Andrea Anderson is an educator at heart specializing in social and emotional learnings. Her fascination for all things cultural has led her to launch a children’s picture book titled “A Journey to Silicon Valley and Beyond”. At HanaHaus, we strive to provide an inspirational space for people like Andrea to unleash their creativity.
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Name: Andrea Anderson
Origin: Wallendorf, Germany
Job: Children’s Book Author
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My Job in Silicon Valley is about…
“When I first moved here, I knew I moved into a fascinating place and I wanted to bring that across to my family but also my visitors because when people come to visit me they say, ‘Show me the fascination of Silicon Valley.’ I feel it in me, but how do I bring it across to them? So I drove them around and I’m like, ‘This is the Google sign, and this is the Facebook sign.‘ But they are just company signs, so how do I bring this across? It’s behind the façades, it’s in the interactions, it’s in the ideas. but then I realized it’s in the certain mindset of the people too. You have a certain attitude if you’re an entrepreneur. You accept failure, you are open to new ideas, you network and figure out what might come out of it for you. It might not be the big thing, but one snippet of thought. Keeping the creativity alive and this lifestyle is one of my goals for the families in Silicon Valley.”
Got to know HanaHaus…
“I looked into meetups in the context that interested me, and that’s how I got to this design thinking meetup and it just happened to be at HanaHaus! Then, I came to some other events that were here because after the design meetup I thought that this is an amazing place…. I really like it! I think it’s also great that you’re right in the middle of Downtown, people just coming by so it’s a wonderful concept of utilizing the old space for modern needs.”
“I want to teach children a simple understanding of it all.”
Wrote my own book because…
“My observation both in business in general and in Silicon Valley is, we sort of engage in our little bubble of what we’re inventing and working on, but we all come with a package. I know so many people that moved here with a family and one of the parents is in tech. Bringing that fascination together, I want to teach children a simple understanding of it all. There’s a lot of pressure on STEM education and possible unspoken pressure to go into tech and study Computer Science. That’s what influenced me to think childhood is a different phase. We need our children to have this childhood without large expectations to discover what they’re passionate about and see where it takes them. Yes, as parents we always influence our children on what we do, but we need to give them the freedom to choose with these possibilities and the amazing work that’s around us and let them think, ‘Is this what I really want to do or is this what influences me?’ I want to bring the fascination of it to the families and the children.”
Comes to HanaHaus…
For Andrea, HanaHaus is one of her many go-to spots to find tech-oriented people. “My book A Journey to Silicon Valley and Beyond is out and I’m spending time introducing it at various events. Some of the locations I’m working on at the moment are the Computer History Museum, the Tech Museum, the Intel Museum, the Stanford bookstore, The Women in Tech event by Silicon Valley Forum. All of these places that are directly linked to what I’m writing about, the events where people that are in tech go to. I’m going to places where you get to meet the people who would be a good match for the book.”
“Bringing people together is a big part of Silicon Valley, it’s the exchange of ideas the connection...”
HanaHaus is unique because…
“It brings people together that share an interest, I can meet here with someone and just sit down for a meeting or attend an event and meet other people with like-minded interests. Bringing people together is a big part of Silicon Valley, it’s the exchange of ideas the connection, the few little snippets you get from an interaction, or the lifelong work relationship that you form after it.”
The favorite spot at HanaHaus…
“Capetown Lounge where I attend Design Bites! The foundation of everything is creativity, and design thinking is our way of bringing this random creativity into a channel and structuring it to make something. So very often if you look at it, look at Apple for example there’s the creative mind and the business mind and somehow, we need these different traits to come together. Just the creative mind would have trouble creating the company, and what I like about Design Bites is it helps develop a structure to use the creativity, and bridge that to a business concept.”
Want to learn more about Andrea’s book and where to purchase? Check it out here.
In our blog series, People of HanaHaus, we present the folks that fill our workspace cafe with life: Start-Uppers, entrepreneurs, artists, founders, innovation managers, students, unicorns, venture capital investors and the people who make HanaHaus unique. We want to learn about their journeys and what brought them to Silicon Valley. We ask them to speak about their current projects and how they leverage HanaHaus for their business.