‘Commanding Conversations: Ready in Plain Sight’ Event

I am profoundly inspired and invigorated by yesterday’s Commanding Conversation: Ready in Plain Sight event, hosted by NPower’s Command Shift coalition. If you were unable to join us, you can watch the session here.

At the center of our discussion was new research from data analytics firm, Emsi Burning Glass, that revealed, among other things, a new strategy and pathway to support increasing women of color in tech and tech-adjacent sectors. In brief, the data shows that there are a quarter of a million women of color in the US who already have foundational tech skills that, with more technical training, would be ready to transition into in-demand, good-paying tech jobs. This is more than research – it’s breakthrough, actionable data that identifies an overlooked yet existing talent pipeline, and on many levels, challenges the existing notion that there is a lack of diverse, skilled talent available for today’s tech jobs.

Our collective actions, with our partners, allies, advocates, and others, will help to make real the new goal that the data helped to shape: to increase the number of women of color in tech from the current 5% representation to 10% over ten years. This new goal will serve as our north star as we continue to expand our movement of convening and mobilizing private, public, and nonprofit organizations, as well as committed individuals, to take action and help accelerate more women of color in tech.

I’d like to thank yesterday’s participants including Bertina Ceccarelli, our CEO here at NPower, as well as Coriel Taylor, Managing Director at Accenture; Joel Simon, Vice President, Workforce Strategies at Emsi Burning Glass; PaShon Mann, Vice President of Talent Acquisition at Comcast; Wendy Dowd, Vice President of Talent Acquisition at Guardian Life; and Lisa Asari, Senior Product Manager at Amazon. 

I’d also like to thank NPower Alumna & IT Specialist Sierra Bentley, who served as one of our moderators and brought such a critical and vulnerable perspective to our work and helped illustrate the goal we are all working toward – to open doors so that women of color can enter and thrive in the tech field.

Lastly, I’d also like to acknowledge our founding Command Shift partner, Citi Foundation,  our dedicated steering committee members Amazon Web Services, Comcast NBCUniversal, Guardian Life, and World Wide Technology for their continued support of our mission, the Command Shift coalition members, and last but not in any way least, the passionate and dedicated team at NPower.

We look forward to sharing more insights about how the new research will inform and underpin the mission of Command Shift. To obtain a copy of the Executive Summary in advance of its launch this spring, please register here.

Warm regards,

Candice L. Dixon, Command Shift Development Director

NPower