Boulder Startup Week 2025

One thing is certain—everything is moving faster than ever before and will never move this slowly again. The demand placed on leaders continues to outpace our capacity to keep up, feel confident, and uphold all our obligations at work and home. We are often more overwhelmed, distracted, and anxious than we want anyone to know, creating an epidemic sense of aloneness.
In this interactive session, Beck Sydow will share practical, accessible, and portable mindful skills they have been practicing and developing for over three decades. These practices provide leaders with a reference point to get grounded quickly and build awareness to know what the f**k is going on inside and around them, and skillfully operate from active choices that create the resiliency and agency we need to do great things without sacrificing our well-being and mental health.
#GiveFirst: Three participants will be selected from a drawing to schedule a private coaching session with Beck.

Brands of all kinds struggle to build trust and demonstrate authority to their customers, but in today’s crowded digital era, this is more important than ever. Effective communication about your products, services, or organization is what sets you apart from your competitors.

The human brain is drawn to CLARITY and away from confusion. Most organizations are confusing their customers, and they don’t even know it, causing them to lose sales, and donations, or be passed up by their competition. In this session, Ian will teach you how to tell your story using the StoryBrand framework, giving you the tools to clarify your message and get your customers, donors, event attendees, or audience to respond.
You will walk away with a plan to effectively communicate about your organization and be able to start applying what you have learned that day.

Colorado is a leading hub for health innovation. In 2024 alone, life sciences companies in the state raised $2.15B. And according to new research from CBRE, Denver-Boulder now ranks among the top 20 life sciences R&D clusters worldwide, with Boulder at the epicenter.

With more than 30% of the state’s biotech, medtech, and digital health assets concentrated in Boulder and along the U.S. 36 Corridor, the region includes powerhouse companies and promising startups.

Colorado BioScience Association (CBSA) leads the health and growth of life sciences in Colorado. CBSA President & CEO Elyse Blazevich, who is also a medtech founder, brings some of Boulder’s leading life sciences founders together for a panel discussion offering stories from the frontline on what it takes to build, scale, and succeed in Boulder.

Location for Innovation: What makes Boulder and Colorado the right place for health innovation.
Raising Capital: How founders secured their first rounds, and what uncertainty with federal and state funding sources means for early-stage companies.
Founder Stories: Honest stories about challenges, wins, and what it takes to move science from the lab to the patient.

Whether you’re thinking about spinning out your research for CU Boulder, preparing your first round, or curious about growing a life sciences business in Colorado, this session offers valuable takeaways and new connections.

Succession planning isn’t just about who will take over for you in the future—it’s about setting yourself and others up for success now. This workshop will help you uncover the more than 30 hidden roles in your business using role charts and role descriptions (not org charts and job descriptions!) to delegate effectively, set expectations, and foster accountability. Small and founder-led businesses will especially benefit from being able to visualize how many roles they are personally filling and how it's creating bottlenecks and preventing their ability to scale. Attendees will use their created role charts to identify opportunities to outsource, prioritize their hiring needs, and start positioning their business up for long-term success.

Attendees will walk away with:
- A role chart template to bring clarity and alignment to the roles within their organization.
- Techniques for assigning and delegating work through role descriptions.
- Strategies for setting expectations and holding people accountable