A special thank you to 6 women who actually make me look forward to growing older

Last week, I was fortunate enough to take part in a local conference called International Startup Festival.

It was a way to get entrepreneurs and investors together and part of this included 12 founders pitching their startups in front of an audience of about 500 hundred people (1000 registrants, 2 stages running simultaneously).

The organizers decided to recruit a panel of 6 grandmothers to act as judges for the 12 pitches.The basic idea, I think, was that your business idea should be so clear, so useful, that someone like your grandmother (who’s in the largest growing demographic on the web, by the way) should get it.

I realize that might come across as sexist or ageist but I don’t give a shit. You know exactly what I’m saying when I say, “Your business idea should be so clear, so refined, so useful that your grandmother gets it.”

Because no doubt, a grandmother has lived a full life filled with experiences that make her savvy, intelligent, critical and able to cut through the crap. She’s not likely to fall for a great pitch based on a lousy, or impossible to execute, idea. She’s not likely to fall for a fast talker because she’s been around long enough to see her fair share.

When I read about the call for applicants, I thought of my mom immediately. I asked her if she’d be interested and she loved the idea. I nominated her, and she was chosen as one of the 6. (Full disclosure: I was on the selection committee for the grandmothers. It had no bearing on my mom being chosen.)

As a result of this, one of the organizers, who is a close friend, asked if I’d help the “Granny’s Den” coordinator on the day. I jumped at the chance. For one thing, he has always been so generous with me that there’s little I wouldn’t do for him. He has been unofficially (perhaps even unknowingly) mentoring me for the past 2 years.

And second, it would be a chance to work with his sister, one of the other organizers. I attended a tech event she ran last summer and it was the best weekend I had in a long time. To be able to watch her in action and learn a few tricks? It was practically selfish of me.

The job itself turned out to be relatively simple. Especially when one of the women (okay, my mother) said irritably, “You don’t have to hover.”

There was no event to coordinate, per se – the 6 women were to sit with the general audience and listen to the 12 pitches, then meet later in the day to confer and choose a winner. One of the women would then get up on stage for a minute that evening to announce their choice.

I liked the coordinator instantly. She had a startup that she sold for a lot of money. She was very generous, not only with her time and her expertise in the area, but she had also bought an extra ticket so that a starving startup founder could attend the festival for free.

I sat for the briefing as the grandmothers were told of their duties. I listened as they discussed their criteria and how they were going to split themselves up – there would 2 groups of 3 women at each stage.

They listened to the pitches and then asked some of the hardest hitting questions these founders had ever heard. These were 6 incredible women with lifetimes of business experience amongst them – they knew what to look for.

An acquaintance of mine was giving one of the pitches later in the day. I offered to introduce him to my mom. He shook his head, “No, thank you. I heard her questions this morning. I’m not giving her 3 hours to prepare mine.”

These women went at the task with so much enthusiasm and energy. They used the time between pitch sessions to grill every startup with a booth. Then they spent time working the line where people were waiting for their shot at the elevator pitch, where founders got to spend 30 seconds in an elevator with VCs and angels.

I turned around for a second and when I looked back, my mother was on camera with a documentary crew. A two-time Sundance Award winner was kicking off principal photography at the festival on her new film and she spent at least 30 minutes with the grannies.

When they were done, the entrepreneur in the scene who was being grilled by the grannies – a pretty big guy with a mohawk – said, “Man, your mom’s tough. She’s my harshest critic!”

As word (and fear?) spread about these women, some entrepreneurs started seeking them out, I guess hoping for the same kind of feedback they’d seen the others get. It was amazing.

After much deliberation, when they finally made a decision on their winner, it was based on usefulness of the product or service, potential revenue, target demographic and pure gut instinct.

I loved listening to them deliberate, being privy to their reasoning and their wisdom. I’m lucky to have had the chance to spend the day with them. I’m grateful for the chance to have seen my mom in that situation, to see parts of her I’d never seen before.

It gave me a new perspective.

I always think I understand so much about the world, about the issues and the things that matter. About what works and what doesn’t work. About people. I don’t have the benefit of having lived a long enough life to have seen the wheel go full circle – I’m still on my first go round.

But those grandmothers? They’ve been around – they do get it. And I aspire to be like them one day.

And the best part of all this?

I met these 6 new female role models at a tech conference.