Girl Geek meetup at MYOB Sydney

Girl Geek Sydney is part of a worldwide initiative to promote and engage women in technology.

Last night, we welcomed more than fifty Girl Geeks to MYOB’s Sydney office for one of their regular meetups – an evening of dinner, drinks, learning and networking. The theme of the event was appropriately MYOB-tinted: Clients Drive Our World.

Katie Osborne (UX Design Lead) talked about how MYOB keeps our clients at the centre of our design, concentrating on the importance of research to inform and shape the user experiences we create. It was great to hear how about the different methods the UX team uses to find out about what clients want from our products.

Terri Diegelman from Elabor8 (currently working as a BA with the Tax online team) explained how our development teams wear “client-coloured goggles” when building products. Her talk followed on seamlessly from Katie’s, taking the audience on a journey through MYOB’s development approach and sharing lessons that everyone could take back to their own workplaces.

We were also lucky to have Cris Gladly as a visiting speaker from the US. Cris, a branding consultant and connection strategist, reminded us that when it comes to our personal brand, everyone’s a client! She convinced us all of the importance of keeping an ongoing record (paper or digital) of our business and personal achievements – including positive feedback from others – so that we’re ready to be our own best advocate whenever the need arises.

As well as our inspiring speakers, there was plenty of food and drink, thought-provoking conversation, and a little Xmas-in-July silliness. It was a great evening, and a wonderful collaboration with the Girl Geek community. We’re hoping that this is the first of many similar hosting opportunities – it’s an excellent way for us to support diversity initiatives and to raise MYOB’s profile as an innovative workplace for passionate and collaborative people!

By Kate Andrews, Senior Tech Writer, EX team