Venture Exec Lisa Coca: Outperforming the Competition Is the Price of Admission for Women of Color

Featuring a broad cross-section of women who have distinguished themselves across a rich variety of careers, our Portraits of Power series is a celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Black Enterprise, and of black women. It’s a place for today’s businesswomen to share their own favorite images and their own stories, in their own words. Today’s portrait is startup adviser and investor Lisa Coca.

Lisa Coca

Managing Director/Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Intel Emerging Growth & Incubation

My first job was as a financial analyst on Wall Street. I constructed the firm’s first automated model for the valuation and acquisition of more than $700 million of distressed loans.

My big break came when Beth Comstock, then Global CMO for GE, tapped me to partner with her in development of the business plan for the launch of GE Ventures. She was incredibly forward-thinking and trusted my ability to translate prior experience and skill sets in a new domain.

I’ve had to work hardest at always being better than the best. For women of color, outperforming the competition in financial services, which is dominated by Caucasian males, is not a luxury. It is table stakes.

I never imagined I would have a daughter who is so incredibly dominated by her right brain! I could not be more proud—she is amazingly artistic but it does take her 20 minutes to put on her socks in the morning. It makes me crazy!

I wish I’d learned sooner about the world of technological innovation. It is driving transformative shifts in our economy, our everyday lives, and offers women an incredible path to empowerment.

My biggest regret is not taking more risks early in my career—exploring opportunities that would have placed me in greater control of my own destiny.

If I could design my fantasy self-care day, I would go back in time to the days when I had fewer responsibilities. When I could wake up, go for a 10-mile run in Central Park, relax, meet my girlfriends for a leisurely lunch, go home and read a book and then re-group with the girls for a night out on the town!

Being a working mother keeps me up at night. I love the adrenalin rush from working and achieving success in a very competitive profession. I also appreciate the element of providing our daughters with role models … “if she can see it, she can be it”. Notwithstanding, it requires compromises. I wish I could be there for her and with her every minute, of every hour, every day.

When I’m struggling, I say to myself, you got this!

I am unapologetically tenacious in my drive for results.

---

Portraits of Power is a yearlong series of candid insights from exceptional women leaders. It is brought to you by ADP.

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U.S. Government Signs $450 Million COVID-19 Vaccine Contract With Johnson & Johnson

The Trump administration has made another move in the race to combat and stop the viral outbreak of COVID-19, also known as the coronavirus, around the globe. The Health and Human Services Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR) recently signed a deal for a $456 million order with Johnson & Johnson’s Pharmaceuticals arm Janssen. The order has been specified as a “new vaccine asset for 2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19).” It is the largest amount spent on a vaccine project to date by the administration.

A spokesperson for Johnson & Johnson didn’t provide any more details on the specific order. The deal was in an announcement from ASPR’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) in February.

This moves the partnership forward between the U.S. government and Johnson & Johnson to co-invest $1 billion into COVID-19 vaccine research and clinical testing. Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceuticals hasn’t yet started any clinical trials for a vaccine but expects human clinical studies for its vaccine candidate to go ahead, at the latest, by September 2020. The company predicts the first round of vaccines to be available for emergency use in early 2021.

Johnson & Johnson also unveiled a new collaboration with the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in developing potential preventive vaccine candidates for COVID-19 earlier this month. A company spokesperson confirmed Johnson & Johnson still hopes to announce progress on the partnership very soon.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there are only two active cases of vaccines going through trials —an NIAID-backed treatment with two others in China from CanSino Biological and the Beijing Institute of Biotechnology.

Despite the global rush to get a vaccine out as soon as possible, it is highly unlikely anything will be made available to market within the year. Healthcare professionals such as Dr. Richard Hatchett, CEO at CEPI, have stated it’ll take somewhere between a year and 18 months before the world has access to a coronavirus vaccine.

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U.S. coronavirus deaths reach 3,000 mark as crisis escalates

As of early Tuesday, the United States has now lost more than 3,000 people to the quickly-spreading COVID-19 pandemic.

The most recent numbers came via the tracker at the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University. There are also 164,610 confirmed cases in the U.S. during the same timeframe.

READ MORE: ‘Respect’ and ‘Genius: Aretha’ release dates delayed by coronavirus

Globally, there are more than 788,000 cases and nearly 39,000 deaths.

Meanwhile, large cities such as New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago continued to struggle to keep up with the skyrocketing numbers and find adequate health care solutions and equipment to accommodate a spike in new patients. Those three cities are all rolling out or planning to roll out, makeshift hospitals to meet the demand.

New York has converted a portion of Central Park into a temporary hospital and is also planning to use the USNS Comfort, a Navy hospital ship, to treat coronavirus cases. The Comfort, which is docked in New York harbor and expected to start taking patients as early as Tuesday, adds 1,000 more hospital beds and 12 operating rooms.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is also asking for nurses and doctors in less hard-hit states to come to New York to help with the devastating outbreak, according to USA Today.

“In this battle, the troops are our healthcare professionals,” Cuomo told the newspaper. “We need relief. We need relief for nurses working 12-hour shifts. We need relief for doctors. Help us now and we will return the favor.”

“The number of beds we had in the beginning of March has to triple by May,” Mayor Bill de Blasio added. “It’s a daunting task, but we got a big, big boost.”

In Illinois, Chicago’s McCormick Place Convention Center, which is the biggest conference center in North America, will be transformed into a care facility to treat up to 3,000 coronavirus patients.

READ MORE: Coronavirus outbreak shakes up Black skiers summit

California Gov. Gavin Newsom told reporters that the state would need to ramp up more than 50,000 additional hospital beds to accommodate the outbreak, and warned that the peak in California is still a few weeks away.

As large cities grapple with the need for more hospital beds, masks and equipment, state and local leaders across the country have increasingly issued stay at home orders and curfews. On Monday, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam issued a stay at home order that takes effect immediately and runs until June 10.

The post U.S. coronavirus deaths reach 3,000 mark as crisis escalates appeared first on TheGrio.

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Venture Exec Lisa Coca: Outperforming the Competition Is the Price of Admission for Women of Color

Featuring a broad cross-section of women who have distinguished themselves across a rich variety of careers, our Portraits of Power series is a celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Black Enterprise, and of black women. It’s a place for today’s businesswomen to share their own favorite images and their own stories, in their own words. Today’s portrait is startup adviser and investor Lisa Coca.

Lisa Coca

Managing Director/Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Intel Emerging Growth & Incubation

My first job was as a financial analyst on Wall Street. I constructed the firm’s first automated model for the valuation and acquisition of more than $700 million of distressed loans.

My big break came when Beth Comstock, then Global CMO for GE, tapped me to partner with her in development of the business plan for the launch of GE Ventures. She was incredibly forward-thinking and trusted my ability to translate prior experience and skill sets in a new domain.

I’ve had to work hardest at always being better than the best. For women of color, outperforming the competition in financial services, which is dominated by Caucasian males, is not a luxury. It is table stakes.

I never imagined I would have a daughter who is so incredibly dominated by her right brain! I could not be more proud—she is amazingly artistic but it does take her 20 minutes to put on her socks in the morning. It makes me crazy!

I wish I’d learned sooner about the world of technological innovation. It is driving transformative shifts in our economy, our everyday lives, and offers women an incredible path to empowerment.

My biggest regret is not taking more risks early in my career—exploring opportunities that would have placed me in greater control of my own destiny.

If I could design my fantasy self-care day, I would go back in time to the days when I had fewer responsibilities. When I could wake up, go for a 10-mile run in Central Park, relax, meet my girlfriends for a leisurely lunch, go home and read a book and then re-group with the girls for a night out on the town!

Being a working mother keeps me up at night. I love the adrenalin rush from working and achieving success in a very competitive profession. I also appreciate the element of providing our daughters with role models … “if she can see it, she can be it”. Notwithstanding, it requires compromises. I wish I could be there for her and with her every minute, of every hour, every day.

When I’m struggling, I say to myself, you got this!

I am unapologetically tenacious in my drive for results.

---

Portraits of Power is a yearlong series of candid insights from exceptional women leaders. It is brought to you by ADP.

from Black Enterprise https://ift.tt/2UN5D76

Black Communities Are on the 'Frontline' of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Here's Why

Every new day of the coronavirus pandemic has brought with it a dizzying amount of change. Teachers explain class projects to their students over Zoom meetings, while friends and family use FaceTime to inquire about their loved ones, alternating between laughter and concern while holding pixelated drinks in their…

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