About Us: Annual Report

2008 was a remarkable year for the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology. Despite a challenging economy impacting non-profits and for-profits alike, the Anita Borg Institute increased its visibility through the release of a groundbreaking research report, expanded its community of partners and sponsors, received high marks for its programs, and maintained stable revenue with a 0.4% increase over 2007 results.

The Anita Borg Institute ended 2008 with a total of 18 industry partners, including new partners Intuit and Lockheed Martin. The support of corporations, universities, foundations, government and individuals underpin ABI’s success, In particular, ABI’s industry partners contributed valuable time, resources, expertise and financial support to the Institute. ABI remains deeply grateful for the support of its entire community, and thanks them all. In 2008, the Anita Borg Institute’s programs created strong, measurable impact, including:

The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing

Held at the Keystone Resort in Keystone Colorado October 1-4, 2008, key results of the 2008 Grace Hopper Celebrationn included:

• Sold-out attendance with 1446 attendees
• 103 companies participated including 10 platinum corporate and government sponsors
• 199 academic institutions represented
• 757 students attended the conference, an increase of 28% over 2007
• 254 scholarships were awarded
• 79 committee members volunteered
• 300 conference speakers presented
• Attendees to the Grace Hopper Celebration came from 22 countries: Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, China,Ethiopia, Germany, India, Kenya, Korea, Mexico, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, Puerto Rico, Romania, Rwanda, Singapore, Spain, Sudan, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, and the United States
• The Grace Hopper Celebration offered fully subsidized childcare throughout the conference. Twenty-four children joined the childcare program, an increase of 242 % over 2007
• The Conference was evaluated by an external evaluator by administering a survey instrument to conference participants (756 respondents, a 52% response rate).
• Impact measurements from the Grace Hopper Celebration included:
  

  RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION

  • 70% of survey respondents report that the conference increased their commitment to continue a degree in technology
  • 70% of survey respondents agree or strongly agree that they feel less isolated as a technical woman as a result of attending Grace Hopper 2008
  • 81% of respondents agree or strongly agree that attending Grace Hopper 2008 has led them to feel more confident and energetic.
  • 89% of survey respondents agree or strongly agree that they felt inspired by the role models they saw at Grace Hopper 2008.
  • 88% of survey respondents agree or strongly agree that they value the celebration component of Grace Hopper 2008.
  • 75% of student respondents agree or strongly agree that attending GHC 2008 has increased their commitment to a technology career.
  • 74% of student respondents agree or strongly agree that attending GHC 2008 has increased their commitment to continue their degree in technology.
  • 51% of student respondents agree or strongly agree that attending GHC 2008 has increased their commitment to pursue a graduate degree.

  ADVANCEMENT

  • 88% of survey respondents who have attended GHC in the past feel like past attendance had a positive impact on their professional advancement.
  • 43% of survey respondents report that they intend to mentor others and 31% report that they intend to find a mentor as a result of attending GHC 2008.
  • 62% of survey respondents report that they intend to be proactive about evaluating their next career step as a result of attending GHC 2008.

  The results for Students show an even greater impact:

  • 93% of student respondents who have attended GHCthe Climbing the Technical Ladder study and discuss actions in the past feel like attending in the past had a positive impact on their professional advancement.
  • 62% of student respondents report that they intend to be proactive about evaluating their next career step as a result of attending GHC 2008.
  • 83% of student respondents agree or strongly agree that they have found out about job and career opportunities at GHC 2008.

Awards at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing

The Anita Borg Awards recognize outstanding leaders who embrace Anita Borg’s lasting vision to change the world for women and for technology. The Denice Denton Emerging Leader Award recognizes a man or a woman under the age of 40 who has demonstrated a significant leadership capability and positive impact of the lives of women through technology. The Change Agent Awards honor technical women that live and work outside the United States and are change agents in their community.

Anita Borg Social Impact Award Winner – BlogHer accepted by co-founder Elisa Camahort Page

Anita Borg Technical Leadership Award Winner – Elaine Weyuker, AT&T Fellow, AT&T Labs

Denice Denton Emerging Leader Award Winner – Naomi Chesler, Associate Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Wisconsin.

Change Agent Awards – three Change Agents traveled to the Grace Hopper Celebration to receive the award:

• Reyyan Ayfer –Turkey
• Zahara Khan – Pakistan
• Dorcas Muthoni – Kenya

CTO Forum

ABI continued to host senior technical executives at the second Annual CTO Forum. A total of 35 CTOs and senior executives from over 20 companies met to review the results of the Climbing the Technical Ladder study and discuss actions needed to increase the number of women in technology. The CTO’s also meet with students, and attended sessions during the conference.

TechLeaders

TechLeaders workshops strengthen and expand technical women’s professional networks as well as provide participants with vital tools to better navigate all stages of their careers. TechLeaders was offered four times in 2008 and a total of 212 women attended.

• Mid-level women
  • TechLeaders: Power and Influence, Feb 27-28, 2008,
    Mountain View, CA hosted by Google.
  • TechLeaders: Power and Influence, May 21-22, 2008,
    Seattle, WA, hosted by Amazon,
• Senior women
  • Senior TechLeaders, June 30-July 1, 2009, Atlanta, GA,
    hosted by Georgia Tech
• New for all levels
  • TechLeaders: Realizing Your Vision for Women of Color,
    September 10-11, 2008, Mountain View, CA, hosted by Google.

TechLeaders: Realizing Your Vision for Women of Color was a two-day workshop specifically designed for entry to mid-level technical women of color in academia and industry. This successful addition to the TechLeaders curriculum was born out of ABI’s commitment to addressing the need for networking, mentoring, and leadership development opportunities for women of color, which studies have shown help them to achieve the highest levels of success in their technical fields. The workshop hosted 41 women. This workshop highlighted many successful Women of Color from across the technology spectrum.

• Impact Measurement for 2008 TechLeaders Workshops
  • 89% of 2008 TechLeaders participants felt more energized and confident about their careers as a result of attending TechLeaders
  • 91% of 2008 TechLeaders participants reported that TechLeaders increased their professional network
  • The 4 TechLeaders workshop achieved an average perceived quality of 4.3 on a 5 point scale.

Women of Vision Awards Banquet

The Women of Vision Awards Banquet hosted by the Anita Borg Institute Board of Trustees, honors women making significant contributions to technology. One winner is selected in each category: Innovation, Leadership, and Social Impact.
In 2008, 670 attended the awards banquet.
The three winners honored in 2008 were:

• Innovation Award Winner: Helen Greiner, CEO, iRobot
• Social Impact Award Winner: Susan Landau, Distinguished Engineer, Sun Microsystems, Inc.
• Leadership Award Winner: Justine Cassell, Professor, Northwestern University.

In 2008, the Anita Borg Institute continued evaluating the quality and impact of its programs through rigorous evaluation.

The following are key metrics for the 2008 Women of Vision Program, based on the survey responses of 230 participants.

• Women of Vision achieved a quality rating of 4.6 on a 5 point scale 5.
• 85% of respondents agreed that they felt more energized and confident as technical women after attending Women of Vision.
• 72% of respondents reported they felt less isolated as a technical woman after attending.
• 97% of respondents felt inspired by the role models they saw at Women of Vision.

Systers Pass-It-On Grants

The Anita Borg Systers Pass-It-On (PIO) Awards honor Anita Borg’s desire to create a network of technical women helping one another. The cash awards, funded by donations from the Systers Online Community, are intended as means for women established in technological fields to support women seeking their place in the field of technology, Systers Pass-It-On Grants were awarded twice in 2008. In April 2008, four awards were given to women in the United States, United Kingdom, India and Kenya. In October 2008, four additional awards were given to two women in the United States, one woman in Indonesia and one woman in Tanzania.

Anita Borg Institute Research Reports

ABI wrote and published Climbing the Technical Ladder: Obstacles and Solutions for Mid-Level Women in Technology in October 2008, in partnership with the Clayman Institute for Gender Research at Stanford University. Climbing the Technical Ladder provides an in-depth look into the barriers to retention and advancement of technical women and provides solid recommendations to high tech companies on the organizational practices that overcome these barriers.

The study examines technical women at the mid-level of their career because mid-level is a critical juncture for women on the technical ladder–a complex set of gender barriers converge at this point–and the high tech firms that employ them. While most high tech companies do recognize the benefits of diversity, gender disparity in technical jobs remains large as very few women reach top technical positions such as Technology Fellow or Vice President of Engineering. The report finds that men are 2.7 times more likely to be in a high level position than women, and women comprise an increasingly smaller proportion of the workforce at every level of the technology corporate ladder.

Funding and support for Climbing the Technical Ladder was provided by the National Science Foundation grant #0413538 through the National Center for Women and Information Technology, the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, Stanford University’s Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research, the Career Action Center, Symantec Corporation, Sudo Coaching LLC, Jody Mahoney, Alexander Atkins Design, Inc. and Ventana Public Relations.

The report achieved a high level of distribution:

• 1500 Copies were delivered to the Clayman Institute for distribution
• 1500 copies were distributed at the 2008 Grace Hopper Celebration
• An additional 1000 were distributed at various meetings and speaking engagements.

Media coverage of the report included:

• Wall Street Journal
• BusinessWeek
• San Francisco Chronicle
• San Jose Mercury News
• CIO Magazine
• USA Today
• And over 40 other leading publications around the world.

Executive Briefing Program

The Anita Borg Institute also introduced its Executive Briefing program, meeting with key technical leaders at two leading technology firms to review the results of the study and discuss ways in which the firms increase retention of their mid-level technical women. These high impact sessions, continued in 2009, are improving the understanding and engagement of senior executives in implementing solutions to recruit, retain, and advance technical women.

Anita Borg Institute Newsletter

The Anita Borg Institute newsletter grew to a distribution of 9233 in 2008, an increase of 71% over 2007.

Anita Borg Institute Awards in 2008

In 2008 Telle Whitney, CEO of the Anita Borg Institute received the following honors:

San Jose Business Journal Who’s Who for 2008

Women’s Venture Fund Highest Leaf Award for 2008

Anita Borg Institute Online Communities Growth

The Anita Borg Institute focused on the development of its online communities in 2008.

• LinkedIn for Good grew to 1207 members, an increase of 660%
• Facebook grew to 1517, an increase of 318%
• YouTube viewings of ABI’s videos grew to a total of 57,603 in 2008.

In 2009, ABI will continue focusing its efforts on the growth of existing programs while increasing program impact and managing a sustainable non-profit social enterprise.

Sincerely,
Telle Whitney
CEO and President, Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology

FINANCIALS

REVENUE AND SUPPORT

ABI generated 2008 revenue and support of $3,033,000, a slight increase over 2007 revenue and support of $3,020,000. ABI programs generated 54% of the revenue and support, and corporate, individual, foundation grants and in-kind donations provided the remaining 46%. ABI’s corporate partners contributed $813,000 in 2008. The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing Conference yielded $1,338,000 in 2008. In-kind facility, services and equipment donations represented $293,000. Grants, other events, and individual donations combined represented $580,000. ABI earned interest income of $9,000 in 2008. ABI revenue over the past 4 years grew from $1,120,000 to $3,033,000.

EXPENSES

In 2008, ABI managed its expenses in line with revenue. Expenses for 2008 totaled $3,049,000, a slight decrease from 2007 expenses of $3,089,000. For 2008, 75% of ABI’s expenses were directly related to programs, 15% to administration and 10% to fundraising. Detailed audited financial statements for 2008 are available upon request.

2008-2009 CONTRIBUTORS

Underpinning the work of the Anita Borg Institute are our corporate partners, sponsors, foundations, government, and individual supporters. Donor contributions — time, talent, money, technology and spirit — infuse the organization with the energy and resources that are fundamental to the pursuit of ABI’s mission and goals. Clearly these are organizations and individuals that do more than talk about their support for women and technology. They act. We applaud them all.