Notes from My Self-Induced Miami Tech Coma
You think I went for the sun and South Beach?
Nope, try again. I went to Miami for Hispanicize and I never left. It wasn’t the sun that kept me (I’m an indoor cycle, obsessed Nuyorican — the last thing I need is another reason to sweat and catch a sunburn. I was born tan people, I embrace every blessing) What really kept me couch surfing in Miami was…
The Miami Tech scene.
The pioneers hand crafting Miami Tech have an insatiable desire to build innovative approaches to problem solving, community development, and engagement.
Innovative Approaches
Corporations are being frank about how difficult it is to implement the 80/20 rule as it pertains to executing IT initiatives. At HITEC, JCPenney’s CIO Therace Risch spoke about how their competitive advantage is in mobile and creating an unparalleled customer experience vs. spending more on innovation. The latter becomes very expensive and time consuming in the corps built on monolithic systems.
Enter Ali from IronHack and Alex from Cognizant, both offering transformational services from two different approaches. As a SCRUM Master, I would lean towards adopting IronHack’s Agile Training course before undergoing a 12–15 month process to pulse check the org’s receptiveness to change. I believe Agile has the power to infect people with the intrapreneur “itch” by teaching them how to be self-organized and laser focused, thereby churning out results faster.
Community Development
The muscle behind this maturing force of techies is in where they live and breathe every day — the office space. I checked out two spaces, The Lab and Building.co
The Lab reminded me of being at Scenyc in the Bronx. Difficult to find if you’re not a local, but totally worth the search. The space was open and inviting. I was even greeted by a furry animal — they are pet friendly among other bits. After a tour and intro to the kitchen area where I had access to tea (don’t ask me about the café — a mí, no me gusta) and Kind bars, I decided to set up at the library’s high tables. I’m most productive at standing desks as I normally sprint in 20 minute increments and then sit down to answer emails before I get back to the grind of project managing and program/event creating. The high tables were the closest I was going to get to having a standing desk. All in all, I was a happy, productive camper. Throughout my time at the Lab, I observed an interesting conversation on computing elasticity. It made me think of two talk topics that may be relevant to the space:
1) 3 Ways to Avoid Disaster When Building a Large Scale App
2) How to Always be Automating
The vibe at Building.co felt similar to that of AlleyNYC. The impromptu conversations with strangers in the common area over fruit and that feeling the people to your left and right are working on something disruptive was in full force. After meeting with Cristian Robiou, a fellow New Yorker driving the Startupbootcamp Miami expansion, I came to understand how MedTech has the power and influence to birth the next set of highly valued startups in Miami. The space attracts people just double dutching into the Miami Tech scene as well. I accidentally bumped into Startup Angels Co-Founder and CEO Leslie Jump whom I’d only met virtually until then. I quickly realized one thing about the people within this community. Albeit small in numbers, it is plentiful in diversity of thought, experience, and cultura.
Community Engagement
Engage? Do they ever. I connected with bloggers, investors, creators, entrepreneurs, visionaries, C-levels and techies at Hispanicize, Angels Summit Americas, eMerge and Hispanic IT Executive Council. Part of the reason why my gut is telling me the Miami Tech scene is worth supporting has nothing to do with the events and everything to do with the new companies creating and developing communities of informed, hustlers like CIC, Startup Bootcamp and Wyncode. One-woman shows like Josie Goytisolo at the helm of CODeLLA and Maribel Martinez driving adoption for EveryoneOn understand the needs of under-served communities and are working diligently to service them with access.
Miami Tech leaders don’t believe in silos. Natalia Martinez-Kalinina, General Manager at CIC is working to create a “center of gravity” whereby collaboration has the opportunity to incite innovation in their space at the University of Miami Life Science & Technology Park. In 23 days I never once felt like anyone was harboring their ideas or approach to furthering their organization’s reach. I did gain a sense of people just coming to Miami for the lifestyle and then lacking the perseverance to pivot and push forward after initial plans fail.
But hey, that may not just be a Miami thing ;)
Eventually I woke up from my self induced coma fueled by Miami Tech’s appetite to entertain, collaborate, and fund viable, disruptive startups. That was a few hours ago — now I’m back in New York City still up writing at 4:26am. Why? Because the opportunity to connect resources and talent on the East Coast has my mind racing and I’m strategically planning how to do just that — the more heads the better. See you (virtually) in the #MiamiNYCTech Forum or hit me up on Twitter Nikki Tirado.
P.S. this is what NYC’s Meatpacking District (Miami’s South Beach) looks like at 5:07am, which city wins life of the party?
