Hannah Lloyd, CompTIA’s 2021 member of the year, plans to keep her commitment to diversifying the channel and advancing the tech industry. Here she discusses how her CompTIA experience has helped her career. This article is adapted from The Future looks bright: Building tech role models for the next generation. Hannah Lloyd, 28, has built two companies, from startup to global brand with multiple vendor partnerships, opened the U.K, U.S., Canadian and Benelux markets for both, received a CompTIA channel changer award and was named one of the top 25 women in tech by PCR in 2020. She believes that her CompTIA experience was a major influence on her career path. She’s only just beginning. Lloyd is CompTIA’s 2021 Member-of-the Year and plans to continue her commitment towards diversifying the channel and advancing the technology industry.
She said, “It can be difficult to be young and a woman working in a male-dominated industry where 90% of the time I am the youngest person at the table,” Breaking glass ceilings requires perseverance, hard work, and determination. There is no right or wrong way to succeed in any industry, even tech.
Finding Her Path
Lloyd, like many others in the industry fell into a career in technology. She said that technology was not encouraged at her school, which was an all-girls school. Many girls were encouraged to study humanities. Lloyd, who graduated with a degree of English literature, was unsure what her next steps would be. She interviewed with a NOC vendor and service desk vendor. One month before her graduation, she began her tech career in full-time inside sales.
Seven years later, she is vice president of channel sales for inSOC. An AI-driven platform that detects security breaches, inSOC is her passion and she is eager to give back to the industry she loves. She is the CompTIA UK Business Technology Community vice chair and actively participates in the Advancing Tech Talent & Diversity Community, the Benelux Business Technology Community and the Cybersecurity Community.
Her dual mission is to encourage women to join CompTIA and to show other women that technology can be a place they can thrive. She hopes that her efforts, along with those of other CompTIA members, will lead to others finding their own paths to success in tech careers.
Nancy Hammervik, CompTIA Tech Career Academy CEO and executive vice president of industry relations, said that Hannah is a great success story. “Hannah has been awarded a CompTIA Spotlight award twice. It’s been amazing to see her grow her career and increase her engagement with CompTIA.
Her passion and dedication are greatly valued. She has done so much for CompTIA, the industry, and I am so grateful for all her incredible success.”
CompTIA: Engaging with
CompTIA members can help the tech industry in many ways. They can do this economically by finding new solutions, narrowing their skills gap, and increasing the capabilities of vendors, VARs and solution providers. Or, they can also help the next generation feel at home and help women and underrepresented groups. Lloyd is passionate about people-focused approaches.
She said, “When I joined the UK Community Executive Council, I was one among three women serving.” “Over the past three years, I have actively encouraged other women to engage with CompTIA over the last year and take part in community meetings. This has allowed them to expand their networks and showcase their vast capabilities and skills, which has in turn brought great value to the membership.
Today, the council’s gender ratio is approximately 50/50.
Lloyd has been leading a cross-continent team of volunteers to improve and build a resource library that can be used by solution providers. The goal is to provide MSPs with tangible documents that will help them grow their businesses efficiently and offer guidance. Lloyd said that the initiative will continue to strengthen CompTIA’s position as an industry expert in education and thought leadership.
CompTIA members who knew her well have noticed her engagement.
“Hannah brings knowledge, energy and enthusiasm to the UK Business Technology Community. She is also willing to volunteer her time to help others, and is always willing to take on the challenge of helping others.