 Good morning. Good afternoon and good evening. My name is Asha Bay, and I'm from the Office of Alumni Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. Our office provides grant opportunities and other resources for exchange program alumni. Thank you for tuning in and welcome to our second episode of Mentor Talks. Mentor Talks is a series designed exclusively for exchange program alumni. This is your opportunity to talk directly with leaders and mentors who excel in their fields. Like our guest today, Anar Simpson. Anar is the global ambassador for Technovation, an organization that teaches young girls all over the world the skills they need to emerge as tech entrepreneurs and leaders. Every year, Technovation invites girls to identify a problem in their community and challenges them to solve it by building a mobile app as well as a business plan to launch that app. Anar is also deputy to the United Nations high-level panel on women's economic empowerment. She works with governments, international agencies, and technology companies to advance the digital inclusion of women. In addition, she has been instrumental in the growth, outreach, and experience of the U.S. State Department's Tech Woman Initiative, which empowers the next generation of women leaders in STEM from Africa, Central and South Asia, and the Middle East, and connects them with their counterparts in Silicon Valley. I just saw Anar in Los Angeles, California at one of our professional development seminars where she spoke to exchange alumni about the art of networking. Our exchange alumni at the event learned a lot from Anar, and we're hoping you all will too. Now that you know a little bit about Anar, what would you like to ask her about? Her advice for women in tech, her tips for networking, her role as a mentor? This time is for you. Welcome, Anar, and thank you for joining us. Thank you. Oh, good. You're welcome. Anar, before we get to questions from our online audience, can you tell us about a pivotal moment in your career that brought you to where you are today? Sure. The pivotal moment for me was when I saw the impact of the Technivation team that I was mentoring. These girls literally blossomed under my eyes. They came together as a team. They identified their individual strengths. We're able to come together with a solution using technology and then they can present that solution. And since Technivation is in a competition format, they won the local and the regional pitch events and then went on to be, it went on to place third in the finals. The Technivation program sparked something in these girls. And when I saw that, I thought that taking this and replicating it around the world would be fantastic. So as I came on board as the global ambassador for Technivation, this is what we've done since 2012. And in seven years, we've been expanding the program. We are now in over 100 countries and growing. Wow, that's great. So you really built your network? Yes, for sure. Okay, so thank you for giving us that background. We have limited time, so let's get to some questions from our viewers. We'll start out with, how did you get started in the tech world? This is a very good question. I had no idea I wanted to get into technology other than the fact that my brother was in computers and being a doting younger sister, I thought, oh, I wanted to do computers too. So when I was in college, I chose my major to be computer science. And as I went through it, I also really liked economics. So that's what I have is a double major, computer science and economics. Wow. Okay, so you're well versed in these areas. A bit. Okay, so we have a question from Nibras on Facebook, who writes, I'm 15 years old. How can young women like me get involved in a career in tech or start businesses in the tech field, particularly living in a society that doesn't encourage this? That's a really super question. And it's exactly where tech innovation comes in. As you said, Asha, we would love for girls like you to join our program to equip you with entrepreneurship and tech skills so you can use your ideas, your very creative ideas to come up with a solution for a problem in your community and then be able to present it and hopefully go from there to get into a career in tech. And you're right. It's not that easy, but it is getting better for young people like you. And I really encourage you to do it because it's only young people like you who don't have barriers built around your mind about the types of solutions that we can come up with that are going to change the world of tomorrow. So there is a lot of, there's a lot of reasons for you to join in into the tech world. We have another question from Alba from Honduras who writes, I work on promoting steam careers to girls and I want to learn more about how I should best market steam and engineering jobs to young women. That's a really, another really good question. The thing is today, technology touches every aspect of our society, whether it's arts, medicine, commerce, finance, zoology. Technology is going to have a, a link to that. And so promoting steam to say, look, you don't have to be a coder, right? You could just really learn technology as a tool and no matter where you, where you end up or what your career interests take you by knowing technology and knowing how to use tech would be sort of very beneficial. Great. We have a tech girls alum who's writing a tool from Jordan who asks, what are some emerging sectors that women should seek to go into? So clearly the tech world itself is growing in bounds and leaps, right? We are entering a phase where artificial intelligence and machine learning are really taking off. So those would be two in the tech field that I would encourage young girls to go into. But really any field that you're in, archaeology, dentistry, etc., you know that those fields will be impacted in tech. And so again, whatever you look at, make sure that you're well equipped in terms of, okay, so I'm in this field, where is the tech intercept here? And do I know enough about it? Ah, good advice. Okay, and now we have another question. What are some of the challenges that you've seen in tech and what ideas do you have for overcoming them? So technology is shaped by people who are building the product and therefore it's influenced by those people's biases, by their worldviews, by their assumptions. And if only one set of people is building technology, then it possibly cannot serve all of us. And therefore we need a more diverse set, and in this case more women, to start building technology, to start shaping it, to be providing policy guidelines about it, so that the technology that we're making is going to be useful to all of us. The other challenging thing that I think that's important in tech is that if we don't have this kind of diversity, then we will be stuck with technology that can later on lead to rather big problems. Yeah, what you were saying reminded me about facial recognition technology and how it was geared toward a certain sub-sect, and so it wasn't getting everybody in there. So diversity is good. DNA sets, data sets, they're available for a particular type of population and not for others. So how can you make big assumptions based on those data sets that don't include everybody? That's true, exactly. Okay, so our next question is, tell us about why you decided to become a tech woman mentor. What brings you back year after year? So this ability to connect with women from 21 countries is both educational and powerful. This getting together of women provides both sides of the participants with knowledge and networks. And when the fellows go home back to their 20 countries, they take back what they've learned and they're impacting the young girls and women in their communities and they're becoming role models for them. The mentors here in Silicon Valley get a global perspective from the 20 countries that the women come from, but they also form a local network. And in all my years of tech, I've never been able to be a part of women in tech and have this network where you can really reach out to it both here in Silicon Valley but globally now in the 20 countries. And that's something that I think is powerful and unique and therefore my allegiance to it. Great. Okay. And so speaking of the network that you have, can you talk a little bit about the importance of networking? For sure. Whether you're a woman in tech or a startup entrepreneur, I think networking is key. And let me tell you, early in my career, I was like a lot of us, you know, you have a role and you're focused. You're sort of very, very driven to what you're doing and you're doing well and you move up the ladder because of that. But I think in retrospect, right, I looked back and I thought, if I had raised my head just a little bit and looked around and saw what was happening at the water cooler or what people were, you know, seeing at the bar or whatever after, I think it would have helped navigate my career a little bit more than it did. So to me, in addition to clearly having a good skill set, knowing, you know, knowing where you're good and sort of really putting your 100% in there. It's super important to network because that can really allow you to find your passion, your career and also opportunities. Great. Okay. And speaking of the network effect, can you tell us more about your experiences meeting exchange alumni? Of different ECA exchange programs when you were at Career Connections in LA last week? Right. So programs that bring together citizens of the country, right, and get them to go to the globe and then come back makes that country really rich. And it really allows us to have a worldview which is super important in today's completely interconnected world. And so having these programs and having this opportunity to then take what we have and further it, it's invaluable. And then those networks allow us to do even better in the world. Okay. Great. And you are, you know, you've been a tech woman mentor for years. So we have a question about how can I balance being both a mentor and a mentee? That's a super good question. And I'll give you an example of it that might resonate with a lot of our viewers today. A lot of times the innovation mentors are actually senior computer science students or senior students in business schools, right? So they're just in the early 20s and they're maybe in their third or fourth year of university. When they mentor these young girls of tech innovation, it's a life changing experience for them because now they're students, they're senior students, but now they're teaching girls that are just four or five years younger than them. And so the experience is really good. Remember, these are still students. So they're being mentored and they are mentoring. And I think it comes quite naturally the more you're exposed to it. Okay. Great. And so one more question from our audience. What inspires you? I think the things that really keep me going and allow me to, you know, continue to promote the work of women and girls in tech is the tangible results of the three things that I'm involved in. So I'm involved with tech innovation, tech women, and at the UN, the digital inclusion of women, right? And when I see in tech innovation, young girls on the stage, whether they're from Cambodia or Rwanda or here from New York, it is super, super rewarding. These are young girls who found their voice, who've taken their ideas, which are magnificent, let me assure you. And they're standing on stage and they're pitching them. You know, that means they're ready to go into the world with today's knowledge. So number one is that. And then with tech women, the impact that they have once they go back into their countries, whether it's individual impact, as in Mombasa, Kenya, or teamwork, you know, in South Africa and Kazakhstan. Those are real things. Those are real results affecting young girls and women on the ground. And again, that's very exciting to me. And then at the high level, at the sort of country level, when countries really take into their stride this need to include women in their digital sphere, like the states with the tech women program, that is super exciting. That means we have partners, that means we have leaders who are genuine in their quest to bring women into tech and therefore also help with the economy. Because remember, tech is everywhere. It affects the economy completely. And if we bring women and girls into that, clearly they will be improved. Good. So it looks like we're running out of time. And in one minute or less, if you could give one piece of advice to women in tech, what would it be? And again, I would say build your network. It is super important. I mean, it is as important as having these great tech skills or whatever other skills you have, but then enjoy them. And join them with a network, whether it's the friends and family, whether it's your colleagues, it's peers, it's people in the wider circles, because it's this melding and meeting of networks locally and then globally that really help us move whatever agenda we have, whether it's a personal agenda or, you know, a passion or just something that you're comfortable with. You cannot do it without a network. So for me, I would stress that. And a lot of times people say, well, you know, I'm working really hard. How am I going to network? I don't have time for networking. But the point is, in fact, your work might get more ahead if you do a little bit of it. That's great advice. Yes. Thank you. Thank you very much, Anar. And a big thank you to you, our online viewers, for participating today. You can learn more about Technovation on their website at TechnovationChallenge.org. And be sure to keep your calendars open for our next mentor talks in early September when we chat with two entrepreneurs about ways to gain funding for your startup. We'll broadcast live from Washington, D.C. Interested in learning more about opportunities for exchange alumni? Visit our website at alumni.state.gov. And join us on social media, on Facebook and Twitter. Thanks for watching and see you all next month for our next mentor talks.