Business Development for Startups – Coloft Academy Workshop

by robynmward Founders/Startups

Last Thursday, I led a workshop on BD for Startups at Coloft as part of their new Coloft Academy initiative. I have spent my career launching and growing businesses, so I was thrilled to be invited to share my learnings with the community.  I had a terrific time and would like to thank all the folks who packed the house to spend 2 hours with me.  I have always loved mentoring young entrepreneurs, and have considered teaching in a more formal way at some point.  I now know that it is something I absolutely want to tackle!

I have received a great deal of positive feedback on the workshop, and lots of requests for my presentation.  Here it is:


Business Development for Startups –

Greetings WORLD WIDE WEB!

by robynmward Personal Development

Does anyone really call it that anymore? No need to answer. I think I just like the dramatic impact of “WORLD WIDE WEB.” I certainly have been told I have a flair for the dramatic.

So it is the first of the year and I am finally creating my first blogpost. I am officially a blogger in the blogosphere! Of course there are umpteen million blahblahblogs so I’ve been thinking about how to differentiate myself (yes, I’m a business chick). I’ve put some thought into why anyone (YOU) would want to read my musings over all the rest of the blahblahbloggers. I’ve also thought about why/how I came to read the blogs that I frequent. I concluded that I pick my blogs upon a mix of the 2 Es: education and entertainment. I am always reading to expand my mind but I need that entertainment factor – which most often comes in the form of the tone, presentation and overall personality conveyed by the blogger. So I figure if you somehow landed at www.robynmward.com, you are going to want to get a very quick taste for I’m all about to decipher whether or not you’ll visit me again.Pictures speak 1,000 words so here is my photo introduction to myself (man, this is a bit new and weird) – Robyn the Adventurer.

Yes, my “Robyn the Adventurer” intro qualifies as cheesy, but I think the photos back me up and prove me an adventurer in the truest sense. Indeed, my life has always been defined by exploration and adventure. It is what led me from the Midwest to Los Angeles for college and then New York City for an amazingly adventurous decade and now back to LA. In my professional life, I am an entrepreneur, which is absolutely synonymous with adventurer. I have been at some very successful and some very, well, not-so-successful start-ups over the past decade and man has it been quite a ride! My newest career adventure is heading up Business Development for www.docstoc.com. Go check it out – trust me you will want to add it to your favorites so you can find any document/template you will ever need fast, easy and, oh yeah, for FREE.

I will wrap it up here and hope I have won you over. I certainly promise to both educate and entertain you with stories/insights related to all my adventures in business, travel, spirit, and life in general.

Stay tuned ……………..And always ask yourself “what would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?”