1.
MELISSA SASSI
CHIEF PENGUIN, IBM Z
STUDENT & ENTREPRENEUR EXPERIENCE
@MENTORAFRIKA
COMMUNITY
BUILDING
DRIVING MORE DIVERSITY & INCLUSION IN TECH

2.
Hit me up on Twitter!
@mentorafrika
Melissa Sassi
Chief Penguin, IBM Z - Student & Entrepreneur Experience
CEO & Founder, MentorNations & XTP Hustle
Intrapreneur Entrepreneur Digital Skills
Advocate
Startup Boss Youth Engagement
Executive
Create. Make. Do.
No Handcuffs.
Make the
Impossible
Possible. No Hierarchies. Thrive Hive.
Be an AND, not an OR.

3.
WHY?
BETTER PERFORMANCE
AGAINST GOALS WHEN A COMPANY OR TEAM
IS MORE DIVERSE & INCLUSIVE.
BETTER PRODUCTS
BECAUSE THE TEAM IS MORE REFLECTIVE OF
ITS AUDIENCE.
BETTER INSIGHTS
BECAUSE THE TEAM CAN BETTEER
UNDERSTAND AUDIENCE PAIN POINTS,
ASPIRATIONS & JOYS.

4.
DEFINE YOUR
VISION
BUILD A PLAN TO
FILL IN THE GAPS
START SMALL
IDENTIFY YOUR
GAPS
GATHER YOUR
THRIVE HIVE
TEST & LEARN
SIX STEPS
EMPATHY! EMPATHY! EMPATHY!

5.
DEFINE YOUR
VISION
WHERE DO YOU WANT TO BE?
WHAT DOES SUCCESS LOOK LIKE IN THE
NEAR & FAR TERM?

6.
Creativity &
Innovation in Action
Women in tech make up 28% of
the workforce.
WOMEN IN TECH
Less than 3% of venture capital
goes to female founders & the
numbers are equally dismal for
founders of color.
STARTUP FOUNDERS
I created my own role & job
title as a means of driving
greater diversity in tech & the
startup ecosystem.
CHANGE!

7.
IDENTIFY YOUR
GAPS
WHO IS DOING IT RIGHT?
IS YOUR TEAM REFLECTIVE OF YOUR
AUDIENCE?

8.
Adaptability in Action
Took time out of my everyday
to listen to the community with
empathy & learn new
strategies.
LEARNING
Before 2019, I had a constant
feeling of failure & used that
fuel my passion for change.
FAILURE
Built a team & group of
collaborators that would be
more reflective of my audience.
MORE CHANGE!

9.
BUILD A PLAN TO
FILL IN THE GAPS
WHAT TACTICAL STEPS DO YOU NEED TO
TAKE TO GET YOU TO WHERE YOU WANT TO
BE?
WHO IS DOING WHAT, WHAT SUPPORT DO
YOU NEED & DO YOU HAVE THE BUDGET TO
SUPPORT WHERE YOU WANT TO GO?

10.
Persuasion in Action
Shared goals and objectives for
greater diversity & inclusion
with everyone everywhere to
make sure it's top of mind.
OVER-COMMUNICATE
Asked for more budget to
support my entrepreneur &
student segments.
BUDGET
Got my Scrum Master
certification to better manage
my work deliverables, timelines,
milestones & KPIs.
SCRUM MASTER

11.
GATHER YOUR
THRIVE HIVE
TALK WITH EVERYONE YOU KNOW.
NETWORK TO MEET THE PEOPLE WHO ARE
DOING IT BETTER THAN YOU. DON'T
COMPARE. ELEVATE OTHERS.

12.
Teamwork &
Collaboration in
Action
Made a point of meeting new
people & actually follow up with
speakers via social media at
virtual conferences.
NETWORKING
Collaborated with individual
influencers, associations,
nonprofits & other companies
with likeminded goals.
INFLUENCERS
Connect with those around you
wherever & whenever. Enable
your audience & community to
get to know THE REAL YOU.
TRULY CONNECT

13.
START SMALL
IS THERE A SMALL TEST YOU CAN DO TO
SEE HOW THE CHANGE IMPACTS YOUR
CURRENT STATE?
DOCUMENT WHERE YOU COULD HAVE DONE
BETTER & BE A LEARN-IT-ALL.

14.
Design Thinking in
Action
Made a point of reading
everything I could on emotional
intelligence & empathy.
EMOTIONAL
INTELLIGENCE
Learned how to facilitate
design thinking sessions to gain
audience insights, brainstorm,
and take on small tests.
DESIGN THINKING
Created blog/webinar learning
series to bring new audiences
into the mix vs. serving as a
company mouthpiece.
LOUD & PROUD

15.
TEST & LEARN
BE KPI FOCUSED AND EVALUATE HOW YOUR
SMALL TESTS ARE IMPACTING YOUR END
RESULT.
REPEAT WHAT WORKED. CHANGE WHAT DID
NOT.

16.
Lifelong Learning &
Growth Mindset in
Action
Worked hard to build my
personal brand & collaborate
with likeminded people to try
new things & learn from others.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Spent a considerable amount of
time reading from experts
within & outside the industry &
sharing what I learned forward.
LEARN-IT-ALL
Shared what I was working on
with everyone everywhere in
ways that were authentically
me.
AUTHENTICITY

17.
Audience-Focused Programs: Students
Year-long student leadership &
evangelist program with 140 active
students all focused on learning IBM Z
skills & sharing their skills forward in
the student community on a global
scale.
Z AMBASSADOR
PROGRAM
Free & virtual hub for students to learn
IBM Z skills, prepare for the future of
work, network with peers & experts,
find out about upcoming events &
contests + guest blogging
opportunities.
IBM Z GLOBAL
STUDENT HUB
Mobile app and web game for learning
the introductory building blocks of
enterprise computing, including the
concepts of open source, uptime of the
Z platform, data protection, privacy &
security + commonly used
programming languages.
HOUR OF Z
GAME
Launched a biweekly livestream that is
entirely for youth, with youth & by
youth occurring biweekly with a lens on
establishing an intergenerational
dialogue between industry & students
where we go beyond the textbooks &
bring real, practical skills &
competencies to life.
STUDENTX BIWEEKLY
LIVESTREAM

18.
High-touch, global, early-stage startup
accelerator program with 53% female
founders, 34% black founders, 14%
LatinX founders & 14% AsianX founders
with access to IBM Cloud credits,
business & technical mentorship &
marketing collaboration with a lens on
enabling startups to build & scale.
IBM HYPER PROTECT
ACCELERATOR
Medium-touch version of IBM Hyper
Protect Accelerator with a similar
percentage of diversity & inclusion
across the founder set.
FRIENDS OF HYPER
PROTECT
Consortium of startups interested in data
protection, privacy & security as a
central strategy within their business,
orchestrated by IBM's accelerator
partner, Village Capital.
DATATECH FOR GOOD
COALITION
Biweekly livestream that is entirely for
startups, with startups, and by startups
with a lens on establishing a dialogue
between IBM and startup founders to
demonstrate the business problems
startups are solving, the solutions they
have created, their value propositions,
business models, target audiences, etc.
STARTUPS WITH
SASSI & RALLS
Audience-Focused Programs: Entrepreneurs

19.
Last week.
NOW!
Next week.
Diversity
Inclusion

20.
JOIN ME TO CARRY THE
CONVERSATION FORWARD
MELISSA SASSI
CHIEF PENGUIN, IBM Z
STUDENT & ENTREPRENEUR EXPERIENCE
@MENTORAFRIKA

21.
THANK YOU!
@MENTORAFRIKA