STAREAST 2018 - Women Who Test Sessions
Friday, May 4
It's Not All Rainbows & Unicorns (The Picture This Clothing Story)
When Picture This Clothing launched in August of 2016 and instantly went viral, the media made it sound like Jaimee was a "simple mom" who stumbled upon a great idea and struck gold. What they didn't share is the teamwork, the trials-and-error, and the years of work that happened before this viral success. While her current day-to-day is quite literally surrounded with imagination, unicorns, and rainbows, Jaimee delves into the struggle of self-worth, re-designing her life, and how her compass of intention positioned everything that has unfolded as she shares the story of how Picture This...
Societal Influence on the Gender Imbalance in Technology
When we look at today's gender imbalance in the tech field, it's easy to doubt ourselves and wonder if we even belong. However, the fact of the matter is that at one point in time, women dominated technology. Not only did we outnumber men, but we excelled - to the point that tech was considered a woman's sport. So, what changed? How could we have possibly gone from the initial innovators and dominating force of tech to now being vastly underrepresented? Let's take a trip back to the 1980’s, the period where there was a sharp decline in the number of women entering the tech field. You'll be...
The Power of Collective Experience
Bring your biggest challenges to this session and tap the wisdom of others. In this immersive session, you will tackle some of the most widely mentioned challenges brought to light from the group. Whether it’s a software testing conundrum, a project setback, a management blocker, a group or team dysfunction or an interpersonal hurdle, all of these can slow our progress and reduce our effectiveness. And when we hunt for options, we all have blind spots and biases that prevent us from thinking out of the box and finding new and different solutions. Typically the best ideas come from...
The Tester's Three C’s: Communication, Criticism, Confidence
Whether you are in an independent testing team and need to communicate formally or in an agile context communicating face-to-face, it can be difficult to do your job well when you are telling people what they don’t want to hear. Dot Graham presents examples of different types and styles of communication, including Virginia Satir’s communication interaction model, that can help you get your points across without rancor. Dot examines criticism—what it is, different types, and the DASR (Describing, Acknowledging, Specifying, and Reaffirming) model for sharing criticism. Since testers are...
Panel–Career Superpowers
Let’s discuss and define the most important career superpowers for women. Hear what industry professionals, leaders, and idea disruptors think the important career superpowers are for women in 2018 and going forward.
Building Your Personal Brand for Success
Building the right personal brand is one of the critical success factors in today’s workplace. Organizations develop a brand and image, but not many individuals think about their personal brand and how it can affect their career. As we interact with people, we want to influence them to support our efforts—approving projects, budgets, and funding; supporting our next career move; or recommending us for that promotion or raise we want. As a professional, it is critical to understand how you are being perceived by your “target audience.” During this interactive session Jennifer shares ideas...