Coming out of the Stanford GSB, one of my favorite customs is small group dinners (SGDs).

These SGDs were a direct response to counter the many large and impersonal events where hundreds of students mingled and chit-chatted much ado about nothing while vigorously drowning their boredom with cheap beer to pass the time.

Although to be far, these larger events were fun in the moment - you laughed over inside jokes, bonded over sinking plastic balls in cups, and generally created loose ties abound - all wonderful things.

But once you left the event, you come to the realization that you didn't really forge any real relationships or got to know anyone on a personal level.

But SGDs? These were the opposite.

On a semi-regular basis, a random cross-section of individuals across campus were grouped together into small pods where they spent the evening huddled over a homecooked meal.

Conversations at SGDs were so engaging and in-depth that we sometimes stayed until two in the morning chatting.

These were the nights where great ideas emerged from nothing.

These were the nights where you simultaneously debated vigorously on a topic that you thought you knew all the dimensions from a-z only to then hear for the first time a logical counter that completely negated your long-held position, while also being the type of night where you laughed so hard your cheeks hurt.

These were the nights where real relationships were forged.

In crypto, it almost feels like every other week there's some major conference of some sort in some exotic location where anonymous people gather IRL.

It's exciting, but it's also impersonal.

Upon reflection, it seems like more than any other industry, crypto needs SGDs.

As someone who spends most of her days assessing founder-market fit, it was not a stretch of the imagination to extrapolate that someone like me, who meets with quirky and interesting builders in crypto, and who also conveniently loves to cook, would be a halfway decent aggregation spoke for something like this.

So this is an experiment.

If you live in SoCal (or are visiting LA) and are building in crypto and want to join in on a SGD, fill out this form: bit.ly/cryptoSGDs 😁

I’ll try and curate monthly SGDs of 6-8 people based on interesting backgrounds and…we’ll go from there 🤷🏻‍♀️

We’ll break bread and discuss anything and everything that is on your mind in an intimate dinner with folks ready to listen, learn, teach, and engage.

I have no idea where this will go, but my hope that this is an unconference of sorts - where you get to forge relationships with other hackers and builders in crypto based on their life stories and lived experiences (yay 👍) as opposed to how their technical integrations can help your project unlock more alpha (nay 👎)

If you have any suggestions or feedback, I’m all ears!

My DMs are always open @joandthezhus on twitter, and I hope that I’ll get to meet you IRL in one of these #cSGDs!

Bon appetit! 🥘 
Jo