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To Go It Alone It Helps To Be in Good Company
Many if not most professional people at one time or another dream of owning their own business, and a growing number are trying to trying to transform their vision into reality.
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Business New Haven
5/13/2003
By: Karen Singer
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Many if not most professional people at one time or another dream of owning their own business, and a growing number are trying to trying to transform their vision into reality.
The good news is there are plenty of educational tools in the New Haven area to assist them, ranging from free, informal counseling to certificate and degree programs.
What began as a single business course at Gateway Community College in the 1990s, for instance, has become a program offering a two-year associate's degree in entrepreneurial studies as well as a 24-credit certificate in entrepreneurial studies. Both programs were accredited in 2002.
There currently are 39 students in the degree program and two in the certificate program, according to Rose Bednarz, who developed the entrepreneurial studies curriculum and established a small business center at GCC last year, which is rapidly establishing itself as a valuable resource for budding entrepreneurs.
Courses include such business building blocks as accounting, business law, marketing, economics and e-business, as well as entrepreneurship classes centering on starting a small business.
“When they're through, they should have a walk-to-the-bank business plan,” Bednarz says.
Students taking Gateway entrepreneurial studies courses range from traditional high school graduates to “people who have been downsized, mothers and sons, and couples who don't want to retire.”
Bednarz characterizes the program as “blossoming,” adding she is finalizing an agreement with Quinnipiac University to enable Gateway students with an associate's degree to transfer credits toward a bachelor's degree in entrepreneurship at the Hamden university.
Actually, “We're already doing that on a case-by-case basis,” notes Ronald McMullen, a business professor at QU's Entrepreneurship & Small Business Management Institute, which accepted its first freshman class just last autumn. Slightly more than half of the 78 high school graduates are male, and Hispanic and African-American students are on the roster. Nearly all hail from New York and New England.
“We have the only accredited four-year program in the state of Connecticut,” explains Matthew B. Smith, the program's executive director. Courses are aimed at developing business and entrepreneurial skills.
“Hopefully, they'll walk out of here with a business already underway or a strong interest in working in an early-stage business,” Smith says.
For business owners, Quinnipiac offers non-credit educational programs aimed at solving specific problems.
“We do about 30 or 40 a semester for companies at all stages of development,” Smith explains. They're usually coordinated by local chambers of commerce and run between four hours and 12 hours [duration]..
The school also provides professional business counseling “usually on a project basis,” Smith says, adding that small-business owners have made the most requests to date for the service.
Smith describes entrepreneurship as one of the fastest-growing areas of study at colleges and universities not only in the Northeast, but across the country.
“After all, it's the core of what American business was traditionally about before the Industrial Revolution - and still accounts for a large sector of job development,” he says. “More and more people have become wary or cynical about working for large corporations, and are looking more toward self-ownership, which gives them more control over their lifestyle.”
Julie Brander agrees.
“The bottom line is there is no job security, and people are looking seriously at starting their own business,” says Brander, who chairs the New Haven chapter of the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE), which offers workshops and one-on-one counseling to small-business owners. “That's probably the driving force.”
No longer the exclusive province of “retired” executives, SCORE bills itself these days as “Counselors to America's Small Business,” and actively seeks volunteers of all ages with business experience.
Over the last two years especially, says Brander, “We've been seeing many more people testing the [entrepreneurship] waters, and a small number actually starting a business.
“They're all ages, but there are a lot of older people. Some are educated; some not so educated. Some have great credit; others not so great.”
SCORE counselors are available by appointment Tuesday mornings at Gateway, or can be accessed online at www.score.org. For particulars about counseling and forthcoming workshops, call the New Haven chapter of SCORE at 203-865-7645.
Interest is “exploding” at the six SCORE chapters and several satellite offices throughout the state, according to Virginia Griffin, a business-development specialist with the U.S. Small Business Administration. The SBA gives grants to SCORE as well as other agencies fostering entrepreneurship such as the Small Business Development Center and Women's Business Development Center. Its Web site, www.sba.gov, is an excellent resource, and posts a calendar of business expositions and other events in Connecticut.
The SBA funds micro-loan programs such as the one administered in the New Haven region by the Community Economic Development Funds.
Yale University also offers a funding program for entrepreneurs as well as a community investment program renting space to independent retailers. Showcases and seminars sponsored by various state agencies are another educational resource for entrepreneurs.
“We run two business showcases per year, which are an opportunity for small and 'micro' businesses to network and receive information on state and federal resources,” explains Harlan Henry, director of community outreach for Connecticut Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz. “They're a way to take your business to the next level.”
Henry also organizes seminars on subjects of particular interest to small businesses. Two are coming up, a July 29 conference on importing/exporting and an August 1 seminar on procurement contracts with state and federal government agencies.
Showcases cost $100 and can accommodate 70 businesses. The next one is in Hartford, on August 15-16. For more information, check out business events at www.sots.state.ct.us or call 860-509-6258.
Business is also booming at the ten Connecticut Small Business Development Center offices throughout the state. They sponsor business seminars and training programs, and enrollment has quickly outstripped availability.
“When the economy gets tight, our offices get busy,” explains Zaiga Antonetti, associate state director at CSBDC headquarters at UConn/Storrs.
Part of the mission is to advise would-be entrepreneurs to proceed with caution.
“In times of layoffs, people naturally look for some way to take control of their own destiny,” she says. “But unless they understand the difficulties involved, unless they understand the marketplace and whether they have the resources to carry them for the first year, they may be setting themselves up for failure and compounding the tragedy.”
A number of four- and five-hour, low-cost programs are in the CSBDC pipeline for fall, a number of which will be held at public libraries.
“A program is no guarantee of success or failure,” warns Antonetti. “The key to their success is what they do afterwards. It's up to them to work on getting a fully functional business plan, which requires research and utilizing as many resources as possible.”
For information on events and other resources, visit the CSBDC at www.sbdc.uconn.edu, or call 860-486-4135.
The Women's Business Development Center in Stamford stresses counseling as the “most holistic approach to self-sufficiency and economic independence,” according to president Fran Pastore.
About a year ago, the center opened a site at the small-business center at Gateway Community College, providing classroom training and one-on-one coaching for free or a nominal fee. Some scholarships are available, based on income.
And, despite the center's name, clients of either gender are welcome.
The first order of business is to find out whether prospective entrepreneurs have the right stuff by scrutinizing character and personality traits.
“We want to make sure they don't just have a pie-in-the-sky idea, and they realize it takes a lot of hard work - often 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” Pastore says with only slight exaggeration.
If candidates pass the initial hurdle, counselors recommend a three-hour workshop designed to ferret out the dilettantes from the serious contenders.
A ten-week “FastTrac” program on business planning is the next step, with classroom training interspersed with skills development training and one-on-one coaching.
“We deal with people from all walks of life, from the underemployed and unemployed and those coming off public assistance, to those who have been downsized and outsized,” Pastore says. “A lot are single moms looking at second careers or who have never had to work.”
One success story is Milford-based Anne Altieri, a manager of technology at Bristol Meyer's Clairol division, who was laid off in January 2002 after 16 years with the company. In the months leading up to her departure, several senior executives requested private computer training, a task that provided inspiration for a business.
“I realized executive-level training was an untapped market, especially in this turbulent economy,” explains Altieri, now president of Corporate Training Solutions, a company she founded with the help of the Women's Business Development Center.
“A lot of these people have relied on administrative assistants and don't want other people to know [their limitations] or don't want to go to a public place for training. They'd rather do it behind closed doors.”
Happy to oblige, Altieri soon realized she needed more business expertise. She discovered the WBDC in her search for resources, and enrolled in the first New Haven-based FastTrac program, which helped her develop a feasible business plan.
“They helped me identify whether the plan was going to fly,” she says, adding the process involved market research on target groups, as well as pricing.
Several months after she launched it the business took off when she landed a personal coaching contract with a major Stamford corporation. Since then it has expanded, largely by networking, and last year Altieri says she “turned a good profit.”
Altieri today also is fostering entrepreneurship as a WBDC coach. “They've been really good to me,” she says. BNH
You can e-mail WBDC at info@ctwbdc.org,
or call 877-999-9232.
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