Dr. Melissa Sassi

Digital Skills & Readiness 101: The Skills YOU Need NOW to Prepare for the Future of Work

Biography:

As IBM Z’s Chief Penguin, Dr. Melissa Sassi created her own IBM job title, job description, and is the Founder & Global Head of IBM Hyper Protect Accelerator, an IBM program focused on empowering early-stage startups to build and scale via business and technical enablement. Dr. Sassi has 100 startups in her existing portfolio with 40% early-stage fintechs. She plans to grow the Accelerator to 145 startups in 2022. Dr. Sassi’s Accelerator also includes celebrity Producer & multiple-Grammy award winning startup – Beatclub – Timbaland’s latest music startup that’s all about democratizing the music industry.

Dr. Sassi is also a Call for Code Judge – a tech4good hackathon, startup competition, and coding camp rolled into one – focused on solving the world’s wickedest challenges via tech innovation. 

Prior to IBM, Dr. Sassi was an impact investor at Microsoft focused on building and scaling internet and energy access solutions and bringing digital skills to the newly connected.

As Founder & CEO of MentorNations, Dr. Sassi created a youth-led digital skills movement teaching tens of thousands of youth changemakers to code in twelve countries. Dr. Sassi is Chair of IEEE's Digital Skills & Readiness Working Group and Founding Member of Coalition for Digital Intelligence with WEF, OECD, IEEE & DQ Institute. She holds several Board positions in digital inclusion nonprofits.

She completed several stints on Wall Street for prestigious firms such as Goldman Sachs and Blackrock. She was also part of the core team that led to the launch of challenger bank – Ally Financial. She spent years working in marketing supply chain and corporate turnaround with companies such as Godiva, Kimberly-Clark, Goodyear, and Chiquita.

Dr. Sassi’s doctoral research focuses on the digital inclusion of underserved and underrepresented communities and the tie that access, skills, and utilization of technology play to make meaningful use of the internet.

Dr. Sassi holds a Co-Chair position in a newly formed working group under the UN Secretary General’s Office focused on the protection of children online where she’s in the process of setting up a youth advisory board. She actively advises bodies such as the UN Round Table for the High-Level Panel for Digital Cooperation, chaired by Jack Ma and Melinda Gates with advisory leadership from Vint Cert – the Father of the Internet – on digital intelligence, gender inclusion, and tech entrepreneurship. 

Dr. Sassi is an avid speaker on startup innovation, digital skills and inclusion, tech entrepreneurship, tech4good, community building, youth empowerment, imposter syndrome, gender inclusion & personal branding. You can find Dr. Sassi on Twitter at @mentorafrika.

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