We are very excited to have two amazing speakers (longer descriptions follow):
Dan Woods, CTO of CITOResearch, Evolved Media, and TheStreet.com will talk about Technical Leadership and How Technologists's personality traits can sometimes become hindrances.
Charlie O'Donnell, Partner at Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, will talk about how to pick the right startup to work for
Afterwards we'll go to hang out at Gatsby's NYC -
http://www.gatsbysnyc.com/, 53 Spring Street.
Note: we are starting at 7pm, and will try to keep on time, but the doors will open around 6:30 in case you'd like to arrive early and network with other people.
Full Talk Descriptions / Bios
Talk 1. Crisis of Tech Leadership / (Executive / Managerial Track)
Dan Woods, CTO, Author, Journalist
http://www.citoresearch.com/
Twitter: danwoodscito
If you are a CTO or aspiring to be one, then you will face a persistent obstacle as you rise toward higher levels of leadership, namely, yourself. The way we think as technologists, the personality characteristics that draw us to careers in technology work against us as we rise to more senior roles. Dan Woods, CTO and Editor of CITOResearch.com, a Forbes.com contributor, former CTO of TheStreet.com, and author of numerous books on IT and technology related topics, has defined the characteristics that work against us as The Raw Technology Persona. In his speech, The Coming Crisis of Technology Leadership, Dan explains how to overcome this persona and why current trends are going to create a leadership crisis unless technologists start rising to a more sophisticated level of leadership. Dan's prescription for CIOs and CTOs charts a way forward toward in all dimensions facing those who are charged with making technology work.
http://www.citoresearch.com/Speech-Coming-Crisis-Tech-Leadership
Speaker Bio
Dan Woods puts his background as a CTO and journalist to work to capture and share knowledge about technology leadership at CITOResearch.com, a site dedicated to helping CIOs and CTOs advance in their careers.
After receving a BA in Computer Science from the University of Michigan in 1982, Dan worked in various positions in development and consulting.
Always involved in writing, in mid-career, Dan became a journalist in 1989, after graduating from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He worked at The Record of Hackensack and The Raleigh News and Observer. During this period, Dan developed 9-Track Express, a program used in the early days of Computer Assisted Reporting to retrieve and organize information.
Returning to technology in 1995, at Time Inc. New Media, Dan led development of customer facing applications. As CTO of TheStreet.com, he led creation of the company's first content management and e-commerce infrastructure, which supported its successful IPO. As CTO of CapitalThinking, Dan lead creation of a commercial loan automation product. Juice Software was spun out of ideas developed at CapitalThinking.
In 2002, Dan founded Evolved Media, a content marketing agency, that helps explain technology. At Evolved Media, Dan and his team have created more than 20 books and scores of white papers that have been used by startups as well as companies such as SAP, Intel, Microsoft, Cisco to explain their products.
In 2010, Dan founded CITOResearch.com, to put his analysis and editorial skills to work to advance the craft of technology leadership.
Talk 2 - Charlie O'Donnell, Partner at Brooklyn Bridge Ventures
Title: How to pick the right startup to work for
Blog:
www.thisisgoingtobebig.com
Twitter: ceonyc
It's a buyers market for tech talent, but as a technologist how do you pick the best startup to work for? Which one is going to be a success and which is just gonna waste the next 3 years of your life? Charlie O'Donnell - a local Venture Capitalist - will provide his perspective on how to pick a startup.
Bio: Charlie O'Donnell has been an active member of the NYC venture capital and startup community for ten years in roles ranging from institutional fund investor to venture capitalist to entrepreneur--with a little product management in between. He has venture experience at two of the top venture capital firms in the country, Union Square Ventures and First Round Capital, and sourced First Round's Investment in GroupMe, which sold to Skype in 2011. The investments he sourced at First Round Capital also include Refinery29, chloe + isabel, Backupify, SinglePlatform, Salescrunch and Docracy. He also teaches entrepreneurship and the business of technology at Fordham University, his alma mater.