Reese Witherspoon's media company Hello Sunshine hosted its second annual Shine Away conference on Saturday, which included plenty of time with the star and her top friends.

After welcoming the 700 guests to the event at Nya Studios in Los Angeles — consisting of two days of panels, activations, and programs designed to empower and connect women — Witherspoon sat down for a conversation with Laura Dern and Octavia Spencer. The trio chatted about their close relationship and how they've supported each other in and out of the industry, with Dern joking, “Basically, I model everything after Reese, from my love life to the jobs I should do.” “

Witherspoon – who has produced a number of projects in recent years including The Morning Show, The last thing he told me, Little beautiful things, To be honest And Daisy Jones and the Six – spoke about her early days as a producer, starting Hello Sunshine at the age of 34, although she admitted she didn't know what she was doing.

Explaining that she spent her first two decades in Hollywood just trying to get jobs, she said, “I didn't have time to look at the bigger picture, like, 'What's our business?' How do they make money?” Wait, why aren't there pieces for women? Wait, why don't I see people of color behind the scenes? For example, why don't I see authors who represent a different perspective? And that got me thinking. When I was 34, I had enough foundation in our company; I also had enough money to start funding and I thought, I won’t take money from people who don’t want the change I want to see.”

Still, Witherspoon admitted, “It was scary because I didn’t know if I was going to get my money back. Every day I would wake up and think, “Oh my God, I'm not going to get my money back.” But I'd rather bet on myself and lose the money by putting in the effort. I woke up every day and thought, 'I am my own lottery ticket.'”

The star also looked back on a moment after her 2017 success Big little lieswhich earned 16 Emmy nominations and eight wins – after producing both Over, girl And Wild in 2014.

“I had a moment right after Big little lies — I financed my first company myself and thought: OK, Big little lies won all these Emmys and Wild And Over, girl We got all these Oscar nominations and made $600 million at the box office. I had four employees and couldn’t keep the lights on,” Witherspoon recalls. “I remember the accountant called me and said, 'You didn't make enough money making these three things to keep four employees.' So I thought, “I'm doing something wrong.” And then I had this aha moment. I thought I needed help. I don't have a business plan.” Hello Sunshine soon brought in Sarah Harden as CEO and helped Witherspoon build infrastructure and hire executives.

Dern also noted how strong the female-centered atmosphere is Big little lies allowed the stars to have conversations they hadn't had before as she recalled standing with Witherspoon and co-star Meryl Streep. “I've ever had anyone to talk to.” And I was going through an uncertain time raising kids on my own and had so many questions, and the advice I got from you was: You need a financial advisor who's a woman , with whom you can talk about these things. And our first conversation was about taking care of elderly parents and putting the kids through school, and no one had ever had those conversations with me.”

Dern added that her relationships with her fellow actresses “are the greatest love stories, but they told us that if we only had one woman in the room, we wouldn't get along as well.”

“That's the thing – they told us that as women, the reason we're on set together is usually because you're competitive. And I've found that when there are multiple women on set, it's the opposite of that,” Spencer reiterated, referencing her long-standing friendships with Melissa McCarthy, Allison Janney and Viola Davis.

Witherspoon explained how consumers and audiences can also support female creators, emphasizing, “When there's a show on Netflix or whatever, you just hit the 'like' button – you don't realize how important that 'like' is.” ' button is.” Just “Like” because that actually affects the salaries of the women who made it. They process all that data… Even if you put them on your watchlist, that little behavior is valuable.

After the panel discussion, Witherspoon participated in a conversation with Spanx founder Sara Blakely about running her two women-owned companies; Looking back at the beginnings of Hello Sunshine, she remarked, “After having one successful film and then another successful film, I had a really hard time understanding why people didn't understand that this wasn't a coincidence. My first two books that I chose were Over, girl And Wildand both went No. 1 within three months of me picking them. And people said, 'Yeah, but can you do it again?'”

Witherspoon continued as she and Kidman chose an option Big little lies, One of the financiers called her manager just before filming and asked, “Do you really think this is going to work, Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman on this TV show?” Because we're taking a big risk here.” She added, “It “It turned out to be something amazing that not only women but men wanted to see.”

Olivia Munn, Amanda Kloots, comedian Heather McMahan and athletes Diana Flores, Alex Morgan and Candace Parker also attended Saturday's event, with a musical performance by The Castellows; Naomi Watts will take the stage on Sunday. The second annual Shine Away was hosted by AT&T.