So there I was this weekend brainstorming a VIP cocktail event for tech week in Beijing later this month...

It's a week where senior level execs from all over the world will be attending the CHINICT 08 conference or the Asia VC Journal conference and holding a cocktail would be a great opportunity to give folks a chance to mix it up between the two conferences as well as with Beijing based who's who in tech and VC sectors. Yadda yadda yadda...

So in drafting up the initial invite list, I realized that a majority of those invited...would be men! A cocktail party with 99% male attendance after they've spent 2 days in conferences with each other. Boring. Definitely not fun when planning a cocktail party that's supposed to reflect a more social networking environment where real guanxi can develop.

At the same time, I also remembered that I also have a growing number of great caliber girlfriends (CEOs, VPs, Directors, Founders and other senior levels) in non-tech sectors such as advertising, PR and marketing, fashion and event planning and thought to myself that it'd be nice to invite them to the cocktail as well since I was going to be in town.

So why the name "Cute Girls Rock" you may be wondering. Why not something like "The Bitter Glass Ceiling Bitches" or "The Professional Corporate Man Haters Club" right? Because I never quite fit into either of those two during those formative years in my early 20's prior to jumping off the corporate ladder (gosh, I feel old now just for saying that). Also, in the year since I've been back in the China business space, I've come to realize that I'm not alone. My life and future success as a female entrepreneur shouldn't take fashion or corporate culture cues from some old 80's movie of what women in the work force should look or act like...and even IF shoulder padded suits and bad boardroom haircuts *did* come back into style, you won't catch me dead in one. I'll be busy holding a funeral for my wardrobe and mourning the loss of my Blahniks instead....with a glass of Clicquot in one hand no doubt.

So created the group the other night. Invited some girlfriends on Facebook and in the 24 hours since the closed invite only group was created, I've already seen some great networking amongst women from all sectors in different cities and countries. There's also a very supportive tone setting in of wanting to help one another. Example:

• An Australian lawyer who's client include large SOE's in China
• One of Shanghai TV's top lifestyle TV hosts.
• Director of Beijing Olympic program for a global sports brand
• The head of a Chinese Radio & TV company in Europe.
• The CFO of a top video sharing site also joined along with an award winning filmmaker
• CEO of a venture capital and consulting company in SF

Etc. etc. etc...

My friends know why I've got a passion for this. My life as I knew it changed in October 2004 and again in September 2005 and again in April 2007 and one more time in January 2008. Call it the universe's way of say "hey, it's time to do something with all the stuff that's been given to you the past 3 years". Heh. Understatement! So creating positive change as a result of my life and experience of the past 3 years is the journey that I'm now on. As a result, i've been talking to some friends in China for a half year now about helping them plan some kind of international women's conference and expo in 2009 so why not start building the community now.

Want to know how you can help? Is there a smart and sexy female in your network that should be in ours? Let me know.

The most important criteria is confidence. Everything else falls into place from there.

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Cute Girls Rock  Just For Fun  Women In China