Speaking Engagement Announcement: Girl Geek Dinners Ottawa January 2013

I've been asked to be this month's speaker at Girl Geek Dinner! To be honest, this a prospect that both thrills me and freaks me out a little. Sure, it's possible to sound smart when you're one of the most technical people in the room, but it's incredibly intimidating to know that pretty much everyone in the audience could be described that way in their own jobs. Fortunately, GGD is a wonderfully supportive environment so I'm totally looking forward to making an ass of myself the experience.

If you've never heard of GGDOttawa, you've been missing out. Whether you're a little bit geeky or a super-nerd, GGD the best way to rub elbows with other girl geeks in the city at (nearly) monthly dinner/ lecture events.

Now, since many of the folks in attendance already know me and my shtick, I thought I would make life difficult for myself keep things interesting by developing an entirely new presentation for the occasion, on a topic that has subtly been showing up in my posts over the past while: hacking. Not heads-down-at-a-computer-in-the-basement-breaking-into-secure-websites hacking, but hacking your own perspective, changing how you attack challenges and using hacking every single day IRL.

Here's a sneak peek at my talk, Hacking is a mindset, not a skillset.

The idea of hacking has a very specific — and wrong — definition in present culture. Born at MIT, hacking was originally a mindset shared by an intellectual community to infuse creativity and an element of fun into their lives. Somewhere along the way, this message got lost.

Much like gamification is the application of game design principles to non-game uses, the core tenets of hacking — in its original definition — can be applied to non-hacking uses. Whether you're a developer, a designer, a project manager or even an accountant, I'll attempt to either convince you that you've been hacking all along or that you really should be adopting a hacking mindset. Bringing 5 principles of hacking and a ton of real-world examples, we will explore when and how you can hack challenges and opportunities to infuse some creativity and fun both at home and at work.

If that sounds like it might be up your alley, then I hope you can come out and give me a hug for my nerves have some fun with the other Ottawa Girl Geeks on Wednesday, January 30th. Event and ticket info is available on the GGDOttawa Eventbrite page.

If you can't make it (boo), you'll be able to follow along on the night of the talk via the @GGDOttawa account or the #ggdottawa Twitter hashtag. And if that just won't do, then come on back the day after the event: I'll be posting my script and slides for your consumption. Hacking expectations and sharing knowledge? You never know, that just might be part of the presentation...