RVA Networking Mixer celebrates “Día de los Muertos” at Recording Studio

PHOTO: VAHCC October Mixer

Michelle Moore (DG Specialty Guatemalan Coffee & Dark Chocolate) & Enrique Mendez (Enrique Mendez Web Design) attend our October mixer at Keagan’s in Short Pump

VA debate to air on C-SPAN tonight, 8pm

The VAHCC is proud to be a sponsor of “The People’s Debate” between US Senate candidates Tim Kaine and George Allen airing tonight on C-SPAN. Please check the link on AARP and tune in at 8 pm, and you can always check it out live. Main sponsors of the event are AARP & the League of Women Voters.

 

VAHCC Corporate Networking Group & VACLAA celebrate at Carytown Bike Co.

Jen & Dorothy from Genworth celebrating at Carytown Bicycle Co. with the VAHCC Corporate Networking Group & VACLAA last week. Check out VACLAA’s website here.

The VAHCC Hosts International Press Corps to Interview Latino Voters in Virginia

Twenty-six journalists from six continents convened in Fairfax to learn about the Hispanic Voter in Virginia

FAIRFAX, VA. – On Thursday, September 27, 2012, twenty-six journalists from around the world met with Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce officials and several members of Virginia’s Hispanic community to discuss the issues important to them in this election cycle, and why they identify as either Republican or Democrat.  The journalists are covering the election and, particularly, Virginia’s role as a swing state, and the role that Hispanic voters will play in the election.  Rather than interviewing party leaders, candidates, or campaign personnel, these journalists wanted everyday Hispanic Virginians who could speak to the issues that were important to them, and how those issues effect their party affiliation, and ultimately, vote.

“As the Hispanic population in Virginia, like that of our nation’s, continues to rise, it is important for the world to take note of the changing nature of our population, and the effects that these changes will have on political outcomes,” said Michel Zajur, VAHCC president. “It is important for elected officials, corporations, and leaders in Virginia and beyond to recognize and incorporate this demographic in their decision making, and we feel that is happening more and more.”

One attendee, Rebecca Jaramillo from Fauquier County, remarked, “After hearing about “the Latino voter” on television, the journalists seemed extremely pleased to get information from Hispanic voters first-hand about their experiences, from both Democrats and Republicans,” as evidenced by the lingering and honest dialogue among all participants.

Hispanics now make up nearly 10 percent of Virginians and their presence, buying power, and increasing political participation are changing the way companies do business, and, the way candidates tailor their messaging.  The Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce has been in the business of bridging mainstream businesses and groups to Hispanic businesses and groups for 12 years.

The journalists were brought to the United States through the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Public Affairs, Office of Press Relations. The Fairfax County Economic Development Authority (FCEDA, www.fairfaxcountyeda.org) sponsored the lunch and Gerald L. Gordon, Ph.D., president and CEO of the FCEDA, spoke to the group about the diverse population and business community of Fairfax County.

The journalists will remain in the United States and continue their travels for several more weeks, watching the October 3 presidential debate in Colorado, another key state where Hispanic voters are an influential demographic.

 

Cigarros & Good Spirits at the After Hours Mixer at Keagan’s in Short Pump, Oct. 4th

Click here to get tickets and join us on Thurs. Oct. 4th at Keagan’s Irish Pub in Short Pump for cigars, beverages, and after hours networking for making business connections to and from Virginia’s Hispanic Community. Bring your business cards!

DC Dialogue on Diversity Conference Focuses on Tech & Entrepenuership

Washington, DC [CapitalWirePR] September 19, 2012 – Friday, September 21 the Dialogue on Diversity 2012 Entrepreneurship/Information Technology Conference is presented at the Microsoft Innovation and Policy Center at 901 K Street, N.W.,  Washington, D.C. Conference registration may be made today at www.dialogueondiversity.org for this free-to-the-public program. The 2012 Conference agenda focuses on the encounter of the perennial entrepreneurial quest with the advancing IT revolution — with added exploration of the effects of IT on effective civic engagement among entrepreneurs themselves as well as rank and file citizens.

Summing up the projected conference, Ma. Cristina Caballero, Dialogue on Diversity President, appealed to “interested women business owners, professionals, and civil society staff and executives, the target audience of the Dialogue’s program cycle, as users of the transformative innovations of IT, but also the creative IT industries themselves – the creators of the new working and social environment – which are growing with dazzling speed on their own dynamic.  The latter sometimes called the ‘techpreneurs’.”

A Conference highlight will be the midday session address by Frank Torres, Microsoft’s Consumer Affairs Director, introduced by Mr. Suhail Khan, Microsoft’s Director of External Affairs.  Mr. Torres, a student of the privacy challenges affecting American life and civic discourse,  is among the most articulate commentators within corporate America on the issues of privacy in our national life.  Alejandra Castillo, Deputy National Director of the Minority Business Development Agency, DOC, continues the midday session with an overview of business conditions.

The opening Conference session, moderated by Jason Llorenz, takes up the respective roles of the users and the creators of IT, bringing together such speakers as Aaron Brauer-Rieke of the FTC on commercial data collection and the accompanying privacy risks, and Tim Dioquino of MicroTech, a Virginia software development firm, himself an architect of advancedc IT systems, along with Cristina Mossi, of DEVIS, Arlington, Virginia, the quintessential woman business owner, combining a rich technical expertise with a skilled hand in managing her creative team.

The supplier diversity topic is again presented through a quartet of its leading advocates and practitioners. Mark Oliver, head of supplier diversity practice at the Department of the Interior, and chief of the OSDBU Interagency Council, is joined by Theresa Speake, formerly head of diversity at the Department of Energy, Kenneth Clark, President of the metro area Minority Supplier Development council, and finally the PEPCO Holdings diversity expert Charlie Partridge, head of supplier diversity programs at PEPCO Holdings, Inc.

An array of entrepreneurship questions are aired in afternoon panels, moderated by Jacquelyn Puente of Comcast. Carlos Guzman discusses a new departure in marketing through the B2B/B2G Matchmakers system. Sandra Eberhard, Executive Director of Washington WBENC, lays out the procedures for certification as a minority- or women-owned business for certain government contracting programs.  Stephanie King and Robert Watkins  of the SBA hold forth on certain of these programs — the HUB geographical Zones, the 8(a) economically-disadvantaged preferences, the newly instituted industry-specific preferences for women-owned enterprises, etc.

Manuel A. Rosales, of the Latino Coalition, Gus West, of The Hispanic Institute,  along with moderator Allison Remsen of Mobile Future, and representatives of Organizing for America and RNC Virginia Hispanic Outreach, take up the vexed question of the flagging the sense of civic engagement among large swaths of the U.S. population.  The questions posed to this panel bring to the fore the problems of inequality in income, education, and cultural savvy, as the genesis of the ominous class-defined civic alienation.

Among sponsors and supporting groups for the 2012 Conference are the Microsoft Corporation, hosting the sessions at its Innovation/Policy Center, Southwest Airlines, and AT&T. Collaborating organizations include the SBA, and MBDA, Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, D.C. Office of Latino Affairs, MicroTech,. PEPCO Holdings, Latino Coalition, MD/DC MSDC, The Hispanic Institute, OSDBU Council, Federal Trade Commission, Google, Mobile Future, CHCI, and many others.  Our media partner is again CapitalWirePR.