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jjdigeronimo

Scope: National 
Employees: 1



EMPOWERING YOUNGER WOMEN



Girls Who Code 

An 8-week summer class teaching programming to high school girls in New York City. The girls take trips to Google,Facebook,Twitter, and Foursquare and work on a final project that tackles a challenge in their community, like recycling.

Contact 1: Reshma Saujani 
Contact 2: Mary Ellen Miller 
Contact 3: Deborah Singer

Website: https://girlswhocode.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/girlswhocode

Scope: International 
Employees: 604



npower 

Npower is a national nonprofit organization of 23 members providing IT training and services to nonprofits and young adults. Through programs and service, Npower aims to bring the IT community together to do social good.

Contact 1: Bertina Ceccarelli 
Contact 2: Shannon Gibbons 
Contact 3: Patrick Cohen

Website: http://www.npower.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/NPowerOrg

Scope: National 
Employees: 253



Robogals 


Inspire, engage and empower young women into engineering and related fields

Contact 1: Emily Heffernan 
Contact 2: Mandy Jor 
Contact 3: Julie Boulton

Website: http://www.robogals.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/robogals

Scope: International 
Employees: 68



Iridescent 

A program where high school girls create a prototype for an Android app, write a business plan, and pitch to VCs, while being mentored by women in tech. Created by Iridescent Learning.

Contact 1: Tara Chklovski 
Contact 2: Veronica Cavallaro 
Contact 3: Wallace Louie

Website: http://iridescentlearning.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/IridescentLA

Scope: International 
Employees: 41



Science Club for Girls 

SCFG fosters excitement, confidence and literacy in STEM for girls from underrepresented communities by providing free, experiential programs and by maximizing meaningful interactions with women mentors in science, technology, engineering & mathematics

Contact 1: Lonsdale Koester 
Contact 2: Kate Pickle 
Contact 3: Corrine Jager

Website: http://www.scienceclubforgirls.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/scfg

Scope: Boston 
Employees: 40



Black Girls Code

An organization that helps African-American girls ages 7-17 learn programming and take charge of their future, mainly through workshops across the country.

Contact 1: Kimberly Bryant 
Contact 2: Monique Wingard 
Contact 3: Tecia Garrett Marshall

Website: http://www.blackgirlscode.com/ 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/blackgirlscode

Scope: National 
Employees: 27



IT-ology 

IT-ology is a non-profit collaboration of businesses, academic institutions and organizations dedicated to growing the IT talent pipeline, fostering economic development and advancing the IT profession.

Contact 1: Tammy Mainwaring 
Contact 2: Rachel Barnett 
Contact 3: Jamesetta James

Website: http://it-ology.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/IT_oLogy

Scope: South Carolina 
Employees: 20



TechGirlz 

TechGirlz is a 501(c)3 nonprofit dedicated to reducing the gender gap in technology occupations. We develop fun and educational hands-on workshops, called TechShopz, and an annual Entrepreneur Summer Camp. These efforts aim to get middle-school age girls interested in different kinds of technology and demonstrate the varied options of careers available.

Contact 1: Tracey Welson-Rossman 
Contact 2: Karen Stellabotte 
Contact 3: Sarah Johnson

Website: http://www.techgirlz.org
Twitter: http://twitter.com/techgirlzorg

Scope: National 
Employees: 18



MentorNet 

MentorNet, a division of Great Minds in STEM, connects STEM students from freshman year through the doctoral level with mentors working in a variety of STEM fields. Any STEM student in an accredited institution of higher education in the U.S. and professionals with STEM degrees may join our new open social network for mentoring at http://www.mentornet.org/join. More than 60% of MentorNet mentees are women and more than 30% are pursuing degrees in computing.

Contact 1: Mary Fernandez 
Contact 2: John Cross
Contact 3: Rebecca Rubenstein
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MentorNetTweet

Scope: International 
Employees: 17



AkiraChix 


AkiraChix is a not for profit organisation that aims to inspire and develop a successful force of women in technology who will change Africa’s future.Founded in April 2010, AkiraChix aims to be the leading women’s network impacting technology in Africa.

Contact 1: Angela O. Lungati 
Contact 2: Judith Owigar 
Contact 3: Linda Kamau

Website: http://akirachix.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AkiraChix

Scope: Africa 
Employees: 16




ChickTech 

We facilitate hands-on technology-centric events to empower, support, and increase the confidence of women and girls. Through our events, we build community, empower participants to see themselves as leaders, and provide networking and mentoring opportunities in the rapidly growing high tech industry.

Contact 1: Janice Levenhagen 
Contact 2: Sally Deck 
Contact 3: Ashly Alberto

Website: http://chicktech.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/chicktechorg

Scope: National 
Employees: 8



DIY Girls 

DIY (“Do-It-Yourself”) Girls’ mission is to increase girls’ interest and success in technology, engineering and making through innovative educational experiences and mentor relationships. We're a supportive community for girls driven by an interest in creating and building with technology.

Contact 1: Luz Rivas 
Contact 2: Evelyn Gomez 
Contact 3: Keyanay Colvin

Website: http://www.diygirls.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/DIYGirls

Scope: Los Angeles 
Employees: 8



Young Rewired State 


Young Rewired State (often stylized as YRS) is an organisation based in the United Kingdom, which run events and schemes for technically gifted young people aged 18 and under. It brings together young developers, designers, and those with other technical skills to build projects (mainly phone and web applications) that attempt to solve real world problems.

Contact 1: Emma Mulqueeny 

Website: http://www.yrs.io
Twitter: https://twitter.com/youngrewired

Scope: UK 
Employees: 8



HER Ideas in Motion 


HER Ideas in Motion is a 501c3 nonprofit corporation focused on helping girls achieve in technology and media arts. Through hands-on workshops and tech clubs, girls learn technical and creative skills from professionals, while building their own projects. In addition, HER Ideas in Motion has developed a women-led approach that combines female technical and creative professionals teaching and mentoring girls to provide access to female role models in these fields.

Contact 1: Rachel Wilkins Patel 
Contact 2: Nicole Capuana 
Contact 3: Chrissy Freeman

Website: http://www.herideasinmotion.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HERIdeas

Scope: Ohio 
Employees: 6



CodeEd 

A program that teaches computer science to girls in underserved communities, starting in middle school. They run classes in Boston, New York, and San Francisco.

Contact 1: Carey Tan 
Contact 2: Angie Schiavoni 
Contact 3: Sep Kamvar

Website: http://www.codeed.org
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/codeedorg

Scope: NYC / San Fran 
Employees: 4



Go Girl, Go for IT 

Go Girl, Go for IT aims to excite and engage female secondary school students by introducing them to the vast range of global, lucrative and varied career options in IT. The event focuses on inspiring students with fantastic role model speakers, showcasing technology of the future and challenging their preconceptions of a career in IT. There will be access to a wealth of information that will assist students in making informed decisions about a career in IT.

Contact 1: Fi Slaven 
Contact 2: Sue Hogg 
Contact 3: Sara Ogston

Website: http://www.gogirl.org.au
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GoGirlGo4IT

Scope: Australia 
Employees: 3



MIT Women's Initiative

High school girls are taking high level math and science courses-with the exception of physics and engineering-at similar rates as their male peers; however, gender disparities begin to emerge at the undergraduate level, where men outnumber women in many STEM fields. Women receive only 18.2% of bachelor degrees awarded in computer science, 19.1% in physics, and 19.2% in engineering.

Contact 1: Yagnaseni Roy 
Contact 2: Jennifer Switzer 
Contact 3: Aswini Prasad

Website: http://web.mit.edu/wi

Scope: National 
Employees: 3



Girls Programming Network 


The Girls' Programming Network is run by girls for girls. We run workshop every term for high school girls in the Sydney area on programming & awesome IT stuff!

Website: https://sites.google.com/site/girlsprogrammingnetwork
Twitter: https://twitter.com/gpn_sydney

Scope: Australia 
Employees: 0REGIONAL GROUPS



Women & Hi Tech 


Women and Hi Tech is an organization of women and men whose goal is to attract, develop, retain, support and promote women who are interested in technology, through networking, role modeling, education and professional development.

Contact 1: Tiffany White 
Contact 2: Audrey Taylor 
Contact 3: Robin Fleming

Website: http://womenandhitech.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WomenandHiTech

Scope: Indiana 
Employees: 10



RichTech Women In Technology Forum 

The Rich Tech Women In Technology Forum is designed to provide networking, mentoring and educational opportunities for women involved at all levels of technology centric businesses or organizations. The mission of the forum is to be a catalyst in growing the interest of science, technology, math and engineering among today’s young women. The council organizes an inaugural Women ETC (Education, Technology, Careers) event that provides professional development, education, and collaboration amongst its participants.

Contact 1: Robby Demeria 
Contact 2: Tracy Dickerson 
Contact 3: Margaret Taylor

Website: http://rvatechwomen.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Women_etc

Scope: Richmond, VA 
Employees: 9



Philly Women in Tech 

A community that connects women in technology fields in Philadelphia to learn from and inspire each other. Host of the 2012 Women in Tech Summit.

Contact 1: Gloria Bell

Contact 2: Tracey Welson-Rossman
Contact 3: Kelly Hoey

Website: http://www.phillywomenintech.com/ 
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/WomenTechSummit

Scope: Regional 
Employees: 5



Women's Coding Collective 


The WCC is a web development community with a mission to narrow the gender gap in technology. We cultivate supportive, no-stupid-questions environments where women can learn, build, and code together.

Contact 1: Nicole Noll 
Contact 2: Susan Buck 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WeAreWCC

Scope: Boston 
Employees: 4



Chicago Women Developers 

Classes and events in Chicago for female programmers. They are in the middle of their Summer Apps Program, a series of three courses to transform your idea into a web and mobile app. They also host weekly open hack nights on Thursday (#XXHACK), where anyone can show up and get help on coding.

Contact 1: Melissa Pierce 
Contact 2: Alison Stanton 
Contact 3: Chelsea Troy

Website: http://cwdevs.com/ 
 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CWDevs

Scope: Chicago 
Employees: 3



DC Web Women 

A 3,000+ member organization of women in web design and development, IT, and other digital careers (such as blogging and marketing).

Contact 1: Sibyl Edwards 
Contact 2: Estela Rueda 
Contact 3: Ashley Holtz

Website: http://dcwebwomen.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/dcww

Scope: Washington DC 
Employees: 3



She++ 

A conference held at Stanford University on the opportunities, challenges, and role models for women in technology, to inspire more “femgineers”: female programmers who use their skills for positive change.

Contact 1: Reynis Vazquez-Guzman 
Contact 2: Katherine Van Kirk 
Contact 3: Shreya Shankar

Website: http://sheplusplus.org/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sheplusplus

Scope: Stanford 
Employees: 3

CODING ORGANIZATIONS



CoderDojo 

CoderDojo is a worldwide movement of free, volunteer-led, community-based programming clubs for young people. Anyone aged seven to seventeen can visit a Dojo where they can learn to code, build a website, create an app or a game, and explore technology in an informal, creative, and social environment.

Contact 1: James Whelton 
Contact 2: Bill Liao 
Contact 3: Giustina Mizzoni

Website: https://coderdojo.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/coderdojo

Scope: International 
Employees: 170



Women Who Code 


Women Who Code is a global non-profit dedicated to inspiring women to excel in technology careers. We provide an avenue into tech, empower women with skills needed for professional advancement, and provide environments where networking and mentorship are valued. The organization has executed more than 1,200 free events around the world, garnered a membership exceeding 20,000, and has a presence in 15 countries.

Contact 1: Alaina Percival 
Contact 2: Jennifer TacheffContact 3: Joey Rosenberg

Website: https://www.womenwhocode.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/womenwhocode

Scope: International 
Employees: 109



Ladies Learning Code 


We are a not-for-profit organization with the mission to be the leading resource for women and youth to become passionate builders - not just consumers - of technology by learning technical skills in a hands-on, social, and collaborative way

Contact 1: Melissa Sariffodeen 
Contact 2: Laura Plant 
Contact 3: Nicole Belanger

Website: http://ladieslearningcode.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/LLCodeDotCom

Scope: Canadian 
Employees: 92



Ada Development Academy


Ada Developers Academy is a training program located in Seattle, Washington for women who want to become software developers. Ada is tuition-free and is comprised of 6 months of full-time classroom training followed by 5 months in a paid industry internship.

Contact 1: Scott Case 
Contact 2: Elise Worthy 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/adaacademy

Scope: Seattle 
Employees: 63



Ladies that UX 


A friendly, welcoming and collaborative community, with a growing number of local groups based in cities worldwide.

Contact 1: Lizzie Dyson 
Contact 2: Georgie Bottomley 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ladiesthatux

Scope: International 
Employees: 26



Django Girls 


Django Girls is a non-profit organization and a community that empowers and helps women to organize free, one-day programming workshops by providing tools, resources and support. We are a volunteer run organization with hundreds of people contributing to bring more amazing women into the world of technology.

Contact 1: Kaja Milanowska 
Contact 2: Lucie Daeye 
Contact 3: Anubha Maneshwar

Website: https://djangogirls.org
Twitter: http://twitter.com/djangogirls

Scope: International 
Employees: 15



Code It Like A Girl 

Code it Like a Girl is a digital media collective that creates content intended to inspire people who self-identify as female to follow their dreams. From technology news and how-to’s to remarkable stories of people all around the world, articles on feminism or just whatever we feel like talking-writing-filming about, we’ll be sharing our POV on anything that can be proven empowering, valuable, informative or entertaining to our audience.

Contact 1: Maria Dermentzi 
Contact 2: Anastasia Siapka 
Contact 3: Vasiliki-Eleni Provopoulou

Website: http://www.codeitlikeagirl.com
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/codeitlikeagirl

Scope: Greece 
Employees: 15



Cloud Girls 

Cloud Girls is an open, vendor-neutral, not-for-profit community of female technology advocates dedicated to educating themselves, their organizations and customers about the vast and dynamic cloud ecosystem. By exploring emerging market and technical trends, advocating best practices/reference architectures and building community consensus, Cloud Girls is fostering the next wave of women in technology.

Contact 1: Jo Peterson 
Contact 2: Manon Buettner 
Contact 3: Michelle Hyde

Website: http://cloudgirls.org
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/gocloudgirls

Scope: National 
Employees: 10



jduchess 

Duchess is a global organization for women in Java technology, currently with 550 members in over 60 countries. Duchess provides a platform through which women who work with Java can connect with each other and get involved in the greater Java community. It aims to make the role of women and the individual women's contributions visible in the Java community and to teach the benefits of diversity in any team environment - whether corporate or open-source.

Contact 1: Linda van der Pal 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jduchess

Scope: International 
Employees: 8



Railsbridge 

RailsBridge workshops are a free and fun way to get started or level up with Rails, Ruby, and other web technologies. Our events focus on increasing diversity in tech, so that people of all backgrounds can feel welcome and comfortable in our industry.

Contact 1: Kari Bancroft 
Contact 2: Coraline Ada Ehmke 
Contact 3: Rachel Myers

Website: http://www.railsbridge.org 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/railsbridge

Scope: International 
Employees: 3



Outreachy 

Outreachy helps people from groups underrepresented in free and open source software get involved. We provide a supportive community for beginning to contribute any time throughout the year and offer focused internship opportunities twice a year with a number of free software organizations.

Contact 1: Marina Zhurakhinskaya 
Contact 2: Christie Koehler 
Contact 3: Sarah Sharp

Website: https://www.gnome.org/outreachy
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/outreachy

Scope: National 
Employees: 3



Latina Girls Code 


Formed in 2014, Latina Girls Code is a program created to fill the diversity gap between girls who are interested in technology through education and resources. LGC will provide mentors, access to hardware and digital tools as well as internships through various programs and events throughout the year. It is the endeavor of the organization to provide tangible education to those particularly in disadvantaged areas in hopes to spur interest in the technology.

Contact 1: Antonio Garcia 
Contact 2: Cindy Agustín 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/latinagirlscode

Scope: Chicago 
Employees: 2



Railsgirls 

Our aim is to give tools and a community for women to understand technology and to build their ideas. We do this by providing a great experience on building things and by making technology more approachable.

Contact 1: Linda Liukas 
Contact 2: Karri Saarinen 
Twitter: http://twitter.com/railsgirls

Scope: International 
Employees: 2



CodeChix 


CodeChix fosters continuous learning through our chapters’ events and workshops. Offerings include hacking sessions, technical talks, and hands-on, developer-led technical workshops. Sample events include Wikipedia’s Operations Infrastructure, Algorithms and Directed Acyclic Graphs, Mobile/Graphic Design for Engineers Workshop, Toy Robotics: My little Pleo, OpenShift Workshop, and Android Instalfest & App Building 101.

Contact 1: Rupa Dachere 
Contact 2: Sabrina Farmer 
Contact 3: Rebecca Parsons

Website: http://codechix.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/codechix

Scope: International 
Employees: 2



Pyladies 

We are an international mentorship group with a focus on helping more women become active participants and leaders in the Python open-source community. Our mission is to promote, educate and advance a diverse Python community through outreach, education, conferences, events and social gatherings.

Contact 1: Lynn Root 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/pyladies

Scope: International 
Employees: 1
EDUCATION




Girl Develop It 

Technical workshops for female programmers held around the United States, as well as in Canada and Australia. They aim to create a supportive environment where women can join the discussion and show off their skills. Courses are also available online.

Contact 1: Corinne Warnshuis 
Contact 2: Vanessa Hurst 
Contact 3: LaVonna Ricketts

Website: http://girldevelopit.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/girldevelopit

Scope: International 
Employees: 127



Skillcrush

A site targeted at women to help them learn technology, including tech terms, Ask Ada (named after the first programmer), and other articles.

Contact 1: Adda Birnir 
Contact 2: Aisha Souto-Maior 
Contact 3: Ann Cadcarano

Website: http://skillcrush.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SkillCrush

Scope: International 
Employees: 38



Hackbright Academy 

A 10-week training program for women in San Francisco – half learning, half doing. Applications for the fall program are due in August, and it costs $6,000.

Contact 1: Sharon Wienbar 
Contact 2: Scott Deming 
Contact 3: Angie Chang

Website: https://hackbrightacademy.com/ 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/hackbright

Scope: San Francisco 
Employees: 20


ACCELERATORS / INVESTORS




Golden Seeds 

A firm that invests in early-stage companies with a female founder/CEO or executive. They also offer business training to entrepreneurs and investors.

Contact 1: Jo Ann Corkran 
Contact 2: Loretta McCarthy 
Contact 3: Peggy Wallace

Website: http://goldenseeds.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GoldenSeeds

Scope: National 
Employees: 193



Astia 

A not-for-profit organization that offers paid, week-long programs to help female entrepreneurs in technology, life sciences, and clean tech to learn skills for revenue generation, sales, and fundraising. Includes a support network of over 200 investors and 300 startup executives.

Contact 1: Sharon Vosmek 
Contact 2: Victoria Pettibone 
Contact 3: Yuka Nagashima

Website: http://www.astia.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/astiaglobal

Scope: Silicon Valley / Global 
Employees: 145



Springboard 

Their “Forum Program” is an accelerator with two months of coaching for women-led businesses. They also offer pitch practice and educational programs to learn how to fundraise.

Contact 1: Kay Koplovitz 
Contact 2: Amy Millman 
Contact 3: Anna Consani

Website: https://www.springboardenterprises.org
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/springboardent

Scope: International 
Employees: 46



Bad Girl Ventures 


A microlending organization started by Candace Kleinthat helps women-owned startups in Ohio. Borrowers also get a nine-week course on business development.

Contact 1: Nancy Aichholz 
Contact 2: Angela Ozar 
Contact 3: Caitlin Saia

Website: http://www.badgirlventures.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BGV_Cincinnati

Scope: Ohio 
Employees: 17



Women Who Tech 

Organizers of the yearly Women Who Tech TeleSummit, with talks by women in technology, startups, and social media. Creators of the #Women2Follow hashtag onTwitter.

Contact 1: Allyson Kapin 
Contact 2: Lisa Stone 
Contact 3: Amy Sample Ward

Website: http://www.womenwhotech.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/womenwhotech

Scope: International 
Employees: 5



FemaleDev 


This year, FemaleDev focuses on producing, mentoring, and nurturing female startup founders in Indonesia’s tech ecosystem.

Contact 1: Alamanda Shantika Santoso 
Contact 2: Aulia Jasmine Oktofan 
Contact 3: Niki Hidayati

Website: http://femaledev.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/femaledev

Scope: Indonesia 
Employees: 3



NewME Accelerator 


A 12-week mentorship program in Mountain View for startups led by a minority founder (African American, Latino, or female).

Contact 1: Angela Benton 
Contact 2: Eva Ho 

Scope: NationalEmployees: 2


CREATIVE SPACES




digitalundivided 


digitalundivided uses innovation to foster the economic growth and empowerment of Black and Latina women entrepreneurs.

Contact 1: Kathryn Finney 
Contact 2: Darlene Gillard Jones 
Contact 3: Danielle Robinson Bell

Website: http://www.digitalundivided.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/digundiv/

Scope: Atlanta 
Employees: 7



Double Union 


Double Union is a space for your projects - Things women do in this space include sewing, programming, electronics, woodworking, fiber arts of all kinds, and zine making.

Contact 1: Alexsarah Collier 
Contact 2: Tina Coles 
Contact 3: Daniela Arias

Website: https://www.doubleunion.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/DoubleUnionSF

Scope: San Francisco 
Employees: 5



Women's Center for Creative Work 


Founded in 2013, the Women’s Center for Creative Work, or WCCW, is a not-for-profit organization that cultivates LA’s feminist creative communities and practices. Combining a co-workspace on the LA river in Frogtown, project incubation facilities, residency programs, a rapidly growing network of over 15,000 followers, and a full calendar of artistic and professional development programming for female creatives, WCCW advocates for female-led creative businesses and projects in Los Angeles.

Contact 1: Sarah Williams 
Contact 2: Kate Johnston 
Contact 3: Emily Walworth

Website: http://womenscenterforcreativework.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WCCWLA

Scope: Los Angeles 
Employees: 3

Friday, December 2, 2016

The 10-Part Formula for Winning in Today's Channel



A large number of channel programs get stuck in the exact same place. After countless hours of planning, building and executing a robust set of partnering strategies and mechanics, channel chiefs miss some very important steps in their go-to-market activities.

Having observed hundreds of channel programs and comparing their success in the marketplace, I have come to a couple of simple conclusions:


1. Some vendors win because their product wins. 

Many of the successful vendors that you see headlining shows today were in the right place at the right time with the right amount of innovation. Read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell for a fascinating look at what might have happened if Bill Gates or Steve Jobs were born 5 years later.

When your product wins, building a channel is easier with thousands of partners lining up to get in on the action.


2. Other vendors win because they understand how to influence the channel.

This is much more difficult and the subject of this blog.

We all know that the channel is highly-decentralized - by specialty, geography, industry focus, customer segment, business model, and a myriad of other things. What smart channel chiefs understand is that influencing this large group of disparate people involves a wide array of tactics, and a ton of manual labor.

It is important to note that the channel is rarely fooled twice. There have been many examples of vendors becoming highly visible and not backing it up with the product, program, pricing, place, promotion and internal channel religion to make it sustainable. Assuming your ducks are in a row, it is time to execute the 10-part formula.

The formula boils down to a very simple concept. Partners are made up of people who, like all of us, need to feel part of something. There are over 600,000 technology partner companies worldwide, with millions of professionals working at them, who all need to connect, learn and engage to be the best they can be. (Want to know more about the size of the channel? Read here.)

Gartner reports that peer networking, associations and communities are the highest ranked ways that small and medium businesses learn, form opinions, and in the end, make decisions. However, these peer to peer connections are not made under some huge global umbrella organization. This is the crux of the problem I started with above - and a large reason that many channel programs under-deliver today.

What if you were able to sit down with millions of partners individually and ask them the following:

- What do you read?
- Who do you follow?
- What events do you attend? listen to? watch?
- How do you make vendor decisions?

The answers would probably surprise you - there are hundreds of sources of influence in the channel and they tend to have a very loyal and engaged subset of followers. (Want to learn more about marketing to a decentralized channel? Read here.)


10 MAJOR SOURCES OF INFLUENCE


1. Industry Media

In the technology and telecom space, there are 16 sizable media companies around the world who have been quick to recognize the communities trend, and have formed powerful offerings under their trusted brands. Looking at their advertising guides, you will quickly notice that unique readers are high among all of them.

Simply put, partners don't have the time to read a stack of magazines or a bunch of newsletters - they tend to choose only one brand to follow. How does this align with your media strategy?

2. Associations

There are numerous associations, both generic as well as hyper-focused. Surprisingly, the largest association in the world (by far) doesn't even reach 5% of the intended audience. Looking at your product portfolio, are you aligned with the macro and micro based communities where your partners are engaging?


3. Analysts

Depending on the size and maturity of partner channel you are recruiting, analyst firms can have a major impact on whether you are considered for your product category. Research by firms such as Gartner, IDC, Forrester, SiriusDecisions, and ZS Associates tend to carry a lot of weight as the size of partner grows.

There are hundreds of mid and smaller sized analysts that carry weight as channel consultants that also have power in making vendor decisions. Are you spending enough time building relationships (and getting into the right quadrant) in the analyst community?


4. Distributors

Depending on your product category, making the commitment to broadline or niche distribution will be important. From an influence perspective, especially in North America, the distributors have out-sized reach and marketing budgets to drive partner influence. Many small and midsized partners use distribution almost exclusively for learning and community.


5. Vendor communities

Several companies have built impressive communities that serve their ecosystem. For example, in the managed services world, companies such as ConnectWise and Autotask have built large and loyal followings of partners that they offer others opportunities to market through. There are many more examples ranging from SaaS ecosystems such as Salesforce Dreamforce to traditional vendors such as HP, Dell, Cisco and Lenovo.


6. Peer Groups

Many partners that I have worked with swear by peer groups. The ability to engage with like-minded folks and solve problems in a very human-centric way is a huge benefit for them. There are larger, more formal peer groups run by companies such as HTG, Taylor and TruMethods. In most cases, these peer groups try to avoid outside influence but do have sponsorships for events available. In some cases, vendors can actually participate.


7. Bloggers / Thought Leaders / Consultants

This is a broad group, but one that is important in breaking into several partners. I created a list recently on the Top 100 most visible people in the channel and many of these individuals ranked high on the list. Because they tend to be very visible, they have influence on a large number of partners across many of the communities mentioned here.


8. Tradeshows

There are over 150 channel-related technology tradeshows in the US alone each year. The majority of channel professionals will only attend 1 or 2 events so understanding your target partner and having a healthy tradeshow calendar is a must. I have written extensively on winning at tradeshows - including this infographic.


9. Social

Being on social means more than having company Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest accounts. There are some vendors currently winning this medium, with very socially-minded channel managers engaging at a personal level on these platforms. There are thousands of partners engaged, with real business being conducted by "people they like".


10. Shadow Channels

Having written about this for the past 6 months, I would be remiss if I didn't mention it here as a major influence. With 72% of technology decisions now being made by line of business professionals, other types of partners such as consultants, integrators, ISVs, industry-based professional services firms, born-in-the-cloud, and startups are all disrupting what traditional channels look like.  (Want to learn more about the rise of Shadow Channels? Read here.)

The shadow channel is currently the wild-west, but the professionals do need to connect, learn, and engage like everyone else. The question, as it applies to your business, is which of these types of partners are important and how do they answer the who/what/where questions asked above?

Friday, November 18, 2016

Dec 13: Webinar - The Future of Deal Registration

The Canadian Channel Chiefs Council (C4) is hosting a first of its kind webinar on a topic that has become the most hotly debated area in the channel today: deal registration. Taking place on Dec. 13th at 1 PM ET, the webinar will feature noted channel professional Jay McBain to outline what the future holds for deal registration programs in light of the recent announcement by Salesforce.com on its new Einstein tool.
Einstein is an artificial intelligence tool that promises to take all the data that organizations have dutifully been capturing to their CRM for years and put it to good use, at first making recommendations about what leads sales reps should call first, or what personalization path is most appropriate for a marketing campaign.
McBain, who was a channel executive at Lenovo, IBM and with Autotask, intends to provide the audience of this webinar new information on how artificial intelligence and machine learning is going to impact the channel. He believes tools such as Einstein are an exciting new thing that’s going to rapidly change the way vendors look at deal registration today.
But Einstein is not the only topic of discussion for this webinar. McBain also plans on unveiling new strategies on deal registration for those who are still developing their channel structure and programs. He also has ideas for what to do in terms of conflict resolution and the rules of engagement when it comes to deal registration.
McBain also plans on answering questions from channel chiefs and other channel professionals at the webinar.
To register for the webinar, click:

Thursday, October 27, 2016

100 Most Visible Channel Leaders - 2016



I have written in the past about Paul Revere and the applicability to the IT/Telecom Channel. It came from a chapter in Malcolm Gladwell's Tipping Point book. In the 'Law of the Few', Gladwell explains that a very select group of people are responsible for the "tipping" of almost all social epidemics. These people are special for their incredible abilities to communicate, teach, and persuade.

Check it out here.

Starting way back in 2009, when I moved to the U.S. from Canada, I began my fascination with how a huge global industry, with tens of millions of people across hundreds of thousands of companies, could be boiled down to about 100 influencers and superconnectors.

Back then, I collected all 16 channel magazines, attended dozens of tradeshows, studied associations, peer groups, bloggers and activity on social media and manually created a master spreadsheet. Every time I came across a keynote speaker, top industry list, writer, board member, trainer, community leader, or vendor/distributor executive, I would write their name, company and title down along with one check-mark. If I came across them again, another check-mark was given.

My hypothesis was that these connectors and influencers would be omnipresent in the industry - showing up at different shows, articles, press releases, top industry lists, communities, radio shows, and so on. A quick sort on check-marks would give me a visibility list - and what I thought was a solid influence list.

And I was mostly right.

Fast forward to today and I continue to keep track of numerous industry sources to keep the list updated. In fact, there are 36 sources that I regularly update including lists of channel leaders from leading global channel magazines, keynote speakers, various board and advisory council members, and others.

Disclaimer:  This is an objective view of the data - a scoring algorithm based on visibility across 36 different communities, importance factor, and timing recency. 

I do have another more subjective list that ranks people based on perceived influence, reach and leadership in the industry - but that is for another day.  :-)

A couple of interesting anecdotes:

1. The research tracks 2,855 people with multiple community touchpoints across 1,702 companies.
2. Social media activity is high among the top 100 - 65% of them are on Twitter, with just under half of those having 1,000+ followers. 99% of them are on Linkedin - here is looking at you Mike Cullen :-)

Anyway, here is a stack-ranked list of the top 100 IT/Telecom industry leaders by visibility:

1.  Rob Rae, Vice President of Business Development , Datto   Points: 57
2.  Janet Schijns, Vice President Global Channels, Verizon   Points: 50
3.  Dave Sobel, Senior Director of Partner Community, Solarwinds MSP   Points: 49
4.  Len DiCostanzo, SVP, Community and Business Development, Autotask   Points: 48
5.  Arnie Bellini, CEO, ConnectWise   Points: 48
6.  MJ Shoer, Chief Technology Officer, Internet & Telephone   Points: 44
7.  Vince Tinnirello, CEO, Anchor Network Solutions   Points: 41
8.  Craig Schlagbaum, VP, Indirect Channel Sales, Comcast   Points: 40
9.  Brooks McCorcle, President, Partner Solutions, AT&T   Points: 38
10.  Scott Barlow, VP, Global MSP, Sales & Marketing   Points: 37
11.  Ted Roller, Owner, GetChanneled   Points: 36
12.  Gary Pica, Owner, TruMethods   Points: 34
13.  Arlin Sorensen, CEO & Founder, HTG Peer Groups   Points: 34
14.  Renee Bergeron, Vice President, Cloud Computing, Ingram Micro Inc.   Points: 31
15.  Larry Walsh, CEO and Chief Analyst, The 2112 Group   Points: 30
16.  Jason Bystrak, Executive Director - The Americas, Ingram Micro   Points: 30
17.  Mary Ellen Grom, VP US Marketing, Synnex   Points: 29
18.  Dave Seibert, President, SMB TechFest   Points: 29
19.  Wendy Bahr, SVP Global Partner Organization, Cisco Systems   Points: 28
20.  Dina Moskowitz, CEO, SaaSMAX Corp.   Points: 28
21.  Shannon Mayer, Vice President of Channel Development, ASCII   Points: 28
22.  Neal Bradbury, Co-founder & VP of Channel Development, Intronis Inc.   Points: 28
23.  David Graffia, VP Sales, dinCloud   Points: 28
24.  Mike Cullen, VP of Sales, Solarwinds MSP   Points: 28
25.  Tiffani Bova, Global, Customer Growth and Innovation Evangelist, Salesforce   Points: 27
26.  Stuart Crawford, CEO, Ulistic   Points: 27
27.  Karl Palachuk, Owner, Small Biz Thoughts   Points: 27
28.  Ted Hulsy, VP of Marketing, eFolder   Points: 27
29.  Ed Correia, CEO, Sagacent Technologies   Points: 27
30.  Stuart Selbst, President, Infratactix   Points: 26
31.  Nancy Hammervik, Senior Vice President Industry Relations, CompTIA   Points: 26
32.  Toni Clayton-Hine, VP, Global Marketing & Value Proposition, Xerox   Points: 26
33.  Darrin Swan, CEO, CloudRunner   Points: 25
34.  Cheryl Cook, Vice President, Global Channels & Alliances, Dell   Points: 24
35.  Meredith Caram, Executive Director - AT&T Partner Solutions, AT&T   Points: 24
36.  Jamison West, Founder & CEO, Arterian   Points: 24
37.  Carmen Sorice, SVP, Global Channel Sales and Programs, Sungard AS   Points: 24
38.  Shannon Sbar, VP Channels North America, APC by Schneider Electric   Points: 24
39.  Leslie Bois, Vice President Channel Sales-North America , Kaspersky Lab   Points: 24
40.  Michelle Accardi, Chief Operating Officer, Star2Star Communications   Points: 24
41.  Brooke Cunningham, AVP, Global Partner Programs & Operations, Splunk   Points: 23
42.  Jeannine Edwards, Sr Director, Platform Strategy, ConnectWise   Points: 23
43.  Luis Alvarez, President & CEO, Alvarez Technology Group   Points: 23
44.  Dan Wensley, President, Passportal   Points: 23
45.  Alessandra Brambilla, Vice President WW, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise   Points: 23
46.  Curtiz Gangi, Vice President, US Channels, Datacenter Segment, Eaton   Points: 23
47.  Frank Vitagliano, VP North American Partner Sales, Dell   Points: 23
48.  Bob Gault, EVP Worldwide Sales Services Channels, Extreme Networks   Points: 23
49.  Scott Dunsire, VP GM Americas Channels, Hewlett Packard Enterprise   Points: 23
50.  Todd Thibodeaux, CEO, CompTIA   Points: 22
51.  Bill Lipsin, VP Worldwide Channels, NetApp   Points: 22
52.  Amy Babinchak, Owner, ThirdTier   Points: 22
53.  Theresa Caragol, Founder & Consultant, Theresa Caragol Consulting   Points: 22
54.  Kevin Royalty, Managing Partner, Total Care Computer Consulting   Points: 22
55.  Susan Bradley, Partner, TSHB   Points: 22
56.  Justin Crotty, Senior Vice President Channel Sales and Marketing, NetEnrich   Points: 21
57.  Tracy Pound, Managing Director, Maximity Limited   Points: 21
58.  Carolyn April, Senior Director of Industry Research, CompTIA   Points: 21
59.  Barbara Spicek, VP Worldwide Channel Sales, Gigamon   Points: 21
60.  Colleen Kapase, VP Partner GTM, Incentives and Programs, VMWare   Points: 21
61.  Donna Grothjan, VP WW Channel Distribution, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise   Points: 21
62.  Kendra Krause, VP Channels, Sophos   Points: 21
63.  Cindy Bates, Vice President US SMB, Microsoft   Points: 20
64.  Kimberly Martin, VP, Worldwide Partner Strategy & Sales, Citrix Systems   Points: 20
65.  Erick Simpson, Co-Founder, Senior Vice President and CIO, SPC International   Points: 20
66.  Terry Hedden, CEO, Marketopia   Points: 20
67.  James Foxall, President, Tigerpaw Software   Points: 20
68.  Ron Culler, CTO, Secure Designs Inc.   Points: 20
69.  Carl Mazzanti, Founder and CEO, eMazzanti Technologies   Points: 20
70.  Colleen Browne, Director, NA Channel and Enterprise Sales, Viewsonic   Points: 20
71.  Linda Brotherton, General Manager, ConnectWise   Points: 20
72.  Alex Rogers, CEO, CharTec   Points: 20
73.  Mary Campbell, Vice President of Marketing, D&H Distributing   Points: 20
74.  Steven Banks, President, Banks Consulting Northwest Inc.   Points: 20
75.  Jeanne Hopkins, Senior Vice President & CMO, Continuum Managed Services   Points: 19
76.  Vincent Brissot, Head of Channel Marketing & Operations, HP   Points: 19
77.  Marie Rourke, Owner & President, WhiteFox Marketing and Communications   Points: 19
78.  Greg VanDeWalker, SVP and General Manager, GreatAmerica Leasing   Points: 19
79.  Paul Dippell, CEO, Service Leadership   Points: 19
80.  Julie Hens, Vice President, U.S./Canada Channels Distribution, Cisco Systems   Points: 19
81.  Craig West, SVP, Channel Sales, NetSuite   Points: 19
82.  Jim Lippie, Chief Advisor, Clarity Channel Advisors   Points: 19
83.  Nancy Reynolds, Vice President, Americas Channel Sales, LogRhythm   Points: 19
84.  Barry Williams, Executive Director, Indirect Channel Sales, Comcast   Points: 19
85.  Robin Robins, Owner, Technology Marketing Toolkit   Points: 18
86.  Phil Sorgen, Corporate VP - U.S. Enterprise and Partner Group, Microsoft   Points: 18
87.  Jed Ayres, CEO, IGEL Technology   Points: 18
88.  Jane Cage, Managing Principal, InsightFive22   Points: 18
89.  Peter Sandiford, CEO, Netsone Technologies   Points: 18
90.  Jan Spring, Vice President, Channel Development, eFolder   Points: 18
91.  Gavin Garbutt, Strategic Advisor, VIPSoftware Co.   Points: 18
92.  Jerry Koutavas, President, ASCII   Points: 18
93.  Harry Brelsford, Director of Business Development, LeadSCORZ   Points: 18
94.  Terry Wise, Vice President, WW Alliances, Channels and Ecosystem, Amazon   Points: 18
95.  Vince Bradley, CEO, WTG   Points: 18
96.  Tricia Atchison, Vice President, Global Partner Marketing, CA Technologies   Points: 17
97.  Amy Luby, Vice President Sales - US, Sinefa   Points: 17
98.  Zak Karsan, Co-Founder, SecureEDEN   Points: 17
99.  Dee Dee Acquista, Vice President, WW Channel Sales, Proofpoint   Points: 17
100.  Erin Malone, Vice President, NA Channel Sales, Sophos   Points: 17

Next time you are at an industry conference, make sure to say hi to these folks. 

Applying the law of Kevin Bacon, you will be one-degree of separation of millions of people by knowing these leaders. Also, follow them on Twitter and Linkedin - some of the best thought leadership you will find anywhere!


Thursday, October 20, 2016

Michelle Ragusa-McBain Named by Entrepreneur Magazine as one of 4 Role Models Who Inspire Girls to Pursue Tech Careers!



Congratulations to my wife, Michelle Ragusa-McBain, who was just named by Entrepreneur Magazine as one of 4 Role Models Who Inspire Girls to Pursue Tech Careers! 

Link:  https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/283994

Think back to the last time you were asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Now think about why you gave the answer you did.

When you’re young, you don’t know what you don’t know -- and you can’t aspire to be something you don’t know either. Our early career preferences are shaped by what we read about or watch, what we learn in school and most directly, what we see the people around us doing for a living.

Today, research suggests that the presence of role models isn’t just essential to defining students’ dream jobs, but to rectifying the IT industry’s gender disparity.

Dispelling tech career stereotypes

Only 23 percent of middle and high-school girls surveyed said they had considered pursuing IT careers, according to CompTIA’s recent research report, Make Tech Her Story: What Needs to Change to Inspire Girls’ Pursuit of Tech Careers. Of the girls surveyed who hadn't envisioned IT in their future, 69 percent didn't know what these jobs entailed or what opportunities were available.

Surprisingly, exposure to technology classes and fondness for video games aren’t the main differentiators between girls who contemplate IT careers and those who don’t -- it’s role models. Although 37 percent of girls in the survey who knew a relative or friend who worked in IT, this number jumped to 60 percent among girls considering technology jobs.

Many girls today narrowly associate IT jobs with working in consumer tech support roles, or spending hours alone in a cubicle, crunching numbers on a screen. But when girls have a friend or relative who works in the industry, their perception of IT starts to expand beyond the stereotypes.

Ongoing mentorship from a passionate IT professional -- someone who can explain why she loves what she does -- gives girls a lens through which they can view their own futures.

If we expect to fill the almost 600,000 new IT jobs projected to be created by 2024, we need to inspire a new class of equal parts boys and girls to follow these career paths. This requires giving girls information: details about what skills are needed to work in IT (beyond math and science), the jobs that exist (beyond coding) and the multiplicity of benefits these jobs offer (from competitive salaries to the ability to travel and help others). Role models are some of the most powerful vehicles for delivering this information.

There are no strict criteria for who can be a strong role model. From founders to public servants, many women work in IT today whose stories can empower girls to consider this growing field. Here are four women with diverse backgrounds who take time (during and outside of their day jobs) to make the IT industry more open and supportive:

Angie Chang

Over the last decade, Angie Chang has worked tirelessly to create opportunities for women in IT. Her resume includes her having co-founded Women 2.0, an online and events-based community for female business and technology entrepreneurs, and having launched the Bay Area-chapter of Geek Girl Dinners, a group bringing local women in tech together for networking and talks hosted by brands like Microsoft and Facebook.

Today, Chang is a vice president at Hackbright Academy, a software engineering school that aims to increase women’s representation in the IT industry.

Michelle Ragusa McBain

Michelle Ragusa McBain is an 11-year Cisco veteran and mother of four devoted to making the technology sector more inclusive. Today, she serves as Cisco’s global customer and partner experience manager, overseeing the company’s alliance with Ingram Micro.

Since 2014, Ragusa McBain has been the executive chair of CompTIA’s Advancing Women in IT community, a group providing women with the resources they need to pursue and grow their IT careers, and helping technology employers create cultures that support a more diverse workforce.



Jessica Williams

Jessica Williams began her career by earning a master’s degree in information systems and then building a background in systems integration. But a trip to a Spark & Hustle event opened her eyes to the world of entrepreneurship. In 2011, Williams founded Tech Biz Gurl, a technology consultancy that advises business owners on everything from launching WordPress sites to managing email marketing campaigns.

Aside from holding Cisco and CompTIA certifications, Williams is a co-facilitator for WiSTEM, a 16-week educational program dedicated to assisting female technology entrepreneurs with funding, community and IT resources.

Brenna Berman

As the commissioner and CIO of Chicago’s Department of Innovation and Technology, Brenna Berman has set a new national standard for open, agile and data-driven local government. Role models played a crucial role in her career (which includes more than 10 years at IBM): her uncle was a pioneering computer science professor who introduced her to computers as early as kindergarten.

In addition to overseeing IT initiatives for the third largest city in America, Berman sits on the board of the Chicago Entrepreneurial Center, a nonprofit group that manages 1871, the city’s startup community hub.

In sum, for girls figuring about what to be when they grow up, information is power. Although parents and teachers play a major part in shaping girls’ preferences, role models are uniquely equipped to reshape girls’ perception of IT.

By sharing their stories and guidance, the women who represent today's small female fraction of the IT industry can make that industry more balanced tomorrow.



Entrepreneur Article written by TODD THIBODEAUX, President and Chief Executive Officer, CompTIA.

Tuesday, October 18, 2016

THE RISE OF SHADOW CHANNELS - 5 New Competitive Threats for IT and Telecom Partners



I have written extensively this year about the changes happening in the traditional IT and telecom channels. Here are some of the major industry trends that have accelerated these changes:

  • 30% decline in the number of traditional channel partners since recession of 2008
  • 40% of partner owner/principals plan to retire in the next 8 years
  • 75% of technical professional services will be delivered by millennials at that time
  • 72% of all customer technology decisions led by Lines of Business (growing to 90%)


We know that millennials are not joining leadership/ownership roles within traditional channel companies in sufficient numbers. Business models based on managed services, client/server management, hardware sales, and break-fix do not seem to be enticing the next generation.

Channel margins have been challenged for over a decade, with eroding hardware, software and services resell opportunities. Further, increased competition and more efficient tools and processes has commoditized the delivery of IT and telecom. There is also a degree of consumerization that threatens traditional cash cows with the rise of Apple, Google and the like.

Millennials are joining the broader technology industry and other industries that are radically transforming themselves into tech companies. Read the annual reports of the Fortune 500 and you would think that they are all technology companies.

The changes in how companies make technology decisions, led by the lines of business, used to be called “shadow IT” or “rogue IT”, but today is the new normal. This change in the customer buying journey has been heavily influenced and accelerated by several “shadow channels”.


Who are these shadow channels?


The shadow channel is a broad and diverse group of companies from all backgrounds who engage, influence, recommend and even resell technology to lines of business. It is useful to break them into categories:
  1. SaaS ecosystem consultants and integration partners
  2. Independent Software Vendors (ISVs)
  3. Industry-based professional services firms
  4.  “Born in the Cloud” IT and telecom firms
  5.  Start-ups looking to disrupt traditional industries


Let’s take a closer look…


1.  SaaS ecosystem consultants and integration partners


The growth of the software-as-a-service industry since early in 2000 has been staggering. Major, multi-billion dollar revenue streams are still growing north of 30% - 15 years later.

We are now seeing clear winners in each of the line of business categories. For example, 10 years ago there were over 300 CRM solutions competing in a very fragmented market. Salesforce has now secured almost 1/5 of all CRM opportunity and competes in a more narrow, established market between on-premises and cloud offerings.

Other winners include companies like Marketo, Netsuite, Workday and many others. All of these winners have built impressive ecosystems around their products where all boats are rising – and quickly. For example, Salesforce has over 1,000 partners globally that drive over $20B in revenue. That is estimated to be $4.14 for every $1 a customer spends on the CRM license (according to IDC). Similar numbers are seen across all LOB ecosystems.

This is primarily consulting and integration revenue. The Salesforce ISV and customized developer partnerships drive billions of more dollars of value. In fact, Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, outlined a $290B ecosystem opportunity value over the next 5 years for those that want to compete.

According to Goldman Sachs research, the SaaS economy drives $106B in revenue this year, growing by 30% CAGR for the foreseeable future. With the opportunity of $5 for every SaaS dollar, we are looking at a half-trillion dollar opportunity that hasn’t yet been realized. I personally don’t believe the number is that high, but anything multiplied by $106B is significant.


2.  Independent Software Vendors (ISVs)


Keeping on the Salesforce example, the ISV ecosystem is called AppExchange and it has 3,000 apps, generating 4 million downloads, $20B in ISV revenue (including a sizable chunk that Salesforce takes off the top in a revenue share). An impressive 75% of their customers use Apps in addition to the core software.

There are several unicorns (companies worth over $1B in market value) that are completely reliant on these SaaS ecosystems. Adding tools, workflow, customized and specialized industry solutions, and other value adds is a very lucrative environment for entrepreneurs. The investment community of venture capitalists are also eager to back companies in these ecosystems with hundreds of dedicated funds.

The shadow competition comes in the form of free services. In the rush to grab share, many ISVs (and the investment community behind them) measure recurring revenue on the software and tend to give away or look negatively upon one-time, project based services.


3.  Industry-based professional services firms


Every company is being forced to become a technology company. Whether it is a car company with Tesla sneaking up, transportation company with Uber, hospitality company with AirBNB, or any other of the 27 industries, technological disruption is threatening traditional companies with extinction.

This means that every ancillary service or consulting company supporting these industries is being forced into technology as well.

CompTIA did an excellent piece of research in late 2015 focused on the professional services vertical. Looking specifically at accounting, legal and marketing firms they drew a couple of important conclusions:
  1. These verticals are huge, rivaling the size of the IT and Telecom Channel in terms of number of firms. The best estimate for IT firms in North America is 160,000 while legal has 190,000, accounting has 133,160 and marketing has 105,180.
  2. More than just size, these companies are rapidly converging into the broader IT and Telecom space. For example, 51% of accounting firms resell software today, with 33% more considering it. The numbers are similar for offering IT compliance, consulting, advisory and assessments.

By the year 2020, more than 80% of accounting and marketing firms will be indistinguishable from traditional IT channel partners. Legal is slightly lower at 55%, but still heading the same direction.

Now think about every company, in every industry becoming a competitor for these technology dollars that lines of business are increasingly spending. This casts a huge shadow and is very tough to compete with.


4.  “Born in the Cloud” IT and telecom firms


Much has been written about born in the cloud – and most of it turned out to be wrong.

Don’t get me wrong, there are many successful companies that have been started in the cloud era, with business models purpose-built for this environment, and finding success as brokers, integrators and building trust within lines of business. I spoke at an Ingram Cloud event earlier in the year with 1,300 of these eager folks in attendance.

The great influx of millennial, born-in-the-cloud VARs and MSPs hasn’t materialized as predicted however. The technology industry is struggling to stay in the top 10 of most desired industries for college grads.

Technology is so intertwined with business today that younger people look to themselves as sales, marketing, HR, operations or finance leaders and that technology is an obvious and ubiquitous part of their job role.

With all that said, born in the cloud is still a formidable shadow channel as the skill level is high, business model optimized and energy level high.


5.  Start-ups looking to disrupt traditional industries


It is difficult to measure startups, as many countries don’t keep track. The best estimate from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor is there are about 613 million people trying to start about 396 million businesses. About one third will be launched, so you can assume 133 million new firm births per year, with just shy of 2 million of those being technology startups.

Forbes reported 50,000 companies get Angel funding in the US, with 4,000 of those moving on to secure venture capital funding per year.

These are big numbers – but safe to say that innovation and entrepreneurship is as hot as ever. Each of these companies have a new idea or, what they think, is a better way to do things.

The shadow channel effect is that traditional service-based opportunities could be automated, replaced or deemed redundant in the future. The traditional channel is not immune to the reported 47% of jobs that could be replaced by artificial intelligence, machines and robotics in the near future.


Summary


It is hard to predict the impact of each of these shadow channels against the future technology opportunity. We do know that competition for traditional partners is shifting from the business across the street to a myriad of influencers on end customers.

The good news is that the pie is also growing. The technology industry is expected to grow by 5.1% this year and is looking positive for years to come. The skills and resources to take advantage of this pie look much different than they did even 3 years ago.

The shadow channel is currently the wild west - the equivalent of where the traditional channel was maturity-wise in the early 1990’s. They are putting customer businesses at risk everyday by playing fast and loose with customer data, financial and even HR data. Proprietary information is flying everywhere across public clouds by smaller startups with little control or regard for the ramifications (or regulations).

The traditional channel has an opportunity to play a crucial role. Through strategic partnerships of their own, mergers, acquisitions, hiring/adopting the right skills, as well as business model changes, they can ensure that maturity is injected back into the system. Things like business continuity, security and compliance are critical requirements of  the LOBs – and very few in the shadow channels can execute at this point.



Sunday, September 18, 2016

Initial Review of iPhone 7 Plus

Well, the 24 hour mark has hit since picking up my iPhone 7 Plus 128GB in flat black. Here are my initial thoughts.

Verdict:  Ho-hum

The acquisition process was more painful than normal. I faithfully stayed up to 3AM EST on preorder day and placed order for Michelle's Rose Gold 7 Plus as well as my own in fancy Jet Black Plus. Because the order went through at 3 minutes after 3:00am, the Jet Black was already showing late October for delivery.

Tip to Apple: After screwing up supply planning on the new Gold color a few years back, perhaps you should be more bullish on your customer's quest to get new colors. How about an early order window for all free trade-in contracts to test what the color/feature mix would be?

I was able to change over the order a few days later to a flat black version and secure delivery on the first day at 9:00am, September 16, 2016. Michelle was still out of luck on the Rose Gold into October.

The first major snag came on restore of new phone. After waiting almost an hour in the Apple Store for process to be complete, it failed at 1% with the following unhelpful message:


I decided to try again with an older backup - same thing, after 1 hour it failed at 1% remaining. I updated the phone to iOS 10.0.1 and tried again to no avail.  As a last resort, I followed the bare-metal restore to factory settings via the DFU Mode - also to no avail.

So, I was defeated. Started a new phone and downloaded hundreds of apps and tuned to what I remembered on my old phone. Next time I will back up to iTunes AND iCloud the night before. I lost my health history which seems to be the biggest issue.

After a long day (and night) - it was time to start Saturday fresh with a new phone.

First up: mow the grass while listening to music on headphones. I plugged the the new Lightning dongle adapter and Skull Candy headphones. Everything worked as advertised however I couldn't make out any improvement of digital over analog sound. There was an adverse effect - in 90 minutes of listening, it burned up 30% of my battery. I checked the battery monitor and "Music" was the culprit.

In the analog days, I could listen for hours and barely dent the battery. Does the new digital port have a big weakness?

Side bar: I applaud Apple for getting rid of the analog headphone jack. As an IBM/Lenovo guy for 17 years selling PCs, I do think it takes courage to take away the floppy, CD-ROM, serial and parallel ports, and now the last remaining analog remnant on their products. This was something that the Wintel industry would never do as they were focused on making enterprise clients happy - the consumer was always an afterthought.

Second up: Play with the family on the neighbors slide. This gave me a good chance to put the dual cameras to use. The 2X optical zoom and some of the advanced effects are a real leap forward. The ability to emulate some of the advanced DSLR portrait effects is really cool. Having 2 cameras working independently and having software stitch together the results will change the game for photography moving forward. Watch this space for incredible artistry.

Third up: Go see a Weird Al Yankovic concert and test out low-light settings. Because of the music battery fiasco early in the day, I did have to find a charger for the car ride over to Schenectady however. The video camera worked "at par" with previous phones in this environment. I was hoping for better focusability so the artist wasn't a white-out when a spotlight was on - but I wasn't able to take advantage of the 2 cameras here.

Other observations:

- They are obviously doing the big refresh on the 10 year anniversary with the iPhone 8. This seemed like more of a "S" release. I will call this my iPhone 6SS.

- I like the water resistance to IP67. Not as good as Samsung, but a big step forward for reliability and those occasional rain/boating accidents.

- Because the lower button is now digital and not a physical mechanism, the taptic feedback was cool. Took a number of times to get used to it. Also, to hard reset the phone, you need to hold down Power and Lower Volume buttons instead.

- iOS 10 is a linear improvement over previous versions. I am excited about the Siri integration within apps as well as mapping integrations with 3rd parties. The new Home app is a future win once the cost of IoT devices comes down. I refuse to be a wide early adopter of plastic devices that cost $300 a piece. Homekit is the much-needed industry standard for millions of devices that are coming to market - not an open standard by any means, but at least a popular one.

- Performance wise, I can't tell any difference on the new A10 chipset. Partially because these are not processing devices, the network is the bottleneck. I do like the dual stereo speakers and volume which is much higher than previous.

Conclusion: This is a linear bump to the product line - more of a "S" product than a new model. I will call this my iPhone 6SS Plus until the iPhone 8 comes out with things like wireless charging, edge to edge OLED screens, and more.


Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Nautical Adventures of the McBain Family

As a family, we love the cruising lifestyle.

Charting new ground across the North East and seeing new sights every time. Here is a visual of thousands of miles of waters and ports seen to date.

(CLICK TO MAKE LARGER)

More detailed trip plans are here:

http://www.jaymcbain.com/2015/07/the-bayliner-chronicles-1000-miles-in-2.html


And the backstory of how the nautical adventure life started:

http://www.jaymcbain.com/2014/12/my-nautical-story-adventure-on-high-seas.html


Tuesday, August 30, 2016

ChannelEyes Provides An Extra Set Of "Eyes" On Your Channel



OPTYX is a predictive analytics platform developed by the team at ChannelEyes that is 100% dedicated to indirect channel sales teams. It helps vendors by watching their partners, people and opportunities and providing real-time sales intelligence to drive more revenue. By analyzing millions of data points, both internally and externally, it calculates the impact that channels have on winning opportunities and the lift that partner interactions have.

It alerts channel sales people with the things they need to know, and prioritize when they need to action. Talking to the right partners at the right time about the right things can generate up to 10% lift in channel revenue.

By watching every opportunity in real-time, OPTYX generates a rolling confidence score based on 65 unique attributes. These scores are constantly changing and it understands what timely actions are needed to ensure success. Out of the box, it achieves over 90% accuracy on forecasting at an overall channel level.

It also watches each channel sales territory and builds stack-ranked lists of hard to measure KPI's. Answering the age-old question:

"Have you ever wondered if you have a great salesperson in a bad territory or a weak one in a good territory?"

By knowing the likelihood of winning every deal, OPTYX produces unique "save and fumble" reports by salesperson. Looking at their activity level, it can ascertain their efficiency level and understand the lift (or lack thereof) that they drive in their territories.

The team at ChannelEyes knows that partners have an out-sized impact on sales success. OPTYX provides automated sales intelligence and workflow to capture up to 10% more in channel revenue.

It is the first predictive analytics software platform that is 100% dedicated to indirect channel sales. It works hand-in-hand with Salesforce and is an easy 5 minute install via the Appexchange.

Friday, August 12, 2016

Robin Williams committed suicide 2 years ago - what if Michael Phelps did too?

The news about Robin Williams was so shocking at the time. How could someone so full of life and who created so much happiness in others be depressed?

The good news, is that it became one of the turning points in our understanding and compassion for mental health issues. Beyond the laughter, that will be his greatest and most enduring gift to humanity.

There are some startling facts about suicide:

  • 10th leading cause of death in the U.S.
  • 42,773 Americans die each year
  • Over 1 million attempt suicide each year - that is a large city.
  • White males account for 70% of all suicides
  • Guns are used 50% of the time, suffocation 27% and poisoning 16%

Most people didn't think about this morbid anniversary because we are preoccupied with the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.  

Perhaps this graphic would remind us that it can happen to anyone, anytime:



Be good to each other - and watch out for your family, friends and neighbors.

- Jay


Wednesday, August 3, 2016

An Open Letter to CompTIA

As the time counts down on another successful ChannelCon, I wanted to document some thoughts before I return back to the grind.

First and foremost, the event this year in Fort Lauderdale was fantastic, the CompTIA staff is amazing, and the get-together feels like a family reunion (even comes complete with some crazy uncles and aunts!).

Two years ago, Todd Thibodeaux, CEO of CompTIA said two things that I personally found startling about the channel:

  • 40% of partners are going to retire in the next 10 years
  • 75% of the channel will be made up of millennials at the end of those 10 years.

These are both coming true, and probably faster than predicted.



Herein lies the challenge for the traditional IT and Telecom channel, and CompTIA in particular. 

Millennials are not joining leadership/ownership roles within “our” channel. They are, however, joining the broader technology industry and other industries that are radically transforming themselves into tech companies.

Todd mentioned in this year’s keynote that Technology was struggling to stay in the Top 10 of desirable industries. With the surge of AI, virtual reality, robotics, IoT, mobility, self driving cars, Pokemon and other cool stuff – this seems perplexing.

When Marc Andreeson predicted that “software will eat the world” 5 years ago, we felt that the channel would lead the charge on driving this change with their customers. With deep skills in security, infrastructure, compliance, and a host of other important things, the IT industry would enjoy a renaissance of sorts.


Well, the opposite has happened.


IT departments have steadily lost power, and the CIO has relinquished purchasing control to the line of business executives. In fact, Gartner reports that 72% of all technology spend is now being led out of LOBs – much of the time without IT influence. In only a few years, this will be 90%.

This was once called “shadow IT” or “rogue IT”, but today is the new normal. Much to the surprise of CompTIA, and the channel industry as a whole, this change in customer behavior has also spawned the “shadow channel”.

The shadow channel is predominantly made up of “born in the cloud” millennials that have built successful businesses inside the ecosystems of SaaS companies. For example, Salesforce has 695 partners that drive over $20B in services – none of them present at ChannelCon.


In fact, NONE of the Top 100 SaaS companies in the world had a booth at ChannelCon 2016.


Dreamforce, an annual conference in San Francisco (run by Salesforce) is now the largest software tradeshow in the world. With over 150,000 attendees, you can see the new shadow channel in action – consultants, integrators, and other experts at serving the LOB customer, solving customer pain points and delivering real business outcomes.

As much as we try to convince ourselves differently, things like security, backup, disaster recovery, remote management and the plethora of other business critical solutions the channel faithfully delivers, do not drive business outcomes in the same way. Hence, the disconnect.

While the traditional channel has shrunk by more than 30%, the shadow channel has exploded in numbers over the same time period.

Not only did none of the Top 100 SaaS companies have a booth at ChannelCon, their partners were not in attendance either. CompTIA needs to immerse into their ecosystems to understand where (and if) it can provide value. Where do they go to learn? How do they certify their people? What do they read? Who do they follow? How do they run their businesses?

THIS is the channel of 2024, where 75% of the participants will be millennials. By then, we won't be calling it shadow channel any longer - it will be the new normal. Does CompTIA represent and lead this new channel or stay with whatever is left of the traditional one?


Action needs to be taken – and fast.


The shadow channel is currently the wild west - the equivalent of where our channel was maturity-wise in the early 1990’s. They are putting customer businesses at risk everyday by playing fast and loose with customer data, financial and even HR data. Proprietary information is flying everywhere across public clouds by smaller startups with little control or regard for the ramifications (or regulations).

The traditional channel has the opportunity to play the adult in the room. It may not be sexy to talk about business continuity, security or compliance with LOBs – but someone needs to do it. If the IT department is losing power, the channel needs to step up to protect these customers. Mistakes in these areas can cause business-ending catastrophes or even put executives in jail.

CompTIA, its members, staff and Board all need to take stock. Software is eating its world too. Larger hardware and software companies are busy making a pivot for survival (perhaps why they weren’t exhibiting this time around) and the association needs to as well.

These LOB focused SaaS companies – as well as their partners and ecosystems – are the future of IT, at least for the next decade. How does CompTIA help train them? How does it speak for them in Washington? How does it design communities and councils to attract them? How does it deliver relevant research and events?


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