The FullConTech 2016 Play Team 3.3 came together last December to figure out how to move forward on a play for creating cross-sector partnerships related to diversity retention in the greater Puget Sound area. In their first meeting, the team members discovered they had a lot in common. Not only were they all women, but they all expressed a strong commitment to creating equity in the workplace. To fulfill their play, they created a list of 30+ resources related to attracting and retaining women in technology. Team members included Christy Johnson, Mikaela Kiner, Nishat Akter, Marilyn Chu, Carolina Duclos, Manmeet Sahdhu, and Tanya Hannah.

I sat down with two team members: Christy Johnson, founder and CEO of Artemis Connection, a leadership strategy firm, and Mikaela Kiner, founder and CEO of uniquelyHR, an HR consulting company, and talked with them about the team’s goals and why the group was so effective at identifying a clear problem and building a solution. Mikaela attended FullConTech 2016 and was part of the original play team. Christy, who had been doing work on diversity retention, joined the group in January to bring her expertise to the effort.

Why was this group so energized about working on this play together?

Christy: We’ve all had different career experiences, but we all love this region and believed that, by working together, we could develop a way to share resources and tools to help companies have more productive diversity discussions.

I have a personal interest in retaining diverse employees. The people who work at my firm tend to be employees who were marginalized by previous employers. They get really motivated by job flexibility or the opportunity to give back in some way. They choose to be a part of Artemis because they want to work on improving diversity, inclusion and equity in the workplace.

At Artemis, we find that the dynamics are a bit different in the Seattle area. Conversations aren’t as open here as they are in the Bay Area. People seem to get frustrated when they discover that employee and culture problems are messy and take a long time to solve. It’s easier to look the other way. Also, tech companies here tend to say, “I’ll give back once I’m established,” while companies in the Bay Area have been set up to give back from the beginning, like Facebook. They work to build the right culture from day one.

Mikaela: For me, it was an important project because I’m an HR person who has worked in tech my whole career. I’ve seen environments that were a meritocracy and others that weren’t and I’ve been asked so many times by clients, “How do I find diverse candidates? How do I get a woman on my board?” Most of the time, I see employers with good intentions who are looking for information.

Your team did a great job of quickly scoping your project, setting an objective, and putting together a workable project plan. What was the magic? Why did this team work so well together?

Mikaela: Everyone who turned up for the first meeting happened to be women. Diversity is a broad topic, but it was easy for us to reach agreement about where we wanted to focus. We were all passionate about the topic of women in tech. In the first meeting, we did a one-hour brainstorm, and it was easy for us to come to consensus on what we wanted to do: create a resource list to help organizations do a better job of creating great cultures to retain women. We started creating the list in that first meeting.

Were you at all apprehensive about a bunch of people working together who didn’t know each other and had no formal accountability for getting something done?

Christy: No. I liked the topic, and I liked the process. Building effective teams is something I’m interested in. While working at McKinsey, I saw that team dynamics made a huge impact on team success. Volunteer teams are especially challenging. But one great thing about this team, even though we are all women, we come from very different types of organizations. That intrigued me, how diversity could change the conversation.

 What criteria did you set for your resource list?

Christy: We organized around use cases. What kind of resources would an employer want? And we wanted those resources to be research-based from a credible source. People have so many opinions on this topic. We stayed away from opinion pieces and a “great article” someone read online. Every resource has research behind it. It’s not editorial.

Mikaela: That’s so true. Everyone can go out on Google and find articles all day long. We wanted our list to offer proven, helpful resources. We don’t want people to drown in different opinions. We also broke down information into resources for employers and resources for employees, and then we categorized it. Is it training information or networking information?

Did your team have a wish list, a vision of what your contribution could be?

Mikaela: We talked a lot about best practices and changing the way organizations think about women and diversity. We often hear employers asking, “How do we find and hire women?” A better question is: “How do we create a great work environment for women, so they can succeed and want to stay.” Women can often get through the door, but then they find themselves in an environment that doesn’t support them. And this is true of all underrepresented groups. Often the things that benefit women, like family-friendly policies, benefit all employees. “Women-friendly” equals “human friendly.”

We also have to keep in mind that not all women are the same, and not all working moms are the same. Employers need to listen to what employees need and be flexible.

Finally, what’s the number one thing that volunteer team collaborations like this need to succeed?

Mikaela: You have to have a clear, common goal, and everyone on the team needs to be passionate about achieving that goal.

Want to learn more? You can find Team 3.3’s “Diversity and Inclusion: Women in Tech” resource list here.