Leanne Pittsford

Hi, I'm the founder of Lesbians Who Tech, the global community of 15,000 queer women in tech with chapters in over 30 cities. Lesbians Who Tech brings together LGBT women in tech, a group that's rarely represented in either of the communities of which they are a part: the tech community, or the LGBT community. Lesbians Who Tech hosts three conferences annually including San Francisco, New York and Berlin. Thanks to funding from the Andreessens we will be launching two new programs, Bring a Lesbian to Work Day & a coding scholarship fund for queer women who want to learn how to code in 2016.

Previously, I lead Start Somewhere, a design and technology agency focused on helping social good organizations. During my time at Start Somewhere I launched Social Good Tech Week, Lean Impact, which helps social good organizations use Lean Startup principles and When You Work at a Nonprofit, a fun and creative tumblr blog only the nonprofit community would understand.

Before starting my own company, I was the Director of Administration and Finance at Equality California, the largest statewide LGBTQ organization in the U.S. and worked on the No on Prop 8 campaign, which is also where I fell in love with technology. During my time there I built an online fundraising tool that raised over $2 Million for the campaign. I was also on the board of StartOut, a nonprofit that supports LGBTQ entrepreneurs and co-founded the Lesbian Entrepreneurship Mentoring Program during my time on the board. I was recently named 40 under 40 in the San Francisco Bay Times, featured in San Francisco Magazine's Power Issue and TechCrunch's, "40 Diverse People In Tech Who Made Big Moves In 2015."