What a year! I have had some incredible professional and personal experiences in 2015 and I thought I would share a few of my favorites:
- At MasterCard, we launched several new API services for a variety of customer segments.
- We launched Masters of Code, a global hackathon competition from MasterCard that enabled us to work with some of the best software developers in the world.
- We focused on expanding our customer base globally and ensuring that our global growth was sustainable through the creation of a decentralized process. This allowed me to work with some incredible technologists and organizations all over the world.
- We launched the first ever global internal hackathon at MasterCard in which more than 5% of the entire company participated.
- We worked with highly skilled and creative NYC developers at events such as the NYC FinTech Hackathon, TechCrunch Disrupt Hackathon (at which a group of MasterCard developers won third place overall) and with Cornell Tech students at an internal event.
- We facilitated Commerce Forum meetups in MasterCard’s NYC Tech Hub, bringing in a variety of speakers to talk about what’s happening in the commerce industry. This was in addition to our NYC involvement in great organizations such as the NY FinTech Meetup and the NYC TechDay.
- I had the opportunity to represent MasterCard at fairly large events in the community this year, including an Inter-American Development Bank event, Front End of Innovation, AnDevCon, and more.
- I was honored to be a formal mentor for a variety of organizations this year including XRC Labs, Techstars, Startupbootcamp, AngelHack Hackcelerator, and NYC Generation Tech.
- I had a (short) conversation with and was retweeted by pmarca.
- We closed out a successful year for Ignite Stamford (and will have relevant news on the organization soon).
- I have continued to serve on my city’s legislative board and with my colleagues have continued to improve our community.
- I was very excited to attend tapings of new talk shows that launched in 2015 including Seth Meyers, Trevor Noah, David Letterman and Stephen Colbert.
- I attended some games including those of the Yankees, the Red Sox and the UConn Huskies. I’m a fan of two out of those three – I’ll let you guess.
- I attended a few concerts, my favorite of which was U2 at Madison Square Garden.
- I saw the new Star Wars movie. Multiple times.
- I am always trying to learn new things, so I took some time to study the fundamentals of quantum entanglement, machine learning, cloud architecture and venture capital.
- I became engaged to an intelligent and loving woman.
Here’s to a great 2016!
