With extra time in the Bay Area, some people go to a spa, take a yoga class, and spend time outside in the many beautiful parks. I love spending time in all those ways. With my recent extra time in the Bay Area, I went to a Stanford event on entrepreneurship. (My nerdiness never ceases to amaze even me!) On Monday evening Stanford hosted a panel discussion entitled “Solving the Global Leadership and Talent Equation.” 4 panelists based in Silicon Valley, Eric Benhamou, Chairman and CEO, Benhamou Global Ventures, David Chao, Co-Founder and General Partner, DCM, Kyung Yoon, CEO, Talent Age Associates, and Michael Zhao, CEO and President, Array Networks, spoke candidly about building teams within global start-ups. Immensely talented and skilled, these panelists offered advice and shared their missteps and triumphs in building teams. For the full article, please visit: http://www.examiner.com/x-2901-NY-Business-Strategies-Examiner~y2009m2d24-Stanford-University-panel-The-Global-Leadership-and-Talent-Equation
Category: Stanford
My Year of Hopefulness – Stanford
I’m finding it hard to leave California this evening, which is odd since I am heading back home to New York. Usually I am rushing to get back home after a trip. To sleep in my own bed, to be among my things, to get back to life as usual. Today I walked through some kind of door, and was consciously aware of a shift taking place. Today life changed, though I’m not yet sure how.
I ventured out to California on Saturday in preparation for meetings with HopeLab today. (More on that in a future post.) They are an exceptionally talented, passionate group of people who create brilliant product. It is a rare combination, especially in these times. Their excitement and commitment are infectious.I left their offices feeling lighter, feeling like I had picked up on some kind of trail that I had been looking for – like Trusty in Lady and the Tramp.
After the meetings with the HopeLab team, I went to Stanford to hear a presentation on talent management and recruitment for start-ups, particularly those with a global footprint. I felt completely at ease here in Palo Alto, on the Stanford campus, even though I’ve never been here before this weekend. Every part of me feels energized and hopeful, even on a day when the Dow plunged to 1997 lows and the outlook back East is as grim as ever. Here in Silicon Valley the sentiment is one of opportunity and the direction of focus is forward.
As I crossed the main quad of Stanford’s campus and meandered through its terra cotta buildings, I felt a very peaceful feeling wash over me that I have been missing for some time now. I peeked into a few classrooms that were conducting late night classes and for a second I felt a twinge of jealousy. I wanted to be one of those students, at least right at that moment. My friend, Janet, teases me that I am addicted to school and she’s not wrong. I am addicted to learning and learning environments. I do miss being a student, more than I realized I would.
Today I felt luck following me around all day, I felt a strong and gentle hand at my shoulder just pointing the way I needed to go. That sounds foolish and more than a little naive, I know, but it’s honest. As I was driving to HopeLab, a huge rainbow appeared over the freeway. And in my fortune cookie tonight I got the message, “You will soon gain something you have always wanted.” On occasion, I believe in astrology – mostly when I agree with its advice. I suppose a fortune cookie and a rainbow have just as much chance of being accurate as a horoscope. Or at least I hope they are, and in the times we’re living in hope is a precious resource.
The photo above can be found at: http://farm1.static.flickr.com/56/132248453_b7df81e3f6.jpg
My Year of Hopefulness – California
I’m in the Bay Area of California this weekend. I am thrilled to be meeting the fine team at HopeLab on Monday morning. Since I haven’t been to Northern California in a while I figured I would make a weekend of it. I wish I could explain my fascination with California. I’ve nearly moved here 4 times in my life. Every time I land at SFO I get this strange feeling that I’ve arrived home, even though I have no idea what it’s like to live here.
It’s a testament to the design of this area that I have yet to make one wrong turn, or get completely lost. My sense of direction is awful – for the 18 months I lived in Central Florida I was lost almost every day. The state of New Jersey still has me completely confused and I’ve spent many an hour going around in circle in D.C., trapped in or out of the city by that Beltway. Here in California, I always know where to like, just like I do in New York.
The grass is green here, there are flowers and rolling hills. I drove through Stanford, stunned by Palm Drive, the architecture of the Main Quad, and the vastness of the campus. There’s something about the golden color of all the buildings matched with the open green space that had me smiling wider and wider with every turn. I felt perfectly in my element.
Downtown Palo Alto is covered with coffee shops, pizza joints, a smattering of Thai and Indian food. Wi-fi everywhere. I’ve missed being in a college town. Hope is alive and well on the streets here. I went past the HP headquarters, the Wall Street Journal, and the Ning office. The ideas and creativity are buzzing around in the air here and if you linger long enough, I’m sure you’re bound to pick up a stroke of brilliance or two. It’s infectious.
The kindness and ease of people here is enough to make you wonder why you ever decided to live anywhere else. I sat next to a man on the plane today. He slept for most of the time and we didn’t exchange more than 10 words. As I got up out of my seat, he said, “By the way, you seem like a very nice lady. I wish you well. Good luck to you.” I was a bit shocked. I didn’t tell him why I was in San Francisco. I actually didn’t tell him anything about me. All I could think to mutter back was “you, too.”
There’s something to be said for stepping off of the island of Manhattan and finding out how life is lived in other places. It informs us, helps us to think differently about one another and our experience in the world. I love New York and it’s my home though I am grateful to be able to go to places like California where life is a little bit slower, people are a little less suspicious, and the spirit is a little bit lighter. Let’s hope I can figure out how to bottle it and bring some back East with me.
The image above can be found at: http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/photos/campus-palmdrive.jpg
My Year of Hopefulness – John Sage and Pura Vida
“As co-founder and CEO of Pura Vida, John Sage has helped Fair Trade coffee – coffee purchased at a price that is fair to farmers – become a regular at U.S. breakfast tables and cafes. At the same time, he has helped better the lives of people in coffee-growing regions. In this talk, Sage discusses how Pura Vida uses every aspect of its products, processes, and profits for social good. He also outlines how the company works to improve the health, educational opportunities, and psychological outlooks of children and families in coffee-growing countries. Sage talks more broadly, as well, about how a new generation of socially minded organizations is producing meaningful, sustainable, and lasting improvements to our world.” ~ From Stanford’s Social Innovation Conversations website
I listened to John’s talk recently and was inspired by his story. After leaving business school, he went to the Pacific Northwest to work for a tiny software company named Microsoft. He went on to other consulting gigs at places like Starbucks. Throughout his career, he kept up his friendship with Chris, a business school friend who went back to Costa Rica after graduation to work in the field that would become social entrepreneurship. It is through this friendship, John’s success is the corporate world, and Chris’s connection to the poor in Costa Rica, that the idea of Pura Vida was brought to life.
During the conversation, John tells a story about a woman who came from Costa Rica to Seattle University to tell her story. She, her husband, and her children had only known a life of picking coffee. Her children didn’t go to school – the family needed them to work so the family could survive. With the fair price that Pura Vida pays for the coffee on the plantation where they work, she and her husband could earn enough money to support the family, allowing her children to go to school. She had a wish for them to continue their education and perhaps to have the opportunity for college that all of the students in the audience at Seattle University have. Prior to Pura Vida, this dream was not even conceivable, much less possible.
The cost for this kind of dramatic change in a child’s life is an extra buck on our cups of coffee. On my Con Edison bill, I give an extra dollar a month to go toward a fund that helps people who struggle to pay their own electric bills. My dollar alone doesn’t help much, but together with thousands of other people it makes an enormous difference. When I go to Barnes & Noble to buy a birthday card, I have the opportunity to purchase a UNICEF greeting card so that a portion of the sale goes to UNICEF. The same can be said of hundreds of other products we purchase regularly. Our tiny purchases in this country have huge implications around the world. And we make most of these purchases without thinking, without even acknowledging that we have an opportunity every day to choose and create social change. With this kind of widespread collective impact, these small decisions are worthy of more of our attention.
Christa Avampato 