I was in San Francisco last Friday and Saturday as the news escalated. After weeks of seeing it unfold from afar, we were facing real threats of a novel coronavirus outbreak in the USA. And it was starting right in my hometown of Seattle. Meanwhile, work goes on. I was in the Bay Area for […] [...]
Despite substantial work and progress across many fronts, ours included, the percentage of venture capital invested in women founders has barely budged in the past 3 years. In a system as entrenched as this one, change is slow and hard to see in the short term. We measure leading indicators and trust that they will […] [...]
It all started with a common sponsor. Just over two years ago I secured a sponsorship for FFA from Project W, an initiative by the law firm Davis Wright Tremaine LLP led by partner Lynn Loacker. Lynn has since become one of our biggest supporters and Project W has been our sponsor 3 years in […] [...]
FFA made magic happen this year. 2019 was a year of accomplishments at a level that I have always wished for but never really expected. I mean that honestly. Because it doesn’t just take a good person and hard work to achieve great things – I learned that lesson in the first 20 years of […] [...]
It didn’t occur to me to write a blog post in celebration of National Hispanic Heritage Month because, up until recently, I wasn’t Hispanic American. I was just Hispanic. I was born and raised in Costa Rica, a tiny nation that nonetheless knows leadership. Even as every one of our neighbors spiraled into dictatorships and […] [...]
There’s a trend we’ve noticed among the grittiest founders: once they fall in love with an idea, they become determined and refuse to ever admit defeat. Normally this is the stuff of success stories. But there’s a troubling side to it too – founders that keep going, working on it slowly for years, without ever […] [...]
Today is a special day. And not just because it’s Monday! We are down to the final hours of the application period for Ready Set Raise 2019. In just under two days, once all your data is in, we get to learn about hundreds of companies led by women and non-binary founders. Because of them, […] [...]
My daughter turned two months old yesterday, and even though we are still squarely in the “fourth trimester” stage, this is when most moms in the US prepare to go back to work. Assuming, that is, they had the privilege of taking any time off at all. How do women CEOs take maternity leave? If […] [...]
New babies come with gifts. That’s what my mom always says. My daughter Dora was born just over three years ago – three spectacularly life-changing years. Soon after she was born, I realized that I didn’t have it in me to be a stay at home mom. I missed work too much, too soon. But […] [...]
I am 39 weeks pregnant. One night last August, I took a pregnancy test. It was positive. It was welcome. It was also unplanned. The very next day FFA kicked off Ready Set Raise, our accelerator program for venture-scale companies with women and non-binary founders, for the very first time. Lucky for me, I was […] [...]
