Page 130 - Marky Stein - Fearless Career Change_ The Fast Track to Success in a New Field (2004)

Fearless Career Change

Like many of the people we’ve talked about in this book,
Alice’s wake-up call came when her employer was downsizing due
to its shifting of much of its computer manufacturing to factories
outside the United States.
Alice sought advice about how to get her business up and run-
ning. She was referred to the Small Business Administration
(www.sba.gov), a department of the U.S. government with offices
in most cities.

The SBA assists entrepreneurs in starting and
improving their businesses. They give free classes
in starting a business, getting government and
private loans for businesses, small-business book-
keeping and accounting, sales and marketing,
and other topics of interest to people
starting new companies.

Alice would be able to consult, for free, with a mentor (someone
who had already started a successful business) through a govern-
ment-funded program called SCORE (www.score.org). Establishing
a working relationship with one or more of the expert counselors
from SCORE is one of the first steps you should take if you wish to
start an enduringly successful business. You might pay up to $500 an
hour for this kind of consulting elsewhere, but at SCORE it will cost
you nothing!
By attending classes at the SBA and working with her mentor
from SCORE, Alice found the best way to fund her new business.
She was somewhat concerned because her credit score was far from
perfect, but she was able to receive a $15,000 microloan cospon-
sored by the Small Business Administration and a private bank.
It took only 10 days from the day she filled out a simple form
to the day her bank account was credited with the funding. In addi-
tion, because she owned a home, she was also able to borrow
$70,000 against her equity in the home by refinancing her original
mortgage.
Like almost every small-business owner, Alice wore many hats at
the beginning of her enterprise: Web designer, owner, administra-
tive assistant, bookkeeper, marketing director—and, well, you get

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