Need Help With Your Small Business? Why Not Gather Information From Someone With Real-World Experience?
By Ken Tarlow
If you're struggling with your small business, take heart. Help is available right in your area and in most cases, it's free.
SCORE, the Service Corps of Retired Executives, is a 13,000-member volunteer program, sponsored by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA). The program matches volunteers with small businesses that need expert advice. These men and women business executives, whose collective experience spans the full range of American enterprise, share their management and technical expertise with present and prospective owners/managers of small business.
Most SCORE volunteers are retired. However, full-time, employed executives are also eligible for membership. About 20 percent of SCORE's membership are still employed.
Helping American small businesses to prosper has been SCORE's goal since the program began in 1964. SCORE volunteers are members of 390 locally organized, self-administered chapters offering services in more than 800 locations throughout the United States, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
They work in or near their home communities to provide management counseling and training to small businesses and those considering going into business. Every effort is made to match a client's needs with a counselor experienced in a comparable line of business. SCORE counseling is provided without charge, however there is a nominal fee for training programs.
SCORE also offers pre-business workshops as well as a variety of other workshops nationwide to present and prospective small business entrepreneurs. These workshops take place in local communities and provide a general overview of what it takes to start a business.
To locate the SCORE office nearest you, call (202) 205-6762 or your nearest SBA office.
The above article was excerpted from Tarlow's MIND TO MONEY, a cassette tape/workbook package that can help you develop a new product from the idea stage to the marketplace. MIND TO MONEY may be ordered from the Dream Merchant at $59.95 plus $4.95 CA sales tax and$5 shipping and handling ($69.90 total). Send orders to the Dream Merchant, 2309 Torrance Blvd., Suite 104, Torrance, CA 90501.
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