Pacific Technology Foundation’s 2007 Tech Woman of the Year, Debra Pyrek, is not your ordinary “techie” woman. Pyrek, who is the Vice President of Corporate Information Systems for Title Guaranty of Hawaii, says she sees herself more as a business person, making business decisions that just happen to have a large technology component to them, than an IT person.

When questioned on the challenges facing women in the tech industry today, she honestly concedes that overall, there aren’t as many gender-based challenges that one may think. In fact, Pyrek believes that women have a great advantage in the often male-populated IT world in that women are strong communicators and it is her belief that if a woman communicates well and is competent in her IT role, she has the potential to make all the difference in a company.