Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is expected to announce a three-tiered mentoring program designed to help minority and women-owned businesses overcome obstacles to their long-term success and viability, the AFRO has learned.
The Mayor’s Mentor/Protégé Program will be announced on Oct. 20, the first day of Baltimore’s Minority Enterprise Development Week. The week-long event will consist of a series of events and programs highlighting minority and women-owned businesses as well as providing networking opportunities for these entrepreneurs.
“I’m excited about the mentor-protégé program. That’s very essential in helping to create the foundation for success for businesses,” Rawlings-Blake said in an exclusive conversation with the AFRO.
Rawlings-Blake explained that one of the biggest obstacles to minority and women-owned businesses is a lack of familial and other connections that can help guide these entrepreneurs through the difficult process of sustaining a new business.
“If you have those connections, your path is smoother because you know what to expect, you have the upper hand and we’re trying to give that upper hand to businesses that might not have those connections through this mentor- protégé program,” Rawlings-Blake said.
The program will have three distinct components. The first is a traditional mentor/ protégé model, in which prime contractors serve as mentors to subcontractors in the same industry.
The second is a public-private partnership in which the city will seek out private sector partners to serve as mentors for minority and women entrepreneurs. As part of the city’s memorandum of understanding with developer Michael Beatty, for example, Beatty has agreed to serve as a mentor for this portion of the program.
The third component of the program, and the one which Sharon Pinder, director of the Mayor’s Office of Minority and Women-Owned Business Development, felt is the most unique, will be called “Lift as We Climb.” Under the initiative, successful minority and women business owners will mentor newer minority and women business owners. “Lift as We Climb” has won an endorsement from the Presidents’ RoundTable, an organization of African-American CEOs, according to Pinder.
Both the mentorship program and the Minority Enterprise Development Week are part of the city’s efforts to improve the number and success rate of minority- and women-owned businesses. It’s an effort that is hampered by the fact that municipal minority set-asides—in which governments attempt to set aside a specific percentage of government contracts for minority businesses—are illegal.
The success of many minority- and women-owned businesses is also hindered by the fact that they are often first-generation businesses, which do not possess the accumulated wealth necessary for navigating the start-up phase of any business.
“The core issue is still the finance piece. We tend to be under-capitalized,” Pinder said of minority and women-owned businesses.
The city has created a micro-loan program, administered by the Baltimore Development Corporation, to help address this issue. It has also sought to ensure that its contractors are paid promptly, since many minority and women contractors are not in a financial position to easily absorb delays in payment.
The work of improving the prospects for minority and women-owned businesses is ongoing, the mayor said.
“Everyone knows that prompt payments is an issue, but what are the other issues,” Rawlings-Blake said. “Are we breaking up contracts in a way that provides an opportunity to businesses but also allows us to get work done? Are there industry sectors that we’ve ignored when it comes to developing minority and women-owned business talent? That work is constant. That’s the work that I think is most important.”
ralejandro@afro.com