EmpowHer

Inspiration

As a team of 4 female tech enthusiasts, we have witnessed firsthand the gender disparities in the tech industry, not just from our campus experiences, but also through events like hackathons, networking, and career fairs.

Women are under-represented in the tech industry: 1) Only 20% of tech roles are held by women; 2) The attrition/retention rate of women is 41% as compared to 17% for men; 3) Only 12% of tech-related patents are held by women. These are happening as a result of systemic barriers to entry to women in this industry, including a lack of robust support system and mentorship, unequal growth opportunities, and workplace culture.

Therefore, we share this vision of creating a platform where women and non-binary individuals are not just participating but are also being heard and thriving. We want to build a more equitable and inclusive tech culture.

What it does

Niche Focus: Women and non-binary community so that they feel safe and comfortable sharing and participating.
Personal Touch & Engagement: More than just ‘coffee chats’ and ‘networking’, we provide the platform for people to build common experiences, share their personal stories and connect with individuals on a more personal level.
Personalized Support: We care about individual interests and career goals instead of mass feeding the content. Events and mentorship programs that suit one’s interests, as well as experience levels will be prioritized by our recommendation system.
Global Access: We aim to reach a wide demographics and provide a greater network for people to connect to

How we built it

UI/UX Design & Prototyping: Figma
Front-end: Typescript, React, Tailwind CSS Next.JS, Next.JS, Nested Layout, Zustand for state management, context provider
Back-end: Typescript, Next.js, Next.js Server Actions, Mongodb, socket.io server for real time chatting, Zod for validation
API: authentication integration- Clerk and webhook; TinyMCE Rich Text editor react integration

Challenges we ran into

User privacy: How to verify a user’s identity? Should we limit our audience to women and non-binary only or should it be open to everyone? What if users prefer not to share that personal information?