Why do governments around the globe keep sending delegations to Silicon Valley to try to discover its secrets? What is it that Silicon Valley can teach the rest of the world about creating value from ideas, build new forms of business and create disruptive innovation? The secret is in the synergy that creates an entrepreneurial ecosystem.
In this keynote, speaker Deborah Perry Piscione explains how different parts of the ecosystem come together as an interconnected web, such as the collaborative dynamics between private and public sectors, the interplay between higher education and the business community and the commercialization of know-how. Piscione takes a close look at the spirit of entrepreneurialism, examining the six characteristics that all Silicon Valley entrepreneurs radiate — passion, authenticity, love of ideas, an appetite for risk, trustworthiness, and resilience. You will find this an extremely enlightening and inspiring keynote.

We all understand how hard it is to manage people.  Since human behavior can be unpredictable, we set policies and procedures to limit behavior and focus our energies on managing productivity and investing in technological solutions. This has led to organization cultures that over-reward production at the expense of under rewarding creativity, risk-taking, problem-solving, and a general passion for innovation and improvement.

In this breakthrough presentation based on her new book, The People Equation: Why Innovation Is People, Not Products, Deborah Perry Piscione shows that every organization can develop a mindset, an organizational structure, and product development/ problem-solving processes that will maximize creativity and innovation.

Using examples from admired organizations and from her research into world-class business practices, Piscione shows how to create a culture where risk-taking is rewarded, Mavericks are encouraged, a collaboration between highly competent people is nurtured, and, when experiments and new initiatives are proposed, the response is to ask how rather than question why. This is a truly inspiring and pragmatic presentation on harnessing the creative energy in every organization.

It’s no coincidence that our most revered business icons are also the boldest risk-takers, such as Richard Branson, Elon Musk, and Steve Jobs. Yet with so much emphasis on short-term stock price gains and bottom line focus, organizations tend to act too safe, resulting in a stagnant business culture which generates entirely forgettable results in a world that demands significant solutions. If groundbreaking innovation is about taking calculated risks, then why do companies not only set reams of policies and procedures to limit risk, but also spend no resources developing the key skills and systems for effective risk-taking?
In this poignant presentation, Deborah discusses how to get back into the business of taking risk. Based on her series of books, including The Risk Factor: Why Every Organization Needs Big Bets, Bold Characters, and the Occasional Spectacular Failure, Deborah Perry Piscione explores risk-taking as a powerful tool for leaders and their organizations. By looking into the fascinating heroes of risk, Piscione makes the case that for your culture to act smarter, faster, and with more agility and creativity, you must explore the one core leadership skill that has been completely ignored in corporate cultures. She explores both the individual skills and organization systems to unleash risk-taking. This is a very exciting speech for an entire audience.

The past year has been a breakthrough for women.  Yet how many leaders are seeing beyond the salacious stories of misconduct, and view this as an opportunity to drive unprecedented innovation and growth in their organizations?
Deborah Perry Piscione sees it.  She is the Founder of Alley to the Valley, the nation’s largest deal-making network for women.  By working with thousands of powerful female leaders, she has seen first-hand how the inclusion of women has to lead to a vast improvement in every corner and every level of organizations.