Establishing a National Entrepreneurship Day is the brainchild of the founders of the Grasshopper Group who launched the initiative on May 11, 2010. So far in excess of 1800 signatures have been gathered.
Recognizing that the economic recovery is dependent on jobs creation and that most of those jobs will be created by small to mid-size companies, the founders of the Grasshopper Group and others think the government needs to pay more attention to those size companies.
The Kauffman Foundation, which supports entrepreneurship, is planning to tie the kick-off of its annual Global Entrepreneurship Week in November to National Entrepreneurship Day.
The signature drive is being publicized through Twitter and Facebook in order to gather the estimated 1 million signatures needed to have the petition receive serious consideration by President Obama. The Boston Globe included an article in the Business section yesterday about the idea as Grasshopper is a local success story.
As a long-time consultant and contract CFO to entrepreneurial ventures I want to see this day get established. So tell your family and friends!
It is important to set expectations and delineate who does what on the advisory board. I’ve found it’s important to think about this before you begin to speak with prospective advisors as the good ones will want to know up front what they’re getting themselves into.
As a consultant on the formation and facilitation of advisory boards I recommend setting expectations by using a Statement of Roles & Responsibilities. The statement:
- Defines roles and who is responsible for specific tasks,
- Reminds people that all information is confidential, and
- Sets the stage to allow for graceful resignations or terminations.
To ensure people take it seriously I also recommend the CEO and the advisors sign the document. While it’s not legally binding, requiring signatures raises the level of importance in people’s minds.
The components of a good Statement of Roles & Responsibilities will include the following sections:
- Overall guidelines to be followed and ground rules.
- Advisor responsibilities.
- Company/CEO responsibilities.
- Resignation & termination.
- Signatures.
Some people may prefer to create a letter. I still recommend the components cover the sections I list above.
As the years progress and your advisory board gets more established it is important to review and revise the statement. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to make it an annual task done at the same time you are preparing to evaluate the effectiveness of the advisory board overall and the individual advisors.
You will find a sample Statement of Roles & Responsibilities in the Advisory Board Kit: A Comprehensive Guide to Establishing an Advisory Board.
Many seniors will graduate with an average student loans outstanding of $23,000, according to the Project on Student Debt an initiative of the Institute for College Access & Success. Therefore it is of critical importance to ensure your graduate understands how to manage payment so that the amount doesn’t grow to be overwhelming.
Michelle Singletary who writes the Color of Money column for The Washington Post recommends the CliffsNotes book “Graduation Debt: How to Manage Student Loans and Live Your Life” by Reyna Gobel. The book is comprised of twelve chapters that take a graduate from determining just how much is owed through how to manage it by discussing budgeting during different economic scenarios, paying off private debt, living a frugal lifestyle while having fun, managing debt in relationships, and how lenders view a graduate’s debt.
Graduation Debt is available as both a book and a PDF on the CliffsNotes website. The book is also available on Amazon.
If your graduate is light on financial literacy perhaps include this book as part of their graduation gift. Also steer them toward the Project on Student Debt where there are additional resources.
