Tech. Strong. Women.

In this episode of Tech.Strong.Women, Jodi Ashley and Tracy Ragan are joined by Ana Margarita Medina, Lightstep staff developer advocate, and Adriana Villela, Lightstep developer advocate, two powerhouse technologists who've focused their careers on SRE and observability. With experiences in leading observability and SRE adoption, Adriana and Ana work with developers, open-source projects like OpenTelemetry and technology creators to continue the advancement of observability and share the best practices of SRE. Ana and Adriana host the On-Call Me Maybe podcast, speaking with diverse guests from someone getting started as an SRE to highly experienced, sharing best practices and lessons learned.

Technology isn't immune to external geopolitical factors--from investments in AI to the dependency on Asian chip manufacturing, IT is front and center on the global political stage. Even seemingly unrelated events can have a direct impact on the software and hardware products we develop and consume. In this episode of Tech.Strong.Women, Jamie Thomas, IBM general manager of strategy, development and CISO, talks with Techstrong Group's Jodi Ashley and Tracy Ragan about the very real concerns businesses face in both hardware manufacturing and software development. Jamie shares her insights into what the future looks like in an interdependent world, IBM's unique response to dealing with COVID-19 and critical areas that every business should consider in a turbulent geopolitical landscape. Jamie also talks about her work as the chairperson of the OpenSSF, her work with the Biden administration and how Log4j started an entirely new conversation around securing the open source software supply chain.

Business leaders tend to underestimate the one factor that could make or break digital transformation: the human factor. But underneath all the talk about new and emerging technologies like blockchain, ChatGPT, the Metaverse and other is people. In this episode of Tech.Strong.Women., Kamales Lardi, author of the book “The Human Side of Digital Business Transformation,” talks with hosts Jodi Ashley and Tracy about the need for technology leadership to embrace qualities that were traditionally seen as “weaknesses” like empathy, vulnerability, authenticity and open communications skills and how those translate to empowering leadership and drive more successful digital transformation. Lardi also talks about how the focus on the “digital” piece of digital transformation is not sufficient without equal focus on “transformation,” and why the younger generation of tech and business professionals are better equipped to tackle these challenges.

In this episode of Tech. Strong. Women., hosts Jodi Ashley and Tracy Ragan talk with Liz Rice, chief open source officer at Isovalent, about extended Berkeley Packet Filter (eBPF) and its impact on the open source ecosystem and observability, the challenges open source developers face with the upcoming Cyber Resilience Act legislation and the significant impact AI has on open source. Rice will discuss how AI opens up numerous opportunities for further automation and optimization of open source development, integration and delivery all along the SDLC. Finally, Rice explores how the modern remote, work-from-anywhere technology landscape will empower more women and underrepresented groups to pursue tech careers.

In this episode of Tech.Strong.Women, hosts Jodi Ashley and Tracy Ragan are joined by Sofia Palamarchuk, co-founder & CEO at Apptim, to talk about her own journey in the tech industry, how she grew her company despite the COVID-19 pandemic, and how important it is to stay lean and sustainable as a startup. This candid discussion will also cover the struggles women, BIPOC and those with lower educational attainment experience in getting funding, the importance of research when searching for funding and the current lack of diversity among both funders and investors.

In this episode, our hosts Jodi Ashley (Techstrong) and Tracy Ragan (Deployhub) are joined by Heidi Gilmore, Office of the CMO at Stackstate. The panel talks candidly about marketing in the tech industry, how important marketing professionals are to delivering education and value and dispels the myth that Marketing is “fluffy.” They’ll discuss the importance of avoiding hype and being open about your offerings and explain why companies without a solid marketing function are dead in the water. Finally, the panel talks about solid messaging as the cornerstone of the marketing process, and why it should be clear, simple and convey to the audience what is important for them to hear.

So many stories in tech start the same way: A great idea, a ‘killer app’, some bootstraps, angel investors, funding rounds and then, with a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck, a unicorn! But it doesn’t have to be just a fairy tale or a once-in-a-blue-moon occurrence. You have the skills and tools at your disposal to take your startup to the next level! Join hosts Tracy Ragan (DeployHub) and Jodi Ashley (Techstrong) along with Nora Jones, CEO of Jeli, for this lively discussion about how the best, most successful startups leverage incident analysis to understand their companies, active listening to track what’s happening in the industry and tools like chaos engineering to build their way to success. They also discuss the importance of Angel Investing and mentoring along the way.

In this episode, our hosts Jodi Ashley (Techstrong) and Tracy Ragan (DeployHub) are joined by Alaina Percival, a technology powerhouse who pivoted her young career by teaching herself to code shortly after she moved to Silicon Valley. Now, Alaina is the CEO of Women Who Code and is “helping diverse professionals increase their wealth and influence around the globe.” If you are interested in learning how to build a diverse technical community, how to take a chance and pivot your own career (or both!) don’t miss this interview with a true tech visionary.

In this episode, our hosts Jodi Ashley (Techstrong), Tracy Ragan (DeployHub) and Rebecca Auguste (Netris) are joined by Zenobia Godschalk, a TedX presenter, to explore the art of communication and how to break down technical topics into an engaging story. Zenobia is the Vice Chair of Forte Group, an advocacy and education non-profit with a focus on women in cybersecurity. Forte has become a community; a source of sharing, inspiration, learning and celebration. It has also helped shape business partnerships and has generated a powerful network effect across the security industry.

In this episode our hosts Jodi Ashley (Techstrong), Tracy Ragan (DeployHub) and Rebecca Auguste (Netris) are joined by Tara Hernandez ( (MongoDB). From the first commercial compilers to today’s DevOps pipelines, Tara walks us through the evolution of development tools and teaches us the history of the development tools market and discusses the industries pivot into DevSecOps and Cloud-Native environments.