16 Small Business Owners Prepared To Take Their Businesses To The Next Level

  • Monday, November 23, 2015
The Inaugural Class of NextLevel Chattanooga pictured with Liza Soydan, NextLevel Chattanooga's program manager (pictured first on the left) with Warren Logan, president and CEO of the Urban League (pictured last on the right).
The Inaugural Class of NextLevel Chattanooga pictured with Liza Soydan, NextLevel Chattanooga's program manager (pictured first on the left) with Warren Logan, president and CEO of the Urban League (pictured last on the right).
Sixteen local business owners successfully developed their very own Customized Strategic Growth Plans and are now on the fast track of taking their businesses to the next level. NextLevel Chattanooga is a seven-month nationally-recognized entrepreneurship program offered by the Urban League of Greater Chattanooga in collaboration with the City of Chattanooga Office of Multicultural Affairs, BrightBridge, Inc. and the Tennessee Small Business Development Center.  
 
The award-winning StreetWise ‘MBA’TM curriculum was developed by its parent company Interise, a Boston-based nonprofit committed to helping existing small businesses that are interested in growing their businesses to scale.
The comprehensive curriculum was taught weekly and included topics vital to small business success, including financial management, marketing and sales, human resources tactics, business strategy development, and access to new capital and contracts. The curriculum was created in 2004 and more than 3,500 businesses across the country have successfully completed it.  According to Interise, these businesses have been able to create jobs at 8 times the rate of other private sector companies.
 
"By completing this seven month program, these small business owners have shown their commitment to growing their businesses,” said Jean Horstman, CEO of Interise, the Boston-based nonprofit which developed the StreetWise 'MBA'™ curriculum utilized by the NextLevel Chattanooga program.  “They have invested over 100 hours to develop their Strategic Growth Action Plan, to analyze and improve their business processes, and to develop the leadership skills needed for second-stage business growth. With our partners, we share a belief that building the capacity of local small businesses is key to social and economic resilience. Businesses completing a StreetWise 'MBA'™ program on average create new jobs at five times the rate of the private sector as a whole. Last year, they did so at eight times the rate. NextLevel Chattanooga is designed to deliver this same kind of impact locally.”
 
The 16 business owners who graduated in the inaugural class of NextLevel Chattanooga and were presented with certificates documenting their completion during a reception held in their honor at the Bessie Smith Hall last Thursday included:

Dr. Thomas Rumph, Aspire Family Dentistry
Cherita Adams, Blue Orleans Seafood Restaurant
Melinda Bone, Chicken-w-Bones
Charles Bass, CIB Enterprises
James Rogers, Customer Healthcare, LLC
Sarah Hooper, Dish T’ Cooking School & Catering Co.
Amanda Varnell, Dish T’ Cooking School & Catering Co.
Sam Bicking, Docu-Shed
Cheryl Key, John P. Franklin Funeral Home
John “Duke” Franklin, Jr., John P. Franklin Funeral Home
Grace Frank, Grace Frank Group
Norma Maloney, LoAdebar
John “JJ” Jerman, Office Furniture Warehouse
Jason Hill, Papercut Interactive, Inc.
Richard Carmack, RMJ Tactical
Efren Ormaza, Terra Nostra
Wendy Buckner, The Hot Chocolatier
“We are so very fortunate to have such a growing number of small businesses in the Greater Chattanooga Area,” said Warren Logan, president/CEO of the Urban League of Greater Chattanooga. “We are extremely pleased and honored to have had the caliber of small owners and leaders who made the commitment over the past seven months to invest their time to step back & customize a plan to deliberately grow their businesses. Our city and community will continue to thrive when small businesses are able to reach their full potential.”
 
Applications for the next cohort will be available beginning January 2016 with the program beginning in late February. The NextLevel Chattanooga is a fee-based program offered to small businesses in the Greater Chattanooga area; however, business owners must meet the following eligibility requirements:
·       Generate between $250,000 - $10 million in annual revenue
·       Have at least one full-time employee besides the owner
·       Have been in business for 3+ years.

For more information on NextLevel Chattanooga contact the program manager at nextlevelchatt@gmail.com or at (423) 847-2375.
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