Show notes
Chris: Welcome to the ‘Tech Lowdown Show’. I’m your host Chris Jones. Today we’ve got a special treat for you as we’re getting out of the studio and talking to speakers and attendees at the ‘Tech Inclusion Conference’ held in Seattle, created by ‘Change Catalyst’ and hosted by ‘Galvanized’. The conference focuses on solutions to the diversity challenges in the tech space, jobs, funding, access opportunity and much more. This is a great opportunity to hear from some of the change makers, people working every day across the tech ecosystem to bring a bit more fairness, a bit more openness and a bit more access to under-represented groups in tech. Speakers and attendees included a dynamic diverse group racially, ethnically, physical abilities, and sexual orientation. When I talk to attendees and speakers representing entrepreneurs, recruiters, VCs and much more. Our first guest is Eric Osborne whose here in Seattle, one of the most influential group through diversity and inclusion in Tech here in Seattle. I’m here to Tech Inclusion Conference with Eric Osborne, the founder of HERE Seattle, had a number of events like this. What makes this Tech Inclusion Conference different or special? Eric: I think it’s special. The Tech Inclusion event is special mainly because it’s one of a kind; it’s something that I don’t think I’ve seen before. As you know there’s been a lot of work going on around the resident inclusion, so it’s natural to have people get together and congregate and talk about all the issues that’s going on and hopefully move the neighbour fuel when it comes to diversity and inclusion. Chris: One of the things I’ve noticed is that the faces, the people that you see here definitely at tech conference I’ve been to not just black and white and brown but also physically did handicapped, deaf, hearing impaired, unbelievable sense of diversity here. I didn’t know that I was even here in Seattle. Eric: You know what, I mean we, ultimately before I was a co-founder here in Seattle, that’s one of the things we started in Seattle in 2014. It was specifically to bring the community of diverse people together so that we can say we are here, we are working in tech and we are you know, thriving in it so definitely plain for us so this conference is definitely going to be different from most typical tech conferences because of the diversity of the topic and I think that it’s a great start but I’m sure we are going to be seeing a lot of more things similar than this. Chris: Yeah I’m looking forward to seeing what Wayne and Melinda do with a Change Catalyst to do this Amazing stuff. Thanks for your time. Eric: All right, have a great day. Chris: Next we’re going to get a perspective from one of the top diversity recruiters in this space, Steven Matly, C.E.O. and founder of SM Diversity. We’re here to Tech Inclusion Conference and talking to Steven Matly, CEO and founder S. M. Diversity, a full service staffing recruitment agency. Steven, you get to see how companies are tackling the problem diversity from the inside. You describe for us how the best companies in terms of hiring and retention are helping to ensure the success of their diversity initiatives. Steven: Thank you, great question. So first off, some of the best companies and I’ve seen are the ones that aren’t always the ones that are being highlighted with the best place to work. You’ll be surprised that you know what P.R. and what perspectives and what news outlets and the lip service is out there. So I will first address that, but there are a lot of folks that are champing for this, advocating for this. You know some people say, wow diversity, what are you talking about? This’ been around you know since affirmative action. See well that’s the thing, the mind-set has shifted. The folks that I see that are leading the charge are the ones that shifted from compliance to competitive. And what I’m talking about is that on boarding experience. What’s your first day look like, are you being welcomed; is that not welcome at being a set of people that are taking an honest look at you know, what a higher practices are broken and they can be improved. I mean especially in the tech industry that prides itself on innovation, in disruption, we still are using out-dated, old fashion thinking behaviours, processes in ways that we attract talent, retain talent and advanced talent. And so the ones that have seen, that are in the forefront of these are the ones that one, its visible communicate visibility from top down, there’s some programs in place, there’s activities in place and the values are constantly being addressed internally, externally and the best way I could summarize all that ones. The ones that are leading are the ones that put their employees first. So if you have, if you’re a company that sells an audience, in you’re all about customer centric, well think of your customers and employees. So if you use your voice of the customer where you say hey we sold to these companies and because you’re like these come to you should buy our products, well flip that around. Hey we have these type employees or we’re seeking to get more of these types of employees and we put that in the forefront and highlight those stories in those journals and that we’re committed to getting more of that. That’s how you sell voice of the customer to attract more of the diverse population that you’re looking attract. Chris: Oh, that’s brilliant. I know one of the challenges that companies ought to have is they get folks in the door but then haven’t put in the infrastructure to support those folks, and they end up leaving. What are you seeing happening there and what can we as candidates coming into those positions do better to ensure that we have existing success once we get into those positions? Steven: Great and you know I wish I could echo a lot of the things that the panellists said today around. You know you’re hired on board for diversity inclusion like what’s next after you walk through those doors right. It’s your first day, there’s a lot of things that can be done and so you know to from an employer’s standpoint, how you retain, as you see is going to continuously refine and have humility and to understand that you, it’s not flawless. You have to if you’re seeing a higher proportion of your workforce especially women or people of color leave a certain department. So let’s say sales, you should be rallying around creating programs and investing into programs and people to investigate why is this happening, in finding a trend and do those trends you know, assessing that and then going in to find the right resources to educate and train yourself. It’s no different than like if you were hiring for salespeople and all your salespeople were missing their quotas. What is it that you could do to support them and in what areas. It doesn’t have to be a shotgun approach, it just basically takes a time for you to listen, to assess, to pivot and then provide the right resources and support and then measure those results. And I will quote the C.E.O. of Seattle Microsoft saying, look it’s not about just experts and gurus, because then you get the sense of that’s it, the expert and gurus, they’ve figured it out. No, it’s about testing your hypothesis; you see we’re still breaking ground and this is a way for you to test your hypothesis. So continue to test your hypothesis, your ideas, your thoughts and see if it’s effective or not. And every organization is different. Chris: That’s brilliant. Thank you so much. I want to find out how people can find out more about SM Diversity because you obviously know your stuff. Steven: Thank you. I’m always looking, listen to learn, to partner, to share. This is something that we at Mercer saw day in and day out. You can find us on smdiversity. com. If you type in diversity recruiting Seattle, I believe for organically the first page result as well. My name is Steven, in S.T.E.V. E.N. Matly, M. A. T. L. Y. And I’m very active on LinkedIn. Thank you. Chris: Wonderful. I’ll make sure we have that in the show notes. Some really insightful stuff from Steven Matly and I encourage you to reach out to him. Chris: Next up, one of my favorite parts of going to events like this is to be able to speak with entrepreneurs who are out there trying to make things happen themselves. Next we speak with entrepreneur Sidney James. Here with Sidney James at the Tech Inclusion Conference, thanks for talking to me Sidney. Tell me what brings you to the Tech Inclusion Conference today. Sidney: I had actually known Wayne, I’ve been known Wayne say for a couple of years, he sent me an invite and let me know the event was going on, so I came out to support him and want to find out more about what the Tech Inclusion was all about and once I got here, I got to get run over to that to start within two hours and arrange to you … Chris: So tell us, you’ve got a start-up, tell us a little bit about your start-up. Sidney: Basically, our start up is called Confer. We reduce travel expenses for small to medium size companies. So basically what we do we aggregate those small to medium businesses and give them the same parks and powers as the lower companies. Chris: Very interesting, how long did you get it started up? Sidney: I’ve been working on it for about a year and a half now so we finally got to a point where we had to start work on the partnerships and development stages now. Chris: That’s exciting. Are you raising capital, you bootstrapping it? Sidney: We bootstrapped today. I think we might delay raising capital you know it’s kind of hard a time. Chris: Hard to turn down when it comes but delay doesn’t care, that’s exactly what you’ve heard, interesting. Right did you get invite from some sort of mentors that you talk to here? Sidney: Oh yes, I actually did. I actually made a good connection with the chief [unclear 10:27] HR consultant firm here. So there is going to be a very good contact for me in the future, I’m moving forward. Chris: Good. And lastly, what’s your background, how do you end up getting into the disc space? Sidney: I went to the University of Alabama. After I left there I went to finish the start-up Engineering program at Georgia Tech and I started my executive MBA at University of Miami, so Chris: Wonderful, so you are coded, you’re on the coding side. Sidney: I’m on the business side. I’m not on the coding side. I wish I were but I’m not. Chris: Wonderful. Do you have any Tech co-founder or you don’t have. How do you want to go about setting it up? Sidney: Yes. I do have a Tech co-founder, is by the group of [unclear 11:05] so we have a pretty solid team I would say. Chris: Wonderful, really appreciate the time, Sidney thanks. Sidney: Thank you. Chris: Next, I get a VCs perspective on the value of diversity with respect entrepreneurs and founders in creating value for investors. Heather Redman, Co-founder and Managing Partner, Flying Fish Partners shares her insights on this topic. Hello here in Tech Inclusion Conference, I’m with Heathen Redman, co-founder, managing partner, Flying Fish Partners, an early stage software technology investment firm. She’s had an incredible career, split between business and law. I wanted to ask why is it important for you to be here today? Heather: Well I’m super supportive of all the stuff that we’re doing in communities doing collectively to try to promote diversity in our ecosystem. We just need more people starting companies. Our company starts here in Seattle are really not where we should be, given the talent pool. The chamber which are I’m a member of a board of has this initiative called 100% Talent which I love that orientation because it’s like everybody off the bench, everybody on the plain field, let’s take it down with all the talent we have and events like this are a big part of that. Chris: And if there’s any one message that you want entrepreneur and potential entrepreneurs in the audience to take from today, what would that be? Heather: Start a company and come see us to get some dollars. Chris: I love it. I’ll be talking to you. Heather: OK. Chris: And really interesting perspective from Heather Redman there and I encourage you specially if you’re in Seattle area starter to reach out to Flying Fish Partners. Next we’ve got two more interviews to share with you today and I’m going to roll them back to back. The first is Godfried Addae, Microsoft’s representative on the Cloud Infrastructure team, and then we’ll finish up with David Harris, Start-up Advocate for the city of Seattle on the role of government plays in supporting a more inclusive ecosystem. Here at the Tech Inclusion Conference, I’m going to Godfried Addae. Godfried, why are you here today? What are you going to get in this event? Godfried: I’m here on behalf of my company. I work for Microsoft and any event that are most tack and inclusion, I’m definitely interested and would like to bring those learning back to my organisation. Chris: Wonderful, and tell us, what do you do with Microsoft and what do you aspire to do long term? Godfried: Yes, so my day job right now is a quality engineer with the quality infrastructure operations team and we’re basically a team that builds the data service that’s part of the Cloud’s shoot supply chain. I’m in Tech Cloud operation. In terms of aspirations, I’m open. You know, ten years ago, I didn’t think I’ll be here so I don’t know what I‘ll do in the next ten, but I’m in a certain space where it’s full technology and rosy hard topics, so I was somewhere in the intersection of both of those. Chris: Wonderful, I just finished up with; is there anything specifically tangible that you’re hoping to get out of this conference personally? Godfried: Yeah personally, just awareness and education. I’m always I’m learning. I like to hear other people’s perspectives and obviously diversity a little bit more than I need diversity to broadening my awareness on gender diversity as well as being inclusive to those with disabilities. Now we can be more welcoming of those groups in our companies and organisations. Chris: Wonderful thanks for your time. I appreciate it. Godfried: Thank you. Chris: So I’m back to you for the Tech Inclusion Conference. I’m talking with David Harris, the Start-up Advocate for the City is Seattle, tell us a little bit about first what your role is with the City of Seattle and how the Tech Inclusion Conference plays into that. David: Yes, it’s good to be here, and I have two parts tomorrow. One is to hope play matchmaker for Tech startups in Seattle to nurture and grow to start a community here. The other half, my job is to help connect under-served communities with the tech industry and we help support organizations that especially work with youth, women, people of color and formally incarcerated. Chris: Great, and can you tell us a little about the politics you’ll be speaking on, in what issues you’ll going to be speaking to on that panel? David: Yes, so I forget the exact name of the panel but basically we’re going to be talking about the role of government in policy making and creating an inclusion tech ecosystem in a city. So that’s something that is right up my alley and I’m looking forward to hear from some other folks on the panel as well in just learning but also hopefully I can share some words that would spark up inspiration or make some connections for people to go forward. Chris: Great, and lastly as an entrepreneur, when would I need to reach out to you? What kind of doors did the Startup Advocate open up for entrepreneur? David: Yeah, a lot of people come and they just have an idea, they want to know how to get started or maybe they’re looking for a technical co-founder or maybe they have traction in revenue already in their start up, and their looking for funding. And I hope this really shortened path of finding information about those things. And as I meet more and more people th…
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Most of us, when we think about entrepreneurship today, we envision founders who’ve built businesses from the ground up and taken them to new heights. People like Gates, Jobs or Zuckerberg often spring to mind. We watch shows like Shark Tank and envision unknown founders getting their big break by getting investment from famous founders who’ve already made it big. But in reality, entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship comes in a wide range of forms. Some entrepreneurs buy established businesses, some, like today’s guest are brought in by the owners to take a business to the next level and in the process become owners themselves.
Welcome to the Tech Lowdown Show where each episode we’ll be discussing opportunities in the tech space with entrepreneurs from the US & around the world. I’m your host Chris Jones – What happens when you’re on the cutting edge of a new industry? How do you decide when to jump into your own venture in a still immature space? I remember the early days of mobile marketing and how year after year I heard “this was the year of mobile” yet dollars flowing into mobile marketing were scarce. Depending on your perspective the entrepreneurs building businesses at this time were either too far ahead of the curve or developing the knowledge to be successful once the dollars started flowing. Today we’re going to speak with an entrepreneur who found himself in just that situation.
Rory Mudie is the Founder and CEO of Redbox Mobile, a leading Appstore Optimization Company with offices in London and New York. Rory has been on the cutting edge of digital marketing for over a decade now. He’s held executive roles with the BBC and Vodafone among others before starting Redbox Mobile in 2013. Rory, welcome to the show – What’s the Lowdown?
– Rory, I want to start by learning a bit more about your background – tell us your story and then what led you to start Redbox Mobile?
– Like you I worked for a carrier previously – what were you seeing taking place during that time that piqued your interest in the still nascent app space?
– Can you take us through your thought process regarding the opportunity and your risk assessment at the time that you made the decision to give it a go?
– When you started Redbox you weren’t focused just on ASO – talk me through how you were trying to build a product in the early days. How did you figure out what was most viable for you to build a business on?
– I believe that you bootstrapped the business correct? Walk me through the turning point for the business – what was going on and what gave you the confidence to pursue ASO and now Search Ads as your primary products?
– Okay, let’s get into ASO now. Briefly tell us exactly what ASO is and why it’s important for app marketers?
– Do we know how big ASO is right now as an industry? Where is the ASO space in regard to it’s maturity as an industry?
The Real Lowdown Segment
– What was your lowest point when you were building Redbox Mobile?
– What are the challenges that the business still faces today?
– So it appears that you timed it right. Did you and was it by luck or design?
– Finally, what advice would you give to someone trying to figure out when to jump into a immature industry?
– Finally, what personal sacrifices have you had to make for the business and has it been worth it?
Rory- this has been so much fun. Please tell our listeners how they can find out more about you and Redbox Mobile? If you liked the show, please download all the episodes and leave us a 5 star rating on iTunes! You can find show notes at techlowdownshow.com and follow me on Twitter at cjones2002. 
I’m so excited today to return back to one of my favorite topics and one that, IMO, anyone working in tech should have at least a passing familiarity with that. Artificial intelligence has been this far off thing in the mind of the general public since the days of the first Terminator movie but we’ve now reached a point where AI and the supporting technologies like NLP and NLI are beginning to impact our lives everyday whether we’re aware of it or not.
– Today’s guest Johan Ahlund has been a pioneer in this space. Currently he’s the CEO & Founder of Jabberbrain a Barcelona-based company that helps clients build high quality Natural Language Interactions applications. An entrepreneur multiple times over he helped create the market for NLI when it was in its infancy as CEO & Founder of Artificial Solutions back in 2001.
– Johan, welcome to the show – What’s the Lowdown?
– You’ve got an amazing background in this space, can you start by briefly telling us about your background and where you’re interest in this space originated?
– I know a lot of people have difficulty understanding the different technologies for which make up what we commonly refer to in shorthand as “AI”. Can you briefly define a few of these concepts and then tell us how they fit together?
– You’re an expert in NLI, how should engineers, product managers, or marketers be thinking about using NLI and can you give us some tangible examples of NLI in action today?
– You got into this area with a business super early so I imagine commercialization at that time was challenging. Can you tell us what were the key developments either within your companies or in the larger ecosystem that have had the greatest impact on getting to where we are today?
– There are people like yourself who have been instrumental in the development of this technology. Where do you see the greatest opportunities right now for the application of these technologies??
The Real Lowdown Segment
– What are the misconceptions around these technologies that fall under the rubric of “AI”?
– We’ve got AI being offered as a platform, Voice being offered as a platform, etc. Who’s doing it well and what are the shortcomings that I as an entrepreneur dabbling in this space should be aware of?
– Finally, I want to ask you about Jabberbrain which I believe is about a year old – Tell us about your product and where the company is in its development? 
