Mid-Atlantic 2019

Introduction: It takes a lot of energy to make an X-ray wave or photon. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory detects X-ray emission from the scenes of explosions and collisions in space such as colliding…

Get Lean: The Easier Way to Create User Experience

Do your projects often get bogged down in seemingly endless lists of features? Do you find it difficult to prioritize them, and determine which ones your users actually need? Whether your company is…

Think Like an Analyst: Become a Data Rockstar using Tableau

Data is everywhere and being able to understand it and think critically about it is crucial for any organization’s success. Data literacy is new to many but getting started doesn’t have to be hard.…

Not a Coder, but Still in Tech

Not every person in technology took the same road. Although it is assumed that you have to have been a "Computer geek" since the beginning, that isn't true. And you don't have to be a…

The Power of WITS – Mentoring hacks that will change your life

The story begins at WITS and how the power of community impacted our lives.I will be sharing a real life story that began at a WITS conference. I was a career changer, just recently transiting into…

From Engineer to Program Manager and back; how switching roles gave me the skills to be a technical leader

Having been an engineer at Facebook, a PM at Microsoft, and a PM then engineer at Amazon, I have experienced a variety of roles and learned about a variety of technologies. I find women are often…

Are you management material? Things to consider before moving into management.

Everyone growing up has been asked at least once, what do you want to be when you grow up? When I was six, I thought I wanted to be the President. Boy was I wrong. Once in college, we're asked to…

Erase Unconscious Bias From Your AI Datasets

Advances in AI techniques like machine learning and deep neural networks have potential to save time and boost productivity. But what if we train these technologies using datasets that exclude large…

Machine Learning on Mobile

This talk will cover the ways to approach machine learning on mobile devices. I am going to compare cloud-based and on-device inference, focusing more on the latter. Local (on-device) machine…

A Software Engineer’s Guide to DevOps

I'm a software engineer who spends her time writing code and developing apps. I have a pretty good grasp of the vocabulary and technologies relevant to my job. But what happens when another facet of…

The most critical keys for technology are rarely the technology

“Why is it so many IT/Technology Projects fail” … I read these same questions in 1988, 1998, 2008, and now even in 2018. According to a Forbes study in 2016: “25 percent of technology projects fail…

Get Lean: The Easier Way to Create User Experience

Jira 101

A workshop on the Atlassian tools Jira and Confluence, on the Cloud versions. Participants will walk away with the basics and should be able to use the tool in their daily lives.

Going Rogue! Reversing Malicious Mobile Apps

This session will provide an introduction to analyzing malicious mobile applications. Attendees will learn how to use the Android tool suite to view the interworking of an application and determine…

Presentation Skills for Brainiacs: Developing talks that gets people excited about your work

Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) professionals often struggle to communicate with people other than their peers. Sure, it’s easy to explain complex technology concepts to other…

Drupal Basics

Welcome to Drupal! I am so glad you're here. In this workshop I will introduce the powerful system for building and maintaining websites called Drupal. Drupal is a Content Management System, or CMS…

Introduction to Accessibility

In addition to why people should care about it (and how to convince their managers to as well) I will include concrete information, such as what to changes in the HTML code to make it accessible for…

The Challenge & Opportunity of Artificial Intelligence

Keynote

Artificial Intelligence is a leap-ahead in capability. It is a game-changer. It is being used all around us. It can improve efficiencies, create opportunities and pose new challenges in how we think,…

Building a Technical Blog

Writing a technical blog can reinforce your knowledge on topics, demonstrate that knowledge, help you to build a community, and build your professional profile. This workshop will lead you through…

Driving an Innovative Culture

Keynote

To be successful, businesses must continuously challenge themselves to deliver products and services that meet ever-changing customer needs. The most innovative companies are first to market with new…

Voice: The New Frontend

In the future, voice will be the primary input mechanism for virtually all interfaces. Science fiction books, movies and TV shows have predicted this for years, including the iconic ship computer in…

Ransomeware Success Stories

Ransomeware has been a prominent threat to enterprises, and individuals since the mid-2000s. In fact, there were more than 8000 ransomware attacks reported to the Internet Crime Complaint Center…

Immersive Experiences Create Leaders

Keynote

Retaining knowledge and learning new processes in our constantly evolving world is crucial for all businesses. We are bombarded with loads of information throughout the day. We hear ideas from our…

How to find High-Impact Work and Make People Pay Attention

“Be more proactive” is feedback we’ve probably all heard at one time or another. But we also know that all projects are not created equal. Simply taking on more work doesn’t always equate to career…

How to Run Your Meetings Like a Boss: The Art of Facilitation

Meetings. We’ve been to them, and until you lock down that mythical job making money without any human interaction, they’re a necessity of doing business. But too many meetings drag on and on without…

Data Visualization

Investing in Yourself