Queer voices in Tech: The O4U Magic
My journey during the Out4Undergrand Digital Conference, September 2023
Hi hi 👋🏻
This is Nour. I am a Skywalker from Tatooine. If you are not a Star Wars fan, Skywalker was a farmboy who rose from humble beginnings to become one of the greatest Jedi in the galaxy. Tatooine is in fact a real place in Tunisia where Star Wars was shot and where I grew up with broken access to financial or technological services, yet gained so much passion for both fields. Just like Skywalker, I took things from 0 to 1 as a queer Muslim woman breaking into Tech.
What is Out4Undergrad?
Each year, Out4Undergrad (O4U) invites a diverse class of high-achieving LGBTQ+ students to unique conferences where they find resources to scale their careers. I knew it was the place to be. A community of talented queer individuals in tech with unapologetic resistance to boundaries. I found myself in a room full of so much inspiration, a kind driven pool of energy where everyone learns from, and alongside each other. Did I mention flights and housing are covered? 🫦
My highlights
The first panel was with Dominique Jackson. Actress, author, model, and reality television personality. I could not believe they brought the one and only… Elektra. She spoke on how Ballroom culture saved her life. It helped her find her chosen and proven family. A lot of us are looking for what Dominique found in New York City’s ballroom community. Dominique gave advice on handling homophobia, starting a new life away from home, and not taking bullshit from anyone. From going through fire to becoming the fire, Dominique’s story was powerful.
Dominique Jackson in the FX TV Show Pose Jay Chopra, a Product Manager at Google, gave us the best workshop on PM Interviews. I learned a great deal from his expertise, especially the Circles framework. I cracked up when he showed us a TikTok of an engineer making fun of PMs and went on to break those misconceptions. PMs lead strategy, build a roadmap, and rally a team to ship. You can make fun of PMs all you want but if you put some engineers in a room by themselves to ship a feature then you will see Jay’s point.
Tiffany Dockery was like the Beyonce of Product Management. She went through life with people looking at her like she was crazy every time she shared her ambitions. Inevitably she proved them wrong. I love seeing lesbians of color conquer the tech industry. My favorite part of her talk was this power formula:
Luck = (Preparation × Opportunity) ^ DelusionSo may your delulu be trululu because being delulu is the solulu.
I miss our mentorship group the most. Shoutout to Gautham and Christina, the dopest mentors! We talked about intersectional feminism, tech ethics, and code-switching in the workplace and it got... deep. I realized we are privileged to be in tech, the most LGBTQ+friendly industry out there. Yet we still have a long way to go as 46% of LGBTQ workers report being in the closet at work. (US Department of Labor) I want to take an active part in this movement to make these safe spaces accessible to queer people from underrepresented communities. Some of us face layered forms of bias held against us because of multiple aspects of our identity. I wish more people understood that intersectionality is not meant to create “oppression hierarchies”. Instead, it helps us understand how different forms of oppression intersect and impact individuals in unique ways.
We need to talk about our Boose Cruise across the Hutchison River. O4U really kept us on our toes the whole weekend with one surprise after another. THE HOUSE OF BALENCIAGA performed and they ate. At that point, I got so used to being around 500 other queer people at all times. I don’t know how to adjust back to reality. Everyone slayed the Gala. Each person I met was so talented, kind, and fun. I got to celebrate and honor my identity with peers and professionals that I look up to.
The career fair was a blast. I had to take some time to recenter myself and tap into my story. Because I will have to tell that story over and over at the career fair and for the rest of my life. Telling my story got me to rooms I never thought I could enter. Stories bind us together and help us make sense of our experiences. That is why I started this substack! Running from one booth to another, I got some behind-the-scenes insights about PM and Software Engineering roles at my target companies. I also learned about their roadmaps and exciting projects in the pipeline. I was glad to find recruiters interested in my nontraditional background. Data science major who was a SWE in Paris and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to run blockchain events around the world. The whole time kept repeating to myself : “If the guy who made the Smash or Pass website for AI-generated pictures of women called it an AI app then I have to be confident to the point of delusion”.
We concluded the weekend by celebrating our friend’s birthday with Korean BBQ and Karaoke. Then I left NYC with newfound perspectives and special friendships.
