Shireen Mitchell, part 3 of 3:
From choosing America’s CTO to bridging the digital divide
Shireen’s work intersects with digital education/access, tech policy, and politics which includes making technology more accessible for minority children.
She’s also a social media and technology strategist, founder of Digital Sistas/Sisters, Chair of the Media and Technology Task Force of the National Council of Women’s Organizations (NCWO), and president of the Community Technology Centers’ Network (CTCNet) Board of Directors.
Being digitally aware & accessible can help you expand your sphere of opportunity.
On economic stability and online access
What I appreciated about Shireen’s talk was how her experience related to online strategy, small business, but also to why basic online access (or lack thereof) can impact economic security. It framed a larger issue that I hadn’t recently discussed.
She explained further with these two factors:
1. A very basic reason is we’ve moved from traditional job seeking opportunities to online searching. When you’re looking for that middle or upper middle income job, you need to have access to technology – the basics – like email for sending your resume. And consider certain circumstances, let’s use President-Elect Obama’s transition team as example; certain jobs like Obama’s CTO position were publicized almost exclusively online.
2. The job one actually holds can inhibit (or propel) online access and its related professional benefits. When you work in more traditional shift employment – you don’t get certain online or tech opportunity. For instance, if you’re on the clock at a labor intensive and/or shift-schedule job, you’re doing the type of work that excludes a computer or email access. Being connected online can help you continue building skills and a professional network by sheer access to information i.e. reading online job sites, industry competitive blogs, social networking sites, etc.
So to summarize these key points, online learning (and access to it) opens the door to expanded economic opportunity to certain types of jobs and the educational resources to get them. This may seem obvious to you and me; but not realizing this can hinder economic possibility for many.
On Digital Sisters, Obama’s technology policy, & a national CTO
Although we’ve always been apart of policy impacting technology and women, we [at Digital Sisters] are now working on an agenda that’s specifically for technology and women for the Obama administration. I’d like to see a woman CTO for this country – not just for the sake of having a woman; but because I believe what women bring to the technical field is not just hard core understanding of technology. Women also bring keen awareness of HCI (human computer interaction). They understand end-user experience.
Women [working in technology spaces] get that human factor; they can think beyond the shiny toy tech syndrome. They know functionality.
-Shireen Mitchell on women candidates for the country’s first national CTO
There are plenty of women candidates who would be effective CTOs in Obama’s administration: Carly Fiorina, Meg Whitman, Sophie Vandebroek, and also Mary Lou Jepsen.
On national technology policy
There is plenty to emphasize but for certain, we must focus on technology integration and innovation for our nation’s future. We are stumbling with inconsistent innovation that lacks diversity. That needs to be mandated from the highest level — to diversify, find the voids in technological professions, and instill diversity in technical education and development in a systemic way. We will fall further behind in this industry as a country if we don’t.
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