Hi Thomas — thanks for taking the time to comment, though I am sorry that you feel disappointed in my journey, or at least my reflections on it.

I come from an environmental & engineering background, where the number of women in leadership or decision making positions is notoriously low, and where I’ve personally seen women excluded, ignored, spoken over, undermined, held back, removed, and — almost always, underpaid. This is just my personal experience, but if you feel that this is “the usual beat up” — that you’ve heard this story over and over and over, it’s perhaps because this is a patriarchal societal structure that we built and are operating in, and it treats women pretty badly. I’ll not be the last to write about it, though I wish I was.

My point isn’t man-bashing though. My point is that there are other ways to do things, and because I think that this system is failing, it’s actually vital that we do things differently. We all have different reasons for coming into it. I commend you for having found a way a long time ago —congratulations. It’s extremely encouraging for us all and I find it inspiring to follow in the footsteps of trailblazers, to be guided by others that have tried and succeeded.

My path is about shining the light for others, being a guide by sharing my story, and hopefully inspiring other people to do things differently, to make the change, and to make it safe for them to do so. I’m not at all tech-minded but I love it, and I think it’s incredible that it’s been around for so long. Rather than berate myself for not doing it earlier, I just say “Brilliant — more people need to know how to use this”.

I’d also say that in the diffusion of innovation model, we are clearly not even at early majority stage yet. I believe it’s coming and that it’s our duty to keep pushing those boundaries, the technology, the implementation, to make it mainstream — and not get bogged down in who did it first or when.

And in 15 years time, when someone else tells me they just figured out how to do it for themselves too and have embarked on their own path — I will give them a big cheer, a very warm welcome, and all the support. They probably need it when they are just getting started. The very last thing I’d do (I hope) is say to them “Well I’ve been doing this for 15 years already” unless I tagged a “so you’ve got so much exciting stuff ahead of you” on the end.

And I don’t see this as at all relevant, but since you asked, I have a team of over 120 people —115 are women.