On 20th May, 2017 we hosted our first open meetup for our community members at CED, IBA. The agenda for this event was to meet and greet other members and get to know each other better. We hosted 33 brilliant Women in Technology/Business and requested them to tell their stories and how they have overcome problems that life has thrown their way so far.
Anum Kamran (CEO – Buyon.pk) welcomed us all and asked me to put forward the agenda. The session had no moderation and we let our members talk about things that are important to them. We heard stories about career switches, domestic and social barriers, entrepreneurship as well as beating down the inner inertia.
The members also talked about the present situation in Tech industry and how to add more diversity to our workplaces. Other topics included, continuing education while raising a family and ways to cope up with the fast paced life of today.
We also had a little activity planned for our participants so that they can network better. We added some rules in our meetup badges for them to follow and also introduced them to each other personally during the tea break.
Few of our generous members also put together a little favor bag for the participants that included discount coupons and other items. This way, we tried to have the entrepreneurs in our group get some well-deserved promotion. We also had students in the meetup and we hooked them up with some notable professionals for career advice.
I would personally like to thank Anum Kamran (CEO – Buyon.pk) for hosting us and for the giveaways, to NoorJehan and Maheen (Partners – Mushawar Consulting) for discount vouchers, to Sukaina Abbas (CEO – Enchante) for discount vouchers, to Madiha Yusuf Ahmed (CEO – ComfortCark.pk and Maddygital) for the notebooks and to Usra Sami (Assistant Professor – Iqra University) for helping us pull it off.
This meetup helped us get to know each other and to find ways to contribute better towards a more inclusive future for Women in Technology.
If you like to join our community, please check here (its Women only).
If you want to read about our first focus group, please check here.
If you want to know some stats about Women in Technology, see here and here.
If you want to read me ranting about random things, follow me on twitter (or don’t!) :p
Picture Credits: Sukaina Abbas, Usra Sami and Anum Kamran
