For those of you who have ever put on an event for the first time, you know it never quite goes as you envision it would from the start. You most definitely will come across things that would have made it better, and others that you should probably ditch the second time around. Essentially, you learn through doing.

It has been no different for our ongoing and upcoming event: Tahoe’s Most Remarkable Women.

When we launched the effort, our goal was to honor the women throughout the basin that have done (and are doing) remarkable things. We asked you, the community, to nominate in six categories.

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From there, we took what you said about the nominee, reviewed and compared that to what was said about the other nominees. This was probably the most important step because it ultimately brought us to our finalists.

Needless to say, it was HARD trying to come up with the list of 10 (five in lower nominated categories) because there were so many worthy women.

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When the finalist voting period opened, we were again overwhelmed with response and we couldn’t have been more happy with the way the communities around the lake supported these women.

So what did we learn? Quite a bit, actually.

We learned we needed more communication across the board to help people understand the expectations and criteria for how the process will move forward. We learned we probably needed more time to be able to aggregate all of what was said about each finalist so that we can share that with everyone.

I point these things out because we know where we can be better moving forward based on experience and feedback. This will only help us get better and make this the truly special event that it is — which brings me to the event.

At the end of the day, it’s all about celebrating and acknowledging the women in the communities surrounding the lake. That’s what it’s always been about, and after exhaling, that’s what we need to remind ourselves of.

There is so much good being done out there, that even a celebration doesn’t seem like enough. But it’s a start.

We have the results of your voting and the top three women in each category are noted in Friday’s print edition of the Tribune. We will be reaching out to the people that nominated them in an effort to gain additional information when we announce the winners live at the event on Thursday, Oct. 24, at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino.

We hope, whether you are a top three finisher or not, that you will come and support your fellow women. It’s not every day that we can take this opportunity to acknowledge women in this way. Plus, we plan to have a little fun — because it is a celebration after all.

Tickets to Tahoe’s Most Remarkable women can be purchased online at: tinyurl.com/Remarkable-Women-Tahoe. Tickets include dinner, music and live entertainment. Happy hour starts at 5 p.m., event at 6:15 p.m.

Publisher Rob Galloway can be reached at rgalloway@tahoedailytribune.com or 530-542-8046.