Wendy Lopez
TECH IT OUT
The Rocky Mountain Chapter of Women in Cable Telecommunications (WICT) hosted the “Tech it Out” event last year and I was one of the college students that was awarded a scholarship to attend the event. This must attend and sold out event was an event directed towards the advancement of women in the cable and telecommunications sector as well as the field of information technology. The women at the event outnumbered the men by the hundreds. The Cable Center was filled with an atmosphere of excitement. Women of all ages, colors and sizes were making their way around the room and filling the room with smiles, hand-shakes and new ideas. The vendors formed a perfect circle around the room and they were sharing their new technology and handing out samples and information about their products. In a field dominated by men it is important to share insight and stories of successful woman in the IT field. Taylor is an inspirational role model and her story serves as an example of how a female with perseverance and passion can succeed in the IT and/or the cable and telecommunication field.
Teresa Taylor a former Chief Operating Officer (COO) for Qwest Communications was the scheduled keynote speaker for the event. Her speech was titled “Riding the Glass Elevator” and I was most certainly intrigued from reading that title and was anxiously awaiting her speech. Most of us have heard of the “Glass Ceiling” and how woman in the corporate world have such a difficult time reaching success. The minute she came from the back of the stage all heads were turning and following her every step of the way until she reached the center of the stage. She was waving her hand as if she was Queen Elizabeth making her way through a crowd. Her tall brown suede boots complimented her tall and slender figure. When she smiled her dimples smiled with her big blue eyes. She stood tall and proud and portrayed a sense of confidence that was felt throughout the room.
Taylor began her speech by giving the audience an overview of her beginnings in the field—how she started from the bottom as a sales person and worked her way up to management and finally a successful COO. It sounds easy but it was not she talked about being the only woman in meetings and being ignored by men when it came to making important decisions. At times she would ask to be excused from meetings and would go to the ladies room and would cry her soul out since she was the only woman and would then return to the meeting when she felt she could handle the situation at hand. Throughout her speech she continued providing interesting insights about leadership, being a catalyst and listening. She also mentioned the importance of reading and attending events in order to stay informed and up to date on advancing technologies. But, more important she talked about how to obtain harmonization between a corporate career and a personal private life. She was able to achieve this harmonization by always making sure she calendared work events and personal events in the same calendar by using acronyms like “ASG” (which meant Aaron Soccer Game) being away from the office for two hours to watch your son/daughter play soccer is not going to bring work to a complete stop.
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