575_ From Venture Capitalist to Entrepreneur Music Producer
Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology and NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy along with Larry Nelson interviewed Heidi Roizen, CEO of Skinny Songs. Heidi Roizen has achieved success as an entrepreneur, a corporate executive, a corporate director and venture capitalist. She has held positions of leadership within a number of industry organizations, and is a recognized and popular spokesperson for the technology industry and entrepreneurial community. Currently, Roizen is CEO of SkinnySongs, which she launched in January of 2008. SkinnySongs introduced the first-ever collection of radio-hit-quality music in which the lyrics are specifically designed to motivate people to reach their weight and fitness goals. This is the first in this new NCWIT series, The Entrepreneurial Tool Box. Each interview will have a particular focus this interview addresses the best way to network. Many listeners will be very surprised at some of her comments, but remember Heidi is royalty when it comes to networking...ask Bill Gates. Lucy asks her to define Networking and references a comment made by Heidi that it isn't stalking. Lee wanted to know what entrepreneurs need to do to be prepared. Larry asked, "What types of people are in your network and how do you avoid compromising them?" Heidi has some great advice about the best way to reach out to venture capitalists and what not to do. This is a great series, listen now...
Related Links: Heidi Roizen Website || SkinnySongs || USA Today || NCWIT Heroes || NCWIT Home || Keywords: Heidi Roizen, Networking, Venture Capital, National Center for Women & Information Technology, NCWIT, Lee Kennedy, Lucy Sanders - Channels: NCWIT on w3w3 & Social Entrepreneurship Bytes: 14773919 > LISTEN - 10/27/08

581_ Networking 2.0 from a Venture Capitalist and Entrepreneur
"Networking is not an event driven thing. It’s not something you go out and do and then you’re done. It’s sort of a lifelong component of building your career. Frankly so many of the people in my network are my personal friends, I think it’s a lifelong component of building an interesting life", said Heidi Roizen during an interview with Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology and NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy along with Larry Nelson. The long-term strength and stability of an organization is dependent on networking. Lucy is always intersted in looking into all the aspects of a topic asked Heidi, "Do you have examples of bad networking or the right way to act?" Heidi replied, "There are a number of trade associations in any industry, and that has always been part of my (I don’t want to call it networking) but building relationships and learning more about your industry. First of all it is a way to give back to the industry and a way to do some constructive things and you build relationships outside of what your immediate needs might be, but ultimately come in very handy for you as well. And I definitely would credit my affiliations with the trade associations within my industry as things that really helped me build out my network. Pitfalls – When you’re going out to meet someone, you have to think, ‘what do I have to offer?’ I think that people have more to offer than they think they do. Every other person you meet out there is a human being and they have interests, children, and hobbies and passions and causes they support. I think you can build relationships with people by looking more deeply at the whole person." There's more great advice...
Related Links: Heidi Roizen Website || SkinnySongs || USA Today || NCWIT Heroes || NCWIT Home || Keywords: Heidi Roizen, Networking, Skinny Songs, Venture Capital, National Center for Women & Information Technology, NCWIT, Lee Kennedy, Lucy Sanders > Channels: NCWIT Bytes: 14773919 > LISTEN 11/3/08

549_ Building a Successful Online Business for a Female Entrepreneur
Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) and Larry turned the table on NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy. Lucy, Larry and Lee (the 3 L's) interview successful female entrepreneurs. Lucy and Larry decided to turn the table on Lee, and put the spotlight on this CEO/Founder of TriCalyx, a consulting business focused on helping people build an online business. She has worked with Brad Feld, and had been the CIO at Webroot Software. Lee has been on a number of other startup teams and moved to Boulder from the Silicon Valley. Like so many others, she quickly saw and experienced the entrepreneurial excitement and supportive cluster. She has an interesting makeup of strengths and interests. Lee is very technically inclined and has a marketing background. Her two partners really carry the ball in in the software development and other techie areas...that's building a well-balanced team. TriCalyx does a great deal in Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Lee pointed out that 85% of the world’s online population, purchase online! And that’s up 40% over the past two years. Then for people in the 75K and higher income bracket it’s more like 90+%. She has some great advice for parents of young people that can help in supporting their children’s move into IT. In fact, you might want your children to listen to this interview also.
Related Links: Tricalyx || NCWIT Heroes || NCWIT Practice || Find It ||
Keywords: Lee Kennedy, TriCalyx, Lucy Sanders, NCWIT, Search Engine Optimization, Online Business, Entrepreneur > Bytes: 13755771 > LISTEN 9/8/08

530_ Entrepreneurship and Ethics Lead to an Extreme Sport
Today Audrey MacLean is focused on working with the new generation of entrepreneurs. Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology with NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy and Larry Nelson, president of w3w3.com, interviewed Audrey, Co-Founder & CEO, Network Equipment Technologies. Professor MacLean has a unique track record for entrepreneurial success as a founder, CEO, seed investor, and board member. She has been on the Forbes 'Midas Touch' list and listed by Business Week as one of the 50 most influential business women in America. She was also featured by Forbes in a cover article on Angel Investing. MacLean has over three decades of combined experience in the computer and communications industries. She was a founder of Network Equipment Technologies which went public in 1987 and later co-founded and was CEO of Adaptive which merged with NET in 1993. Building on her own entrepreneurial success, MacLean has been instrumental in helping to launch and grow successful companies through her work as a mentor, capitalist and as a professor of entrepreneurship at Stanford University. She is also an affiliate and advisor to a number of leading Venture Funds. Audrey points out it takes a team, a team you can trust and has a strong leaning toward ethics, entrepreneurship and clean tech...listen now.
Related Links: Audrey MacLean || NCWIT Heroes || NCWIT Blog || CO Coalition for Gender and IT || NCWIT Practice|| Keywords: Audrey MacLean, Stanford, Network Equipment Technologies, Lucy Sanders, Lee Kennedy, NCWIT - Bytes: 17844248 LISTEN 7/28/08

592_ Brad Feld and the NCWIT Entrepreneurial Tool Box
Brad Feld was being drilled by Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology and NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy along with Larry Nelson, about the learning experiences of a new entrepreneur for the new NCWIT series, The Entrepreneurial Tool Box. And as Brad said, "Dave Jilk was a college friend. In 1987 we launched a company which we then grew, with no financing into a couple million dollar business and sold in 1993. So that was the first real success I had, after a couple of companies that went absolutely no where." When addressing the failures Brad said, "Well you go through this cycle of believing, sort of the optimism of the creation at inception of the company, some progress, whatever progress there is and then ultimately you start to have some problems and you either push through the problems or you don’t. I mean Feld Technologies had all kinds of things that could have caused us to fail. In fact, one of the first things we did was hire a half dozen college friends and part time people, and spent money we didn’t have and all of a sudden we were upside down $20,000 and we had no money, and we realized we couldn’t do that anymore because we didn’t have the money to pay the people and we had to get to a place where we’d make money. In the case of the other failures, I think it was pretty clear at some point we were not making real progress." said Brad Feld, Chairman of the NCWIT – also co-chair of the Governor’s Innovation Council. Listen for more insights...Brad also talks about what it takes to create winners.
Related Links: Foundry Group || Brad's Blog || NCWIT Channel || NCWIT Practice || w3w3.com Blog || Keywords: Brad Feld, Foundry Group, NCWIT, Entrepreneurial Tool Box, Dealing with Failing, Lucy Sanders, Lee Kennedy, Governor’s Innovation Council, Blog > Channels: NCWIT, VC, Bytes: 12940750 > 12/1/08 LISTEN

588_ Changing Career Choice From an Attorney to High-Tech Entrepreneur
Lena West, CEO, Founder and Chief Strategist of xynoMedia Technology. This New York based firm helps high growth companies leverage the power of social media, blogs, podcasts and online communities. This interview is one of a continuing series of interviews for the NCWIT Heroes Channel. These entrepreneurial women are great examples that are inspiring to young women and girls who might consider an IT career and is also informational for parents and business leaders. Lena strongly believes that social media is a catalyst to uniting the world’s people and will continue to lead businesses and individuals toward greater levels of environmental accountability, social responsibility and corporate transparency - hence her passion for the medium. She went onto say, "And, that's how I really, truly feel. It's the main reason why I do what I do. With all that's going on in the world, I still believe in the goodness of people. I believe in the power of positivity and higher levels of energy to trump negativity." As a first year college student, Lena was going to be an attorney. That idea was short lived, just not her cup of tea. Eventually she took a job as a secretary with IBM, getting closer to the technology, and learned what she needed to learn and where she could learn about computer technology. She went from help desk work to consulting and eventually to business owner. There's more, listen now...
Related Links: xynoMedia Technology || Lip-Sticking || NCWIT Heroes || NCWIT Fact Sheet || Find It || Keywords: Lena West,xynoMedia, NCWIT, Social Media, Blogs, Podcasts, Online Communities, Lee Kennedy, Entrepreneur - Channels: NCWIT Bytes: 16498419 - 11/17/08 LISTEN

562_ Social Entrepreneurism and Microfinancing Goes Global
Social entrepreneur, Jessica Jackley Flannery is a co-founder of Kiva with her husband Matt. Kiva is the first peer-to-peer microloan website, demonstrates how the Internet can facilitate meaningful, positive connections between lenders and entrepreneurs in the developing world and even help us all become micro-financiers. Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology and NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy along with Larry Nelson interviewed Jessica. She first saw the power and beauty of microfinance while working in rural Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda with Village Enterprise Fund and Project Baobab on impact evaluation and program development. Jessica has worked in the Stanford Center for Social Innovation to launch the inaugural Global Philanthropy Forum, and at Amazon.com, Potentia Media, the International Foundation and World Vision. Jessica has spoken widely on microfinance and social entrepreneurship, and has seen microfinance at work in a variety of communities in more than 30 countries. Jessica is an Ashoka Fellow and has built the Kiva budget from a small startup amount to $45 million. She was asked, "What does a $20 donation do for Kiva?" "Any donation helps us cover our basic operational costs--paying salaries, keeping the lights on, etc. In 2007, for every $1 Kiva receives in donations, we raised another $10 online in loans for the poor." Jessica shares some incredible success stories. Listen for more...
Related Links: KIVA || NCWIT Heros || ASHOKA || NCWIT Practice || Keywords: Jessica Flannery, Kiva, NCWIT, Ashoka Fellow, Microfinance, Social Entrepreneurship > Bytes: 24043836 > - LISTEN 9/29/08

Female Serial Entrepreneur Raises Millions of Dollars
536_ Here's a story about a female serial entrepreneur who literally fell into becoming a co-founder of a couple companies. Jean Kovacs has raised tons of money and in 2006 her company was bought by Sterling Commerce, an AT&T company. Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology and NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy along with Larry Nelson interviewed Jean who had some very interesting replies to their questions. When they were discussing some of her best learning experiences Jean replied," I learned the most from bad managers." That's another way of learning vicariously. Today Jean Kovacs is the Senior Vice President of Corporate Marketing and Strategic Alliances for Sterling Commerce, responsible for driving global strategic alliances, including the AT&T strategic relationship, and all corporate marketing and communications. Kovacs has over 25 years experience directing technology companies and a track record of using her strategic business skills and background to deliver exceptional results with growing enterprises. Jean also is Chair of the board of BUILD, a non-profit that gives entrepreneurial experiences to under-served communities - she believes that all students have the same potential and drive to succeed. The reality, however, is that students in under served neighborhoods begin with limited, and sometimes no, motivation or role models. Listen now.
Related Links: Sterling Commerce || E-Business Article || NCWIT Channel || NCWIT Practice || Keywords: Jean Kovac, Sterling Commerce, Lucy Sanders, Lee Kennedy, NCWIT Practice, National Center for Women & Information Technology, BUILD - Bytes: 16801857 LISTEN 8/11/08

523_ Women Will Drive Media Revenue Once it is Mainstreamed
The mobile consumer software industry is a multi-billion dollar market that is slated to grow three-fold to $50 billion worldwide by 2009. Lucy Sanders, CEO and Founder of the National Center for Women & Information Technology and NCWIT board member, Lee Kennedy along with Larry Nelson interviewed Kristin Asleson McDonnell, CEO of LimeLife and serious serial entrepreneur. LimeLife, a company that delivers “fun” right to your mobile device, making women’s lives easier. And, LimeLife is the only publisher of wireless content exclusively focused on the women’s market. The company’s products are forging innovations in the mobile industry based on unique insights about what women seek in mobile entertainment. They entered the market with games. The games include 'Girls Night Out Solitaire', 'Girls Night Out blackjack', 'Hollywood Hangman' and and Lucy's favorite 'Law and Order'. Products include lifestyle tools, entertaining mobile games, Sleek & Chic™ fashion wallpapers and original Daily Dose™ text messages. Lucy, Lee and Larry (the 3 L's) asked Kristen what was on the horizon for LimeLife? She replied, "We are creating 'Lifestyle tools like ‘People Magazine on the phone’. Launching this summer is a web and mobile' community for women centered around shopping, fashion, music – our tagline = “Everything I like, wherever I am.” Kristen has some great ideas for entrepreneurs as well as some motivating thoughts for girls and young people considering high tech. Listen and pass this along to others.
Related Links: Lime Life || Kristin at Stanford|| Heidi Roizen || NCWIT Heroes || NCWIT Blog || CO Coalition for Gender and IT || NCWIT Practice|| Red Herring || Keywords: Kristin McDonnell, Lime Life, Lucy Sanders, Lee Kennedy, NCWIT, Women in IT, National Center for Women & Information Technology, NCWIT Heroes > - Bytes: Bytes: 19930282 LISTEN 7/14/08