This Monday we had our third Boulder Women Engaging Tech meetup at The Cup. This week we all came armed with our copies of Getting Things Done. We’re doing productivity work together as a team (Goldie covered GTD further on her blog). After thirty minutes or so of talking about contexts and how to delegate, we moved on to discuss a bit about tech evangelism - zealous advocacy of the tech cause. In other words, how to spread the word about your product or service.

Technology evangelism is a hot topic around Boulder these days. We have an occasional meetup, yes, but more important, so-called evangelists are being hired left and right. It’s one piece of my puzzle, too. I’ve been doing outreach to women and women’s groups since the first week of January on behalf of TechStars. I am personally invested in getting more women into the tech scene in Boulder, specifically, and the world of tech & entrepreneurship in general.

What I’m finding about outreach is that it’s a matter of planting seeds and watering them. Letting them grow on their own. Tara Anderson, one of the first people to even use the term “evangelist” around me (and this was in July 2007 at Blogher), gave the group a few pointers on how to spread the word. She suggests using humor, especially when following up for the umpteenth time. When I asked her how you know when you’ve crossed the line from “evangelizing” to “pestering” someone, she answered in her classic style, with a smile. Essentially, you have to know, deep inside, that what you’re sharing is of value, that the person on the receiving end of your emails will eventually ask you to stop sending them if they’re not into it. For her, four is the magic number.

Right now I’m reading Pitch Like a Girl, by Ronna Lichtenberg. The focus is on learning about yourself in order to “get respect, get noticed, [and] get what you want.” All of those sound like good things, but I have to admit I read the title and was momentarily mentally paralyzed: Do I even deserve respect? Who am I to think I should get noticed for what I do? What do I want? (And the little Zennist in me screamed: What’s with all the getting?? What about giving?!)

The book is reminding me of a lot of fundamentals. The difference between the male and female brain practically requires us to pitch differently. I met with someone recently that pointed out that relationships between women must be nurtured. We may not see the fruits of our labors in the same fiscal year for which we hired to do something (in my case, spread the word about the desire to have women involved in TechStars), but once a seed is planted and a conversation begun, it can grow and evolve over years. It’s not so much pitch and walk away as pitch, follow up, have a coffee, send half a dozen emails…

I can tell you this, the relationship flourishes under these conditions. It may take more time and energy, but to me, at least, it’s well worth the wait. I love the journey.