Butterfly Frenzy

Small business grants from Intuit

In late January, we launched the Small Business United effort at Intuit. Many months in the making with a village of Intuit folks and partners required to bring it to life, the effort is all about helping small business owners succeed. Music to my ears!

One of the key elements of the effort has been a small business grant competition. In the first part of the grant competition, close to 2000 small businesses submitted written stories about their businesses along with some excellent tips for others. Out of 2000 entries, 50 finalists were selected...no small task for the community of raters and our expert judges.

Now, the second part of the competition is coming to a close. The 50 finalists submitted videos about two weeks ago and have been getting the word out about their video and their business. Thousands of people have been rating the videos and sharing insightful or encouraging comments with the entrepreneurs. Ratings close tonight, so if you have a favorite business or video, be sure to get your ratings in!

On Thursday, after the judges have reviewed all of the videos and after the calculations have been completed, we'll announce the winners. All 50 business owners received $5k in grants along with a Flip video camera. The grand prize winner gets $25K and four runners-up receive $10K. All in all, we'll have given out over $300K in small business grants!

Seattle Just Start event - 1000s Inspired to Leave the Rat Race Behind

Seattle, oh Seattle. How do I love thee? The city welcomed us with open arms yesterday as our first "Just Start" event kicked off in front of Westlake Center.

Thousands of folks interacted with the live event! Our JumpUp members did an amazing job of answering questions for people who want to leave the rat race. Every time I looked around, I saw people getting help to start a business. So cool!

We also had quite a few people enter the contest to win $50K in startup funds and expert help. Some of the business ideas were just incredible, and they reminded me of why we've been working so hard over these last few weeks. One of my favorites was the gal from the National Guard who is planning to start a gym for seniors.

Seattle, being Seattle, It did rain a bit yesterday. The clear tent was a genius last-minute addition. The tent actually helped draw attention to the event. And, the warm coffee and cookies brought the crowd in too.

It's supposed to be a sunnier day today here in Seattle, but cold. I'm excited get over to the event in a couple of hours. It should be a lot of fun!

More to come and more pics from the other events in Chicago and New York in the coming weeks.

Just Start a Business Contest - QuickBooks

Okay, okay - it's been two months since I've blogged! I've been agonizing about it, but I have a good reason. See, I've been "birthing" this other baby here at Intuit called the Just Start campaign. We're encouraging folks to get out there and finally, "just start" a business. Ten million consider starting a biz every year and just need that push to leave the rat race and make it happen.

Anyhoo, there's a $50K startup grant ($40K in cash and $10K in expert resources) up for grabs. Folks just have to tell their story in writing or in video for the chance to win. The videos and essays have been absolutely amazing - real, heart-warming, funny - it's addicting to spend time on the site reading the entries as they come in. I'm going to add some of my favorites to the blog over the next couple of weeks plus I'll add posts from our live events in Seattle, Chicago, New York and Boston.

Meantime...check out the video that we put together to tell the story of the campaign. Lotsalove, Kira

The Hidden Kitchen Dinner Series 1 - a Mom's Eye View

A few short weeks ago, my hubby Jeff, kicked off his business, Eclecdish, with an amazing event - The Hidden Kitchen Dinner. Twenty four foodies from around the San Francisco Bay Area joined us as Jeff and my sister Katy dished out some delicious treats. From passed yummies like Gruyere fritters to Jeff's famous fig-crusted Halibut, everyone left full and, as I'd hoped, ready to spread the good word about Jeff's business.

All of this fun didn't come without some parenting challenges. As a reminder, we live in a teeny, weeny house. And, we have a vocal, sleep-is-very-important baby. Jeff had arranged for our neighborhood babysitter to watch Sophie starting at 3PM on Saturday. After all, Jeff had organized everything from prepping in our small kitchen to picking up a truck in Davis to managing the logistics of a free refridgerator. So, planning child care should have been a breeze.

At 10AM on Saturday morning, Jeff answered the phone. After a few minutes, he approached me in the "command center," where, as his CTO, I was desperately trying to map his blog to his domain. "We've got a situation." As is always the case with me, I immediately thought "how bad could it be." Well, our babysitter had the flu and couldn't watch Sophie!! Unbelievable.

Some good karma was on our side though because Sophie napped for a full three hours in the afternoon, giving us time to help Kathy turn the backyard into an al fresco dining experience. And, Kathy agreed to stay a little longer to watch Sophie. We turned our bedroom into Sophie's play area, and I shuttled between my job as hostess and my mommy job. At one point, I had to take off my fancy dress entirely because I couldn't nurse with it on!

Anyhoo, as my boss said,  these experiences provide the content for our lives, and our blogs.

Only a geeky MBA could love...

Here at Intuit, we have a very cool program called the Rotational Development Program. Kids fresh from undergrad spend a couple of years at Intuit "adding value" in various functional teams. We've got two RDPers on JumpUp, both of whom are way cooler than I'll ever be (at least now that I'm 34).

Adam sent me this periodic table of visualization methods. If only I'd had this at Duke! It would provided not only a nice shorthand to some of the many tools we learned, but we could have really skewered it in our April Fool's issue of the Fuqua Times. Oh the days...