Mobile Tech Cocktail Inspires Conversation, Pride

Jill Foster, founder of Live Your Talk, is fascinated on how social tech and public speech come together. And she guest blogs for RMC on Washington, DC area events about social media and entrepreneurship.

The recent MOBILE TECH Cocktail event has stayed on my mind. It was fun for sure with a diverse set of mobile start ups featured. But it took a while to realize why it lingered in my memory.

Then ‘Wham!’ – that mental light bulb popped and it finally became clear. Yes there was a diverse crowd of entrepreneurs (tech and beyond), nonprofits, government, and mobile tech enthusiasts plus industry pros. That enriched the conversations I had the pleasure of participating in. But still, that diversity wasn’t the ultimate quality that bound the different talks together.

I finally realized that quality was pride: pride in the event and even in what DC had to offer the tech community overall. That was the conversational theme and spark. It was fantastic to observe.

From different vantage points related to TECH Cocktail (and beyond it), people shared their pride for the social tech community, for entrepreneurship, for staff support, and even for the personal quests to improve business offerings. It all knocked my socks off but it’s literally taken a few weeks to recognize how pride threaded the whole night.

Some sample conversations where pride came into play:

Some of the event’s organizers expressed appreciation for the staff and volunteers who helped propel MOBILE TECH Cocktail forward that night. There was pride in the team effort.

A biz owner and blogger for an awesome online business community, Women Grow Business, mentioned the positive impact that involvement has made on her reputation – and the pride it produced (for her by her). She and other entrepreneurs planned to present at a related, upcoming bootcamp (where our very own Mayra Ruiz will be presenting, too!).

Another blogger couldn’t wait to share about what she’s doing to promote mentorship for female lawyers. Conversations emerged from that to other mentoring capacities in the area that could relate to her mission. Pride for her goal was clearly all over her face.

A whole lot of pride was expressed for Washington, DC being the host city for Digital Capital Week. So many events, with another TECH Cocktail too, that week will rock the area with all sorts of digital education, interaction and festivities.

How many events convene these types of ideas, all linked through a contagious pride, to the backdrop of celebrating great startups? Is TECH Cocktail magic? Is the social tech community? …is Washington, DC? …Or with a cocktail metaphor in full swing, is it a mix of all three?

Photo “Proud” by Rachel Titiriga, Creative Commons