AfroTech is coming (November 1-5) and everyone who’s anyone in the Black tech ecosystem will be there.
Blavity Inc.’s marquee conference was first held in 2016 in San Francisco, CA with just over 650 tickets sold and in less than eight years, the event is poised to host thousands of ambitious professionals of color in Austin next month. Social media users have credited the event for helping them land dream jobs (and baes), all while showing them a great time.
This year Emmy-winning actress, producer, and writer Issa Rae, iconic record executive, producer Timbaland, U.S Representative Maxine Waters, billionaire businessman Robert Smith and more will take the stage.
We spoke with AfroTech’s Senior Vice President Simone White to learn more about the brand’s secret to its deep impact and how attendees can effectively network while there.
How does it feel to be leading one of the premier events for Black professionals?
It feels great! That was always the plan. I think that year one we were testing out, how do we get together? What does that look like for people who are young professionals in industries where they do not see anybody that looks like them?’ What does that experience look like? How do we get in person? Blavity has done a really good job of creating spaces online and we pivoted because there was a need to host in-person events that aren’t always concerts. And it feels good to be here now. The team is excited. We have an incredible lineup of speakers and ultimately we want people to get jobs. We want people to level up. We want people to continue to grow in their own professional development. So, our end goal is to make sure that people actually get something out of it other than cute photos. But we also hope they get that too (laughs).
Right! I think that is the key takeaway from all of the well-deserved fodder around AfroTech. There are real tangibles that always come out of everybody’s experience that decides to invest in attending. Out of all of the other networking conferences, why does AfroTech have so much value add?
I think one of them is that we do a really good job of building communities. We didn’t just pop up with a 20,000 person event. We spent years creating small pockets of communities, having happy hours around the country, going into ERG groups at different tech companies and nurturing those relationships. This didn’t just happen. It takes time to build trust. And then I think the second thing is that we also have a really deep relationship with hundreds of tech companies, and we can say things like, hey, you want to come? We need you to make sure you put butts in seats. We need you to make sure that you are investing in professional development, not just for entry level positions, but also for executive level talent. And that has allowed us, as we continue to nurture those relationships, really provide tangible tactical outputs.
For those who are looking for a new job or to level up in the position that they’re currently in, do you have any action steps that they should start implementing before arrive in Austin?
Preparation. Like, extreme preparation. A lot of times we go to conferences and we’re like, oh, ‘you have this conference tomorrow, let check the day-of who’s going to be onstage.’ No, you have to see who is there. Make connections on LinkedIn in advance. Submit your resume to Talent Infusion, which is our new jobs portal for our resume book. Build community inside the app. Make all your plans in advance. Those are the people who always win. They’re like, ‘I know exactly what I’m doing for these four or five days that I’m here.’
Long before the speaker lineup was released, people were so excited, and the excitement seems to have reached a fever pitch this year. Why is it so anticipated this time around, you think?
A large part of it is that we were in the house for so many years {because of the lockdown.} And last year, I think folks were still like, ‘oh, it’s back.’ And then they missed out. Last year was an amazing year for us because we got to spread across the city. And so now I think people are like, ‘oh, wait, I refuse to miss it again. I will be there this year.’ And we’re excited about that because we get to take over a city, engage with so many local partners, so many dope restaurants, so many community partners who will spread across the city, and people will be like, is this like it didn’t look like Austin.
What are you most looking forward to this year?
We’ve decided to expand our programming into multiple sectors. So we have an executive stage that will be specifically for tech executives and business executives that can talk amongst each other. They are decision makers, and they need spaces to be able to talk amongst one another as they’re making decisions. The next year, probably our summit stages, like our women’s Summit. This is going to be the first year of the women’s Summit, really highlighting C suite level, executive level women who are just rock stars and we haven’t created a space specifically for women before and so excited about potential growth there. The next is probably the sports summit. Our team has been asking us for years to create a space specifically for sports and talking about the intersection of sports and technology. This will be the first year we actually do it, so we’re able to engage conversations around, what does it look like to be an athlete who decides, okay, ‘I want to be an investor.’ We’re raving conversations about industries that we really haven’t touched in the same way and I think people will recognize. I’m just as excited as everyone to see everything.”
More information about the conference can be found here.