Attendee Guide
Hawaii Tech Week is one of the best opportunities of the year to connect with Hawaii's tech ecosystem — across functions, roles, and industries. This guide covers our tips on how to make the most of it.
1. Sign Up for Events Now
Most events have limited capacity and many are selling out. If something catches your eye — a panel, workshop, or mixer — claim your seat now. We're adding new events every week until HTW, so check back weekly.
2. Invite Friends and Colleagues
HTW is better when shared. Invite a founder, a Hawaii-based exec, an engineer you met at a pau hana, or a student looking to break into tech. The more voices we include, the stronger the ecosystem. Send them to hawaiitechweek.com to register so they can get the cal and important updates.
3. Focus on What Matters — Don't Overbook Yourself
Many people attend 3-5 events during the week plus the HTW Official Mixer, taking advantage of the great speakers and interesting topics at HTW. Don't feel the need to go to every single event (unless you really want to). Pick what matters most to your company, your interests, and your energy and make the most of them. Quality > quantity.
4. Sit Up Front and Be Engaged
Take notes. Ask thoughtful questions. Put your phone on silent :) Speakers notice when someone is tuned in — and hosts love seeing full front rows as they put a ton of work into their events. Want to connect with a speaker? Ask a smart Q that ties into what they covered during the talk.
5. Focus on Relationships — Dialogue > Monologue
Focus on asking questions, getting to know people, and being genuinely interested. If you followed Step 3, you're at events with like-minded individuals and can learn a lot. People don't want to hear a 30-min monologue at a networking mixer, they want to talk about shared interests, big ideas, and common pursuits.
6. Share Your Experience
Post photos, insights, and event highlights on social media. Follow and tag the Hawaii Tech Week socials (LinkedIn, X, Instagram, or YouTube), the event host, speakers and venue so that others can follow along and join in. Don't post AI-slop, focus on impactful and important messages and use photos you took + AI to complement the message.
7. Let Hosts Know If You Can't Make It
Plans change — we get it. If you can't attend an event you signed up for, cancel or message the host asap. It frees up space for someone else and helps everything run smoother.
8. Support Your Team's Growth
HTW is more than a week of excitement — it's a week to level up. Great leaders give their teams space to learn, network, and plug into the community. We designed HTW so our tech community could get connection, education, and inspiration without the need to take a full week off or fly to another state or country.
If your team won't let you take off 2-hours during the week to do a professional development event, let me know privately via DM so I can better understand how to improve the messaging around the value prop in future years.