Several weeks ago, the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) hosted a summit where stakeholders made recommendations on how to improve minority business programs, overcome legal challenges to those programs, advocate effectively on businesses’ behalf, and help entrepreneurs address emerging markets.
Some of the common themes that emerged, that MBDA will use as a blueprint to develop economic parity for minority businesses, include building a record of evidence of discrimination and barriers to be entered into congressional and legislative records; streamlining the certification process for minority businesses; implementing partnerships with colleges and universities to teach entrepreneurship programs; providing training access to capital and other resources to a group of 10 business owners in each state to help them enter emerging markets; and training minority entrepreneurs in advocacy at the federal, state and local levels.
The findings also include strategies that have been suggested many times before, such as developing criteria for minority business contracting goals at federal, state, and local levels and then enforce those goals; providing incentives for larger companies to partner with smaller firms; and increasing funding for MBDA so that it can offer more programs to build the capacity of minority business enterprises.
Recommendation from summit participants and others can be viewed here:
— Legal Landscape
— MBE Programs
— Emerging Entrepreneurial Opportunities
— Advocacy as a Tool
Entrepreneurs are invited to continue to share add comments on the MBDA’s blog, which the agency will review on an ongoing basis.
The suggestions were for the most part very good ideas, but as one woman in the audience asked: What happens next?