January, 2017 | TechBirmingham

TechBirmingham Blog

Archive for January, 2017

Meet Our Member Company – Command Alkon with Mark Vines

We want to welcome to the TechBirmingham community Command Alkon. We are featuring Mark Vines who is the HR Recruiter for Command Alkon, he’s lived in Birmingham for 38 years. He’s very excited seeing the new start-up companies in the Birmingham area, and sees the growth as being positive for our city.

We are so glad that you are joining the TechBirmingham Community Mark! Tell us about your company Command Alkon.

Command Alkon is a global supplier of integrated solutions for construction materials producers, with customers in over 70 countries worldwide. The company is celebrating 40 years of being in business.

Tell us what you think about the Tech Scene here in Birmingham:

It seems like there are a lot of start-ups that have come to Birmingham. It is tough to predict the trends in Tech, but Birmingham is definitely trending in the right direction.

What is one of the challenges you face in your industry?

Finding qualified technical talent, especially software developers.

What is something exciting happening at Command Alkon right now?

Currently we are expanding our mobile application offerings and web enabling our legacy client-server products.

If you could give some advice to someone new to the job market, what would you tell them?

Find what are you passionate about and what are you great at. Strive to be the best at what you do. Surround yourself with like-minded people.

Thank you Mark for taking the time for us to get to you know you!

You find Mark on Twitter @mvinestweeted and on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/mvines/

For more information about Command Alkon contact Mark or visit their website: http://www.commandalkon.com

Meet Our Volunteers – Tina Maddox

TechBirmingham thrives through its immensely talented and diverse group of member companies and their employees. We are also fortunate to be part of a community that values giving back and helping others to succeed. Meet Our Volunteers is an ongoing Q&A series highlighting the individuals who are crucial to the success of our programs.

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New Year’s Resolutions

By now many of us made at least one New Year’s resolution for 2017. You may have already broken that resolution, started over, or abandoned it altogether. 2017 marks the beginning of our fourth year as our “rebranded” organization and the 15th year since the organization was formed. Our mission at TechBirmingham is broadly described as “strengthening and promoting the technology ecosystem in the region” and each year we look at what we have accomplished and what we can do better in the coming year to serve our members and the community.

2016 was a successful year for our organization by many measurements. We increased membership by over 50%, produced 2 new high quality conferences for Birmingham (ACN and Sloss Tech), launched a coding initiative for kids with our affiliated non profit Tech Alabama, and saw attendance growth at our monthly TechTuesday and Birmingham Women in Technology group meetings. We also partnered with Innovation Depot, local companies and top CIO’s to launch the Keep IT Local Pledge. This program is focused on encouraging and facilitating local businesses to look local for IT products and services first. Lastly, we launched the Work Your Magic branding campaign focused on elevating the profile of Birmingham as a tech hub and attracting talent to our city to help address the talent gap.

Through our kids coding initiatives we positively impacted 370 kids through our Super Code Sunday Events at the McWane Science Center, over 660 girls through 100 Girls of Code workshops and had 64 kids participate in our first Kid’s Code-A-Thon. In addition to the positive impact learning how to program has had on children ages 8-17 in our region, we are also providing the local tech professionals who volunteer to help us with these programs the opportunity to give back and make a real difference in Birmingham.

So, what’s in store for 2017? Well, we have big plans for 2017 and expect to exceed our 2016 membership, event attendance and impact numbers.

We challenge you and/or your company to get MORE involved in TechBirmingham this year. Attend an event, be a speaker, volunteer, share your company’s big events and product releases. In return, we pledge to continue to “work our magic” to help your companies grow, inspire young minds and help fuel Birmingham’s growth.

Don’t forget to check out the Events Calendar to see what we have planned so far for 2017!

Win a ticket to a 2017 EVENT!!!

We sent out a survey at the end of 2016 and few people were brave enough to share their thoughts. We would love to hear from you on how we can serve our member community better, and to sweeten the deal, we’re offering a chance for you to win a ticket to an event of your choice for 2017. All you have to do is complete and submit the survey by January 18 and we will choose at random from all the surveys received. You must be a member to win.

https://goo.gl/forms/lW3tpbrcmwJEYgpu1