Join us for a panel on Effective Communication hosted by WEST at Zendesk. Hear from a panel of professional women in technical roles talk about effective communication and how they developed the skills and strategies necessary to influence, collaborate, and navigate the workplace.
Panel will be moderated by Cheriana Griggs, Sr. UX Manager at GoDaddy and WEST team member. Come hear from amazing women from Zendesk, Twitch, SurveyMonkey, Udemy, and Foursquare discuss their careers and what women can do to develop effective communication skills to help them succeed.
Agenda
- 5:30pm- 6:30pm Networking/Refreshments
- 6:30pm-7:30pm Panel
- 7:30pm-8:00pm Closing Remarks
The Panel
Lisa Friedman (Zendesk, Staff Software Engineer)
Lisa leads the Security Development team at Zendesk. The Security Development team builds shared services that enhance web security and product functionality. Zendesk is a global corporation and these services impact all of Zendesk’s family of products and require communication and collaboration with people around the world.
Prachi Sakharkar (SurveyMonkey, Sr. Engineering Manager)
Prachi manages both the survey creation and survey taking (which accounts for more than 3 million responses in a day) experience at SurveyMonkey. Prachi contributes her growth to being curious and asking questions while being an active listener, which are both essential to effective Communication.
Marissa Chacko (Foursquare, Sr. Director of Consumer Products)
Marissa is the Senior Director of Consumer Products at Foursquare, where she leads development of the City Guide, Swarm and Marsbot mobile apps. Prior to joining Foursquare, Marissa was a product manager at Hotel Tonight and Zynga. Outside the office she has a passion for horse riding, and can be found practicing her jumping skills down in Portola Valley. Marissa holds BA & BSBA degrees from Washington University in St.Louis, as well as an MBA from UC Berkeley.
Claire Menke (Udemy, Sr. Manager of UX Research)
As an anthropologist by training, I transitioned into UX Research several years ago and have since started the UX Research function at two EdTech companies. Currently at Udemy we have a team of four researchers who primarily work with product & design, but who also support marketing, brand, and others - empowering everyone to develop the best customer experience through research insights.
Communication is one of the most essential skills you can have as a researcher, largely because of our cross-functional role. I believe communication is about meeting people where they are - molding your style to match your stakeholder's way of understanding. Communication is often considered a "soft skill," but it's one of the hardest to execute well!
Jaclyn Zhuang (Twitch, Business Operations & Strategy)
Jaclyn works at Twitch, leading efforts on Twitch's international expansion and collaboration with game developers to build integrated game-Twitch products. Jaclyn has held multiple strategy and operations roles at Google, Electronic Arts, and Deloitte Consulting prior to her role at Twitch. Through these experiences Jaclyn has learned that success is often equal parts what you say (strategy) and how you say it (communication).
Chériana Griggs (GoDaddy, Sr. UX Manager)
Chériana Griggs is a San Francisco resident, strong advocate for women in the workplace and UX manager at GoDaddy. She’s passionate about building better products and growing teams that thrive on great company culture. In her current role, she works on building delightful product experiences for GoDaddy’s small business customers.