Girl Geek Dinner 2012

This year Yahoo did not limit the event only to networking or discussion between the Women entrepreneur panelist, they had also organized a Web app development workshop for all the girl geeks :) at Vivanta, By Taj.

I registered myself for the workshop. All the necessary software was provided to us in a pendrive which made it easier for setting up the environment. It was an amazing coding along with a huge bunch of geeky girls in the room. It was presented by;

Sudar Muthu, Research Engineer, Yahoo! Labs and

Pradeep BV, Frontend Engineer, Media Experiences, Yahoo!

Learnt about Node.js and Express framework, a Web development framework. Not going much into the technicality, let me summarize it as;

•   Node.js is a javascript program environment used for creating highly scalable network applications. It uses a non-blocking I/O model that makes it lightweight, fast and efficient built on top of Google’s V8 Javascript engine.
• Express is a light-weight web development framework based on MVC architecture. You could start creating your project just with a single command ‘express projname '. It would create project structure with all the needed files.

In order to start developing, you would need to install Node.js and install Express using npm (npm is a package manager for Node.js that is run through the command line and manages dependencies for an application. It is the predominant package manager for Node.js.)

It would be much interesting if you could do some hands on as we did in the session.

Some links you can refer;

http://nodejs.org/, http://expressjs.com/guide.html

Source Codes of a simple App http://square-thing-app.herokuapp.com/green can be referred at;

https://github.com/ericf/square-thing-app

It’s a pleasure learning about new technologies and trying it out and so was this :).

At 6pm there was a networking session organized called “Speed Networking”. This is where you are supposed to introduce yourself and learn about the opposite person in just 3 mins. My takeaways from this session;

• Speak clearly and confidently and make an eye contact during your interaction.
• Use some impressive keywords when you introduce yourself such that the opposite person would remember you easily.
• You could use some humorous words in your introduction too to make a mark …only if you can (don’t mess it up :P)
•  Try describing your work life and personal life that defines you in just few minutes, never brag too much.
• Learn to be a good listener and remember the person you met, it’s really tough but very essential during networking.

It was then followed by a Panel Discussion on "Starting & Succeeding as a woman entrepreneur”

               Moderator: Bala Girisaballa, Director, YEN, Yahoo!

               Panelists  : Apala Lahiri Chavan - Chief Oracle and Innovator, Human Factors International
                                 Jaya Jha – Founder, Pothi.com
                                 Valerie Rozycki Wagoner - Founder & CEO, ZipDial
                                 Jessie Paul - CEO, Paul Writer

It was a pleasure listening to their entire journey and learning, I can definitely say that there’s struggle involved behind every successful life, nothing comes an easy way :).

Some keynotes from this session;

• Plan your career, it’s never late.
•  Entrepreneurs should have a clear exit strategy.
•  Follow your heart, believe in yourself and be confident.
• You need to sacrifice all the luxury and make sure you don’t fall into the trap (money earning trap, family burden traps, etc)
• You need to have the conviction. Unless you are not convinced you won’t be able to drive yourself ahead. Once you are convinced, stay to it.
• You shall never get answers to all the questions, take advices from experts or risk it out and learn it hard way.
• Unless you do not have any experience it’s tough to get into any startup. It’s good at times to have Big companies names on your resume.
• Make mistakes (not repetitive) but learn from your failures.
• Appreciate people around you for all that you are now. For girls it very important you get a partner and family who would support you throughout (Great to have a salaried spouse as all agreed :P :))

Things that make these people successful in things they are doing;

•  They enjoy what they do.
• When you think of any startup, make sure you are passionate about it, you are best at it and the profitability in that.
• Valerie believes that among idea, money and people, it’s important you have the right people with you who would come up with great, innovative ideas and help you get the necessary investment for your idea.
• Trust people and build the trust when in business.
• Learn to listen and do ask for advices from experts, well-wishers.
•  At the end Apala spoke about 3 things that has made her successful and I reciprocate to it too;

       ·         Creativity- Enjoy stuff you do and be creative

       ·         Courage- Have the courage to face all downsides and keep telling yourself “This too shall pass”

       ·         Balance- Be calm, patient, fair and objective. You can never lose your temper or become too emotional

It’s always been an inspirational event as always, Thanks to Yahoo!, the entire panelist and the geeky girls who made this a success :).

Good Wishes to all ladies out there who wish to become an entrepreneur and lead the path! Cheers! :D