Times: 6-9 PM; Second Thursday of the month. (Open for all to apply; events are invitation only)
House of Genius is happy to open doors in Dallas, our second Texas location.

Apply to present or participate now!

Team

Stephen Ellis, City Director
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Stephen Ellis has a career that so far has spanned a wide range of fields from shipping logistics, broadcast production, marketing, and sales, to business development and research. He works to leverage these skills from this wide array of positions in a few entrepreneurial ventures, in each of these, he has approached the project with a mix of research, analytics and technology. Stephen finds that he is most fulfilled tackling a new problem or starting a new venture.

Debra Swersky
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Debra Swersky has spent her career building, scaling, and managing operations in startups. Prior to landing in Dallas, Debra worked with tech, hospitality, and consulting startups in New York and Boston, orchestrating comprehensive employee and customer experiences. She believes in facilitating singular first impressions and structuring systems and applications to increase the personal touch of her clients and partners.

Fiona Schlachter, Moderator
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One of Fiona’s colleagues called her the ‘VP of GSD’ (GSD = getting stuff done). Nothing makes her happier than getting folks together for an objective and making sure it gets met. This includes things like building new products or services, gathering great minds for a business review, or having a dinner party.

Fiona spent almost 20 years building out products and services for Fortune 200 high tech and healthcare companies before launching out on her own in 2009. She was living in Boulder, CO where entrepreneurship is in the water and the close-knit startup community made it possible to dream big. She worked with founder partners to develop a Facebook iOS app. The company failed but she wouldn’t have traded her experience for anything. She learned a lot and is giving back where she can since she knows she probably wouldn’t have tried without the support of the Boulder startup community.

After 15 glorious years in Colorado, Fiona moved to Dallas in 2011. She is happy to be a Texan again (went to Austin High and UT back in the day) and excited to be part of the team launching House of Genius in the Big D. As a presenter in the Boulder HoG, she understands the magic of the sessions and can’t wait to help entrepreneurs in Dallas get the best HoG experience.

Michael Sitarzewski, Moderator
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Michael started his entrepreneurial life at the age of 18 shorty after dropping out of high school (for the second time). From design, to development, and execution, Michael has acquired more than 20 years of experience in entrepreneurship and startups.

In addition, Michael is heavily involved in the Dallas, Texas startup community, building on the lessons learned in Boulder and Denver over the past seven years. He is the EIR at The DEC, a mentor for VentureSpur, and runs #BigDOCC every Tuesday morning. Dallas New Tech, and of course House of Genius, are events that help build community and foster and promote entrepreneurship.

A passion project is Peer to Peer for America – designed to gain, and retain control over our lives, our families, and our community. From those caught in the cycle of poverty to those struggling to make ends meet with 6 figure incomes, Michael believes that life is one big lesson and sharing experiences can help strengthen our community. (photo credit: greeblemonkey.com )

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