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How to Sponsor a “Diversity Circle”
in a Technical WorkspaceAmy Therrien, Senior Software Development Manager, AWS
Lee Kear, Solutions Architect, AWS
April 19, 2016
Diversity Circle Sponsorship
The flywheel for growth
Amazon S3—unleashing untapped potential
Growth of
Amazon S3
innovators
Career
development for
innovators from
innovators
Innovation
leaders
Role models
attract more
innovators
Amazon S3 women’s circle
Membership selection (17 members)
• Common
• All women (inherent)
• All part of the Amazon S3 organization (acquired)
• Diverse
• Diverse levels of experience (acquired)
• Diverse roles: managers, product managers, software
engineers, systems engineers (acquired)
• Diverse cultural backgrounds (inherent)
Sponsoring
• Identify
• Time/budget
• Coaching
• Facilitating
Facilitating trust
Safe environment for learning
Strong relationships keep circles
together
Make it fun!
• Blackberry picking
• Happy hour
• Lunches
Facilitating a structure
• Monthly meetings on topics covering experiences and
knowledge
• Amazon S3 topics are defined by the circle: negotiation,
leveling the playing field, communication, confidence, work-
life balance, and so on
• Establish role models
• Individual mentoring for the first role models
• Leverage existing career development techniques and
resources
• Guest speakers, published resources
• Provide feedback, encouragement
Sample meeting
Knowledge sharing
• 10 minutes: Grab lunch and
greet/mingle
• 30 minutes: Video on “Leveling
the Playing Field”
• 40 minutes: Interactive
worksheets, open discussion
• 10 minutes: Planning next
session
Experience sharing
• 10 minutes: Grab lunch and
greet/mingle
• 5 minutes: Introduction of guest
expert on “Confidence”
• 60 minutes: Pre-prepared Q&A
with guest product manager
• 10 minutes: Planning next
session
Logistics
Do’s
• Stay connected to participants’
managers
• Advocate for your circle
participants outside of the
circle
• Make time for retrospectives
Don’ts
• Get into expanding circle churn
• Feel like you need to limit this
to women
• See this as a replacement for
all other mentoring
Measuring success
Role model innovators
Growing influence
Diversity Circle:
Benefits of Participation
Personal and professional development
How we started
Networking opportunities
What do participants get out of a circle?
Experience sharing
Knowledge sharing
Two types of meetings
Leveraging resources
Career development resources
My favorite:
“Communicating
with Confidence”
www.leanin.org
A Story
Confidence
The confidence
flywheel
Practice new
behaviors
Confidence
Success
Strategies
Communication changes
have an impact on
perceptions
Remove lessing language:
- Just
- Sorry