Powerful and specifically p so um power of World Women, which is an organization dedicated for women and by women. Uh that was co-founded by K and I am currently the marketing manager and I am Lauren Katz is the other person.And today we would like to start with um presenting a few questions to you. So if you could start all over again, what would you do differently? What are your unfulfilled dreams? Where do you face limitations internally or externally? These are some of the questions that we would like to explore today by telling you about our story about how we got into power and how um right now we're struggling with all of these questions as as well a little bit. And the one message that we want to send to you today is that we understand that there are many challenges along the way, not only individual but also systematic, but at the end of the day, we really want to make sure that the message that you get from this presentation is that you got this, that you are powerful and that there are ways to harness your power and achieve your dreams and get to the place where you want to be.

And before we get into the details of that, I would like to briefly introduce myself. So um as I mentioned, my name is Lauren. I go by she, her pronouns. I am originally from Mexico, but I have lived in over five different countries in the last 10 years. Um I'm currently a student at uh um at a master's level, I'm doing a master's in women and gender studies. Um I'm very passionate about traveling about exploring about um photography also as you can see food, I'm very um active person. And if I'm not sipping coffee in front of my computer, you can usually find me outdoors doing an activity or also uh hanging out with my family and my friends for me community is one of the most important things and really everything that I do professionally and personally is um always surrounded and surrounded and accompanied by um community.

So that's me and cat. I'll pass the mic to you now. Yeah. Thank you.

Um I hope you don't hear the echo as I hear it. It's a bit strange. Um So this is me in a picture. You might recognize the yellow sweater for me. It's all about why I always ask myself, who am I who do I want to be? Um And I am on a mission to combine woman empowerment with tech and the biggest change probably came after I left or when I left my job at Mont Blanc gave up all my securities to go volunteer in Africa as well as in Colombia. And that kind of like kicked off my passion for community work for women empowerment, for doing good and giving back to others. Um, ever since I have been certified as a yoga teacher, I have worked in various start ups. I published my own book. I founded my own start ups. Um I've been at the UN intern there and recently I left a job as a CMO in Silicon Valley. And for me, it's all about three different areas. It's about entrepreneurship, women empowerment and mindfulness. And um yeah, that's why I'm very excited that we're here today to talk

about power. Thank you, cat. Um So thinking about what have been some of the challenges that we face as women in these different areas, the ones that Kat just mentioned and myself. Um and specifically for me, I think being a Latina woman migrating to Europe, I'm currently residing in Vienna. That's where I'm currently studying. Um I think there has been way too many challenges that we can list right here and talk about in one session. But I think one of the most uh or like the biggest challenges that we face is feeling stuck, feeling pressure from society um naturally having fear and frustration, especially when you know, you go somewhere else where you're not having a settled community or a support network or some sort of, you know, knowledge of the area that you're in um community.

So that experience of staying connected with your community. But also at the same time pursuing your dreams, pursuing your goals, goals. And with that also comes the guilt and the pressure, right? I mean, especially from my side, I think that um all my family back home in Mexico, for me, it's always a struggle to combine these things and being able to pursue what I want to do. Um in Austria here in Austria, for example, but at the same time, staying connected and maintaining that relationship with my family back home, which is very important to me. Um But again, you know, these are all like, these are some of the many issues that we can face, but we want to say that you got this and that we're going to try to in some way, share with you some of the strategies that we've used so that we can express our like live to our fullest and truest self and really harden as that power that we have.

Um This is, yeah. So the first thing here that we want to talk about is know you why? So it's quite difficult to start, you know, seeing a path and following that path if there is not. So a sort of guidance or guidance point in your, in your life or in your path. So for us, we think that knowing why you're doing, this is one of the greatest starting point. So as Kat was mentioning, um empowering women um is one of her goals. So that's something that can really be a guide. And that's something that also drew us to power and that's why we're working together. And once you have that, I feel like it's one of those things that you'll figure out the exact steps along the way, it's not necessarily, you know, linear or easy or, you know, kind of like a step by step guide. But once you have that goal or that point of guidance, then it becomes easier to get to that place and then sorry. Um So connected to that, we really want to emphasize that sometimes those goals and those dreams might change along the way, you might discover something new about yourself, you might discover something new about the environment where you're at and those dreams might become different or bigger or change and modify.

And that's OK because I feel like all of us have skills within us that we can use to adapt to the circumstances that we're in. So now I hand it over to k

thank you, Lauren. Um Yeah, it's all about the question how to overcome the challenges. Um

It's first of all, start

small, right? Again. Sorry. Can you just quickly tell me in the chat if you hear me twice because I hear myself

talking? No, you're fine.

OK. Well, then it's just me. I got to ignore that. Um Thank you, Caitlyn as well. Um So, first of all, how to overcome the challenges is that you got to start small, right? Take the first step, engage in projects. What kind of projects can you engage in? What are communities that you can find that you can thrive in, that you can thrive with? And then the fourth step is to share your story. We all have a story. You have a story, you are unique, you have something that makes you, you have something that is truly unique to yourself that you could overcome and that is your power. Do you mind moving over to the next slide, Lauren? And that's why I and the team actually founded Popo. You may have already noticed that we spell power with a two Ws um P was founded in 2018 and it all started when I was attending the Youth Assembly of the United Nations in New York. And we got together with so many young change makers from around the world, passionate to make the world a better place and you know, full of ideas. But you may have come across this as you attend conferences and as you attend um you know, those events you leave without an actual impact. And we didn't want this. We wanted to prevent this at all costs.

So what we did is we got together and we knew we were passionate about women empowerment without really knowing what this meant and how to figure it out. But we drank big and we were like coming together from six different nations and that's how power was founded and power stands for power of world women, but we just keep it to power usually. Now, what is power? Um We say power is a woman led project that fosters women empowerment, educates, inspires and amplifies the voices of women unknown outside their communities. Long meaning. But what does it actually mean? Um We want to provide guidelines, we want to provide tool kits, we want to provide the support for women to empower themselves. We believe that women are so powerful and that they have what it takes to empower themselves and to not be dependent on others but to empower them from within, from inside. By now, we have a team of about 10 team members um spread around the world including non-binary members and by now, even men included. Um And in the past, we have focused on different topics.

So as you can see here, for example, on the Instagram highlights, we focus on women in sports, we focus on human trafficking. We focused on women and sex on LGBT Q. Um Domestic violence FGM really topics that very often don't get the attention that they deserve. And we invited women on our podcast on our blog, on our social media to share their story. Um And by then, like, you know, just make themselves more heard and give them really the stage to empower themselves and share their story. Now, we say we are here for you and I'm trying to wrap this up in a bit because we're running out of time due to the technical issues in the beginning. Um, empower yourself. As I said, it, you can imagine us as the cheerleaders, we're here to support you. We are the basis we cheer you up, we help you stand on top and we're here to cheer you up. Also in a way that we celebrate you, that we celebrate your story, your accomplishments, that we really want to make sure you get the stage and the celebrations and the toolkits and the support that you deserve. Now use your power. The question is I told you about what power was in the past. How are we going to do it in the future right now? We're in this very interesting transitioning stage of um early stage start up.

You could say where we try to really turn this into a business. What was just a passion project before we're trying to turn this into a business. Meaning we provide guidelines to kids, support to young women, change makers that do work in their community. Let it be something about sustainability. Um giving out books to Children usually wouldn't have access um giving out food, cooking every Sunday, whatever it is very often women get to a point where they're like, I'm stuck. I want to have you in more impact. I want my story to be shared. But where do I get started? How do I do it? And that's where we come in. We want to support you, provide you with the tools and guidelines and support and maybe a bit of um consulting to make sure that we close the gap between change makers and their communities and the politicians because we're all aware we want change. But the change actually happens within the communities right now, what we want you to take away you might be thinking about as we said, start small and maybe have a project that you're already thinking about. Maybe have something of like, oh, I feel like there's something bigger in me. But like how do I embrace it fully?

First of all, what we want you to remember is that if you feel rejected and fulfilled or like limitations that can be your superpower, not gonna lie, you're not alone, right? I have overcome the biggest challenges and that led me to the greatest successes and the greatest stories and changes. No matter if you are an entrepreneur, if you are on change maker or even an individual, there may be some women of you here working in tech who have the desire to just, you know, have a passion project on the side. As we started with the right mindset, you can contribute to way more diverse and way more inclusive community. And we really want to encourage you, you don't have to think of like, oh and this has to be a business, do something small. And if it is for five people, it is for five people that you benefit and that you create value. And if as long as you have the right mindset, you can do it. The last one that we wanna share is become aware of your own magic. If you remember the previous picture, there was like this magic stick.

Um You have magic and you, you are powerful, you have what it takes and we just really want to support you in being seen, being heard and sharing your story and just making sure that you become aware of your value in a professional setting in your passion project and whatever it might be.

And we highly encourage you to take part of this journey and connect with us. We want you to share the story. We want you to, if you have a project that we can help you with, um reach out if you feel like you're stuck with something or you want to have a career change and you feel like, hey, there's something inside me and I made for something bigger or I work in tech and I love it, but I want something on the side.

You know, I work in tech myself and I am a board member of two ngo S in Uganda on this site, you don't have to be just one person. You can be multiple things at once and you can do, you know your part to commit to contribute to a better community. And we really want to hear your story and we highly encourage you to reaching out to power of work women.com. I'm just also putting in my linkedin in the chat um because I think we're coming to an end and I know the next sessions are coming up and it's quite tight. Um If you want also, Lauren's is gonna put in hers as well. Uh Feel free to reach out there again. Thank you so much for your patience um during the beginning with the technical issues. Um And please, if there's one thing you should take away from this speech is really that you are powerful and that you have what it

takes. Thank you so much cat and thank you so much everyone for being here today.