theClubhou.se is continuing its charter to train, prep and uplift local business owners with its latest teaching initiative: a series of free, virtual Business Viability Workshops.
“How do you reduce the risk involved in entrepreneurship for yourself?” asked theClubhou.se president Eric Parker, summarizing the central concern the upcoming workshops address.
Starting Tuesday, the co-working space provider and nonprofit will be holding a series of virtual seminars in which participants connect with experts and business leaders to discuss and evaluate business ideas and develop plans to grow those businesses.
The target audience for the workshop includes dreamers who just have an idea, as well as those who’ve been running a business that is up to two years old.
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The central aim of these workshops, Parker says, is to educate budding entrepreneurs about discerning the market potential of their businesses or ideas, whether and how they can afford to pursue those ideas and how to position themselves financially to do so.
“The main thing we’re trying to get into is helping people understand how their personal finances and their business finances relate to one another,” said Parker. “So that they can understand what early-stage things they need to focus on with their business so that they don’t negatively impact their personal finances.”
The weekly free workshop will also serve as an interview for enrollment into Make Startups, theClubhou.se’s 12-week entrepreneurial training course. Students in the Make Startups program receive three weeks of training, followed by six months of support and mentoring. Interested and qualified pupils will be invited to join the Make Startups course.
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After helping more than 200 businesses get launched via its training programs, theClubhou.se partners noticed many new enterprisers in the community repeatedly encounter recurring pitfalls early on. Helping them avoid these challenges, Parker says, was impetus for the viability workshops, as well as to help set them up for success through the Make Startups program.
“This workshop is really meant to help make sure that people are on that firm financial footing that they can go into the Startups certificate program,” Parker said, before noting further that completing the course opens the door for support from 25 different lenders and investors. “They would give entrepreneurs the graduate much better consideration towards getting capital for their business.”
The Business Viability Workshops will be held online every Tuesday, start on July 19 and continuing through Sept. 27. To register, or for more information, visit www.theclubhou.se/apply-yourself.
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter covering business for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
