Category Archives for community

Finally — A Family Friendly Conference

The Anita Borg Institute issued a press release today saying that full childcare will be offered at the next Grace Hopper Celebration (GHC) (in October in Orlando). Says the release:

A technical conference, GHC is the largest gathering of women in computing in the United States. Childcare is a relatively new and unique offering at a technical conference, typically dominated by men.

As Deanna Kosaraju, GHC Program Manager at the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, points out:

We recognize that many women have multiple jobs and we are leading on this issue to find creative ways to help our women-technologist care for their families as well as their professional and technical development. The GHC conference is a signal to other technical conferences and to industry that in order to attract, retain and advance women the culture of computing needs to change.

This childcare will span the entire length of the conference, including all keynotes, sessions, and banquets, etc. But it’s not just women who benefit. This benefits:

  1. Anyone who has a child ages zero and up. Presumably by the time your children area 18, this isn’t an issue anymore, but if you’ve got kids who can’t be ‘home alone,’ and you’re the primary caregiver, chances are you’ve missed out on some career-building events in your life. With more childcare in strategic places (and that includes companies), you stand to lose far fewer opportunities. This includes mothers as well as fathers, though women report far more responsibility for taking care of kids than do men.
  2. Everyone else. Diversity along all conceivable axes – and those we haven’t even conceived of yet – is key to innovation. A multitasking parent can be a tremendous source of innovation. Tech conferences and other centers of innovation are wise to be more inclusive of this potential.

Now – if those conferences like Web 2.0 and the other O’Reilly conferences start offering childcare, they might actually get women to attend, not to mention to speak. SAP: are we next?

Whiskey and a Hammer

I’m on vacation next week (first of two in short order this summer), and I’ve been fond of thinking “it’s not a minute too soon.” The past couple of weeks have been very intense, but the work is fun and energizing. Above all, the best part about working is the collaboration, and without a doubt, the various social tools internally at SAP have opened up the world to me at work. This last week was so busy I usually didn’t know whether I was IM’ing or emailing – or twittering?

Among the highlights:

  • My instant-message working collaboration with Michael Biermann. Together with Craig Cmehil, we want to find a whole new way to surface trends and ideas. Michael and Craig are two-men machines of great ideas and skills (and right now may be the most dangerous guys in town); Michael nearly took down the internal wiki in the process – that’s a blast! Thanks Michael for the whiskey and the hammer: and it really does take a village.
  • Moderating the response to an internal newsletter relating to our wiki space, which has been phenomenal – nearly inexplicably so. Again, whole new communities open up to me and I count myself fortunate.
  • Watching and working on the wiki space redesign process between Phil, Will, and Dirk. I’ve concluded that email is not a great way to run design reviews, but I think in the end you guys can gain consensus. Sometimes, it’s good to take a step back and really get a good look around.
  • Working with Jerome across timezones toward an understanding on knowledge architecture. Should be interesting to stay tuned.
  • Wrapping up Pride in San Francisco. It’s typically ironic to me that we get a month to be proud – and then after that? After Sunday we all go back to shame! But seriously – there was much energy inside and out this year. Another kind of importance of community.
  • Our daughter saying goodbye to her favorite teacher so far, Sarah. She drew her a heart and gave it to her. Not even three and she gives us a knot in our throats. Her community.
  • New fire-colored hair. Well, it’s actually apparently a very very bright red, but it looks pink. Is it fuego? Well… you’ll just have to see me after Bandon to find out…

First stop: Bandon, OR. Next stop: Palo Alto. Next stop: Alaska. See you somewhere there!

The Muni Pill

The Muni Pill

The Muni Pill

As often as possible and minimally two days a week, I work from home in San Francisco. I believe this quite literally saves my life. In spite of my occasional encounters with Muni on these days.

I know it’s a cheap shot to complain about Muni, but I just have to get it out of my system and then I’ll be done. I met a friend down at the ferry plaza for lunch and stepped into one of the longest Muni fiascos I can remember. I say this with some measure of restraint, since I know Muni is capable of killing and as far as I know there’s been none of that today. But “something happened to some computer somewhere” and the railways underground have been reduced to a crawl – if they are even running at all.

Note that the news article recommends taking buses or streetcars: should YOU, dear reader, be blessed with reading this before commute hour this evening, heed NOT the scant information in that article! I say that, and note that I always take streetcars whenever I can – I love the friendly colors of the F Market and I generally prefer being above ground. Today, however, these colors make me ill. Note that on days when there is “something wrong in the tunnel,” anything that rolls and is run by Muni above ground is so packed that you don’t want to approach it. This is where I was for most of an hour returning from lunch just now.

Somewhere around Van Ness on the way down and at the point where the orange car I was on resembled a giant, stuffed sardine can, another driver hopped on (I think… I couldn’t see) and started yelling at everyone: “Get back! Get all the way back!” he yelled, “This is MY car now; get back!” For a brief instant, I imagined that terrorists had taken over the car and were going to hijack it; then I considered that it was Muni and why would anyone want to take over Muni? My windows had bars on them so I couldn’t even contemplate breaking out of the car. A claustrophobe’s nightmare, pretty much.

In the meantime, ambulances and firetrucks are inexplicably careening up and down the tracks, sometimes stopping directly in the path of the train, for occasionally no apparent reason.

But lunch was great and the ferry plaza was as gorgeous as always. Only then I had to get back home.

The way back was less crowded but took me an hour. My green train stopped only at 9th street so that it could double back to pick up other stranded passengers. Instead of waiting for the next one, I walked up Market the rest of the way. I approached my street as three colored F Market trains caught up behind me, struggling up the street like gigantic bitter pills stuck in someone’s esophagus. One orange, one yellow, and one green…

Much better to walk.

And with all that, there’s no question at all in my mind that I’d rather be stuck on Muni (or better, walking home in San Francisco) than stuck on highway 280 or stuck in traffic pretty much anywhere.