TechEquity Collaborative: Strategy Update

Last month we held a meetup to present our current thinking on the TechEquity Collaborative’s strategy. We recognize that many people who are interested in our approach weren’t able to attend the event. This post is a reiteration of what was presented at the meetup. Slides can be found here.

History/Context

The TechEquity Collaborative was started in late 2015 as an outgrowth of a conversation between James Nixon and Darrell Jones III. James had been working with the East Bay Broadband Consortium and others who were thinking about tech equity through the lens of ubiquitous access to broadband and digital literacy and had drafted a concept paper on TechEquity with Bruce Buckelew, Founder of OTX West. Darrell, who runs business development at Clef (an Oakland-based startup), was spending a large chunk of his time on community engagement projects for the company. Both of them realized a need for the tech industry in the East Bay to play a leading role in addressing inequality especially as the tech boom spreads to Oakland.

I described how I became involved in the TechEquity Collaborative here. Since I came on board, I’ve been spending much of my time thinking about strategy — how can we be most effective with our limited resources? What value can we bring to an already robust ecosystem? How do we focus on and prioritize the things that will have the most impact?

From the time of the first meetup in December, there has been incredible energy for the idea of the Collaborative. Led by the Urban Strategies Council, the Tech Equity Collaborative helped to produce the new TechPathways website. A working group of the Collaborative formulated the first draft of what became our statement of values. The Collaborative also joined in sponsoring TechEquity Week in February. However, to succeed it was clear that the effort needed more clarity and structure — we needed to become more than a Meetup group. Based on many conversations, lots of research and a few very helpful working sessions we’ve come up with an identity and approach we think is viable, valuable, and currently missing from the Oakland tech ecosystem.

Our mission

The TechEquity Collaborative builds an inclusive, representative and community-oriented tech ecosystem in Oakland.

We are a membership-driven organization made up of companies and individuals who share our values.

Creating the mission took the least amount of time — it has been the tag line on our website since the first meetup! We added the second line about membership because we think it’s important to note that we have a strong focus on building community as an effective way to achieve our goals. More on membership later.

Our Approach

The TechEquity Collaborative will focus on four things:

1. Supporting Oakland tech companies in setting goals and making commitments that reinforce our mission: We have drafted a statement of values we will be asking tech companies in Oakland to sign on to, and then make concrete commitments that reinforce those values. We will coordinate with the companies to make these commitments public and report back on the progress of our member companies — and our overall progress on building a more inclusive ecosystem.
2. Developing programming to help companies meet their commitments: As I said, when the TechEquity Collaborative launched there was lots of energy around the idea of companies contributing to an equitable tech ecosystem. Much of that energy came from companies themselves. But many of them expressed a lack of know-how, resources, or capacity to understand where to start. We plan to lower the barrier to doing the right thing by providing programming and support to our member companies. We’re still determining exactly what this programming will be but it is likely to take the form of trainings, toolkit development, data sharing, bridging the gap between community organizations and companies, and more.
3. Providing opportunities for individuals to contribute to a more equitable ecosystem: Many of those who express interest in our work are technologists who live in Oakland but work elsewhere, usually San Francisco or Silicon Valley. We want to create ways for those people to do what they can to further our mission.
4. Aggregate the political power of the tech industry to advocate for policies that support our mission: We recognize that much of what will protect and grow an equitable tech ecosystem in Oakland — like affordable housing and more robust public education — is out of the control of individual companies. Working with local experts and advocates, we will develop a policy agenda that supports ongoing efforts and leverages the tech industry’s power to accelerate change on these issues.

Why Companies?

You’ll notice a strong emphasis on working with companies to achieve our goals. Many might think that’s an odd approach for an organization that thinks the tech industry can and should do better. That’s exactly why we think working with companies can have the greatest impact and fill the biggest gap. There are similarities to this approach and the work I did at Code for America. In the civic tech space, there were many great organizations working from outside government to advocate for better, more transparent government. But very few, if any, of them approached the problem from the perspective of government. Much of what prevented change was not lack of desire on the part of government officials, it was lack of understanding, lack of capacity and resources, and lack of skill to build change internally. In the face of many other urgent and immediate challenges, government officials couldn’t find the time, will or resources to tackle the problem.

Code for America’s role was to create the space and opportunity to remove internal barriers to change. We hope the TechEquity Collaborative can play a similar role for tech companies, particularly in Oakland where companies tend to be smaller and less well-resourced than those across the Bay. What progress can we make if we approach the challenge from the perspective of the companies? What is preventing them from fully participating and how can we change the incentives or the costs? How do we build bridges to and shared language with others in Oakland who care about creating equitability?

Membership

Our initial attention will be paid to getting companies signed on to the statement of values and inking commitments with those companies. Once those commitments have been made, companies will officially become members of the TechEquity Collaborative. There are still a lot of details to be worked out about how to ensure that commitments have teeth, that companies are truly committed (and not just checking boxes), and that we follow up on commitments in a transparent way. To that end, we are creating a committee (which I’m currently calling the reporting committee — input on better names greatly appreciated!) that will advise this process to make sure that corporate membership is not simply window dressing or PR. Corporate members will have access to our programming and can participate in our policy advocacy work.

Programing for individual membership is a little less clear right now but we are thinking about creating a clearinghouse that can match members with community organizations in Oakland to volunteer their skills in support of those organizations’ missions. This could take the form of mentoring, tech support, design work, or just an additional set of hands. We want to make sure we scope this program so that it works for the community organizations. Having spent most of my career at nonprofits and managing volunteers, I know there is often a high cost to bringing on volunteer capacity. We hope to work with organizations like the Taproot Foundation to make sure we channel this capacity in the most productive way.

What Now?

By June, we hope to start conversations with the first wave of corporate members. Once we have a better view of what commitments companies are making, we can begin to design and deploy the most relevant programming for them. We also will start building out opportunities for individual members. In addition to programming, there is a lot of work to do in creating the structures, and raising the money, that will ensure the TechEquity Collaborative can be a real force for change in the East Bay, and beyond.

There are still many unanswered questions and lots of details to fill in. But what is not in doubt is the passion and energy so many people have brought to this idea. We are looking forward to making sure that energy is turned into results. Now is the right time — now is the only time — to make sure the tech boom in Oakland works for everyone.

If you want to get involved, you can sign up here and join our Slack and Meetup groups. Our next Meetup is on May 19, and you can get more details here. We’re also looking for volunteers who can help with design/brand development, social media, and website content/design. And Clef welcomes you to join them at their community dinners, held the first Wednesday of every month at 7pm at the Port Workspaces.

If you have questions, or want to express interest in helping out, you can reach me in our Slack group (@cbracy) or by email at eastbaytechequity@gmail.com.