 |
 |
|
 Print Friendly
 Email to Friend
|
|
Small-Business Owner’s Guide To Government Resources
|
|
|
Article 7: SCORE
The Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) is a national nonprofit organization with a public service mission which it serves in conjunction with its partner, the SBA. SCORE’s 10,500 volunteers provide small-business counseling and training through 389 chapters, 800 branches and its Web site, www.score.org.
More than 7 million entrepreneurs have been served by SCORE, which logged 1,377,097 hours helping entrepreneurs last year alone.
“SCORE provides professional guidance and information, accessible to all, to maximize the success of America’s existing and emerging small businesses,” according to its mission statement.
SCORE’s service is based on giving back to the local business community. Businessmen and businesswomen who have managed successful careers and entrepreneurial ventures serve as volunteers. These real-life business experts donate their personal time and expertise to help new businesses to start, and existing businesses to grow.
Local SCORE chapters offer workshops and seminars on a variety of business topics Since 1996, many have been accessible online. The SCORE Web site features hundreds of pages of tools and advice, and is visited by 95,000 individuals each month. You can even receive small business advice via e-mail.
SCORE’s workshops and its advisory boards for existing businesses are free or very low-priced. But the organization’s most significant benefit is found in its entrepreneurial mentors. In one-to-one business counseling, these mentors provide advice on the full range of business topics.
SCORE counselors are not government bureaucrats. They have been in the trenches themselves, piloting businesses and managing successes. Its counseling service is noted for personal attention and helping startups stay on track as businesses launch and subsequently expand. The network of business counselors features more than 600 skills, making business advice quick and easy.
Deborah Naybor started her land surveying business with only $1,000, an old pickup truck and a solitary, part-time employee. Although she had plenty of information about the industry, Naybor had no business experience. She didn’t know what her first step should be. But she knew enough to get good advice.
Naybor’s first telephone call was to the Buffalo, N.Y., SBA office, where she met a SCORE counselor. She also attended SBA workshops. When Naybor expanded her business, she again turned to the SBA for assistance, more advice and a loan guarantee. In 1996, Naybor won the SBA’s District Small Business Person of the Year Award and was inducted into the Western New York Women’s Hall of Fame. Today Naybor Survey invoices more than $1 million a year.
And not so incidentally, since 2000, Naybor has volunteered as a SCORE counselor herself, advising others on how to start and grow businesses into successes.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Print Friendly
Email to Friend
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Small-Business Owner’s Guide To Government Resources
|
 |
|
|
 |
| Select an online seminar from the Success Skills Archives:
|
|
|
 |
|
|
If you liked
this seminar, check out these related topics:
|
|
