Adelene Perkins won a Stevie Award for Best Executive in the management awards categories of the 2009 edition of the Stevie Awards for Women in Business, and was a member of this year's final judging committee.

What item of news recently caught your eye and why?
The news that has been catching my eye every single day for the past couple of years is the whole healthcare-reform debate in the United States.  What stuns me is that the dialog is so narrowly focused on the issue of coverage.  While that is important, the more complex issue is fixing the system.  We need to focus on ensuring the healthcare system provides high-quality care at a reasonable cost and on how to increase the value of healthcare.  Fixing the system is a much tougher issue.  If we are so stuck on the easier issue, will it ever be possible to handle the tougher one?

What book are you currently reading?
I’ve just started reading Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay.  It‘s historical fiction about the treatment of Jews in France during World War II and what an American journalist living in Paris finds out about it 60 years later.  It was recommended to me by a friend, but you’ll have to come back to me when I’ve finished it for my own review.

What was the last movie you saw, and would you recommend it?
The most recent move I saw, which I didn’t love, was The Expendables, featuring virtually all the action heroes of the last decade.  A movie that I did love, however, was Invictus — although I didn’t particularly enjoy the rugby parts because my son plays rugby and they were almost too painful for me to watch!

What is your favorite sport or hobby?
While I love all sports, skiing is my favorite.  In professional life I have to be measured about taking risks and I try hard to keep things under control, but when I’m skiing I take risks and love being on the edge, totally absorbed in the moment and a little out of control, at times.

Who is your favorite historical figure?
Someone who really resonated for me right after I came out of business school was Ronald Reagan. I can hear his voice now saying: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”  He was an extraordinary man, who led his nation and the world to a different place.

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Video clips of this year's Stevie Awards for Women in Business presentations are now up on the Stevie's YouTube channel.  The presentations took place on November 12 at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York.  Women at this event always give the best acceptance speeches, but I think these were the best five this year:

1. Amanda Welliver of Paradigm Esteem, winner of the Stevie for Best Canadian Entrepreneur, brings the crowd to its feet - a rare occurrence - with the story of her obstacles overcome

2. Ruth Elliott of R&J Elliott Incorporated, winner of a Best Entrepreneur Stevie,  tells in all of about 30 seconds of going from poverty to riches in just a few years

3. Ann Kaplan of Toronto's Medicard Finance, a Finalist in several categories including Best Entrepreneur, offers a backhanded...er, compliment...to her mother-in-law

4. Rebecca Fishman Lipsey of Teach for America, a Best Executive Stevie winner, offers the evening's most thoughtful speech

5. Anne Walker of International Dance Supplies in the UK, winner of this year's Stevie for Best Entrepreneur in EMEA, gave a lovely tribute to the power of ambition

Which are your favorite speeches?  View them all on YouTube.

Shining a spotlight on women executives, business owners, and organizations run by women, the Stevie Awards for Women in Business announced the results of its 2010 competition on November 12.

The Stevie Awards for Women in Business is an international competition recognizing the accomplishments of outstanding women executives, entrepreneurs, and the organizations they run.   With more than 300 businesswomen and their guests in attendance, the awards were announced at a dinner at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York City.  A portion of each ticket sold for the event will be contributed to Oceana (www.oceana.org), the largest international organization focused solely on ocean conservation.

More than 1,200 nominations were submitted this year for consideration in 54 categories, including Best Entrepreneur, Best Executive, Most Innovative Company and Best Overall Company.

Notable Stevie Award winners from this year’s competition include:

-          Best Executive: Erin Clift, Senior Vice President of Global Sales Development of AOL

-          Best Asian Entrepreneur: Dr. KH Wang, Group Executive Director of Smart Reader Worldwide Sdn Bhd, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

-          Best Entrepreneur in EMEA: Anne Walker, founder of International Dance Supplies Ltd

-          Women Helping Women Award: Carolyn Kepcher, President of Carolyn & Co. Media

-          Lifetime Achievement Award: Julia Homer, Founding Editor of CFO Magazine

-          Mentor of the Year: Lorin Beller Blake, founder of Big Fish Nation

-          Blog of the Year: Career Woman, Inc.

-          Website of the Year: GradeGuru.com by McGraw-Hill Education

-          Fastest Growing Company of the Year: MamaBargains.com

-          Best Overall Company of the Year: House Party

-          Best New Company of the Year: Apps of All Nations

The 2010 honorees reflect a diverse group of large and small organizations from around the world.  Organizations that won more than one Stevie Award are: Accenture, Apps of All Nations LLC, Big Fish Nation, The BioEngineering Group, BrickFish, DRT Strategies and FuzziBunz. Nations represented in the winners’ circle include Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the U.S.A.  For a complete list of honorees and more information, visit www.stevieawards.com/women.

We're expecting more than 300 women entrepreneurs and executives, and their guests, to attend tomorrow night's Stevie Awards for Women in Business in New York.  They're coming from all of the U.S.A. plus Australia, Austria, Canada, Germany, Israel Japan, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Turkey.

A PDF of the awards dinner program is now available on the awards web site.  Look for photos to be available starting Saturday, and video clips of the presentations sometime next week.

Here's the list of organizations that will be represented, as of this past Monday:

Accenture   Chicago IL

Accessibility Partners  Silver Spring, MD               

Advocacy & Consulting for Education  Wayne  PA     

Alacare Home Health & Hospice  Birmingham AL

Anisa International, Inc.  Atlanta GA    

Apps of All Nations LLC  Lynchburg VA       

Artitudes Design Inc.  Issaquah  WA       

Assurant Employee Benefits, Kansas City, MO      

Axis Teknologies  Marietta GA

Backup My Info  New York, NY          

Bhava Communications   Berkeley CA

Big Fish Nation   Solana Beach CA

Bistra Ilkova  Sofia  Bulgaria           

Bloomberg TV  New York NY             

Bowling Green State University   Bowling Green OH

Brickfish  San Diego  CA        

Campus Apartments   Philadelphia PA

Cbeyond  Atlanta  GA           

CFO Publishing  New York NY

CIGNA  Hartford  CT           

Citrix Online San Barbara CA               

Competence Call Center  Vienna, Austria            

Cvent  McLean, VA            

Decipher  Inc. Fresno  CA             

Designs by Lolita  Providence  RI              

Elite Editing  New York, NY                 

EmpowHER/HW  LLC Scottsale AZ         

emTRAiN  Sacramento, CA         

Everything Everywhere  London United Kingdom  

EXIT Realty Corp. International Mississauga ON Canada

EyeMail Inc.   Marietta GA

Farbman Group  Southfield  MI        

Felice Keller Productions  Los Angeles  CA       

GradeGuru by McGraw-Hill Education  New York NY           

GroundFloor Media  Denver CO       

Health Revenue Assurance Associates  Inc.(HRAA) Plantation  FL                               

Henkel AG & Co. KGaA   Dusseldorf Germany   

HJMT COMMUNICATIONS  LLC  Westbury  NY    

Holland America Line  Seattle  WA           

IntelePeer  San Mateo  CA

InterContinental Hotels Group Atlanta GA       

International Dance Supplies Ltd  Newton Abbot  Devon  England                              

International Financial Data Services Canada  Toronto  ON  Canada                                 

ITM Group  Inc. Ft. Lauderdale FL           

Kahosha, Inc.  Tokyo Japan

KeyBank Cleveland OH            

Kryon Systems  Tel Aviv  Israel            

Leading Women  Charlestown  RI        

Love to Swim and Tumble School San Antonio TX     

Loyalty Factor, LLC  Portsmouth NH

Luminex Corporation  Riverside, CA        

Marketing 24/7  Inc.  Trussville  AL    

Martopia  Saint Charles IL

Medicard Finance Inc.   Toronto Canada

Melilea International Group of Companies  Kuala Lumpur  Malaysia                           

Mom Central Consulting  Newton  MA         

MorrisAnderson  Chicago  IL      

MotherNet KK  Osaka Japan          

MWW Group  East Rutherford  NJ           

Northbound LLC  Sunnyvale  CA          

Nu Skin Enterprises  Provo, UT         

ODEL Limited  Rajagiriya  Sri Lanka           

Parties That Cook  San Francisco CA

Pediatric Therapeutic Services, Inc.   Conshohocken PA

Penmac Staffing Services  Inc.  Springfield  MO       

PetRays Veterinary Telemedicine Consultants  The Woodlands  TX                                  

PK Walsh  Needham MA

Plus Relocation Services  Minneapolis MN

Purry Communications Group Los Angeles CA   

R&J Elliott Incorporated  Normal  IL        

Renu Mobile  Boston  MA           

RockYou  Redwood City CA

Sanofi-Aventis  Istanbul  Turkey       

Savoir Media Co.  Belmont MA

SelectMinds New York NY             

SheTakesOnTheWorld.net  Kitchener  ON  Canada    

Smart Reader Worldwide Sdn Bhd   Kuala Lumpur  Malaysia                               

Softtek  Monterrey Mexico

South Miami Center for Women & Infants  Miami  FL   

SPARK Publications Mathews NC   

SpellSpace, Inc.  Lake Arrowhead CA

Spoilt Rotten Hair & Beauty Studio  Smeaton Grange Australia                           

Staff Management  Chicago  IL              

Teach For America  Miami FL

TechnoDyne LLC  Wayne NJ

Tenrehte Technologies, Inc.  Rochester NY The Ad Club  Boston MA

The Henker Group   Easton MD

TIBCO Software Inc.  Palo Alto  CA            

Trevena  Inc.  King of Prussia  PA       

Vantage Communications  San Francisco  CA       

VerticalResponse  San Francisco, CA         

What's On? Event Planning  Harrington Park Australia  

WildlyWealthy.com Mooloolaba QLD Australia         

Womenetics  LLC  Atlanta  GA        

Women's Intercultural Exchange  Charlotte NC   

Today we announced the Finalists in the 2010 (7th annual) Stevie Awards for Women in Business.  Personally this is my favorite Stevie Awards competition, because the stories of success that women entrepreneurs and executives tell are often so dramatic, and women give much better acceptance speeches than men do.  Find the full list on the Stevies for Women web site.

We had a record number of entries to the Stevies for Women this year - more than 1,200.  13% better than last year.  The majority of entries to this competition are still from organizations in the U.S.A. - I'd like to see this competition become more broadly international, and we're working on that - but we received entries from Australia, Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Israel, Malaysia, Mexico, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and the United Kingdom as well.

This year's awards dinner is back at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York City, and tickets are now on sale.  Last year the event had more than 330 women and their guests from the U.S. and several other countries, and I expect this year's attendance to be just as strong.  Sara Eisen of Bloomberg TV will emcee.

Among the leading contenders with multiple Finalists are BGT Partners, Miami, FL; The Buildmore Group Pty Ltd, Caloundra, QLD Australia; Elite Editing, New York, NY; Euro RSCG Worldwide PR, New York, NY; JCPR, Parsippany, NJ; Kryon Systems, Tel Aviv, Israel; MWW Group, East Rutherford, NJ; ODEL Limited, Rajagiriya, Sri Lanka; Reserveage Organics, Gainesville, FL; and VerticalResponse, San Francisco, CA.