I had the honor of being invited to speak at the National Association of Women Business Owners Los Angeles Chapter’s (“NAWBO LA“) 26th Annual Leadership & Legacy Awards Luncheon.  It was a pleasure being at the event with so many amazing entrepreneurs.

I was on a panel called “KEEP MONEY: How to save money and increase your bottom line” that was focused on cost cutting measures, online tools as well as tips and tricks from the panelests personal experiences.

The panel included Jason Nazar, co-founder of Docstoc.com, Marylou Garcia, Managing Director of Expense Reduction Analysis and myself.  The moderator was Rita Dailey, SVP of Union Bank.

After the panel was the luncheon, where NAWBO LA awarded 7 people from all different backgrounds awards for their contributions to “legacy and leadership”.  The winners were Luisa Acosta-Franco – Head of Specialized Distribution for Farmers Insurance Group, Lubov Azria – Chief Creative Officer of BCBGMAXAZRIAGROUP, Frieda Caplan the Founder & Chairman of the Board, Frieda’s Inc., Cookie Johnson the Founder & Co-Owner of CJ by Cookie Johnson, Byron Reed the Senior Vice President of Wells Fargo, Julie Schoenfeld the CEO of Perfect Market, Inc., and Patricia Watts the President/CEO of FCI Management Consultants.

It was a fantastic event!

The panel (left – right) moderator was Rita Dailey, SVP of Union Bank, Jason Nazar, co-founder of Docstoc.com, Stephen Jagger and Marylou Garcia, Managing Director of Expense Reduction Analysis.

Kalika Yap, NAWBO LA Chair and Stephen Jagger

Magic Johnson introduced his wife Cookie Johnson

I dropped into the Salesforce Cloud Conference the other day in San Francisco at the Moscone Center to check out what Salesforce was up to and to meet up with fellow Canadian Daniel Debow.  Daniel sold two companies, Workbrain and most recently Rypple to Salesforce.com.  It was great to sit (in huge beanbag chairs) at the event and chat with Daniel about his experiences in the technology world.  He has amazing experience and expertise.

I attended a meetup at Rocket Space in downtown San Francisco the other night on the topic of startup exits. It was a sold out event that was full of great information. The panelists and entrepreneurs talked about the importance of networking, connecting with companies CTOs and to continually meet up with VCs and Angels as a way of expanding your network. They panelists did talk about how deals came their way but basically agreed there is no one way. They learn about companies through their network, VCs, Angels, other entrepreneurs and bankers. All in all it was a solid event. Here is who was in the line up:

Keynote: Jack Abraham, co-founded and sold Milo to eBay for $75M

Fireside Chat: Aydin Senkut, Managing Director, Felicis VC “Thoughts On The Exit From A VC’s Perspective”

Panelists:
Ilya Fushman, Corporate Development, Dropbox
Tom Duterme, Corporate Development, Groupon
Tim Carlson, Corporate Development, eBay
Ken Gullicksen, Corporate Development, Evernote
Nathan Beckord, Principal, VentureArchetypes Startup Advisors (Moderator)

Last night we attended a cocktail party at Jonathan Swanson‘s condo overlooking the bay. Jonathan is the co-founder of ThumpTack.com and part of an informal group that meets every few weeks called “Founders Drinks”. Last night was dubbed “Founders Drinks: Philippines Edition” as everyone invited had something to do with Philippine workers in one way or another.  It was a great event bringing together over 40 founders.

Along with Jonathan, the other organizers were Jamie Wong of Vayable, Jen O’Neal of Tripping, Liz Knopf of Sorced and Jessica Scorpio of Getaround.  On the invite list was people from all sorts of interesting startups, including Hotel Tonight, Huddle, Klout, Sponsorfied, Socialize, Qwiki, Udemy, Tagged, CrowdFlower, Minted and quite a few more.

Our pals at Taskus.com, who moved into the Payroll Hero house for a night while they were in town supplied the beer and wine for the event!  (Thanks Bryce and Jaspar!)

(Nice thank you gift left at our house from Taskus.com)

Last night Mike Stephenson and I found our way into (thanks to Kris Krug) the networking reception for the C100’s 48Hours in the Valley. The networking event was hosted by the Consulate General of Canada in San Francisco and Palo Alto and Ericsson.  It was a great evening of networking with tons of other Canadian entrepreneurs and investors working in the San Francisco area.

What is C100?
“C100 is a non-profit, member-driven organization dedicated to supporting Canadian technology entrepreneurship and investment.

C100 is comprised of a select group of Canadians based primarily in Silicon Valley, including executives of leading technology companies, experienced startup entrepreneurs and venture capital investors. C100 members are passionate about leveraging their collective experience, expertise and relationships to help mentor and grow a new generation of successful Canadian-led technology companies.

C100 Charter Members include startups CEOs, top executives of companies such as Apple, Cisco, EA, eBay, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Oracle, and venture investors representing more than $8 billion in capital.”

Kris Krug and Stephen Jagger

We attended the Warm Gun Conference in San Francisco on Friday which was put on by 500 Startups.  It was an excellent conference with a solid line up of speakers that kept us entertained all day.

“…Warm Gun unites designers & startups to learn about web design that isn’t just pretty, but actually converts!”

The event finished (quite behind schedule) with a panel of rockstars (a few beers deep) giving feedback to brave entrepreneurs who offered to have their products reviewed in front of the crowd.  Made for some very entertaining moments.

Tonight I ventured over to the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) to check out the MobileMonday event.  This was a well attended event at the University that brought together a panel of 4 mobile entrepreneurs to talk about their products in the mobile space.