Walmart Lab's Women In Tech Hackathon

An insightful day of innovation and collaboration...

I was honored to co-host the @WalmartLabs hackathon this past weekend. @WalmartLabs is the e-commerce technology arm of the largest retailer in the United States. Being an unabashed supporter of organizations like FC St. Pauli, it’s only natural that some may view my association here as questionable or perhaps even hypocritical. I likely would not have been overly enthusiastic about the arrangement if it wasn’t for the fact that it was executed by a strong group of women engineers within Walmart Labs. Don’t let achieving perfection of global economic equity be the enemy of great recruiting opportunities for a historically marginalized gender in the tech space 😉. No organization is perfect, but from what I’ve observed, and learned since the hackathon, @WalmartLabs actually executes on the promises of inclusion that so many companies in our space continue to profess.

Hackathons aren’t easy to pull off - and it’s important not to try to do too much. If the event is focused on promoting or leveraging specific tools (this particular event was promoting @WalmartLabs Electrode React/Node.js framework), familiarity and training with the tools before a competition is underway is a must-have. For those of you planning an event, consider a scripted challenge with a clear result or outcome to achieve, using the promoted technology. Future hackathons, with increasingly more breadth and positioned to developers that develop mastery of the chosen technology, can build a dedicated community and strong advocates for the tech in the industry.