Laura Heintz, CEO of Stanford Youth Solutions, says majors changes are coming to California’s foster care system. For more from Heintz, check out “Seeking Stability” in our April issue. Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll email you when it’s available online.

Fred Palmer, who handles sponsorships for Sacramento Pride, recalls the festival’s 33-year journey from a gathering in McKinley Park to a larger event in Southside Park in Sacramento, finally making “a big, big leap” in 2010 to Capitol Mall, where about 13,000 people are expected to gather this year.

Having a robust agricultural industry has meant accommodating crops and livestock by forcing out wildlife. Before farming came to the region 150 years ago, waterbird habitat was primarily provided by wetlands. Now managed wetlands make up only about one-third of their habitat in California and rice fields comprise nearly 60 percent.

Kandace Mulvaney, a broker with boutique agency Miller Real Estate in Sacramento, offers her insight into a big trend happening in local real estate. For more from Mulvaney, check out “Homemakers” in our May issue. Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll email you when it’s available online.

Tim Johnson, president & CEO of the California Rice Commission, gives his insight into the state’s rice industry, which is the second largest producer in the U.S. behind Arkansas. For more from the commission, check out “Better Bang for Your Duck” in our April issue. Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll email you when it’s available online.

Women’s desire to please can inhibit their ability to take charge. That is one of the many factors that contribute to women comprising more than half of the American workforce, yet only a small fraction of executives.

Stanford Youth Solutions, a Sacramento-based nonprofit organization, helps to support foster parents, foster youth and the families behind them through their foster care program.

Culture needs to be a constant priority. You can’t expect a bunch of perks to define your company. Instead, spend some time defining your values — afterall, you already know them. Then make sure everyone on your team has buy-in.

Sometimes it’s better the second time around. At least, that’s what Sacramento artist and gallery owner Theresa Gutierrez, aka Lady Tee, believes. Recently retired as chief of the Centralized Operations Unit in the Center for Health Care Quality of the California Department of Public Health, Gutierrez has become a fixture in the local arts scene with her mural work and recent opening of the ARTners Collaborative in the heart of downtown.

To be disruptive now means to change things, to get people to look at something in a new light. (I’d like to go back and convince my 6-year-old self that it’s actually a good trait that got me sent to the time-out chair.)

Like all jargon, “disruption” started out well-intentioned: Who doesn’t want to be the one with the fresh vision of how things could be — not how they are?