Why am I involved in helping small businesses?

I got involved in Corvallis Economic Development, and in particular looking at what it takes to grow jobs, because I saw what was going to happen to Corvallis with HP downsizing (I believe they have gone from more than 8000 jobs to less than 1500 jobs -no data is available), HP contractor's downsizing (Nypro, ATS, Videx etc) and OSU funding changes- leaving more "soft money jobs", and felt like I had to give my talents to creating an alternative future:

- Where Corvallis wasn't dependent on one major private employer, and the rest government and service jobs,

- Where Corvallis citizens had options about where to work, and as one business downsized or shifted, there were other businesses growing, and able to hire folks, rather than necessitating that they leave town,

- Where the schools were vibrant because Corvallis had living wage jobs that attracted and retained families.

- Where we had enough public sector employment paying property taxes to support the services and quality of life that we so value.

I've been volunteering large amounts of time for 7 years in creating a small-business "ecosystem" where the support needed for 1, 2, 10 or 50 person businesses can find the resources, connections and financing they need to make a go of it. The goal is to have 100 1 person businesses, with 10 becoming 100 person businesses, and perhaps leading to 1 1000 person business. In this model, we don't have to change our values and quality of life, but we can change and create a better future for our community.

------ Background------ more about me.
I left HP seven years ago (before they started downsizing). I had been at HP Corvallis for 14 years, and had paid very little attention to the rest of the Corvallis community and economy. I was blissfully inside the HP bubble. Then several things happened, I moved away and came back, I left my HP job and started my own business, I learned about the loss of jobs in Corvallis, and what it meant for the future of our schools, and I got involved with a group of folks trying to start new start-ups with existing talent and resources, rather than focusing on trying to get a new HP in town.... with that new perspective I got passionate about choosing between two futures, and decided to actively work for the better future.


Here's a rough order of how I got as passionate as I am about what we need to do to create a thriving community of small businesses in Corvallis.
1. I left HP, willingly, for personal reasons, and moved to a suburb of Boston for a year. By leaving Corvallis I realized what a unique and amazing community we have.
2. I got interested in entrepreneurship and start ups. I was nearby MIT and Harvard, so I set about learning from "the best" about how new business started, grew and thrived -esp MIT, as Cambridge has many parallels to Corvallis.
3. I returned to Corvallis, and learned about the population changes that were/are threatening the strength of our local schools (through work the school board did on long term planning, note: we are barely able to justify two high schools, and enrollments are declining at all schools)
4. I started my own business- putting some of the theory into practice, (and learning that its really a lot more difficult than it sounds)
5. I volunteered with a group working on Commercializing Oregon Research (CORC), and brought marketing, sales and go-to-market perspectives to that team. The goal was bringing research out of university to start new businesses.
6. I moved my business into the new Business Enterprise Center, and started working with start-up and small technology clients to help them in marketing, but learning that many of their issues were, like mine very basic, and very broad. Finding the right resources while keeping your business running is amazingly difficult, especially for those who are technologists working to commercialize an invention, rather than business background folks.
7. I asked to be, and was appointed to the Economic Development Partnership (EDP) board by the Benton County Commissioners to help support and focus the EDP"s efforts to start, grow and nuture local businesses (called Economic Gardening or Economic Ecosystem), as opposed to supporting classic Economic Development, which is usually focused on recruiting large corporations.
8. As a board member of the EDP, I supported merging the EDP into the newly formed Chamber Coalition with a new focus and executive director to ensure viability of the EDP. The edp had 1.5 employees, and spent way too much of its meager budget on overhead, fund raising, and too little on direct services and the "work" of economic gardening or recruiting. By merging, we were able to focus almost all of the Economic Development public and private funds on the work, with Rent, computers, internet, back end infrastructure and fund raising infrastructure being shared and supported services with the Chamber Coalition.
9. I have served for 3 years on the ChamberCoalition board, stewarding the Economic development work to make sure the commitment made with the EDP merger was kept. Since then we have helped 100's of businesses, helped create 3 businesses (at least) of greater than 10 employees, influenced or helped create 100 or more jobs, and have brought hundreds of thousands of dollars of investment capital into Corvallis. We ran the first, highly successful Angel Conference in the willamette Valley.

90% of this work and success is due to the efforts of John Sechrest. It's the right kind of job growth for Corvallis, and we'd be fools to let him go.