Conference Leaders
Carrie Nikitin
Project: Chairwoman of PWIC's Prison Project
Topic: “The Courage to Change a Broken System: An Innovative Approach to Reduce the Rate of Recidivism”
CEO of AvaTekh and a master business strategist, Carrie has over 30 years of experience in business building, development, strategies, modeling and funding in both start-ups and existing companies, she has worked at the executive level in various areas and has worked with companies in various stages, such as start-up mode, expansion, downsizing, turnaround, branding and re-branding phases, collaborative development, mergers and acquisitions, grant writing, and technology transfer and industry partnerships. www.avatekh.com
Cristal Montanez BaylorProject: Hashoo Foundation USA
Topic: Tracking Your Project for Optimal Funding
Cristal is a global award winner of her project, Hashoo Foundation with many awards for her work with women and families. She is also a former Miss Venezuela. Cristal is an experienced and passionate professional with proven ability to strategically develop, coordinate, organize, promote and implement projects utilizing both local and international resources. Global Citizen with years of experience in Citizen Diplomacy. Excellent interpersonal communication skills honed by working with a wide variety of professionals, corporations, volunteers, government officials and the media. www.hashoofoundationusablog.org
Valeri BocageProject: Rebuilding School/Orphanage in Nairobi, Kenya
Topic: Removing Fear & Doubt to Make a Bigger Impact
CEO and Founder of PWI Connections, Valeri has been assisting people in living their dreams for over 25 years. She has inspired hundreds of people to fulfill on their life's mission. She has consulted with authors, entrepreneurs, parents, families, public speakers and artists to expand their vision for what was possible in their professional and personal lives.
Sally CrawfordProject: The Humanitarian Collection
Topic: Using Video to Powerfully Convey Your Message
Sally is a world-class filmmaker, Emmy award winning television producer, marketing/branding expert, and master of media for corporate, commercial, and industrial webcast media presentations and communications.
Her work in entertainment includes: Emmy award-winning broadcasts, as well as, non-scripted reality programs, documentaries, and feature films.
Delia HorwitzTopic: Powerful Collaborating to Expand Your Team and Contacts
Delia's extensive experience consulting and facilitating hundreds of groups in a wide variety of circumstances spans over 40 years.
Her projects include strategic planning with non-profit Boards, team building with small and large corporations, goal setting with City Councils, corporate culture work with Fortune 500 senior leadership teams, and visioning with community stakeholders.
She also co-founded and served for three years as Executive Director of Leadership Santa Barbara County. In addition to partnering with Paula on Collaboration Soup, Delia owns and is the principal of Business Relationship Consultants. www.collaborationsoup.com
She is also the author of The Achieving Agreement Workbook: Managing Your Internal and External Conflicts and Letters From My Future Self: Musings of a Mid-Life Seeker.
Pam TerryProject: Showcasing Humanitarian Projects that Makes a Difference
Topic: Connecting Leaders for Social Change
Pam is CEO and Founder of NOWW Media, providing public speaking coaching and marketing strategies that make a difference in people's lives and communities. Pam is a savvy marketing strategist with more than 30 years' experience in public speaking, marketing, public relations, sales, and systems development. She is a leader for social change that makes the world better for all. Her moniker, NOWW, stands for Network Of What's Working.
A writer, trainer, interviewer, and newscaster, Pam works with conscious entrepreneurs and corporate teams. She is a columnist on public speaking for Small Business Today magazine, a frequent keynote speaker, a conscious community leader, and, formerly, the Executive Director and President of the Galleria Chamber of Commerce in Houston. Pam is currently developing a humanitarian news and TV programming service, NOWW News and NOWW TV, to connect activists of social change and provide resources to expand social change projects. www.pamterry.com and www.theindemandspeaker.com
Elinor Stutz
Topic: Building Powerful Relationships that Make a Difference
Elinor is the CEO of Smooth Sale and author of the international best-selling book, Nice Girls DO Get the Sale: Relationship Building That Gets Results, written about in TIME Magazine. Elinor has written and published two other books, HIRED! and The Wish: A 360 Business Development Process to Fuel Sales, which provides a comprehensive plan for securing improved sales.
Kred.com proclaimed Stutz as a Top 1% Influencer. Bizzhum and NowISeeIt both named the Smooth Sale Blog as one of the “Top 100 Most Innovative Sales Blogs.” Stutz consults and speaks worldwide. www.smoothsale.net
Najjiyya Arnold
Project: Profiles Unlimited
Topic: Self-Defense - Key Things You Can Do to Protect Yourself
Najjiyya has mastery in both Karate and Taekwondo. She has been a body guard and/or provided training for Elijah Muhammad II & family members, PLUS, Dr. Fredrick K.C. & Betty Price, Marilyn Hicky, Creflo Dollar, Bishop T.D. Jakes, Fred & Patricia Arnold, Yolanda Adams, Singer; Helen Baylor, Singer; Vickie Winns, Singer; and M.C. Hammer, Dancer
Dr. Denise Strong
Topic: Starting & Running a Non-Profit Successfully
Denise Strong consults nonprofit, government and social enterprise organizations that are tackling tough societal challenges. She has extensive experience in nonprofit leadership and management, higher education and government service which gives an in-depth understanding of organizational Dr. Strong is sensitive to the uniqueness of each organization which has its own culture and priorities. Her company does consultation in strategic planning, program evaluation, organization assessment, board training or crisis management. Her unique strategy is done in partnership with and is designed for that organization.
Barbara HofferTopic: Life Balance
Barbara is passionate about the transformation of individuals in health and wellness. She is a motivational speaker, health and wellness trainer and corporate consultant across multiple industries. Barbara has influenced entrepreneurs and executives from IBM to Mary Kay, The World Bank to Mt. Zion Hospital and many CEO’s to reduce their stress levels. She has mastered her own breast cancer and work to teach others.
Bonita BanducciProject: Unmasking the Gender Effect and Gender Competence
Topic: The Hidden Power of Women
Bonita Banducci teaches Gender and Engineering for Santa Clara University’s School of Engineering Graduate Program in the Core Curriculum, Engineering and Society. She is President of Banducci Consulting based in Hayward. Her original research in one of Silicon Valley's Fortune 500 companies “What is the Contribution Women Make that Could be the Strategic Advantage in the Global Marketplace?” launched her specialization in Unmasking the Gender Effect and Gender Competence. Banducci is an Associate of the Institute for Women’s Leadership and a founding faculty of Santa Clara University’s Global Women's Leadership Network, sponsored by the Leavey School of Business and has been faculty and coach for the Women Leaders for the World Program. She taught Leadership Experience at the Leavey School of Business. She has been a Gender expert on how to retain and promote women in the Engineering Workplace for Mentornet, which provides professional mentors to women and underrepresented minorities in Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) majors in hundreds of universities throughout the United States. In 2014 Banducci was named one of 100 Women of Influence of Silicon Valley by the Silicon Valley Business Journal.