In this workshop, we’ll provide you with an overview of writing a business plan. There will also be time for attendees to ask questions.

Topics include:

• Why write a business plan?
• Business plan vs business model canvas.
• Overview of each section of a business plan.
• Research and writing tips.
• Resources for help and support

Date: July 21, 2023 | NOON – 1:30 PM

Cost: Thanks to the SBA-powered, Community Navigator Pilot Program (CNPP), this training is provided FREE OF CHARGE!!!  The sliding scale information below is for your information. If you can no longer attend the class, please reach out to us so someone else can take your spot.

Instructor: Faye Longo, CWE CNPP Project Manager – https://www.linkedin.com/in/faye-longo/

Instructions:

Calling all service providers, product-based businesses, and brick & mortar shopkeepers… have you been sitting on an idea that you think could make for a totally rad digital product? Maybe it’s a course or a membership, maybe it’s a download of your art or music? Perhaps it’s an ebook or a graphic design template! 

Join anti-capitalist business coach, Emily Eley, in this 90-minute workshop to explore what are some exciting and need digital products you could add to your business. Leave this workshop having nailed down what your first (or next!) digital product idea is, and we’ll get into the initial stages of how to validate your idea (and maybe even make a few sales in the process!). 

Date: Tuesday, July 25, 2023 | 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM

Cost: Suggested $10-50 

Instructor: Emily Eley

I’m an Anti-Capitalist Business Coach, a fierce advocate for small business owners, and the creator of Made 4 More, an anti-capitalist business coaching program for entrepreneurs. I’ve spent the last 6 years studying capitalism, individualism, neoliberalism and labor. Understanding power and people is at the root of essentially everything I do.

I’ve devoted my career to teaching folks how to grow ethics-based and values-driven businesses without exploiting their energy or anyone else’s. I’m also a mama to a rad little 2-year-old named Bo, a partner to my beloved, Matt, and can often be found on the back of my mountain bike or under a barbell at the YMCA.

My mission is to empower womxn-owned businesses, BIPOC-owned businesses, queer-owned businesses and other folx from marginalized communities to generate sustainable wealth and significant impact in their communities.

If you speak strengths, my top 5 CliftonStrengths are: Activator, Maximizer, Strategic, Communication, Futuristic

#1 Know Who You Are…and Who You’re Not (branding/positioning)

#2 Understand the Competition (competitive analysis)

#3 Get Close to Your Customers (buyer personas)

#4 Figure Out What to Say (messaging/content management)

#5 And Where to Say It (channels)

#6 Build Your Online Presence (digital presence)

#7 And, Last But Not Least, Be Social (social media – including advertising and influencer marketing)

This is an affinity space. To participate in this class you must live in Vermont and identify as a low to moderate-income woman-headed household. 

Join CWE & Shanda Williams of SD Communications and Marketing Group, LLC to connect, learn, and ask all your small business, self-employment, and entreprenur-ey questions! You’ll get to engage with and learn from CWE staff, consultants, instructors, and AMAZING women-entrepreneurs just like YOU! 

Participants can choose to attend in person or virtually. Lunch will be provided for those attending in person. If you are facing barriers to joining please reach out to Faye Longo, flongo@cweonline.org, we may be able to help. 

Money Matters: Pathways to Success! In this workshop you’ll create pathways to cultivate and harness your business dreams into reality with creative financial tools. Come to learn ways you can optimize:

• bartering
• buying wholesale/direct
• the power of negotiation, and
• manifestation planning (leveraging your brain power to bring in and create what you want!).  

Date: July  27, 2023 | 11am – 1:00 PM

Location: Virtual via ZOOM (link shared upon registration) or come in person – United Church of Thetford 5470 US-5, North Thetford, VT 05054

Cost: FREE. Thanks to the SBA-powered, Community Navigator Pilot Program (CNPP), this training is provided FREE OF CHARGE!!!  The sliding scale information below is for your information.  

Instructor: Shanda Williams (she/her), is the Owner and Visionary of S D Communications and Marketing Group LLC.  She is a native of Hartford, CT, and a UCONN Alumni.  Shanda has worked within the Banking and Insurance industry for a cumulative of 10+ years.  Currently, Shanda enjoys collaborating with innovative groups and putting together financial workshops and symposiums to empower and enlighten underserved markets.  Her “Money Matters” financial series is being taught throughout the Central Vermont region as well as the Brattleboro and Burlington regions.  She is currently collaborating with The Vermont Kindness Project for her upcoming event on October 13th at  Goddard College,  Money Matters II: Eco Feminism + Radical Love.  Her goal is to give strength to underserved people, by connecting them to the people, places and tools that they need to get ahead and achieve their goals and dreams! Some things Shanda loves most when she isn’t working hard to feed the masses with “food for thought” are listening to live music, pet sitting for her friends, reading, stargazing, and sun gazing while taking in the natural beauty of Vermont.  

Facilitator: Faye Longo (she/they), CWE CNPP Project Manager – https://www.linkedin.com/in/faye-longo/ 

Your CWE Vermont Team is hosting a Community Coffee Call on the last Friday of each month (happening on Thursday in December.) Do you have challenges or ideas you would like to discuss and brainstorm with our team and other women business owners? Let’s hear them! Bring your coffee, stories from your week, goals for the month, business questions, and brainstorming needs. Join us in supporting each other as we close out each month and look forward to the next! 

Are you thinking about certifying your business as woman-owned?  A common reason that applications for certification are denied, is that the business is not set up correctly.  Join us for an overview of the process and criteria for obtaining WBE/WOSB certification and explanation of the supporting materials that must be submitted for different business types.

Your Facilitators

Louise Leduc Kennedy, Founding Attorney at West Hill Law, is a business law attorney with extensive experience advising technology companies on strategic and commercial matters including: software commercialization, cloud computing, strategic alliances and all aspects of on-line business and contracting. She has advised start-ups, mid-sized private and public companies as well as Fortune 100 enterprises in a variety of matters that also include mergers and acquisitions, employment law issues and open source software strategies. Louise particularly enjoys working with small and medium-sized entrepreneurial businesses. Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly recognized Louise as a “Top Women of Law” honoree in 2022.

Kim Prior, Transactional Attorney at West Hill Law, is a business law attorney with experience advising clients on a variety of corporate matters.  Kim has specialized knowledge in private investment funds, domestic and international securities offerings, corporate formation, equity structuring, financings and contract negotiations representing both for-profit and non-for-profit businesses.

Deb Thomas, Attorney and CWE Volunteer, is a corporate lawyer by training and has had various volunteer roles at CWE since 2008, including volunteer coordinator and WBENC committee member. For the past 5 years she has chaired the Resource Development Committee and the annual Auction & Gala.  Previously she served on the Board of Trustees of Harborlight Montessori School in Beverly, Massachusetts. As Chair, she helped guide the school through a merger, sale of one campus and a head of school search.

If you have an established business (operating for at least a year, with regular sales), and are at a point where you’re ready to step away from the day-to-day operations and consider the next stage of growth, this workshop is for you! Certification represents a growth opportunity for woman-owned businesses, opening doors to contracting opportunities with government and corporate purchasers.  If you are unfamiliar with the concept of certification, we strongly recommend you take this free workshop prior to joining this session. 

Let’s talk vendor readiness! A key benefit of certification is enhanced opportunities to work with corporate and government buyers. But simply getting certified is not enough – you also need to be ready to do business with them. That means, for example, having a product or service you can deliver on a large scale, and cash to make that happen. Join us to learn what vendor readiness looks like, how to identify opportunities, and what resources exist to help you. 

Our panelists are:

• Sandra Ledbetter, Procurement Specialist with MSBDC Government Sales office  & central MA APEX Accelerator (PTAC)

• Akshata Nayak, Founder of Little Patakha. Little Patakha is certified by WBENC as a WBE, and is a semi-finalist in the WBENC Pitch Competition.

• Daylana Ervin-Parker, Director – Budget and Supplier Diversity at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts

• Samilys Rodriguez, Director – WBE Services, WBENC New England

This panel will be held virtually, via Zoom. You will receive the Zoom link when you finish registering.

There are two camps when it comes to hiring: hire before you’re ready and push the business to grow OR push yourself to the breaking point and then hire. But which is right and if you do think hiring is in the future (near or far) what’s the best way to go about it? And what if you’re not interested in the traditional capitalist model of owner and worker? What about things like profit-sharing, co-ops, and other ways of distributing gains in the business? Can small business owners partake in these radical forms of power redistribution and still be financially stable?

In this 2-hour workshop, anti-capitalist business coach, Emily Eley, will walk you through how to know if you’re ready to invite some help into your business and how to go about it in a way that’s not perpetuating harm and exploitation (for you, others, or the planet).

You’ll walk away from this session with templates, scripts, and tangible action steps to support you in growing a team (even a tiny one!) that’s in alignment with your values and mission.

Date: Tuesday, August 8, 2023 | 12:00 PM – 2:00 PM

Cost: Suggested $10-50 

Instructor: Emily Eley

I’m an Anti-Capitalist Business Coach, a fierce advocate for small business owners, and the creator of Made 4 More, an anti-capitalist business coaching program for entrepreneurs. I’ve spent the last 6 years studying capitalism, individualism, neoliberalism and labor. Understanding power and people is at the root of essentially everything I do.

I’ve devoted my career to teaching folks how to grow ethics-based and values-driven businesses without exploiting their energy or anyone else’s. I’m also a mama to a rad little 2-year-old named Bo, a partner to my beloved, Matt, and can often be found on the back of my mountain bike or under a barbell at the YMCA.

My mission is to empower womxn-owned businesses, BIPOC-owned businesses, queer-owned businesses and other folx from marginalized communities to generate sustainable wealth and significant impact in their communities.

If you speak strengths, my top 5 CliftonStrengths are: Activator, Maximizer, Strategic, Communication, Futuristic

Are you thinking about certifying your business as woman-owned?  A common reason that applications for certification are denied, is that the financial documentation is not in order.  Join us for a walkthrough of financial documents needed for obtaining certification!

About your instructor:  Owner of Shanks Books LLC, Shaelyn Shanks is an entrepreneur who helps small business owners with big dreams increase their cashflow and decrease their stress.

Many entrepreneurs detest the financial piece of their business, but they don’t discount its importance. The numbers tell a story – do you know how to read it?

In this workshop, participants will learn:

• How to read and understand basic financial statements
• How to use the numbers to make well informed operational decisions

About the Instructor: Yarelys is a first-generation Afro-Latina in the finance industry who is passionate about teaching and impacting people in their journeys after she became debt-free for the first time in 2019. She uses a combination of her personal story growing up in a low income household, to being a six figure income earner in corporate, & to now running her own company as a framework for her message & work. Cash is Kween™ was created to give BIPOC, in all phases of their financial journeys, the opportunity to create generational wealth & be financially abundant.

If you are planning to start a business or are in the early stages of launching one, then this workshop is for you!

You will learn to:
• Develop your business ideas and start planning
• Consider your legal structure
• Discuss choosing a name and entity
• How to obtain an employer identification number, licenses, permits, and insurance

Bring your questions! And leave this session with an A-to-Z overview and specific tools and tips to help you get started quickly. 

Date: August 23, 2023 | 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM

Cost: This class is offered free of charge, thanks to the SBA powered Community Navigator Pilot Program (CNPP)! Space is limited, so sign up soon. 

Instructor: Faye Longo, CWE CNPP Project Manager – https://www.linkedin.com/in/faye-longo/ 

This session is made possible by the Community Navigator Pilot Program, powered by SBA! 

By clicking “sign up” above, you are showing interest in future cohorts, NOT signing up for the class.   We will reach out to you the next time that we run this course and you will get priority access to sign up!  

Do you have an idea for a business that you want to launch or explore more deeply? Have you always dreamed of becoming an entrepreneur, but were never sure just where to start? This course will help you to take the necessary steps to becoming an independent business owner, while gaining confidence in yourself and your knowledge of small business management.

In this accelerated business planning course, you will:

• Explore and assess the market and financial viability of your business concept
• Learn how to market yourself and your business to target customers
• Explore options for funding the costs of operating your business
• Actively participate in class time and in one-on-one consulting sessions
• Build a network of fellow entrepreneurs that can support you in launching and growing your new enterprise.

In addition to the online classes, one-to-one counseling will be provided upon request. A Liveplan account will be assigned for students enrolled, free of charge.

At the end of this program, you will leave with a completed business plan to guide you in the launch and growth of your new company.

This course does not require any previous experience or education in business management. However, access to a computer and a Zoom account are necessary and knowledge of MS Word and Excel is strongly recommended. This is a small cohort only 20 spots available and are first come first serve. There is a deadline to register 1 week before the course starts, no exceptions.

Cost: 

We use a slide scale model for payment here at Center for Women & Enterprise! Please read more about our scale at the bottom of this page. Please see the levels available for this class here: 

• *$100 – Supporting Communities Registration Fee* – you are at the formation or start up stage of your business and are starting to make sales, if you are meeting your basic financial needs, or if you feel like you are able to support CWE’s mission at this ticket price.
• *$300 – Disrupting Industries Registration Fee* – you are at the formation or start up stage of your business and are starting to make sales, if you are meeting your basic financial needs, or if you feel like you are able to support CWE’s mission at this ticket price.
• *$500 – Making Waves Registration* – you are at a growth stage of your business, if you are meeting more than your basic financial needs, or if you feel like you are able to support CWE’s mission at this ticket price.