#32 The Cupcake Effect with Kate Kirwin

Kate brought her spark to this episode of Weird Growth. Lover of creating and driven by people and purpose. You’ll often find her in glitter, coding or hooping outside of She Codes. Why do She Codes exist? Simple. To inspire 100,000 women by 2025. Their programs involve teaching technical skills, connecting women to career pathways, and working with fantastic partners. Their flagship program, She Codes Plus, is a six-month program that is designed to supercharge the tech career of its participants – ideal for women looking to enter, or advance in, the tech industry. They also offer one-day workshops and tutorials. Kate packed a lot of brilliant advice in this episode so strap in. Problem We need another million people in tech in Australia by 2025. She Codes solves both the hiring and diversity problems of the tech scene. One big piece of advice. It never hurts to ask. Everyone is so nice. What is the worst that can happen? An ignored email? And listen to your customers. Don’t be afraid to ask them what they want. Bullets: (00:00) – Introduction (01:37) – The business Kate would start today (06:00) – How She Codes reached their first customers (07:14) – Why Kate took the leap (09:16) – Their first partnership with BHP (11:55) – What next-level customer validation looks like (12:52) – The Cupcake Effect (14:07) – What we can learn from the cupcake effect (18:18) – Spacecubed turned 10 – Here are some of Kate’s highlights (20:44) – Kate’s advice for encouraging STEM (23:46) – What’s next for Kate and She Codes (24:46) – How East Coast states differ from Perth (27:20) – Be helpful first (28:17) – How Kate asks customers for feedback Show & tell: - Code tutorials - code.org - https://code.org/ - She Codes Website - https://shecodes.com.au/ - Slack - https://slack.com/ - HubSpot - https://www.hubspot.com/ - Kate on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kate-kirwin