She Builds: How Women in Tech Are Redefining Leadership, Resilience, and Opportunity

She Builds Bridges. She Builds Resilience. She Builds Her Own Table. She Builds the Next Generation. She Builds a Business. She Builds the Next Role. “She Builds” was the central theme of the 2025 Women in Tech Panel & Luncheon at Community Summit NA, a theme developed by USTPay’s Kate Coffey-Bacon.

“She Builds is active. It’s what we’re doing. It’s how we’re moving forward as women in the community, how we’re leaning on each other. We’re seeing ourselves in each other’s stories, and we’re finding family. We’re finding sisterhood,” Coffey-Bacon told the crowd.

This year, panelists Sam Bush, Qachauna Gipson, Kim Congleton, Elif Item, Mary Lanham, and Michelle Serna took the stage to share their experience with building – whether that be resilience, bridges, relationships, brands, the next generation of women in technology, or a role that doesn’t exist.

She Builds Bridges

Bush, B2B Marketer, Ambush on Air, discussed her journey of building bridges through mentorship – having been a mentee and a mentor.

Bush told the story of asking to be given the chance to take on a role “instead of waiting for someone more qualified.”

As she explained, “That moment didn’t happen because I ticked every single box. I didn’t have all the technical experience, but it happened… because someone built a bridge and gave me the guts to walk across it.”

In that moment, she realized, a title doesn’t dictate someone’s ability to mentor. “I just needed to remember how hard it was for me to figure this out on my own, and then I decided to give it back.”

She Builds Resilience

At last year’s Women in Tech Panel and Luncheon, Qachauna Gipson attended the event as a TechFluent learner and Summit scholarship recipient.

She compared the career journey to riding a bike – something that, in theory, sounds simple, yet in practice, is more complex. When riding a bike, as described by Gipson, balance isn’t about staying in the perfect position. “It’s about adjusting, leaning, shifting as the terrain changes beneath you. Career balance works the same way.”

Resilience, as she defined it, means allowing ourselves to be off balance, wobble – because as long as we move forward, we won’t fall.

“I listened to women share their stories of resilience and the desire to forge forward for a brighter path. I hope that today, my words to you can be the way that I pass the torch to the next woman, the way that it was passed to me, to let her know that she, too, builds resilience.”

She Builds Her Own Table

Discussing the early days of launching her own company, Kim Congleton, VP of Strategy, TMC, painted a clear picture of late nights at kitchen tables, where she and her co-founder Kerry Peters worked to turn an idea into a business. “Those weekends,” she explained, “were messy… there was blood, sweat, and yes, a few tears poured into those tables.”

Congleton’s story came full circle as she reflected on her journey to TMC, where she joined what she called “another women’s leaders table, a table that Jen [Harris] built with intention, inclusion, and heart.”

At TMC, she noted, women collaborate instead of compete. Her message to the audience was straightforward, but powerful: women build stronger when they build together.

“The tables we build together, the conversations we have, the ideas we nurture… those are the things that change everything.”

She Builds the Next Generation: Raising Strong Daughters in Tech

“How can we raise daughters who feel curious, confident, fearless, and interested in technology?” asked Elif Item, Founder and CEO, Item by Item.

The path toward greater representation in technology doesn’t begin in college or the workplace. Instead, it begins at home, stated Item.

“It starts with the words that we use, the space that we create, and the quiet ways we become an example.” By showing up, even if nervous or unsure, Item said she sends her daughter an unspoken message that she belongs here.

She describes how her own daughter found a passion for technology, despite not having a strong interest before. Labels, like not being a “techie,” are limiting.

“Our daughters need autonomy… they need to show their agency.” She encouraged mothers to resist defining their daughters too early and instead give them space to struggle, fail, and discover their own strengths.

In closing, she reminded the audience that “confidence is built by doing hard things.”

She Builds a Business

Mary Lanham, COO and Co-Owner of Lanham Associates, described her journey as a young entrepreneur through owning her own business.

Describing her first role as a business owner at the age of 11, she told attendees how, “From there, I never went unemployed and often had my own business going forward.”

During her presentation, Lanham shared an insightful and practical roadmap for women ready to take the leap into entrepreneurship. She shared a message of strategy blending with encouragement, reminding listeners to “Put a lot of thought into whether you should be doing this.”

She also highlighted the foundational considerations of building a business, such as the importance of financial planning, commitment, and clarity of purpose before launching a venture.

“Let go of your imposter syndrome,” she said, reminding attendees that confidence is as important as strategy. She closed by sharing a remark she heard from Shark Tank’s Barbara Corocan: Successful entrepreneurs have in common the ability to take rejection, brush it off, get back up, and go again.

She Builds the Next Role – Even if it Doesn’t Exist

“I want to start by saying I didn’t raise my hand for the job that I have now, because it didn’t exist. I built it,” Michelle Serna, SVP of Revenue, TruNorth Dynamics explained during her opening.

Serna describes her instinct for innovation. In her early career, spotting inefficiencies at a furniture manufacturer, she designed her own process for recovering lost revenue, saving the company millions. Fast forward to the present, Serna describes how, at each stage of her career, she didn’t wait for opportunities to appear. Instead, she built them, shaping four entirely new roles within her company over the years.

She describes that a turning point came when she saw organizational chaos not as a problem, but as an opportunity.

“Some of the most important leadership work I’ve done happened before the title ever caught up,” noted Serna, reminding the women listening that titles aren’t required to lead. “It’s about working and walking into that room, looking around and saying, ‘There’s something missing here,’ and I can build it.”

Building the Next Opportunity

Women are not waiting for opportunities. Instead, they’re building them. From mentorship and resilience to entrepreneurship and innovation, each story shared during the panel and luncheon underscored the collective strength of women who create, connect, and lead with intention. She Builds is a movement shaping the future of women in technology.