SiliconCaribe 2020 : It’s Time to Get Back to Basics

This blog has been heavily dominated by curated news and sponsored posts for a little while now. I’ve done very little actual writing. I took a year-long sabbatical from the Caribbean tech industry, after ending Kingston Beta my pioneering 11-year-old tech startup community event series and startup mentorships. I also drastically cut my speaking engagements and ended my advisory roles with government boards focused on tech entrepreneurship and innovation.  I did the podcast pilot and pauses. Truth is, I felt myself on the brink of what would have been a second burnout. I had lost interest in things I’d previously loved, I was feeling tired and drained. So I literally dropped everything. 

It was a time to take a break, put the oxygen mask on myself and see things more clearly and try to figure out what would be next.

It’s time to get back to basics and the why of why I started doing this in the first place, as everything that I’ve done and achieved so far in the Caribbean tech entrepreneurship, in the startup and innovation ecosystem started with this blog back in 2005 when it was initially called CaribbeanTechNews.

Now, please don’t get me wrong; I absolutely loved keeping the fire burning and curating Caribbean tech industry news and digital culture. That said it’s time to start connecting the dots and start writing again…to share what  I see, been thinking and who I’ve come to know. 

I’m looking forward to working on this blog every week like when I had first started and it gave me so much joy and fulfillment.

Starting this blog back in 2005 got me to the place where I can say this:

“ 15 years in the Caribbean Tech Industry as an entrepreneur, startup ecosystem pioneer and facilitator of over 10,000 Caribbean tech entrepreneurs by producing over 150 Caribbean Tech Events in the Caribbean, Diaspora USA and Commonwealth for entrepreneurs and Women in Tech.

Kickstarted the Jamaican Tech Startup Scene in 2007 with the Caribbean’s first and longest-running tech startup community meetup Kingston Beta, followed by the Caribbean’s first tech entrepreneurship conference in 2011 – Caribbean BETA.

And went on to produce Meetups, Workshops, Bootcamps, Startup Weekends, Entrepreneur Pitch Competitions, Trend Forums, Hackathons, and Conferences. I also produced Caribbean content programming for events such as SXSW, Black Tech Week and Pitch Agrihack.

I have advised Government Ministers, Universities and Development agencies on startup ecosystem development. I have also served as Board Chairman of StartupJamaica; advised the Minister of Science, Energy, and Technology on the National ICT Advisory Council and been an SXSW Startup Accelerator Event Board Member. For my work with Caribbean Tech Entrepreneurs, I’ve received the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ) 50Under50 Business Leader Gamer Changer + TechLink Game Changer Social Entrepreneurship Awards.

I was also featured in a SiliconValley TEDx Talk given by Futurist Gary Whitehill that’s been viewed 1.7 million times.

I’ve spoken at over 200 tech and entrepreneurship events across the Caribbean, USA, Africa and Europe.

Over the past 14 years of blogging, there are now 2,000 articles being read by people from over 45 countries. The  topics ranged from Caribbean Startups, Startup Ecosystems, Tech Entrepreneurship, Women in Tech, Innovation, Blogging, Digital Media, Social Media Trends and The Future of Work being Online.”

I am super grateful for it all.

What Back to the Basics Will Look Like

So back to the basics for me means listening, observing, connect the dots, questioning, interviewing and share it all by writing and my podcast. I want to share with you that part of the Caribbean that’s Beyond the Beach and Going Digital and all of the people and things that are driving that. It’s something that I’m still passionate about thanks to my radical sabbatical.

It’s going to be a mixture of stories on Caribbean Entrepreneurs and Innovators who are leveraging technology and innovative thinking to launch all kinds of digital businesses and products that drive Digital Caribbean Culture.

It’s going to also be about what I am observing and thinking about the culture and trends around entrepreneurship and innovation is reshaping the future of the Caribbean.

Equally important, those early years of regular writing helped me to think more clearly and to connect the dots around some key things that I believe:

“ I’ve always been an unapologetic believer that each country and region in this world, has its own unique culture, digital talent, unique ways of innovating and unique strengths that can breakthrough locally, regionally and globally and be super successful. The Caribbean is no different, but do we believe it?

I believe that each Caribbean Nation must sit with itself and acknowledge the things it does best in the world, then marry it to the existing and emerging technologies to further cement those strengths.

I also believe that each Caribbean Nation must sit with itself and be honest about its most pressing problems and have the courage to disrupt itself with technology and innovative thinking to drive economic and social impact for its people. These are the things I believe the Caribbean must do to thrive in the regional and global digital economy. And those exercises can’t be driven by people who want to sell us loans, products and their beliefs on who we are and need to be in this new digital economy emerging.”

– Excerpt fromThe SiliconCaribe Manifesto

All that I’ve said there… has been a constant message in my writing, my speaking, my mentoring entrepreneurs and how I approached my government advisory roles.

For me, to start writing again is to become more connected and stewed in what I’ve always cared about.

Approaching this LIke I did when I first started.

Now, I’m getting back in the writing game, I’m going to publish something on this blog at least once per week starting in January and let’s see what happens from there on in.  I find this pressure quite helpful. I’m declaring too that I will be heavily biased on Women in Tech and How Tech Entrepreneurship of all stripes in manifesting in the Caribbean.

To further grease the wheels, allow me to set expectations extremely low.

I know that some of the writing will be decent. Some of it will be long (e.g., unpublished chapters from my pending SiliconCaribe Manifesto), and some of it will be short. As long as I publish something — anything — once a week, it doesn’t matter.

Thanks for reading this far, friends. Much more to come…

Ingrid