Corporate Governance

For our May meetup, we're delighted to be back at the fabulous Accurx offices. We have two amazing talks lined up and the agenda will be: * 6:30pm - arrive, drinks, networking * 7:00pm - Welcome & Housekeeping * 7:15pm - **Talk** **1: "A practical guide to inner sourcing your IDP"** Bridging the gap between developers and platform teams is hard. Scattered documentation, fragmented language and hidden knowledge leave developers frustrated, while platform teams struggle to understand what devs really need. Treating platforms as products is a start, but treating them like open source projects unlocks real collaboration, allowing developers to contribute and maintain features. In her roles as Developer Advocate and platform engineer, Lian has years of experience working with highly bureaucratic organisations helping to improve developer experience and adoption. In this talk, she’ll share concrete steps to identify contribution opportunities, set up maintainable processes, and measure engagement. You’ll leave inspired with ideas to boost adoption, reduce friction, and turn your platform into a collaborative, thriving ecosystem. **Speaker:** Lian Li, Cloud Native Human *Lian always wanted to save the world. After leaving law school, she decided to work with computers instead. While in Web Dev, she started attending tech events, and soon fell in love with the community. In her roles as Consultant and DevRel, Lian combined technical knowledge with a focus on the human side.* *Currently, Lian works as freelance Platform Engineer in Amsterdam and is the Chief Karaoke Officer for Kuberoke, the first and only Kubernetes Karaoke Community. She also enjoys performing in musical improvisation theatre and standup comedy shows.* * 7.45pm - food, more drinks & networking * 8.00pm - **Talk** **2: "The Humans Behind the Platform: Structuring Teams for Culture and Capability**" It’s easy to focus on the tech when building a Platform team, and that’s tremendously important, but it’s often the people and how they work together that determine success. Over the past couple of years, Claire has led a Platform Engineering Team through different formations, migrations, and tooling adoptions. Whatever shape the team has taken, whatever they're working on, the constants have been a need for clear purpose and a culture where people can thrive, this takes work, and has sometimes been tricky to get right. In this talk, she’ll share what she's learned from shaping and supporting platform teams: what’s worked (and what hasn’t) when it comes to team composition, balancing seniority, and supporting career growth. Collaboration is central to how to operate, so she’ll talk about how her team works with and supports internal customers, and what’s helped to navigate complex, knotty migration projects. She’ll also cover how they built a culture that gives engineers space to lead. We want engineers at every level to feel confident taking ownership, and that takes deliberate effort. If you’re figuring out how to shape your platform teams to enable others as well as deliver, this talk will offer practical ideas, and maybe a few things to rethink. **Speaker:** Claire Reckless, Engineering Manager *Claire is an Engineering Manager and leads a Platform Engineering Team. With a background spanning Tech Support, Testing, and QA across sectors like Finance and Security, she brings a deep appreciation for resilient systems and collaborative teams. Claire is passionate about learning and development, and she’s especially proud of her past work coordinating an apprentice programme, an initiative that’s helped build a more diverse and sustainable pipeline of engineering talent. She’s energised by helping engineers at all levels grow their confidence, take ownership, and shape the future of their teams.* * 8.30pm onwards - drinks and networking. So, please come and join us, we look forward to seeing you there. The LOPUG team. * Food and drinks provided * Good time will be had by all

***[We're leaving Meetup! Going forward, tickets on Meetup will be limited. We encourage you to register via our Luma calendar instead, where the full number of tickets will be available.](https://luma.com/ck2etymg)*** **Agenda** 06:00pm - Doors open 06:30pm - Welcome 06:35pm - [Mariia Borysova](https://www.linkedin.com/in/maria-borysova/), Senior Product Designer at Amazon, "Storytelling in AI" 07:00pm - Break 07:15pm - [Celeste Horgan](https://www.linkedin.com/in/celeste-horgan/), Senior OSS Developer Advocate at Snowflake, "Apache Spark Pipelines: Adventures in Raccoon detection" ​07:45pm - Lightning Talk: [Sneha Kalaivanan](https://www.linkedin.com/in/snehakalai/), Senior Product Manager at Tesco, TBD **Please note you will be unable to enter the venue before 6.00pm.** RSVPs will close 24 hours before the event, you may be unable to register after this time but you can still watch online. If you can't join us in person you can watch remotely via [our YouTube channel](https://youtube.com/@ai-signals-community). **Our hosts may require that we provide a list of all attendees, please ensure that you register with a name that matches your government issued ID or bank card: if you do not we cannot guarantee you entry to the building.** Please RSVP for the event well in advance if you plan to attend in person and unRSVP if you can no longer attend as limited spaces are available.

\*\*\*PLEASE NOTE TEMPORARY CHANGE OF VENUE DURING EXAM PERIOD\*\*\* Join the Corinthians Badminton Club for a fun and social evening of badminton! This event is perfect for anyone at **Intermediate level** looking to improve their skills, meet new people, and have a great time on the court. We will have friendly matches and plenty of opportunities to socialize with fellow badminton enthusiasts. Feel free to share the event with a friend so they too can come along and enjoy a night of sports and recreation in a welcoming and inclusive environment. We play with feather shuttlecocks and unfortunately cannot accommodate beginners. This is to ensure games are fair and enjoyable for everyone. We currently have 15 regular members and are opening up 8-10 guest slots using MeetUp. Guest fees are £10 per session, please arrange payment 24 hours before session starts otherwise we would have to release your place. We are unable to offer refunds at this point. Bank Transfer Details: Account: Corinthians BC Account No: 22788263 Sort Code: 60-19-01 Reference: Your Full Name Venue: Harris Academy Rainham Lambs Lane South Rainham London RM13 9XD

Something's shifted. The people who've spent years deep in data - the analysts, the engineers, the consultants - are building with AI agents now. **And it's the most exciting thing in a decade.** New tools. New workflows. Whole new ways of thinking about what data work even means. Everyone's experimenting. Everyone's learning. **Nobody's done this before.** We couldn't find a community in the UK for people doing this work. So we're starting one. In pubs, with laptops, sharing what's actually working. No slides. No pitches. No lanyard energy. Just people who build things, showing each other what they've built. **Bring your terminal. Bring your questions. Bring the thing that's half-working and you can't figure out why.** More at [swarm.org.uk](https://swarm.org.uk/)

**Advanced booking is required** \- find out more on our website \[[www.silverfit.org.uk/elephantandcastle](www.silverfit.org.uk/elephantandcastle)] **Meet Up is a means for promotion and *not a way to sign up* to this session.** ### **Activity: Yoga - A Gentle, Open-Level Class for All Abilities** **Venue:** Elephant and Castle Community and Engagement Hub, Upper floor, Castle Square, 40 Elephant Road, London, SE17 1EU **Day:** Wednesday **Time:** 10.15am-11am session, please arrive from 10am. **Instructor:** Heather **Description of session:** Boost your flexibility and strength while calming your mind and body in this relaxing yoga session. Suitable for all, each class includes a gentle pranayama (breathing meditation) to deepen your experience. **Price:** This session is free, with an option to donate to Silverfit at the check out. Advanced sign up is essential to regulate numbers. *** For more information about this session please email the Project Manager at - **info@silverfit.org.uk** Learn more about **Silverfit Charity** on our website [www.silverfit.org.uk](http://www.silverfit.org.uk/)

We're delighted to announce an exciting LSCC event on Wednesday 13th May, in partnership with our friends at Zopa Bank! Join us at the Zopa Canary Wharf office in London for this session and get the chance to flex your architectural design muscles! "So how are we supposed to get great architects, if they only get the chance to architect fewer than a half-dozen times in their career?" — Ted Neward. This quote highlights the need for practice, which is what our LSCC architecture katas provide: a safe, repeatable way to hone your software architecture design skills by simulating architectural challenges. **What's the format?** You'll be split into groups and have a business problem to solve. You'll be tasked with designing a technical architecture to meet that problem context. As with real-life you'll have to manage various trade-offs in your design and interact with a Product Owner to clarify your questions. At the end of the task each team will showcase their architecture and technology choices back to the wider group as part of a group discussion. Whether you're a seasoned coder, software architect or new to the scene, you're invited to share insights, discuss best practices, and learn from fellow participants. No prior session attendance or architecture knowledge is required – just bring your enthusiasm. No laptop is required for this session, we'll provide each group with paper, pens and sticky notes to support the activity. Thank you to the Codurance team that will run the event at Zopa Bank's office. Find out more at https://www.codurance.com/ Food and drinks will be provided with vegetarian, vegan and non-alcoholic options available - thanks to Zopa Bank for sponsoring refreshments and hosting in their great office. **About Zopa** Founded in 2020 with a full banking licence and backed by some of Silicon Valley’s most iconic investors, digital bank Zopa is building the Home of Money. This is a place where financial products deliver good value and managing money is made effortless; deep and long-lasting relationships mean customers are left confident about their choices. One of the UK’s highest rated and most celebrated financial brands, Zopa has been recognised with over 10 British Bank Awards, holds a Trustpilot rating of 4.6/5, and has one of the highest customer satisfaction scores in the industry. Zopa Bank Limited is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. https://www.zopa.com/ We look forward to seeing you soon!

**Dead Product Society \| After Work Drinks** Come along, bring a friend/colleague or two and join us for a relaxed evening of informal product and tech chats over a few drinks and doughnuts. We aim to connect everyone without awkwardness or LinkedIn spiel, and value good conversation over boring presentations. **Who is welcome?** Product Managers, CEOs, UX/UI Designers, Developers, Scrum Masters etc. We welcome anyone who works in, with or wants to break into product. *Note: We intentionally keep our After Work Drinks on the smaller side to allow for more in-depth conversations.* **The Bike Shed** We'll be hanging out in the lounge area (behind the area with all the tables, next to the store). \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\- **Dead Product Society** Dead Product Society is a collective of like-minded professionals sharing real-talk and joining forces to navigate the twists and turns of the product world. Our down-to-earth community is for anyone who works in, with or wants to break into product teams regardless of their background or experience. **Our Sponsors** Shout out to our generous sponsors at Waggel Pet Insurance; Lifetime pet insurance, simplified. With their support we are able to host these events for you and create a space for those important, honest conversations.

Many governments are now pushing age verification and VPN restriction laws, lobbied by Big Tech companies, with no visible popular demand for it. Is that truly to "protect children", or is it better explained by desire to control and censor online speech, while appeasing their corporate donors? Let's discuss the future of the Internet, freedom from censorship, privacy vs. security trade-off, and other related topics. To kick off the conversation, we will look at Cory Doctorow's essay on age verification and "Online Safety Act" called ***[“Privacy preserving age verification” is bullshit](https://doctorow.medium.com/privacy-preserving-age-verification-is-bullshit-0aefd53019e0)***. *<...>politicians all over the world demanded a kind of impossible encryption: encryption that works perfectly when it’s doing something legitimate, like keeping hackers from pushing malware to your pacemaker or stealing your life’s savings or listening in on you through your phone’s microphone, but also they require that this encryption offer no protection to criminals, drug dealers, terrorists, child abusers, and other miscreants.* *This really is like water that’s not wet.*

**BOOK HERE**: https://sportas.co.uk/games/48733 **Game Description:** Social fun mixed and beginner friendly badminton session based in East London. Founded in 2024 delivering weekly badminton sessions 🏸 Please note even if session isn't full, there will attendees coming internally :) Find more about us at @sportingdllm (IG)! **Rules** Mixed doubles up to 21! always be friendly, respectful and match each other levels. We all started somewhere!

This group is a private substance misuse support group, for individuals who are experiencing difficulties in their relationship with drugs/alcohol. The group is facilitated by a trained and qualified Janus worker. This group is designed to offer support, encouragement and to provide a forum, that allows you to make informed choices. The objective of this group is to liberate you from the labels of addiction, dependency, illness sickness and "disease", replacing them with the more proactive terminology of choice, responsibility, self control and decision making. Janus does not use the 12 step model. It uses the Janus approach to working with substance use called "The Resonance Factor" http://bit.ly/Resonance_blog Hopefully you will find these groups informative, innovative and creative. Before entering this group could you contact CHRISTOPHER ROBIN on 07515663621 to discuss the finer details regarding payment and room number in the venue etc.

PLEASE NOTE YOU MUST book and pay for your ticket in advance at https://www.privateequitynetwork.co.uk/ The London Family Office & Private Equity Business Networking Committee would like to extend you an invitation to our May 2026 Networking Breakfast to be held in the private lounge of the famous Bonds of Mayfair - and hope you can join us for a delcious pre-work breakfast and productive networking to make new contacts and ideas for 2026+. We now have over 8000 diverse and relevant London members so it’s the perfect opportunity for making new third sector connections. PLEASE NOTE YOU MUST book and pay for your ticket in advance at https://www.privateequitynetwork.co.uk/ ALSO PLEASE NOTE we take most of our event bookings through our website and EventBrite so the numbers booked is much larger than displayed on this Meetup page (normally about 30-50 guests for our breakfast events).

Explore how AI-native operations are reshaping enterprises, sustainable scaling strategies, and the risks of intelligence without responsibi Join HEC Paris alumni and industry leaders for an evening discussion on building intelligent and sustainable enterprises in the AI era. Topics include: • The Shift to Intelligent Enterprises • AI-Native Operations: Redesigning the Enterprise • Intelligence Without Responsibility is Risk • Scaling Growth in the Intelligent Era Network with founders, operators, and technology leaders exploring how AI is transforming modern business operations.

Shaping our future with AI. Creating opportunity through AI fluency, connection and community. No jargon. No hype. No confusing terminology. NOTE: This event will be focussed on the changing shape of software development. Everyone is welcome to attend but the content will be somewhat technical. **Join us for our next in-person meetup in London on Thursday May 14th.** Our theme for this meetup is **Reimagining Software Development with AI.** We're going to take a step back and think about the role we, the humans, play in the software development process now that coding agents have arrived. This event provides a small glimpse of the future, from the innovators who are challenging everything and rebuilding the process of software development from the ground up, with humans at the centre! **Where and When?** * Thursday, May 14th * Doors open at 18:00 * Talks start at 19:00 * AutogenAI, 123 Pentonville Rd, London N1 9LG **Talk 1: The Validation Gap: We Need A Better Way To Review AI Generated Code** (Robert Werner, Co-Founder & CTO Leapter) AI coding is fast. We're generating more code than ever. But more code means more code to verify, and agentic workflows are scaling that gap faster than review processes can keep up. The bottleneck didn't disappear. It moved from writing code to verifying logic. For most generated code, you can ship, test, and iterate. But what if we need to be sure? What about the code that runs our financial systems or decides if you qualify for a loan? It has to be right. Hope is not a strategy, we need to better ways to review code. In this talk Robert will share his recent innovations, experiments and insights with you. **About Robert:** Robert Werner is the CTO of an AI startup dedicated to shaping the future of AI-native software development. He has over 20 years experience focussed on Software Engineering, Developer Experience and Transformational Platform Engineering, across Fortune 500 companies and FinTechs. **Talk 2: Narrative Engineering: What Cognitive Science Actually Tells Us About Building with LLMs** (Sal Kimmich, Security Architect at Gadfly AI) We keep treating LLMs like search engines that hallucinate. That is the wrong category, and it produces the wrong engineering. LLMs are narrative generators. They do not retrieve facts or execute logic. They complete stories. That distinction is not philosophical. It determines what kind of system you can build with them and what kind you cannot. Neuroscience has been studying probabilistic, distributed, narrative-generating systems for decades. Most of the LLM engineering field is ignoring that work. This talk walks through cyberneutics, an open source methodology and repository built on the premise that we need a new engineering discipline for narrative computing the way software engineering emerged from symbolic computing. The theoretical foundations come from second-order cybernetics, distributed cognition, and Minsky's Society of Mind. The empirical validation comes from 2025 mechanistic interpretability research showing that reasoning models internally simulate multi-agent dialogue to reason better. The practical techniques come from iterative practice: adversarial committees, pipeline algebra with formal quality propagation, observer-aware interaction design. Three real lessons for practitioners building agentic systems: reliability is a property of the pipeline, not the prompt; repetition is latent space exploration, not failure; and if you want auditable AI reasoning, you need to externalise the dialogue structure, because the transcript is the explainability artifact. The discipline does not exist yet. This is what building it looks like. **About Sal:** Sal is a developer advocate for open source and passionate about helping engineers, ethical hackers and digital enthusiasts understand the complexity of modern software development. With over a decade of experience as building cloud-native machine learning pipelines in the healthcare and tech for good sectors, their work is now focused on filling the cracks in the open source software supply chain to build a better digital future for all of us. **Thanks!** We'd like to thank our sponsors [Leapter ](http://leapter.com/)and AutogenAI for making this event possible. **Code of Conduct** This event has a code of conduct that you can [review here.](https://aifortherestofus.live/code-of-conduct) By joining the community and registering for this event you agree to abide by our code of conduct. **Providing Your Name and Email** To register for this event you'll be asked to provide your email address. After the event you will be automatically subscribed to the newsletters from *AI for the rest of us* and Leapter GmbH. You can unsubscribe at any time (But why would you? They are really very good!)

When: Thursday, May 14, 2026, 5:30 – 8:30 Location: Lost Rhino, 21730 Red Rum Dr, Ste 142, Ashburn, VA 20147 Come network with other local GovCon Executives and enjoy a few free beers on us and engage with our sponsors and Industry speakers. Speaker: Advanced Technology International (ATI), Tom Bailey – Director of Strategic Engagements. Largest Consortium Management firm, will discuss collaborations and Other Transaction Agreements (OTAs) – allows agencies to enter into agreements for research, development, prototyping, and sometimes production of new technologies or capabilities. Will provide overview of these collaborations with discussions and Q&A. Please register here for your spot and please enter full name and company so a badge will be waiting for you. If you would like your company logo to appear on the digital board, please message the logo to me. Feel free to pass along to another colleague or GovCon Executive in your network. Co-Sponsorships: Insperity, Pinnacle Financial Partners

## **1 Million Cups Loudoun – Resource Presentation** **What You Really Need to Know from an HR Professional** **Presented by Donna Giarratana** **Wednesday\, May 27 \| 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM** **Venture X Loudoun** Join us for a practical and insightful resource presentation designed to help small business owners navigate one of the most critical — and often overlooked — areas of growth: **Human Resources**. *** ## **About the Session** As your business grows, so do the complexities of managing people, processes, and compliance. Many entrepreneurs wait too long to think about HR — and by the time they do, they’re already reacting instead of planning. In this session, **Donna Giarratana** will break down what small business owners *really* need to know about HR — in a way that is clear, actionable, and relevant to your stage of growth. This conversation is designed to help you move from uncertainty to confidence when it comes to building and managing your team. *** ## **What You’ll Learn** * When it’s the right time to hire * How to set your business up for success before bringing on employees * Why HR matters — even for small businesses * Common pitfalls and how to avoid them * The foundational HR knowledge every business owner should have *** ## **Who Should Attend** * Entrepreneurs preparing to hire their first employee * Small business owners currently managing a team * Founders looking to strengthen operations and compliance * Anyone who wants to build a business with a strong, scalable foundation *** ## **Why Attend?** * Gain clarity on one of the most important aspects of business growth * Learn how to avoid costly mistakes before they happen * Ask questions and get real-world insight from an HR professional * Walk away with practical knowledge you can apply immediately *** ## **About 1 Million Cups** 1 Million Cups is a national program that brings entrepreneurs and communities together to learn, connect, and grow through presentations and discussion. Loudoun’s chapter meets on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays each month. Join us on **May 27** for coffee, connection, and a conversation that will help you build your business the right way from the inside out. We look forward to seeing you there.

Come and join Northern Virginia porcelain artists. We will provide all the paints and materials needed. Just bring your smile and creativity. We paint from 10:00 am - 2:00pm every Tuesday & Wednesday. Please RSVP in advance if you like to join oir group. Text: 703-906-9150 We are located few minutes from Tyson’s corner in McLean.

Attendance is $35 (cash, credit/debit card, or ApplePay - paid at the door), which includes water/soda/coffee, bread, choice of a plated lunch entrée, and a dessert assortment. Parking is also validated in the Reston Station garages (3 hours of validation). Join one of Northern Virginia's most successful business networking groups (part of BNI). Open to the public and is typically attended by business owners, business developers, and entrepreneurs. Meetings are typically attended by 30-40 members and guests. \*\*\*PLEASE RSVP here: [REGISTER HERE](https://square.link/u/0WvC6Eir) \*\*\*If you do not register on the BNI website, there may not be a seat available for you.

Cool down with an icy drink at Electric Cool-Aid with the DC Portuguese Conversation Group. IF YOU ARE STILL LEARNING THAT IS FINE, ALL LEVELS WELCOME. Come practice Portuguese over a slushy cocktail (or a can of beer or glass of water if you prefer). Build new connections and broaden your cultural/lusophone horizons with us! Whether you are a native Portuguese speaker, an English-speaking expat looking to practice Portuguese, or simply interested in making international friends, this event is perfect for you. Come ready to engage in stimulating conversations, make new connections. Ate ja, tchau!

**ProductTank NoVA is back!** After a brief hiatus, we are relaunching the chapter with a format that cuts out the fluff and gets straight to the reality of building. Every product feed is flooded with AI hype right now, but what does it actually look like on the ground? Instead of a polished keynote, we are hosting **0 to 1 with AI: Real Product Talks**—a "Show & Tell" featuring 3–4 lightning talks focused on the intersection of AI and product. The framing for the talks is simple: *"Here is what I'm building, and here is what I'm stuck on."* We want to look at the messy, 0-to-1 reality of integrating AI into your workflows and products. *(Want to share what you are working on? Reach out! The bar is low-pressure, just 10–12 minutes to talk about a real AI problem you are trying to solve.)* **Agenda:** * **5:30 PM - 6:00 PM:** Doors open, networking, & name tags * **6:00 PM - 6:10 PM:** Welcome + Chapter Relaunch Intro * **6:10 PM - 7:30 PM:** Lightning Talks (Three 12-min talks + 5 mins Q&A each, with a 5-min stretch break) * **7:30 PM - 8:00 PM:** Open networking * **8:00 PM:** Soft close **Location & Logistics:** Herndon Fortnightly Library (Extended Hours Meeting Room) 768 Center St, Herndon, VA 20170 * **Parking:** We'll meet at the library, located just behind the Herndon Municipal Center. There is plenty of free public parking available around the municipal center. * **Metro & Bus:** Take the Silver Line to Herndon Metro Station, then connect via Fairfax Connector Route 921 or 950 to Historic Downtown Herndon. * **Driving (via VA-267/Dulles Toll Rd):** Take Exit 10 North (Centreville Rd, which becomes Elden St). Turn left onto Station St or Lynn St. * **Driving (via VA-286/Fairfax Co Pkwy):** Take the Elden St West exit. Turn right onto Lynn St. Looking forward to seeing everyone again and getting back to building!

## **1 Million Cups Loudoun – Business Presentation** **Featuring Aida Davalos, Founder of Argon Accounting** **Wednesday\, May 13 \| 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM** **Venture X Loudoun** Join us as we welcome **Aida Davalos**, founder of **Argon Accounting**, to the 1 Million Cups Loudoun stage for a thoughtful conversation around financial clarity, intentional growth, and building a relationship-driven business. *** ## **About the Presenter** Aida is a **first-generation college graduate with a master’s degree** and an entrepreneur at heart, inspired by her family’s business roots in Ecuador. With a strong background in **corporate accounting, financial operations, tax strategy, and advisory**, her career has been focused on helping businesses make smarter financial decisions and build sustainable foundations for growth. Over the past seven years, Aida has been growing her own **boutique accounting and tax practice organically**, built on trust, relationships, and practical, real-world financial guidance. She is also actively involved with **George Mason University**, mentoring students and supporting the next generation of professionals. *** ## **About the Business** Argon Accounting provides **accounting, bookkeeping, financial advisory, and tax services** designed to help small business owners and individuals feel confident and informed about their finances. Aida’s approach focuses on making financial information **clear, approachable, and actionable**, so clients can understand what their numbers are telling them — and use that insight to make better decisions for long-term growth. *** ## **Who Aida Is Looking to Hear From** Aida would especially value feedback from: * Small business owners and founders * Service-based business operators * Marketing and brand strategy professionals * Entrepreneurs who have grown beyond referral-based business * Individuals passionate about supporting BIPOC entrepreneurs and professionals *** ## **Current Business Focus & Challenge** Aida is in the **early stages of intentional growth**, focused on building a sustainable and well-positioned business. Her biggest challenge is **gaining visibility and attracting a consistent client base**, and she is seeking feedback around: * Clearly communicating her value to small business owners * Marketing her services effectively without relying on paid advertising * Building trust and credibility as a growing business * Expanding beyond word-of-mouth while maintaining strong relationships *** ## **Why Attend?** * Gain insight into building a service-based business with intention * Provide valuable feedback on marketing, positioning, and growth strategy * Connect with entrepreneurs focused on sustainable, relationship-driven growth * Be part of a meaningful, solutions-focused conversation *** ## **About 1 Million Cups** 1 Million Cups is a national program that brings entrepreneurs and communities together to learn, connect, and grow through presentations and discussion. Loudoun’s chapter meets on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays each month. Join us on **May 13** for coffee, connection, and a conversation about building financial clarity and growing a business with purpose. We look forward to seeing you there.