Granholm comes to campus

Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm spoke while Carol Lopucki, Dr. John Dunn, and Dr. Ajay Samant listen during the forum held Thursday in Western Michigan's Schneider Hall. Jo Wei Looi/Western Herald

By Josh Holderbaum
Western Herald

Small businesses looking to start up in Michigan will be able to get business training faster with a new boot camp program.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm presented the idea along with Western Michigan University President John Dunn and Haworth College of Business Interim Dean Ajay Samant at a roundtable discussion Thursday in Schneider Hall.

The FastTrac NewVenture 10-week program offers small business owners a crash course on business planning and training, plus opportunities for mentorships with established business owners.

That makes the risks of starting up a business easier to handle, Granholm said.

“If you go to Silicon Valley in California, it’s seen as a good move to take that risk of starting a business,” Granholm said. “It’s good to have that notch in your belt to have tried something.”

Gov. Granholm speaks at WMU in roundtable from Fritz Klug on Vimeo.

The State of Michigan, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, the Michigan Credit Union League and Michigan Small Business and Technology Development Center partnered to provide scholarships to the first 1,000 businesses to sign up for the program.

The move makes Michigan the only state to take such a program state-wide, Granholm said.

“Places that have the most dynamic economies in the nation have a strong entrepreneurial base,” said Greg Main, MEDC president and CEO.

“To set up a program like this, we need to think of three things: a good source of counseling, a way people can interconnect and capital. If you can’t get money, it’s unlikely you’ll be successful down the road.”

The panel included several business owners who are still in or have finished FastTrac training.

Richard Chapman, formerly a laid-off architect, now owns R2 Photography and has completed six of the 10 weeks in the program.

“It’s been very intense,” Chapman said. “There’s an amazing amount of info available in the course. It’s a very interesting mix of individuals and amazing think tank of individuals to help provide you with a road map and ways to hit your benchmarks.”

Roy Adkins had been laid off from several different jobs before starting West Michigan Building Services, a janitorial and building maintenance company.

“I learned about market research, knowing what competitors and customers I had out there,” Adkins said. “I had to think seriously about what I offered. Not a lot of companies are 100 percent green, so we offer green cleaning. It really separates us from everyone else.”

Adkins finished the training last April and expects to triple the size of his business by next year, he said.

Ann St. Amand, Ph.D., used the program to run her St. Joseph-based water analysis company Phyco-Tech.

“I’ve been in the business for 20 years and have quite a presence in the market, but I had no manufacturing experience,” St. Amand said.

“I’m a scientist first and businessperson second. I could write a business plan but not articulate what I offer. Now I can get my business plan down to a manageable size and explain my product to customers.”

Now, St. Amand plans to manufacture a water analysis instrument from a prototype that exists across the country and already as three beta customers signed on for it, she said.

These stories drive the program forward, said Carol Lopucki, State Director of the MI-SBTDC.

“We hear lots of doom and gloom,” Lopucki said. “Here are the everyday stories that we don’t hear about.”

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Posted by HeraldAdmin on Mar 25 2010. Filed under Breaking, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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