Keynotes

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Bettina Bair
Founder OCWiC, ACM-W Communications Chair

Feb 24 3:30-4:30pm EST

Bettina Bair was a full-time lecturer at Ohio State University, teaching CSE, from 1998 to 2021. Prior to her career in academia, She worked in industry for nearly 20 years. This real-world experience, somewhat unusual at a research institution, has given her a unique and valuable perspective on the role of technology in business and society.

Bettina was consistently one of the top-rated instructors in her department, and very engaged with students at the undergraduate level. She received recognition for Teaching Excellence at the CSE Awards Banquet in 2020. She has received many awards for her work encouraging the recruitment and retention of women and underrepresented minorities in computer science. Bettina has created computer science content for TED-ED, and authored several research papers and articles highlighting the gender imbalance in computing.

In 2005, Bettina organized the first Ohio Celebration of Women in Computing (OCWiC), a well-attended statewide conference that was reported in the Chronicle for Higher Education as well as in the computing media. OCWiC is now one of the longest running and best attended regional celebrations of women in computing, delivering events and providing support and advocacy for women in computing. In 2018, Bettina founded the first ACM-W* Professional Chapter in the United States to provide ongoing community and leadership of the OCWiC community. Bettina is currently an active member of the ACM-W Executive Committee as Global Communications Chair.

In this talk, Bettina will share her OCWiC journey from founder to keynote speaker. She will reflect on what makes OCWiC unique and effective. How can we learn from the growth and success of groups like ACM-W and OCWiC to create a more hopeful, peaceful and equitable future?

*Association of Computing Machinery – Committee on Women


Building a Remote Career


Lisa Pierson
Global Head of DevOps, Build for Aon

Lisa Pierson is the Global Head of DevOps, Build. In this role, Lisa drives strategy and deployment of DevOps, resilience engineering, application security, and test automation across all solution lines. She creates the multiyear vision and strategy for each of the disciplines. Lisa holds herself and her teams accountable through transparent roadmap project delivery as well as continuous measurements in maturity, performance, and team engagement.

Lisa’s goal is to create a positive impact for as many colleagues as possible. She does this through eliminating low value work for colleagues via automation; improving the wellbeing of her team through upskilling; creating a highly engaging work environment; and volunteering her time for the betterment of women in technology. She enjoys spending her free time with her family and relaxing by reading and crafting, especially Amigurumi.

Working remote had always been a dream goal for Lisa’s career. She achieved an opportunity in 2016 as an individual contributor in a remote role. Since then, Lisa has stepped through a series of increasingly complex and broaden roles to now be the Global Lead for DevOps across the organization. Since the pandemic, now workers are finding themselves in a remote or hybrid environment – ready or not. In this session, Lisa will discuss tactical steps she has used successfully to build a remote career through building remote relationships, building a remote presence, and building remote well-being.

Feb 25 1:30-2:30pm EST