Okanagan woman needs your vote
An Okanagan entrepreneur and tech industry trainer has been nominated for the 2020 BraveIT Award, a technology honour that acknowledges bravery in information technology.
Vernon resident Jill Binder trains people from underrepresented and marginalized groups around the world to become inspiring speakers and leaders in their companies.
She also helps technology conferences and companies get more speaker diversity on their stages and, ultimately, in their leadership.
According to Binder, the award is a huge honour because the final four candidates were nominated by their peers. The winner will be selected by online voting from now until Aug. 28.
“I was very excited when I heard the news that I was nominated for the BraveIT Award,” said Binder. “I am honoured that my hard work empowering people around the world is being recognized, and I am just getting started.”
Binder first recognized the need to support diverse tech speakers in 2013 when she became a co-organizer of a tech conference. In her first year in the role, their final speaker lineup had only 14 per cent diversity representation. Many people from marginalized or underrepresented groups told Binder they felt like they didn’t know enough to be able to give a talk.
“I was inspired to help diverse speakers like me find their expertise and their voice,” explained Binder. “I led a team that created a new workshop that helps people … find a topic to share with our communities, and start giving talks. The workshop was an immediate success. The following year, our conference had three times the number of diverse applicants and fully 50 per cent speaker diversity.”
Since 2018, Binder and her teams have helped 40 conferences and over 350 people from marginalized or underrepresented groups in 35 countries with her diverse speaker training programs.
“I would love to be voted the 2020 BraveIT Award winner, but I need some help,” she said. “I encourage anyone who wants to hear a wider variety of voices in the world of tech and to encourage diversity in these sectors to please vote for me. Plus I will get to choose a deserving nonprofit to be awarded $10,000, which I would love to do as well.”
Web.tierpoint.com/braveit-award2020-vote has details.