It helps to have founded and run a company if you're going to help somebody run a company who is a founder.
Small businesses, you can give them capital, but what they often need as much is mentoring, advice and help with their business plan.
We spend a great deal of our energy making sure that small businesses have help in navigating to the outcomes that they want.
I'll be a mentor to those who want to create a business, product or service and aren't exactly sure how to do that. To me, it's a true sign of success if I can help someone have a better time of it.
I think I would have kept in contact with venture capital investors and entrepreneurs. I'm sure staying involved as something like a coach would be fun. If I handed over the reins to a successor, I wouldn't stick around [to pull strings] like a retired emperor.
We've had this program for a number of years now, called 10,000 Small Businesses, where Goldman Sachs has convened a group of partners to basically give business education to small business owners.
It's not government that creates jobs; it's small business. Our job is to make sure they have the access to capital, the access to contracting opportunities, and the help, advice and mentoring that they need to go out and be successful.
Every woman who has a business book has a platform. For the most part, they're either a television personality or someone who had the perfect pedigree and worked their way up the career ladder.
Our business is all about helping someone - a founder, a CEO - building a great business. It's not about seeing our names in the press.
You make more money selling advice than following it. It's one of the things we count on in the magazine business -- along with the short memory of our readers.
TechStars is mentorship-driven.
At TechStars, I have the privilege of working with hundreds of the best and brightest start-up mentors on the planet. We coach our mentors to take a Socratic approach and to provide data rather than decisions.
I've trained my people in mentoring entrepreneurs and made myself obsolete.
I think you need to have a very strong angel community that is committed to mentoring up-and-coming entrepreneurs.
I didn't intend to go into the seminar business.
No first-time entrepreneur has the business network of contacts needed to succeed. An incubator should be well integrated into the local business community and have a steady source of contacts and introductions.
Mentorship is key to unlocking each of our entrepreneurial spirits.
Business coaching and the personal development and self-help industry is considered to be one of the booming industries today.
I wish I had had more mentorship and more access, not only for capital, but the critical thinking.
