U.S. Small Business Administration Explores Disability and Entrepreneurship
By Kathy Martinez (Kathy@wid.org)
The Bush administration's focus on fresh approaches to employment in all sectors is evidenced by its sponsorship of a National Leadership Summit on Disability and Entrepreneurship, held in Washington, D.C. on January 10 and 11.
The primary purpose of the Summit was to identify new, cross-sector strategies and opportunities to advance entrepreneurship for people with disabilities. A panel of disabled entrepreneurs was featured to contribute experiences, provocative observations, and creative ideas.
A review of the environment by the Small Business Administration identified four critical barriers to self-employment and business ownership for those within the disability community:
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People with disabilities have inadequate access to capital.
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People with disabilities are not seen as viable candidates for business ownership.
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Rehabilitation professionals are not prepared to effectively support clients who identify self-employment as their primary vocational goal.
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Mainstream business development professionals are uneasy about working with clients with significant disabilities.
For a significant part of this meeting, the invited participants were broken up into small, cross-sector groups to consider the following key questions:
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My organization can best advance entrepreneurial opportunities for people with disabilities by ____________.
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If you were going to create a "Dream Partnership" to address the barriers outlined above, what would it look like? Who would be the key partners? What activities would be undertaken?
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What would help your organization efficiently and effectively achieve maximum results for entrepreneurs with disabilities? Government support? Resources? Information? Training? Technical assistance?
The goal of the Summit was for each organization to leave with a realistic action plan to address one or more of the identified barriers. A report of the Summit will appear in the next issue of DisabilityWorld.
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