June 11, 2025

The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Rebooting Tech Culture: How to Ignite Innovation and Build Organizations Where Everyone Can Thrive by Telle Whitney

21 minutes

Rebooting Tech Culture: How to Ignite Innovation and Build Organizations Where Everyone Can Thrive by Telle Whitney

Amazon.com

Drive a more innovative, inclusive culture that welcomes all talent.

Many technology leaders believe in having more women and people of color in technical and leadership positions throughout their organizations. In truth, though, they just fall back on exclusionary behaviors, like revering the typically male "lone genius" who is essential to their innovative future. Why the disconnect?

According to Telle Whitney, cofounder of the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, while tech leaders may want to talk about inclusivity, few actually change their cultures to dismantle the unwelcoming environment, fearful that doing so will compromise innovation. Women and people of color pay the price, facing exclusive and even hostile workplaces. They're held back from professional growth and, in many cases, choose to leave the industry altogether.

But there is a solution. In Rebooting Tech Culture, Whitney argues that the same values at the heart of innovation—creativity, courage, confidence, curiosity, communication, and community—can also foster a culture that’s welcoming to all employees. Drawing on more than fifty interviews with tech executives and a survey of a thousand people in tech, she shows how these "six Cs" can power real change in technology organizations, creating workplaces where anyone can be successful and where innovation thrives.

Today, every company is a tech company. By understanding how to apply these values and reinvigorate their cultures, leaders will learn how to eliminate the behaviors holding their teams back from true belonging, growth, and innovation.

About the author

Telle Whitney is a senior executive leader, an entrepreneur, and a recognized advocate and expert on women and technology. She has over 30 years of leadership experience and was named one of Fast Company’s Most Influential Women in Technology. She is a frequent speaker on the topic of Women and Technology. She is an accomplished technologist who spent twenty years in the semiconductor industry in Silicon Valley. Telle has been called “a pioneer for the promotion of women technologists” and “one of the most inspirational leaders I have ever known.”

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