The Women’s Business Development Council is scheduled to hold its annual business breakfast Nov. 13 at the Stamford Plaza Hotel and Conference Center.
National journalist Paula Zahn will lead a panel discussion  featuring Carla Harris, managing director of Morgan Stanley and the president-appointed chairwoman of the National Women”™s Business Council; Amy Millman, founder and CEO of Washington, D.C.-based Springboard Enterprises; and Rose Wang, founder and CEO of The Binary Group, a Virginia-based tech company. The guest speaker is Torise Baker, CEO of 101 Things 2 Do LLC, a tax preparation business in Bridgeport.
More than 500 people are expected to attend the breakfast, including CEOs, legislators, entrepreneurs and community leaders, who will engage in a dialogue about how women-owned businesses can make a positive and lasting impact on the economy.
“Women will create over half of the 9.72 million new small-business jobs expected to be established by 2018,” said Fran Pastore, president and CEO of WBDC, in a statement.
Baker, an entrepreneur who used the WBDC’s resources and small-business training program, plans to talk about her journey into establishing her own business. She had attended a class on access to capital and worked with WBDC counselor Janet Siegenthaler to apply for funding, including a Small Business Administration-backed loan and a Small Business Express grant through the state Department of Economic and Community Development. With the funding, she purchased and renovated a 4,000-square-foot building in Bridgeport, which is now the office for her previously home-based business.
The development council reported that Baker has tripled her revenue  since she came to the WBDC two years ago. She plans to add two full-time positions and diversify and expand her services, according to a WBDC press release.
