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The inaugural 10X25 Creativity Conference took place at the Las Cruces Convention Center earlier this month. The conference brought together local entrepreneurs, artists, educators and politicians for a chance to share their stories and inspire more people to follow their passions.
With such a diverse and unique group of people at the 10X25 Creativity Conference, keynote speaker Beto Pallares hopes some of the ideas shared will become a reality.
“The creative conference is really about bringing people together at the intersection, metaphorically of I-10 and I-25. But really it is bringing together business entrepreneurship as well as the arts and in many ways entrepreneurship is more like art than it is science.”
Pallares is no stranger to entrepreneurship. Having started many successful endeavors, he now teaches at New Mexico State University.
“I also worked as a telecom executive throughout Latin America, I worked on Wall Street and did a few other things and went back for school and eventually launched the first regional venture fund in this region of the southwest. And about three years ago I started teaching entrepreneurship at New Mexico State University.”
One example of the mix between art and entrepreneurship can be seen in Jerry Prochazka’s video game development company “Ganymede Games” based in Las Cruces.
“We are an independent game development studio. It kind of started with the industry veterans here in Las Cruces of all places. We did a multistate tour; Arizona Texas, we were even thinking about going back to California but fell in love with Las Cruces and that is how we got here.”
Local musicians also attend the creativity conference. Artist, model, and musician A.Billie Free shared her journey as a businesswoman and where she hopes to be in the future.
“I have been doing music since a little girl. Going into college I went to a libral arts school and it didn't really click for me that music could be a career. So after I finished my studies I was always still involved in music and bands and stuff but after I finished my studies I said hey I can make a lot of money off of this.“
An often-misunderstood aspect of entrepreneurship is networking. Tech and sales professional Otilio Reyes says networking combined with persistence is key to a successful business.
“Usually when people hear the word networking they think of going to events where you just hand out business cards and connect with as many people as possible. I think that is a key component of networking but I think networking goes a bit farther. When you connect with somebody and you are really genuinely interested, you learn from them. And then if you start thinking of those people when you are connecting with other people you are able to connect people to opportunities.”
The 10X25 Creativity Conference allows local professionals a chance to share their wisdom. And the speakers have lots of advice for people just starting out.
Beto Pallares: “In the random walk that is everybody's upbringing and life, looking at that randomness in retrospect you find that every opportunity, every challenge, every setback is really a defining moment for you to make new decisions and find your path. That randomness really creates a tapestry of really beautiful things.”
Jerry Prochazka: “Creativity is often one of those skills that seems in many ways like high risk. But a lot of the world's problems that we are seeing require creativity. A lot of the problems and a lot of the opportunities are things we have never done before and the only way to do something you haven't done before is through creativity.”
A.Billie Free: “You don't have to have a lot of material things, you can use what you have and sort of build off of that and for me that is a lot more rewarding when you are not going out, sort of breaking the bank. Use your own networking skills, use life skills in order to build your career.”
Otilio Reyes: “I think that this is a great conference for Las Cruces. There is a lot of really interesting people here that are very smart. I think if we build, if we incentivize entrepreneurship and keep kind of bringing these types of conferences to the region we can kind of open Las Cruces up to some of the things that are available out there.”
The 10X25 Creativity Conference highlights the important connection between entrepreneurship and creativity. With more events in the future, hopes that this conference will grow into something bigger are on the rise.