Saturday, December 10, 2011

The Cloudcast - Eps.26 - "IT Women of the Cloud" + Show Notes

Date: December 10, 2011
Guests:


As we look across our industry at some of the biggest or fastest growing companies (HP - Meg Whitman, IBM - Ginni Rometty, Oracle - Safra Catz, Facebook - Sheryl Sandberg), they now have women in the #1 or #2 positions. This has happened in other industries, but if feels like an unprecedented time for women in high-tech. Since both Aaron and I are fathers of daughters, we felt like it was the right time to have a show that looked at the changing landscape of women in tech.

Topic 1: Would any of you like to offer a theory on why we’re seeing this shift in technology leadership?  [Brian’s theory: These are very relationship-centric businesses as opposed to most engineering-centric; http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/20/why-women-rule-the-internet/]


Topic 2: Seema & Vanessa are involved in an organization called “Cloud NOW” which is focused on using technology for the overall professional development of women from around the world. Tell us about this group and some of the activities it’s involved with?


Topic 3: Raejeanne leads Intel’s involvement in the Open Data Center Alliance. That organization is attempting to take on a huge challenge - driving standards and best practices across the data center. How is that effort going and how do you measure success?
Topic 4: As you each talk to companies around the world how is Cloud Computing different as we move from established markets (eg. North America) to emerging markets (eg. China)?


Topic 5: Vanessa recently spoke at Hadoop World on Business Solutions for Big Data and Hadoop. Why is Big Data going to change how businesses operate and what do companies need to prepare for?


Topic 6: The three of you bring an interesting cross-section of companies, activities and skills (engineering, analysts, marketing, leading community functions). Beyond the activities you’re involved with, what other women in technology to you look up to or inspire you?