Generation: Serving The Startup

MAY 2012
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A WISCONSIN DOWNTOWN REVITALIZED PACKAGING SMALL-BIZ PRODUCTS
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Generation
Young entrepreneurs Daniel Linhart and George Brooks represent the next generation of loyal community bank business customers
Serving the Startup
Vantage Point
Tim Williamson ([email protected]) is the co-founder and CEO of The Idea Village, an independent nonprofit organization in New Orleans.
Sparking Ideas and Startups

ate one evening in 1999, at a bar in downtown New Orleans, a movement was ignited. Five local entrepreneurs were having a conversation about how to reverse the last 40 years of fundamental economic and social decline in our city. New Orleans was in a downward spiral, failing in all relevant areas of community vitality: education, jobs, health and crime. retain entrepreneurial talent in New Orleans. Over the past decade, The Idea Village has solidified its position as a leading driver of entrepreneurship by providing direct support to more than 1,654 New Orleans entrepreneurs by engaging 2,122 professionals and allocating more than 56,119 free consulting hours and $3.1 million in capital. Collectively, this portfolio generates over $82 million in annual revenue and has created more than 1,000 jobs. Our story is genuine but not so unique that it cannot be implemented elsewhere. The following road map outlines five steps we used and which other communities can adapt to foster their own entrepreneurial movement: Identify the issue Community leaders need to identify the real issue that is prohibiting their community from attracting and retaining entrepreneurial talent and create a vision to address the issue. The issue could be crime, corruption or leadership. This vision must be larger than the individuals themselves and serve the needs of a greater, more diverse population. In New Orleans case, the real issue was insular networks created over decades. A vision was hatched to create a new network to attract and retain talent, an idea village. Find the leader Leaders who embrace this new vision must identify an entrepreneur to take the lead in building a network of private, public and university leaders who are able and willing to embrace and advocate on behalf of the visiona call to arms. This individual must understand entrepreneurs, be passionate
Five steps for building an entrepreneurial movement in your community

about creating community change and be open to diversity in the form of people and ideas. A successful leader will build trust among the diverse network and be the honest broker by hearing new ideas and approacheseven if he or she competes with the existing vision. The leader should also be able to help identify key community influencers in business, government and university sectors who have wide appeal and can be trusted to help validate the vision. For this reason, it is important that the values of the key supporters reflect those of the organization. If there is imbalance, the movement will suffer.
Motivated by the shortsighted vision of leadership, we decided to challenge the status quo. Each of us contributed $2,000 toward a $10,000 business plan contestbest idea wins. Entrepreneurs emerged pitching their big ideas and professionals began contacting us with offers of in-kind support, leading to a grand prize worth over $125,000. We hit an unexposed nerve in a still-fledgling community of emerging leaders. The Idea Village, as the movement officially came to be known, formalized as a nonprofit organization in 2002 with a mission to identify, support and
Organize the network The network now must become well organized, or it will fail to evolve into a movement. The leader of the network is quickly faced with the challenge of ensuring that the network remains both active and focused. To ensure that the group remains focused, the leader can create an organizational structure or series of activities that can unite the players by proactively channeling their energy to produce achievable results. Activities can include the creation of new programs, events, networking sessions, technical assistance, outreach or any other function that is relatively easy to perform and which yields results. Immediate results are important, as the process of securing low-hanging fruit helps to both unite and focus the network.
Evolve the network Now that the network has been organized, the leader needs to attract new members and advocates who
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May 2012
In order for entrepreneurship to become part of the culture of the community, there needs to be a way for everyone to participate.
support the original vision but better reflect the changing landscape. It is important for both movement leaders and participants to understand that structure needs to change as the ecosystem in which they operate evolves. Recognize the need to reach out to new leaders, advocates and general supporters. A successful network is one that can figure out ways to grow the total pie by interacting with the competition to better leverage each others assets. Entrepreneur Week. The event enlists new people with new ideas who buy into the movement and the benefits it generates for the community. The leader must be sensitive to the fact that new members may require organizational change and, for this reason, it is important for the movements leader to lead from behind by validating new opinions and elevating others in the ecosystem. Today, New Orleans is at a tipping point and the movement that started in 2000 is showing measurable results. Dynamic entrepreneurs leading new ventures like Receivables Exchange, iSeatz, TurboSquid, Naked Pizza, Federated Sample, Sucre, AudioSocket, Kickboard, Cordina, Lifestyle Revolution Group and Schedulist are validating the notion that entrepreneurs can grow successful companies in our city. Entrepreneurial hubs continue to sprout up in critical neighborhoods, and capital is being invested in new ventures. New models for health care, public education, physical infrastructure, food and creative media are being incubated and developed. Entrepreneurs are emerging as the next generation of leaders and in turn mentoring the next up-and-coming generation of entrepreneurial talent. The downward cycle has been broken and new networks have formed. Historically, great cities have been led by entrepreneurial leaders who felt a strong connection to their community. There is something special happening in New Orleans as we are in the midst of reinventing a great American city. The next generation entrepreneurial leaders are being developed here, and the movement is scaling to other communities. New Orleans can provide a road map for other communities seeking to become a magnet of talent. But now is the time to start. Step one: Find the entrepreneurs in your community and start a movement.
Sustain the movement To ensure sustainability, systems must be installed to sustain the engagement of the network and increase the diversity of entrepreneurial talent participating. In order for entrepreneurship to become part of the culture of the community, there needs to be a way for everyone to participate. In New Orleans, we have organized the programming into an Entrepreneurial Season that begins each July and ends in March with New Orleans
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MAY 2012

TABLETS TAKE OVER RETAIL BANKING

A WISCONSIN DOWNTOWN REVITALIZED PACKAGING SMALL-BIZ PRODUCTS

Serving the Startup

Sparking Ideas and Startups

Five steps for building an entrepreneurial movement in your community

Could your bank do better with ICBA Securities?

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