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America's SBDC Accreditation Reviews are a rigorous, peer-to-peer process designed to ensure that Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) across the national network meet and maintain the highest standards of professional excellence, service delivery, and operational efficiency.
Learning Objectives:
The reviews serve as a mechanism for quality assurance and continuous improvement by:
America's SBDC Accreditation Reviews are a rigorous, peer-to-peer process designed to ensure that Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) across the national network meet and maintain the highest standards of professional excellence, service delivery, and operational efficiency.
Learning Objectives:
The reviews serve as a mechanism for quality assurance and continuous improvement by:
The America's SBDC Board of Directors Meeting is the primary governance forum where the national organization's leadership convenes to set strategic direction, ensure fiduciary responsibility, and oversee the integrity and performance of the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) network. The meeting ensures responsible and effective governance for the national body that represents and advocates for the entire SBDC network.
Learning Objectives:
Key functions of the meeting include:
Before Writing the Business Plan AI tools and business planning software can now generate a polished business plan in minutes. While these tools are powerful, they often skip the most important step: validating the assumptions behind the business itself. As a result, many entrepreneurs arrive at advising sessions with a finished plan that looks complete but is built on untested ideas, vague market assumptions, and unrealistic financial projections.
This session focuses on how counselors can guide clients through the research and validation work that should happen before writing the business plan. Using a structured advising framework, participants learn how to help entrepreneurs test the core components of their business model before moving into formal planning.
The session introduces a series of practical planning checkpoints counselors can apply in real advising conversations. These checkpoints help clients clarify their concept, validate market demand, analyze competitors, define a clear offer, test pricing logic, understand operational realities, and evaluate financial viability.
Planning before the Plan 2026 By completing this validation work first, entrepreneurs develop stronger assumptions, better financial projections, and clearer strategy. When the time comes to write the business plan, clients can use AI tools or business planning software such as LivePlan much more effectively because the underlying research and decisions are already in place.
Participants will also receive a Small Business Planning Guide that can be shared directly with clients after the session to support continued research and planning between advising sessions. The guide includes prompts, worksheets, and research questions designed to help entrepreneurs organize their thinking, conduct further research, and complete the planning work that leads to a credible, well-supported business plan.
Rather than focusing only on producing the document, this session equips counselors with a practical process for helping entrepreneurs move from idea to validated assumptions, stronger financial projections, and a well-supported business plan.
Learning Objectives:
Strategic planning is essential for effectively operating and growing a business. It is particularly valuable for small businesses, as it enables them to focus their limited resources on the most critical priorities and pursue the most promising opportunities for growth.
By establishing clear goals, defining priorities, and implementing thoughtful execution strategies, small businesses can maximize their impact and significantly increase their chances of long-term success.
For entrepreneurs and small business owners, strategic planning provides the clarity, structure, and direction necessary to navigate an increasingly competitive marketplace. Without a well-defined strategy, businesses risk misallocating resources, losing market share, or experiencing declining profitability.
A carefully developed strategic plan serves as a roadmap that guides decision-making and supports the successful launch, growth, and sustainability of the business. In addition to providing direction, strategic planning can strengthen internal alignment and collaboration among team members. It can also lead to improved operational efficiency and cost management, ultimately driving higher productivity and profitability.
For these reasons, strategic planning is a fundamental practice for organizations of all sizes, enabling them to adapt to change, seize opportunities, and achieve sustained success.
Learning Objectives:
This interactive 60-minute session shows SBDC advisors how to use LivePlan as a practical advising tool from the first client meeting through ongoing forecasting conversations. Attendees will learn how to quickly set up a client, guide the 1-page pitch and business plan, and build a simple forecast that creates immediate value.
The session will also demonstrate how to use cash flow planning, funding scenarios, and what-if forecasting to support better client decisions and deeper engagement. Participants will leave with a repeatable framework, sample workflows, and collaboration tips they can apply with both new and existing clients. Ideal for both new LivePlan users and experienced users who want a more structured, outcomes-driven approach.
Learning Objectives:
Most small business owners have the majority of their personal wealth tied up in their business — yet fewer than 20% have a written exit plan. For SBDC advisors, this represents one of the highest-impact areas of client support: helping owners understand what their business is worth, what makes it sellable, and how to prepare for a successful transition.
This session draws directly from a curriculum developed and delivered by the Central Virginia SBDC, updated to reflect current market conditions and best practices in small-business exit planning. It is designed for SBDC advisors working with clients who are considering a sale in the next one to five years — as well as those who haven't yet thought about it but should.
Attendees will walk away with a practical framework for assessing client business sellability, a clear explanation of how small businesses are valued (SDE/owner benefit multiples), and an understanding of the key levers that increase both value and marketability. The session also covers the mechanics of a typical small business sale — from deal structure options (cash, seller financing, earnout) to transaction costs and realistic timelines — as well as the role of business brokers vs. DIY sales.
The presenter brings direct experience as a former business owner who sold her own company, as a CVSBDC advisor specializing in exit strategy, and as a business broker working with buyers and sellers in the sub-$2M market. The content is practitioner-tested, grounded in real transactions, and designed to be immediately applicable to advisors' client conversations.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
Too many startups seek funding before they have proof of a real problem or viable market. As SBDC advisors, we often meet clients who are emotionally attached to solutions but have not validated demand.
This session equips SBDC professionals with a practical coaching framework to help clients find proof of the problem and proof of the market before building, branding, or borrowing. Based on field-tested methods used in the Missouri SBDC’s “Proof to Profit” program and inspired by Diana Kander’s All In Startup, participants will learn how to coach clients through structured customer discovery, simple validation experiments, and early market testing.
Attendees will leave with ready-to-use tools, coaching scripts, and a repeatable validation roadmap they can immediately implement with startup clients to reduce failure, improve capital readiness, and increase long-term client success.
Learning Objectives:
As AI adoption increases among small businesses, clients will need to navigate the associated risks, which may include weakening brand authenticity, erosion of customer trust, or even the compromise of sensitive data.
This class reviews possible risks of unchecked AI use in small businesses and offers consulting suggestions to help clients manage AI use in the workplace. Presenters will draw on their backgrounds in small-business marketing and lending to discuss AI risk mitigation techniques across marketing, sales, and finance.
Presenters will also elicit discussion from attendees so participants can share timely AI observations and consulting insights with the group.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will learn how to help clients:
Every SBDC advisor will eventually sit across from a client who believes one hire is all it takes to get from $50K to $100K — and needs to know what to do next. But the tools we already have (SWOT, Business Model Canvas, resume review, interviews) don't capture the two variables that determine whether a first hire actually works: skills relative to the role, and flexibility relative to the business. The New Work Equation fills that gap.
This session introduces a practical hiring framework built around two 2x2 matrices — one that evaluates the candidate, and one that evaluates the employer. Attendees will move through three real case studies drawn from Katherine's experience as a small business owner who has hired from three distinct talent pipelines — the Troy SBDC's university-linked program, a national data science training program (QuantHub Data Scholars), and a traditional academic pathway.
Each case study places both the candidate and the employer on the matrix, revealing why some hires create momentum, some require intensive investment, and some drain resources regardless of how much flexibility the owner offers.
Juliana Bolivar shares how SBDCs can intentionally design talent pipelines by tying student roles to grants, contracts, and university programs — and why that structure benefits students, small businesses, and centers alike.
Kelsey Bickett makes the case that data science talent — often assumed to be out of reach for small businesses — is one of the most accessible and high-impact pipelines for non-tech founders looking to build or integrate technology into their operations. Unlike tech job boards, certification platforms, QuantHub's Data Scholars program develops candidates specifically for real-world business applications, not just technical credentialing.
The session closes with a risk-reduction framework — build the runway, chart the flight plan, keep the plane in the air — that reframes the advisor's role from safety net to cabin-pressure monitor: someone who helps clients detect early warning signs before the whole system fails.
Attendees leave with a matrix tool they can use in their next advising session, a pipeline model they can begin building in their own center, and a new way to answer the question their clients ask most.
Learning Objectives:
Dave Oetken shares a powerful approach that business advisors can use to guide clients beyond traditional business planning. Instead of starting with revenue projections and operations, this framework begins with the entrepreneur’s values, lifestyle goals, and personal priorities—creating businesses that are sustainable, aligned, and far less likely to lead to failure or burnout.
Dave walks through practical tools SBDC coaches can incorporate directly into their advising sessions, including the Wheel of Life, which helps entrepreneurs evaluate balance across health, relationships, finances, and personal growth. These exercises help clients clarify what they actually want their business to support—before they start building it.
The session also introduces several coaching techniques that advisors can use with clients right away, such as:
For SBDC coaches, this approach transforms advising from simply helping someone start a business to helping them build a business that truly supports their life goals.
Learning Objectives:
Most conversations about business exits stay conceptual. This is a true story of coaching an owner from “walking away” to a multiple six-figure exit. This practitioner-led session uses a detailed case study of a founder-owned landscaping business to pull back the curtain on what truly happens during a small business sale.
Presented by the sole advisor who supported the owner from three years pre-sale through closing, the session walks step-by-step through the preparation, valuation, marketing, negotiation, and transaction phases of a successful sale.
Attendees will follow the real decisions made along the way, including cleaning and substantiating financials, preparing assets and employees for portability, positioning the business for both strategic and financial buyers, determining fair value under different buyer lenses, assembling and coordinating a deal team, approaching potential acquirers, navigating negotiations, and managing the documents that ultimately governed the deal.
Important non-financial aspects, including emotional connection to the business, identifying with the business, and spousal or partner input, will also be examined. Rather than relying on textbook examples or online hype, this session focuses on the documents actually used, the challenges encountered, the expectations that had to be reset, and the moments where theory collided with buyer behavior and the deal was nearly lost - twice.
Participants will gain insight into Letters of Intent, valuation support schedules, buyer due diligence requests, and the emotional and financial realities owners face when selling their primary source of family income. While it may not be the role of SBDC advisors to serve as transaction representatives, understanding how real deals unfold equips advisors to better prepare clients long before a sale is on the table.
This session equips attendees with practical knowledge to help clients improve readiness, avoid common pitfalls, set realistic expectations, and experience the life-changing opportunity that a well-planned business transition can represent.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
This is an invitation-only program: America’s SBDC AI U is a focused, half-day AI Clinic designed to equip small business advisors with the foundational knowledge and practical resources needed to leverage the potential of artificial intelligence.
The exciting rise of AI tools and digital technologies is revolutionizing business models and sparking new opportunities for growth and innovation. This transformation offers both fresh industries and established businesses new avenues for expansion.
This invitation-only half-day event kicks off America's SBDC Rising Leadership Certification program, a nationally endorsed, year-long leadership experience that brings together selected SBDC professionals from across the country. Designed to elevate leadership practice, strengthen network connections, and expand professional impact, the program provides participants with opportunities to learn alongside peers, engage in meaningful dialogue, and build lasting relationships across the SBDC network.
During this kickoff session, participants will meet their cohort, review the program structure and expectations, discuss their leadership self-assessment results, and connect with their Leadership Circle. The session establishes the foundation for the year ahead and introduces participants to the experiences, relationships, and learning opportunities that will shape their certification journey.
Learning Objectives:
Note: This session is reserved for participants accepted into the current Rising Leadership Certification cohort. Questions about the program may be directed to Kelly Flint at Kelly@AmericasSBDC.org
Connecting the Dots: Cybersecurity in the Modern Manufacturing Space helps SBDC advisors confidently guide manufacturing clients through today’s most common cyber risks, where IT and operational technology converge and a “cyber event” can quickly become an uptime, safety, quality, or environmental incident.
The session equips advisors with a practical, manufacturing-friendly approach aligned to the NIST Cybersecurity Framework (CSF) 2.0 and the NIST Manufacturing Profile, translating standards into clear advisory actions that fit small and mid-sized manufacturers.
Participants learn how typical attacks (ransomware, credential theft, remote access abuse, perimeter device exploitation, and third-party/vendor access) progress from initial access to lateral movement and operational impact.
Advisors practice listening for key differences between business systems and production systems, and they use an advisor-ready 12-question intake to quickly surface the highest-risk gaps in areas like MFA, backups and restore testing, asset visibility across IT/OT, segmentation, remote access controls, patching cadence, endpoint protection, logging/alerting, and incident response readiness.
The session provides a simple green/yellow/red scorecard and a realistic 90-day roadmap that advisors can co-develop with clients, prioritizing the controls most tied to resilience and recovery. It also covers how cybersecurity increasingly functions as a revenue requirement through customer questionnaires, insurance underwriting expectations, and regulated supply chain obligations (for example, CUI and NIST SP 800-171 alignment), and shows how to map these demands to CSF outcomes and a documented plan.
Advisors leave with clear boundaries for their role, referral triggers for incidents or suspected OT compromise, and a curated set of trusted resources to share with clients, enabling immediate adoption in advising conversations and action plans.
Learning Objectives:
Cybersecurity is an important topic for small businesses, but many of them do not have the resources or knowledge to tackle it. There is no business too small to need a general understanding of its cybersecurity posture and how it can potentially mitigate risk.
As an advisor, this session will give you a better understanding of cybersecurity for small businesses and help you feel better equipped to talk to the businesses you advise. We understand that business owners do not have much extra time, so we offer actionable, understandable suggestions they can easily implement.
This session will cover issues small businesses may face and offer easy ways to mitigate cyber risk. Small businesses are often targets of attacks like ransomware, and sometimes hackers even use them to reach larger organizations.
We will talk about the most common ways small businesses are breached, and tactics they can take to keep their businesses and their employees safer online. We will also discuss cybersecurity policies and procedures that businesses should have in place, as well as what to do if something happens. We will cover resources for small businesses to help them evaluate their cybersecurity posture, prepare for cybersecurity insurance, and respond to a breach.
We will also have time for questions! Cybersecurity is vitally important for small businesses, which are the cornerstone of our economy. Businesses need usable information that they can understand. We aim to make cybersecurity something that every business feels confident about.
Learning Objectives:
Artificial Intelligence tools are rapidly being adopted by small businesses for marketing, research, and productivity. However, many business owners are unaware of the cybersecurity, privacy, and data risks that can come with these tools. At the same time, cybersecurity is one of the most difficult topics for advisors to discuss with small businesses. Technical language and traditional presentations often lead to disengagement rather than action.
This interactive session takes a different approach. Using a playful “Defense Against the Dark A[I]rts” theme, participants will explore common AI risks—from hallucinated information and data exposure to intellectual property concerns and over-automation—and the practical safeguards advisors can recommend to help clients use AI safely.
The session also serves as a live demonstration of how cybersecurity workshops can be made more engaging through storytelling, metaphors, and interactive exercises. Participants are encouraged to pay attention not only to the content but also to the delivery techniques used throughout the session.
Attendees will leave with practical strategies for helping small businesses adopt AI responsibly, protect sensitive information, and maintain strong cybersecurity awareness.
Learning Objectives:
Cyber Advising 101 equips SBDC business advisors to have confident, practical cybersecurity conversations with small business owners who are reluctant, overwhelmed, or disengaged. The session reframes cybersecurity as business risk, focusing on the impacts owners recognize immediately: downtime, fraud, lost customer trust, and contract or compliance failures.
Advisors learn how to start the conversation without jargon, reduce fear and resistance, and move a client from avoidance to action without positioning the SBDC as an IT provider. Participants practice an advisor-friendly approach that includes a simple opener, realistic objection handling language, and a repeatable 15-minute intake. The intake uses six plain-language questions to identify common exposures related to email access, financial accounts, backups, and payment change processes.
Advisors then apply a simple green-yellow-red scorecard to prioritize next steps and guide a client toward the highest impact controls, including multi-factor authentication, backup and restore testing, and payment verification procedures.
The session also shows how to integrate cybersecurity checkpoints into routine advising engagements such as LLC formation, business planning, hiring, e-commerce, and financial projections. Advisors leave with a 30-day action plan they can share with clients, plus clear “red flag” criteria for when to stop advising and refer to appropriate technical or incident response resources.
This training supports the North Star cybersecurity certification pathway and helps SBDCs meet NOFO-related expectations for cybersecurity capability across the network.
Learning Objectives:
In the last decade, U.S. businesses have launched over half a million successful crowdfunding campaigns raising over $6B dollars from their communities. Join this session to learn how your SBDC colleagues are opening new routes to funding for small businesses of all sizes, from idea-stage sole proprietors to established corporations via crowdfunding.
Hear first-hand from regional directors and consultants the methods they are using to introduce crowdfunding to their colleagues and clients. Learn about the rubrics your peers are using to determine if crowdfunding is a good fit for a business and a process to support clients in preparing for and launching successful campaigns.
We’ll also discuss potential challenges when introducing businesses to this less familiar capital-raising tool, as well as resources for professional development.
The session will begin with a brief overview of crowdfunding, followed by a panel discussion moderated by crowdfunding education leader Kathleen Minogue of Crowdfund Better®.
Learning Objectives:
With rising costs and excessive fees associated with payment processing, this workshop will be a useful resource for both SBDC Directors and Advisors and Small Business Owners to navigate best practices and useful tips to implement the appropriate measures to reduce costs and retain customers. Small businesses preparing to newly open or well-established businesses looking to cut overhead will learn about current and emerging technologies, including how AI is being utilized to make purchases, automate inventory, and prevent fraud.
Learning Objectives:
Break-even analysis is one of the most useful tools in small business finance, and one of the most underused. Most business owners have a rough sense of what they need to make, but they cannot tell you the exact revenue number at which they stop losing money and start making it. Their advisors often cannot either.
This workshop teaches SBDC advisors how to calculate break-even for any small business in under 10 minutes, and more importantly, how to use that number in client conversations about pricing, hiring, expansion, and survival. We will work through the math live (it is simpler than most people think) and then apply it to real scenarios that SBDC advisors encounter every week.
We will cover: the break-even formula and how to calculate it for any business type (service, product, mixed), how to use break-even to evaluate pricing decisions before a client makes them, why contribution margin matters more than gross margin for most small business decisions, how to stress-test a client's business by asking what happens if revenue drops 20%, and how to frame break-even conversations so clients actually engage instead of glazing over.
This is math that fits on the back of a napkin. No spreadsheet required (though we will show you one you can take home). The goal is to give advisors a tool they can pull out in any client meeting to ground the conversation in actual numbers instead of gut feelings.
Advisors who attended last year's Profit Mastery workshop will find this is a natural next step. New attendees can follow along without prerequisites.
Learning Objectives:
This session equips SBDC advisors with practical tools, frameworks, and communication strategies for leading cash flow discussions that resonate with hospitality clients. Participants will learn to translate complex financial data into actionable insights, uncover hidden pressures in revenue, cost, and labor, and support clients in making strategic decisions that improve financial stability and profitability. Understanding cash flow is critical for hospitality businesses, yet many advisors find it challenging to guide clients in translating financial reports into actionable decisions.
Restaurants, cafés, and food businesses often operate with tight margins, fluctuating sales, and seasonal pressures, making cash flow clarity essential for survival and growth. Advisors who can confidently navigate these conversations with food business entrepreneurs strengthen both client outcomes and economic impact milestones. The goal is to empower advisors to feel confident in bridging the language & culture gap that can exist between hospitality and business so that clients make informed financial choices.
Aligned with the theme “Stronger Together,” this session highlights how advisors and clients collaborating around cash flow can drive measurable impact. Outcomes include improved client decision-making, increased capital readiness, strengthened financial performance, business stabilization, and long-term sustainability. Additionally, advisors will leave with enhanced skillsets and confidence, allowing them to guide future clients with clarity and authority. By combining mindset reframing, practical tools, and exercises, attendees will gain both knowledge and confidence to transform financial discussions from overwhelming to actionable — helping hospitality businesses thrive while strengthening advisor expertise and impact across their SBDC programs.
Learning Objectives:
Cash flow kills more small businesses than bad ideas. A business can be profitable on paper and still run out of money because the owner did not see the gap between when cash goes out and when it comes back in. SBDC advisors know this, but most do not have a simple forecasting tool to put in a client's hands that will actually get used.
This workshop introduces a 13-week cash flow forecast that any business owner can maintain in 15 minutes a week. It is not a complex FP&A model. It is a practical, rolling forecast that answers the only question most small business owners care about: Will I have enough cash to cover the next three months? We will build the forecast live during the session using a real (anonymized) small-business example.
Advisors will see exactly how to set it up, how to teach a client to maintain it, and how to use it in advisory conversations to help clients make better decisions about timing, spending, and growth.
We will cover: why the cash flow statement is not the same as a cash flow forecast and why you need both, how to build a 13-week rolling forecast from scratch using a simple spreadsheet, the three inputs that matter most (receivables timing, payables timing, and recurring obligations), how to use the forecast to spot cash crunches 6 to 8 weeks before they happen, and how to coach clients to maintain it weekly without it feeling like homework.
This is the workshop for advisors who are tired of hearing "I am profitable, but I have no cash" and want a concrete tool to turn that conversation around.
Learning Objectives:
This dynamic session brings SBA’s Working Capital programs to life through a real-world case study, lender insight, and direct guidance from SBA leadership. We will begin with a walkthrough of the 7(a) Working Capital Pilot (WCP) Program, including delegated authority, lender approval pathways, and how WCP provides flexible, transaction-based working capital solutions for growing businesses.
A local business owner who successfully secured WCP financing will share their experience, alongside a participating preferred lender from SBA’s WCP delegated lender list, WCP-PLP-Lenders- explaining how the deal was structured, underwritten, and funded.
This discussion will provide practical insight into documentation, underwriting expectations, collateral considerations, and how advisors can better position clients for approval.
SBA leadership will then provide an overview of the newly launched 7(a) Manufacturers’ Access to Revolving Credit (MARC) program. MARC is a distinct 7(a) delivery method designed specifically for manufacturers (NAICS 31–33), offering up to $5 million in term or revolving working capital with maturities up to 20 years for revolving structures and a maximum guaranty of $3.75 million. Appendix 13 7(a) Manufacturers'…SBA will clarify eligibility, guaranty limits, delegated (PLP) vs. non-delegated processing, underwriting standards, including 1:1 debt service coverage requirements, collateral expectations, and post-closing review requirements for revolving facilities.
This session is designed to ensure SBDCs and capital advisors fully understand how WCP and MARC can be deployed strategically, how lenders process these loans under delegated authority, and how to position clients — especially manufacturers — to successfully access SBA-backed working capital.
Learning Objectives:
Small business advisors frequently assist entrepreneurs in navigating federal tax responsibilities and interacting with IRS systems and resources. As the IRS continues to expand its digital services, it is increasingly important for advisors to understand the online tools available to help small businesses access tax information and manage their responsibilities more efficiently. This facilitated discussion will introduce SBDC advisors and community partners to key IRS online tools and resources, including the IRS Business Tax Account, online payment options, and digital information available on IRS.gov. Participants will learn how these tools can help small businesses complete common tax-related tasks and access important information online. The session will also provide an opportunity for advisors to share their experiences working with entrepreneurs and discuss how small businesses currently use these tools. Participants will exchange practical insights, identify common challenges encountered when navigating IRS digital services, and discuss opportunities to improve awareness and usability. Through an open and collaborative conversation, participants will gain greater familiarity with IRS online resources while contributing perspectives that can help ensure these tools remain accessible and useful for the small business community.
Learning Objectives:
The 7 Minute Conversation™ has helped thousands of advisors quickly understand the story behind a business’s financial statements and guide better client conversations—without overwhelming owners with data. In this session, Mike Milan demonstrates how that proven framework is reimagined and amplified using AI-powered advisory tools.
Attendees will see how the Clear Path To Cash methodology uses six core calculations to surface what truly matters in a business, identify the real burning issue, and focus conversations on decisions instead of reports. Mike then shows how the AI-powered Clear Path To Cash app accelerates this process by interpreting financial statements, identifying patterns, and highlighting risk and opportunity before the conversation even begins.
This session is not about replacing advisor judgment with AI. It’s about using AI to remove noise, save time, and strengthen the human conversation that builds trust and clarity. Advisors learn how to walk into meetings prepared, confident, and ready to guide business owners through meaningful decisions in minutes.
Designed for SBDC advisors, counselors, and small business professionals, this session delivers a practical, repeatable approach that can be used immediately in client meetings, workshops, and follow-up advisory engagements.
Attendees will leave with the ability to conduct a powerful 7 Minute financial conversation that business owners understand. Use AI insights to focus advisory discussions on what matters most, translating financial data into clear, actionable next steps.
Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
The Love It or List It workshop offers a practical, interactive learning experience for professionals involved in—or interested in—small business lending. Designed to mirror real-world decision-making, this session helps participants evaluate loan requests through a lender’s lens while staying grounded in today’s market realities.
Participants will work through real small-business loan scenarios, reviewing deal structures, identifying strengths and weaknesses, and voting to either “Love It” or “List It.”
After each vote, we’ll reveal the real lender outcomes and discuss how participant assessments aligned—or didn’t—with final credit decisions.
This hands-on format deepens understanding of lender criteria and the nuanced trade-offs involved in approving or declining financing requests. Key takeaways include: Hands-On Deal Evaluation. Engage directly with real loan requests to build practical experience in assessing creditworthiness, risk, and deal structure.
This immersive approach strengthens participants’ confidence and judgment in lending decisions. Identifying and Mitigating Weaknesses Learn to spot common pitfalls in loan applications and explore strategies for addressing weaknesses before a deal reaches a lender’s desk. Coaching Borrowers Toward Better Outcomes Discover how to help borrowers shift from “how much can I get?” to “what does my business truly need?”—a core principle of responsible lending and effective SBDC coaching.
Finding the Right Lender Fit: Understand how to match borrowers with appropriate lenders, both locally and beyond their immediate market, to expand financing options and improve approval outcomes. Current Market Trends and Challenges: Gain insight into today’s lending environment, including economic conditions and industry-specific headwinds, to contextualize better and evaluate loan requests.
Participants will leave with sharpened evaluation and decision-making skills, stronger technical knowledge, and practical tools they can apply immediately to assess loan applications and support small businesses in achieving their financial goals.
Learning Objectives:
Raising capital is one of the most important—and often most challenging—steps for small businesses seeking to grow. But the decisions entrepreneurs make long before they plan to raise money can significantly affect their future funding options.
This interactive workshop, hosted by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Small Business Advocacy Office, is designed to help business advisors and ecosystem partners understand why helping their clients learn about capital raising early prevents common pitfalls and positions them for success when new opportunities arise. Most early-stage companies don’t think the SEC has anything to do with them, but taking any investments – including loans from family and friends - likely requires a securities law exemption. During the session, SEC representatives walk attendees through common ways companies raise capital, the regulatory considerations that matter most early on, and the resources the SEC develops to help small businesses navigate this landscape with confidence.
Participants are introduced to the Office’s interactive Navigator tool, glean insights from national and state-by-state geographic data on capital raising from across the country, and receive plain language guidance to help business advisers build the foundational knowledge needed to support their clients through a compliant fundraising process—whenever they choose to pursue investment capital.
Throughout the workshop, attendees are encouraged to ask questions, share observations from their work with entrepreneurs, and offer feedback on how the SEC can better support ESOs, small businesses, and investors.
By the end of the session, participants leave with a clearer understanding of the SEC’s role in the small business ecosystem, a greater appreciation for why early knowledge of capital raising rules matters, and actionable tools they can use or share within their communities. The session also creates a direct channel to share insights with the SEC—feedback that informs future improvements to capital raising policy and educational resources.
Learning Objectives:
Access to capital is one of the most common challenges entrepreneurs face when starting or acquiring a business. While SBDC advisors often focus on traditional funding sources such as bank financing, SBA loans, and investor capital, many entrepreneurs also have retirement savings that may be available to fund a business venture.
This session introduces SBDC advisors to ROBS (Rollover for Business Startups), an often overlooked funding strategy that allows eligible individuals to use retirement funds to start or buy a business without taxes and penalties when structured properly. Although the strategy has existed for decades, many entrepreneurs—and many advisors—are unaware that retirement funds can legally be used as startup capital. SBDC advisors will learn how a ROBS arrangement works, including the basic structure, key compliance considerations, and when this funding strategy may or may not be appropriate for a client.
The session explains how retirement funds can be invested in a new business to provide startup or acquisition capital, and how this approach differs from taking a taxable distribution or borrowing from a retirement account.
The workshop also explores the types of entrepreneurs for whom this strategy may be a fit, such as individuals seeking to start a business, acquire an existing company, or meet equity requirements for other financing.
ROBS funding may be used as the equity injection for an SBA-guaranteed loan. SBDC advisors gain practical knowledge that helps them recognize situations where retirement funds may represent a potential funding source for clients.
The session also acknowledges that some advisors have concerns about entrepreneurs using retirement funds for business ventures. Rather than advocating for or against the strategy, the goal is to ensure SBDC advisors understand how it works so they can help clients evaluate the option thoughtfully and make informed decisions based on their individual circumstances.
Throughout the session, real-world examples illustrate how entrepreneurs use retirement funds to launch or acquire businesses. Advisors leave with a clearer understanding of how this funding strategy works and how it fits within the broader landscape of small business financing options. By expanding awareness of this lesser-known funding option, SBDC advisors can better assist clients in evaluating the full range of capital access strategies available to support business creation and growth.
Learning Objectives:
Capital readiness is one of the most common challenges facing small businesses. Advisors routinely work with clients who are strong operators but struggle to produce clean, lender-ready financials. In our recent survey, 60% of small business owners don't have a clear view of their financials. Advisors see this most clearly when they try and secure a loan – missing bank reconciliations or incomplete P&L statements often delay underwriting and/or reduce confidence from lenders. This session provides a practical, advisor-focused checklist for helping small businesses become capital-ready before they apply for funding. Advisors will learn the core financial elements lenders expect (e.g., SBA DSCR requirements) and how to prepare clients to meet those requirements within Xero. The workshop presents a clear, repeatable checklist advisors can apply with clients. It covers common breakdowns in financial documentation, how to transition businesses from spreadsheets to Xero, and the steps required to produce accurate, lender-ready reports. Using practical examples, the session shows how accounting software like Xero can support this process through bank reconciliation, invoicing, and financial reporting.
Learning Objectives:
Most small business owners receive financial statements they do not read. Not because they are lazy, but because nobody ever taught them what the numbers mean or what to do with them. SBDC advisors are in a unique position to change that, but only if they have a repeatable framework for walking clients through the basics.
This workshop gives advisors a practical, jargon-free method for teaching clients to read their three core financial statements: the income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement.
We will work through real examples (anonymized) and identify the five numbers every business owner should check first, why those numbers matter, and what questions to ask when something looks off. This is not a CPA-level accounting course. It is a field-tested approach built from teaching thousands of business owners in live Profit Mastery seminars.
Advisors will leave with a step-by-step process they can use in their next client meeting. We will cover: the income statement and why revenue is not profit, the balance sheet and what it actually tells you about business health, the cash flow statement and why profitable businesses still run out of cash, the five numbers to check first and the questions each one should trigger, and common mistakes advisors make when reviewing financials with clients.
This workshop is designed for advisors at all levels of experience. New advisors will get a solid foundation. Experienced advisors will pick up techniques for making financial conversations stick with clients who have historically tuned out.
Learning Objectives:
Attendees will learn various reasons why loan requests are declined, understanding lenders concerns and how loans are underwritten, including but not limited to the importance of: personal credit history and minimum credit scores, industry and management experience, cash injection requirements, liquidity after the cash injection, collateral requirements (including a lien on their primary residence in states that allow it), personal guarantee and limited guarantee of spouse, if applicable, alternate sources of income, global cash flow analysis and household debt to income ratio. Attendees will also learn the elements of a loan package, such as a business plan or pitch, financial projections and underlying narrative financial assumptions, personal financial statement, past three years of complete federal personal tax returns (personal and for all businesses in which they have an ownership interest), draft or executed lease for the business location or draft or executed Agreement of Sale or Letter of Intent for property to be purchased, and entity formation documentation including Operating Agreement and EIN if already an established business. Lenders will likely require bank statements to verify the source of the equity injection. In addition, attendees will also learn how to prepare clients to address lenders’ concerns by inquiring about their credit score, how to handle questionable credit situations, addressing industry and management experience, how to determine and address cash/equity injection requirements, addressing alternate sources of income, providing assistance with preparing financial projections and helping clients understand lenders concerns when leasing property and suggestions for negotiating lease terms.
Learning Objctives:
Attendees will leave the session with knowledge of the various reasons why loan requests are declined, lenders’ concerns and requirements, how loans are underwritten, and how to prepare clients to address those concerns and requirements before applying for a loan.
Welcome to Tuesdays' General Session Emceed by Joe Cooper
The Power of Our Network, The State of Small Business
2026 State Stars - presented by America's SBDC Board Chairman, Byron Hicks
Welcome to Wednesdays' General Session Emceed by Joe Cooper
The Advisor’s Role: Evolving for Future Growth:
AI: Growth Potential Across All Fields
Advisors working in minimally funded SBDC programs often serve large geographic regions while operating with very small teams, and in some cases as the only advisor in a center. These environments require creativity, adaptability, and strong professional networks to maintain high-quality client service despite limited staffing and resources. This facilitated roundtable provides a dedicated space for advisors from minimally funded states and small centers to connect with peers who understand these unique challenges. The Small But Mighty Roundtable is designed as an interactive discussion rather than a lecture. Participants will engage in live polling to identify the topics most relevant to the advisors in the room. Based on those results, attendees will break into small discussion groups focused on priority areas such as managing client demand with limited staff, building partnerships that expand a center’s capacity, improving outreach with minimal resources, serving large rural or statewide service areas, and identifying tools or systems that improve advisor efficiency. Participants will share practical strategies, lessons learned, and approaches that have worked within their own centers. The goal is to surface real-world solutions used by advisors operating in similar environments and to strengthen connections among peers across the SBDC network. Attendees will leave the session with practical ideas they can apply in their own centers, new connections with advisors facing similar challenges, and opportunities to stay engaged through the Small But Mighty advisor community.
Learning Objectives:
The Next-Gen Collective Interest Group welcomes the active participation of SBDC leaders from the 63 state-networks in identifying challenges, opportunities, and new approaches to nurturing a highly motivated and experienced SBDC workforce.
Grounded in the group’s mission to curate next-generation best practices in professional development and training, this facilitated discussion relies on peer exchanges and small-group breakouts to tackle the leadership and workforce challenges SBDC centers face today.
Participants compare approaches in three domains: technology enablement, workforce dynamics, and leadership development, and translate insights into practical actions they can apply immediately. Volunteer Next-Gen Collective ambassadors guide the conversation, capture key takeaways, and share a curated bundle of peer-tested resources attendees can bring back to their centers.
This facilitated discussion is ideal for SBDC Advisors, Instructors, Directors, and client-facing staff and coordinators
Learning Objectives:
Supporting SBDC advisors, instructors, and leaders, as well as the small businesses they serve, the facilitated discussions will focus on the next generation of technology, workforce dynamics, integrated operations, and leadership development.
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
America's SBDC Capital Access Interest Group will host a collaborative session to recap the key discussions, lessons, and insights from our 2025 monthly meetings. Throughout the year, this group has brought together SBDC leaders, capital specialists, lenders, and ecosystem partners to explore practical strategies for improving how SBDCs help small businesses access capital.
Topics over the past year have ranged from building dedicated capital centers within SBDC networks, identifying the most effective lending partners for referrals, and working through real-world financing challenges faced by advisors and their clients.
These conversations have created a space for peers across the country to openly discuss difficult deals, share solutions, and learn from one another’s experiences placing capital in diverse markets.
This session will serve as an open forum for advisors and program leaders to bring their questions, comments, and challenges related to capital access.
Participants will explore how the SBDC network can continue evolving its role as a trusted intermediary between entrepreneurs and funding sources.
The discussion will also examine how emerging tools are changing the capital access landscape. Participants will review how AI-driven financial analysis tools can help advisors analyze financial statements more efficiently, prepare clients for funding, and strengthen capital readiness. In addition, the session will highlight fintech platforms such as Fundica and MStreetX that help advisors identify grants, public funding programs, and lending opportunities that go beyond traditional financing channels.
As artificial intelligence and automation begin reshaping financial analysis and lending workflows, SBDCs must adapt to remain relevant and valuable to the small businesses they serve.
This session will focus on how advisors can leverage technology while continuing to provide the human expertise that entrepreneurs and lenders rely on—interpreting financials, structuring deals, and connecting businesses to the right capital at the right time.
Ultimately, the session will help define how SBDCs can strengthen their role as capital matchmakers and trusted financial advisors in an evolving technology-driven landscape.
Learning Objectives:
Join the Cybersecurity Interest Group’s annual convening to connect with SBDC advisors and program leaders working to strengthen small business cyber readiness nationwide.
This session will highlight the group’s purpose and priorities for the year ahead, surface timely cybersecurity developments that affect advising and programming, and provide a structured opportunity to share successful initiatives, partner models, and tools that are working in states and regions.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will leave with practical takeaways they can apply immediately, including a short professional development segment and a clear pathway to contribute resources, collaborate on new initiatives, and support conference-quality training content for the broader SBDC network.
Annual meeting of the America's SBDC Training Interest Section, bringing together training professionals from across the network to share best practices, discuss emerging issues, and connect with peers.
Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
A meeting for the America's SBDC Procurement/Government Contracting Interest Group (open to all event attendees)
Learning Objectives:
National forum on veteran business owners and entrepreneurs. The group compiles and shares information, tools and best practices, while coordinating with America’s SBDC staff on information for the network to better serve veteran clients. Open to all staff with approval of the SBDC Network Director.
The session focuses on how companies can build stronger international partnerships by understanding the needs and expectations of foreign distributors and business partners. Much of international business training stresses what US companies should demand of their partners, but there is the other side of that partnership.
The central idea is that successful international business requires seeing the relationship from the partner’s perspective. Companies operating across borders face differences in culture, regulations, markets, and economic conditions, which makes communication and mutual understanding essential.
The session emphasizes the importance of collaboration, transparency, and support between suppliers and their international partners. Businesses that provide clear communication, appropriate resources, and flexibility are more likely to develop productive and long-lasting global relationships. It also highlights that international expansion requires patience and realistic expectations. Entering new markets often involves challenges, adjustments, and ongoing coordination between partners.
Overall, the attendees will learn that strong international partnerships are built on trust, cooperation, and a shared commitment to long-term success rather than short-term transactions. This knowledge enables the counselors to better assist clients in developing their go-to strategy and building on their current international business.
Learning Objectives:
All SBDC networks are required to have a minimum number of advisors certified to provide trade assistance. A popular way for networks to meet that requirement is to have counselors sit for the SBA Intermediate Exam. The exam has been updated in 2026 to reflect current programs, policies, and dynamics. Certified advisors are now also required to recertify every three years.
The Intermediate Level certification – created by the SBA, America's SBDC International Interest Section, and the International Trade Administration – covers topics such as Export Compliance, Export Marketing and Sales, Export Financing & Payment Methods, Global Logistics, Export Readiness and Resources, and Trade Counseling Best Practices.
In this two-session bootcamp, Aaron Miller, Chris Van Orden, Dulce Zahniser, and Bill Cummins will cover the information included in the examination, including recent changes to the curriculum. They will also provide study materials and tips that will help attendees prepare to pass the exam, become certified, and be counted among their network’s certified counselor base, as required by the SBA. After attending both sessions, attendees should be prepared to sit for the exam and are encouraged to plan to take it while in Atlanta or shortly thereafter. A process for pre-registering to take the exam will be communicated to registrants.
Learning Objectives:
All SBDC networks are required to have a minimum number of advisors certified to provide trade assistance. A popular way for networks to meet that requirement is to have counselors sit for the SBA Intermediate Exam. The exam has been updated in 2026 to reflect current programs, policies, and dynamics. Certified advisors are now also required to recertify every three years. The Intermediate Level certification – created by the SBA, America's SBDC International Interest Section, and the International Trade Administration – covers topics such as Export Compliance, Export Marketing and Sales, Export Financing & Payment Methods, Global Logistics, Export Readiness and Resources, and Trade Counseling Best Practices. In this two-session bootcamp, Aaron Miller, Chris Van Orden, Dulce Zahniser, and Bill Cummins will cover the information included in the examination, including recent changes to the curriculum. They will also provide study materials and tips that will help attendees prepare to pass the exam, become certified, and be counted among their network’s certified counselor base, as required by the SBA. After attending both sessions, attendees should be prepared to sit for the exam and are encouraged to plan to take it while in Atlanta or shortly thereafter. A process for pre-registering to take the exam will be communicated to registrants.
Learning Objectives:
Many small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) aspire to enter international markets, yet they often lack the preparation needed to succeed in exporting. Advisors and business support organizations play a key role in guiding entrepreneurs through the early stages of internationalization and helping them assess whether their businesses are ready to expand globally. This session presents practical checklists and advisory tools to help SMEs evaluate export readiness. It focuses on key aspects such as product differentiation, production capacity, market analysis, regulatory considerations, and logistics.
Drawing on real advisory experiences, the session highlights the common challenges SMEs face when internationalizing and provides practical strategies to help businesses avoid common mistakes. The presentation emphasizes a structured approach that advisors can use to support SMEs as they explore international opportunities. Participants gain practical insights and tools to strengthen advisory services and better prepare entrepreneurs for sustainable international growth.
Learning Objectives:
This session introduces SBDC advisors to the fundamentals of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and the practical strategies they can use to attract and support FDI clients. Advisors will gain a clear understanding of what FDI is, why it is important to national and regional economies, and how it intersects with the services SBDCs provide.
The session explores the motivations behind international clients' consideration of expansion into the United States, the factors that shape their investment decisions, and the common challenges they face when entering an unfamiliar business environment.
Advisors will learn how foreign investors typically approach early-stage market exploration, what information they seek, and where they often need guidance. The session highlights how SBDCs can create value through market insights, resource connections, and informed guidance.
By helping advisors understand the dynamics of FDI and the expectations of international firms, this session aims to build confidence, clarity, and consistency in serving FDI clients.
By the end of the session, advisors will be better prepared to engage foreign direct investment prospects, support their early-stage needs, and help guide them toward the resources essential for establishing and growing their operations in the United States.
Learning Objectives:
Attendees will leave this session with the ability to:
Export controls shape how manufactured goods and technology move across borders. This session introduces the reasons why export regulations matter for anyone advising companies engaged in international business.
This presentation explores the core concepts behind export controls: what counts as an “export,” the basic regulatory framework for controlled dual-use technologies and activities, and steps companies can take to ensure compliance with U.S. export laws. We’ll look at how consultants help clients in global markets and how to introduce export‑control rules to exporters.
By grounding these ideas in real‑world examples, the session helps participants recognize how export controls intersect with common consulting activities by sharpening their focus on this critical area.
Learning Objectives:
Cross-border e-commerce presents significant opportunities for U.S. small businesses to boost sales. Join this session for an interactive deep dive into e-commerce in South Korea and Taiwan, featuring Coupang. This U.S. technology company provides retail, restaurant delivery, video streaming, and fintech services to millions of customers. This session will cover e-commerce readiness, best prospect categories, fulfillment models, and key success factors.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will be equipped to:
Join your international trade colleagues for our annual in-person meeting for updates. Among other topics, we will address SBA's criteria for achieving and maintaining a recognized credential in trade, as well as hear from SBDCs on how they are supporting manufacturers. Join us for a lively and interactive meeting!
Learning Objectives:
This session introduces participants to the comprehensive tools and resources offered by USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) to help businesses succeed in global markets. Participants learn how FAS supports U.S. food and agricultural exporters through four critical pillars: financing solutions, market development opportunities, overseas support, and market intelligence.
The presentation covers practical strategies for reducing risk and improving cash flow through USDA’s Export Credit Guarantee Program (GSM-102), which enables exporters to offer competitive payment terms while ensuring timely payment.
Attendees will also discover how to leverage FAS-led trade missions, USDA-endorsed international trade shows, and cost-share programs that help businesses expand into new and emerging markets.
Additionally, the session highlights free data tools and reports developed by FAS, which provide actionable data and insights on foreign markets, regulations, and trade trends.
Join us to learn how FAS empowers U.S. food and agricultural businesses to compete globally—from financing to market access and beyond.
Learning Objectives:
SBDC clients often enter international markets with strong interest: trade show leads, distributor conversations, inbound inquiries, or digital traffic from overseas. Yet deals stall. Pricing conversations break down. Negotiations slow. Follow-up goes unanswered.
The problem is often not product demand. It is a sales strategy misalignment. This practical, advisor-focused session helps SBDC professionals better understand why international sales momentum slows after initial traction and how to diagnose the root causes.
Domestic sales tactics do not always translate across borders. Cultural expectations around hierarchy, negotiation pace, trust-building, language, and relationship development vary significantly. Without adaptation, clients may misinterpret silence, push too aggressively, or miss opportunities.
Participants will explore real-world case examples drawn from decades of global client experience and interviews with international business leaders. Advisors will learn how to ask better diagnostic questions when export clients report stalled deals.
Drawing lessons featured in The Secrets of Global Sales, this session connects day-to-day sales conversations to broader international growth strategy.
Advisors will gain insight into how sales approach, marketing messaging, communication style, and cultural expectations intersect — and how thoughtful adjustments can unlock stalled opportunities.
This session strengthens SBDC advisory effectiveness by equipping counselors with practical questions, real examples, and clear guidance they can use immediately to help clients close international deals more effectively.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
U.S. businesses, particularly manufacturers and growth-oriented firms, are operating in an increasingly competitive global landscape defined by supply-chain volatility, workforce constraints, and rapid technological change. At the same time, the United States holds a distinct advantage: a dense ecosystem of AI startups, research institutions, and technology providers, paired with a regulatory environment that is accelerating AI research, development, and commercialization.
This creates a unique “home field advantage” for U.S. companies to adopt AI faster, compete more aggressively, and leverage tools that many global competitors cannot easily access.
The Home Field Advantage: How AI Gives U.S. Businesses an Edge Globally explores how small and mid-sized U.S. businesses are using accessible AI tools to improve productivity, modernize operations, and strengthen global competitiveness.
The session focuses on practical, advisor-relevant applications of AI, including forecasting, supply-chain optimization, marketing efficiency, and decision support. Rather than positioning AI as a future-state or enterprise-only solution, this session emphasizes real-world use cases and commercially available tools emerging from the U.S. startup ecosystem.
Participants learn how to frame AI conversations with clients, identify appropriate entry points for adoption, and guide businesses toward responsible, scalable implementation. The session also addresses how faster innovation cycles and reduced R&D barriers allow U.S. firms to iterate more quickly, respond to market shifts, and compete against larger or lower-cost global players.
Advisors leave better equipped to help clients capitalize on AI as a practical competitive advantage—without overpromising or losing credibility.
Learning Objectives:
Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs) are currently facing a "perfect storm" of volatile tariff environments, shifting geopolitical trade lanes, and heightened consumer expectations for rapid delivery.
For the SBDC advisor, helping a client scale often means navigating a supply chain that feels rigged in favor of enterprise giants.
This lecture-style session, led by Flexport’s trade experts, pulls back the curtain on the modern supply chain. We will move beyond logistics theory to provide a practical roadmap for how SMBs can navigate the logistical and financial challenges of international trade.
Learning Objectives:
This panel discussion will focus on global trade finance options, including SBA OMT and EX-IM Bank guarantee programs. The program will also address how commercial lenders assess lending options and the best way to approach a bank for financing.
Learning Objectives:
Associate State Director Roundtable #1 of 3 (90 minutes) Exclusively for Associate State Directors, this roundtable provides a private, in-person forum for peer connection and candid discussion among leaders within the SBDC network. The session creates space for open dialogue around operational priorities, leadership challenges, and opportunities facing Associate State Directors. Participants will engage in a facilitated conversation designed to encourage the exchange of perspectives, experiences, and practical approaches from across the network. Topics will be announced closer to the event. Questions: please contact Kelly Flint at kelly@americassbdc.org
Learning Objectives:
State Director Roundtable #1 of 3 (90 minutes) Exclusively for State Directors, this roundtable provides a private, in-person forum for peer connection and candid discussion among leaders of the SBDC network. Facilitated by Andy Donahue, the session encourages open dialogue around current priorities, challenges, and opportunities facing State Directors. Topics will be announced closer to the event. One of the three State Director roundtables will feature a fireside chat with Bruce Purdy, offering an opportunity for direct conversation on issues relevant to the network. Questions: please contact Kelly Flint at kelly@americassbdc.org.
Learning Objectives:
Effective strategic planning is essential for SBDC network success and a core requirement of Accreditation. A strategic mindset and clear alignment build organizational capacity and communicate direction to both internal and external audiences. Equally important to the plan itself is the design of the planning process: a repeatable structure that engages leadership, staff, and client-facing locations across the full Network. This session presents a practical, inclusive approach to strategic planning that moves networks from planning to action. You will learn how to assess your ecosystem and stakeholders, align planning with Accreditation expectations, implement plans successfully, and sustain continuous learning and integration across the Network so priorities are translated into measurable outcomes.
Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, attendees will be able to:
Ready to assemble your Advisory Avengers team, starting with yourself? This isn't your typical professional development session. It's a 60-minute interactive experience where you'll discover your communication superpower, learn to stay regulated under pressure, and walk away with a personalized 30-day leadership playbook. Side effects may include unstoppable confidence, better client conversations, and actually enjoying Monday mornings.
Small business advisors face a real villain: the caseload paradox. High volume, high customization, and clients who bring symptoms instead of root causes, all in a market that shifts faster than any playbook. This workshop addresses the personal acumen that separates good advisors from great ones: the ability to communicate across personality types, dig beneath the presenting problem, and maintain intentional growth without losing yourself.
Participants begin with the Advisory Avengers Icebreaker, discovering their primary communication archetype: The Connector, The Strategist, The Energizer, or The Anchor. Through partner exercises, they practice "style flexing" to connect more effectively with diverse clients, directly impacting retention and outcomes.
Next, participants are introduced to the THRIVE Framework™, a six-part advisory operating system built on Trust, being Heard, Regulation, Identity, Value, and Empowerment. Through real-world client scenarios, they practice moving beyond surface-level symptoms to uncover root beliefs driving client behavior, using powerful reframe questions tied to three core belief patterns: Unworthy, Helpless, and Unlovable.
The session culminates with the Infinity Gauntlet exercise, where participants build a personalized 30-day plan using the 3-2-1 Method: three strengths to leverage, two skills to develop, and one bold move they've been putting off. Each of the six Infinity Stones maps directly to a THRIVE element, ensuring the plan is both actionable and grounded in the day's learning.
The superhero theme isn't just fun; it creates shared language, increases retention, and makes the hard work of self-development feel worth showing up for. Ideal for SBDC advisors, team leaders, and any professional ready to elevate their impact while enjoying the process.
Learning Objectives:
Building a cohesive communications ecosystem across a distributed network can be one of the most difficult challenges for SBDC systems. Many networks have talented staff, strong programs, and compelling success stories, yet still struggle with fragmented messaging, inconsistent branding, disconnected tools, and uneven adoption across centers.
This session presents a practical A-to-Z framework for building a communications ecosystem that supports clarity, consistency, and collaboration across a statewide SBDC network. Using the New York Small Business Development Center (NYSBDC) as a case study, the session walks through the process of designing and implementing a cohesive communications structure across multiple regional centers and outreach locations.
Participants will learn how core elements such as brand architecture, naming conventions, messaging frameworks, shared templates, and internal communications tools can work together to form a scalable ecosystem. The presentation highlights how these components help centers operate more efficiently while maintaining a clear and consistent identity across the network.
The session also examines the real-world challenges that arise when implementing statewide communications systems. Topics include balancing local autonomy with statewide alignment, coordinating across centers with different communications capacities, sequencing initiatives in a manageable way, and building adoption among staff.
Rather than focusing only on theory, the session shares practical lessons learned from NYSBDC’s implementation experience, including what worked, what required adjustment, and what other networks should consider when building or strengthening their own communications infrastructure.
Attendees will leave with a clear understanding of the components that make up a communications ecosystem and a roadmap for applying these principles within their own SBDC networks.
Learning Objectives:
By invitation only, this is the kickoff event to the Orientation to Managing an SBDC Network Program led by Andy Donahue, Minnesota State Director.
This session launches a year-long learning experience designed for new SBDC network leaders. Through live sessions and peer engagement, participants gain practical insight into leading an SBDC network, learn best practices from experienced leaders, and connect with peers across the network.
Participation is limited to one staff member per network to support open dialogue and confidential sharing. State Directors may attend or designate one staff member to participate. Staff below the State Director level must have prior approval from their State Director.
For more information, contact: Kelly Flint, Program Manager, Kelly@AmericasSBDC.org
Learning Objectives:
Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) are most often hosted by institutions of higher education, placing them at the intersection of community economic development and campus-based entrepreneurship efforts. At the same time, many universities have launched or expanded entrepreneurship and innovation centers focused primarily on students, faculty, and alumni engagement. While these missions are distinct, they can also overlap - creating powerful opportunities for collaboration as well as real risks of misalignment or unintended competition.
This facilitated discussion-based workshop is designed for SBDC Center Directors, Associate State Directors, State Directors, and senior staff who work closely with host institutions.
Participants will explore practical strategies for positioning SBDCs as highly complementary—and essential—partners within university entrepreneurship ecosystems.
Drawing from real-world examples at three very different institutions—a small private university, a regional public university, and a large research-intensive university—the presenters will highlight collaboration models that strengthen student entrepreneurship pathways, enhance experiential learning, support faculty and alumni engagement, and reinforce the SBDC’s value to university leadership.
These case examples will illustrate how SBDCs can serve as a bridge between campus-based entrepreneurship activities and real-world small business advising, validation, and growth support. The session will also address common friction points that arise when roles are unclear, governance structures are absent, or communication breaks down.
Participants will discuss where SBDCs and university entrepreneurship centers can unintentionally compete for resources, visibility, or institutional support—and how proactive alignment can prevent these challenges. Through guided discussion and peer exchange, attendees will reflect on their own institutional contexts and identify actionable steps to strengthen relationships with entrepreneurship centers, deans, provosts, advancement offices, and other campus partners.
The session will emphasize practical tools and positioning strategies that help SBDCs demonstrate their relevance to institutional priorities such as student success, community engagement, accreditation, workforce development, and alumni relations.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
Many leaders discover that moving from colleague to supervisor changes more than their title; it reshapes relationships, responsibilities, and expectations. Across the SBDC network, many professionals step into leadership roles after years of working alongside their colleagues as business advisors.
While advisors are highly skilled at guiding entrepreneurs through complex business challenges, supervising former peers introduces new leadership dynamics. New supervisors must establish clear expectations, build trust, and support team performance while navigating evolving relationships with colleagues who are now direct reports.
At the same time, many SBDC leaders continue serving as working supervisors, balancing client advising, team leadership, program delivery, partnerships, and operational responsibilities.
This session explores practical strategies for navigating the colleague-to-supervisor transition while empowering high-performing teams. Participants will examine the key mindset shifts required when stepping into a supervisory role and discuss approaches to strengthen communication, support advisor development, and clarify roles and expectations.
Through facilitated discussion and interactive exercises, attendees will reflect on common leadership challenges such as delegating effectively, managing competing priorities, and maintaining team morale during periods of change. Practical tools, including the Eisenhower Matrix and time-blocking strategies, will be introduced to help leaders prioritize important work and create space to support their teams. Participants will leave with practical frameworks and strategies to confidently navigate the transition from colleague to supervisor while empowering their teams for success.
Learning Objectives:
Is your team or your business leaders struggling to communicate effectively, especially in times of stress and uncertainty? Poor communication can feel like trying to navigate through dense fog. Leading to confusion, conflict, and disengagement, all of which hinder your team’s productivity and mental well-being.
If you’re noticing more misunderstandings, increasing stress, and diminishing trust, it’s time to clear the way. Bridging Communication Bias provides you with clear, actionable strategies to steer through the communication challenges that can cloud your team’s path.
Learn how to manage communication biases, eliminate emotional barriers, and foster trust. Master the essential skills for transparent, impactful communication that fosters stability and collaboration.
The Transformation? Your team and leaders will be equipped with the tools to prevent misunderstandings, resolve conflicts, and foster a supportive, resilient workplace. Communication will no longer be a source of stress—it will become a tool to strengthen bonds, boost productivity, and support the mental well-being of every team member. Effective communication isn’t just a skill.
It’s your team’s navigation system, guiding everyone toward clear, authentic, and consistent messages. Unlock the power of effective communication to create a healthier, more engaged, and productive team.
Learning Objectives:
Successful restaurants and food businesses are not built on talent alone—they are built on systems. Many entrepreneurs enter the food industry with strong culinary skills and passion, yet struggle to achieve consistent profitability and sustainable growth because the operational systems behind the business are not fully developed.
This session explores the seven core systems every restaurant and food business must implement to operate successfully and scale effectively. Participants will learn how strong leadership translates into building operational frameworks that support consistency, profitability, and team alignment.
Using practical examples from real food businesses, the session demonstrates how leaders can design systems that connect market research, menu strategy, inventory management, and operational decision-making into one cohesive structure. Attendees will learn how to use tools such as the Menu Engineering Matrix to evaluate the profitability and popularity of menu items, allowing them to strategically highlight high-performing dishes, improve underperforming items, and eliminate products that reduce operational efficiency.
This presentation also explores how data-informed decision-making—including sales analysis, customer feedback, and social media insights—can guide menu innovation, purchasing strategies, and staffing decisions. Participants will gain a practical understanding of how strong inventory standards and shared ingredient strategies improve food cost control, reduce waste, and streamline kitchen operations.
Beyond operations, the session emphasizes the leadership role required to implement and sustain these systems. Participants will learn how guiding principles, team training, and operational clarity create a culture in which staff understand not only what to do but also how the business expects work to be done.
Attendees will leave with a clear framework for evaluating their own businesses through the Research → Menu → Inventory → Profit loop, helping them identify the weakest system in their operation and develop an actionable improvement plan.
This session is designed for restaurant owners, food entrepreneurs, hospitality leaders, and small business advisors seeking practical tools to improve operational performance and build more resilient food businesses.
Learning Objectives:
SBDC advisors play a critical role in helping business owners move from ideas to action, yet many advisory relationships stall after the first meeting. This session introduces a practical, advisor-focused framework for guiding clients from initial concept through long-term growth while increasing repeat advisory engagement.
The session begins with establishing credibility in the first meeting by vetting business ideas using local market conditions, economic demand signals, capital feasibility, and risk indicators. Advisors will learn how to use industry, lending, and underwriting data to validate—or redirect—business concepts without triggering defensiveness, positioning themselves as trusted guides rather than opinion-based critics.
The discussion then shifts to turning vetted ideas into executable, fundable plans. Panelists will share how they sequence business planning, financial projections, cash flow analysis, benchmarks, and growth forecasts to support funding readiness and measurable progress without overwhelming clients. Attendees will gain insight into which tools most effectively convert one-time conversations into follow-up advisory sessions. As businesses mature, the session explores how advisors create ongoing value through recurring touchpoints such as annual reviews, updated financials and forecasts, valuation discussions, and capital planning tied to growth and technology needs. These strategies help advisors remain relevant beyond the startup phase and maintain long-term engagement.
The session concludes with practical guidance on staying top of mind with business owners and referral partners. Attendees will learn how to use workflow tools, alerts, and shareable industry insights to drive consistent, value-based outreach that encourages return visits and referrals from CPAs, lenders, and community partners. Co-facilitated by experienced advisors, this interactive panel session emphasizes real-world examples, actionable tactics, and repeatable workflows attendees can apply immediately.
Learning Objectives:
This session provides advisors with a practical framework for guiding business owners from the first meeting through long-term advisory engagement. Attendees will learn how to use data, planning tools, and outreach workflows to build credibility, drive repeat interactions, and increase advisory impact.
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
Participants step into a fast-paced, insight-driven session that sharpens their ability to recognize when challenges like turnover, low morale, or uneven performance are really symptoms of unclear expectations or fragile leadership systems. They’ll learn how to guide business owners toward solutions that strengthen culture, improve communication, and elevate performance, without relying on scripts, role plays, or lengthy activities.
This experience reframes consultants as leadership multipliers, people who expand the capacity of every owner they work with. It blends motivation, practical strategy, and real-world application to show how everyday conversations can unlock a leader’s confidence, clarity, and influence.
The core message woven throughout is that you are more than a consultant. You are a catalyst. You are the spark that turns overwhelmed owners into intentional leaders. You are the steady force behind stronger teams, healthier workplaces, and thriving communities. Every conversation you have is an opportunity to elevate someone’s potential, and when you elevate a leader, you elevate everyone they lead.
Learning Objectives:
What participants walk away with:
State Director Roundtable #1 of 3 (90 minutes) Exclusively for State Directors, this roundtable provides a private, in-person forum for peer connection and candid discussion among leaders of the SBDC network. Facilitated by Andy Donahue, the session encourages open dialogue around current priorities, challenges, and opportunities facing State Directors. Topics will be announced closer to the event. One of the three State Director roundtables will feature a fireside chat with Bruce Purdy, offering an opportunity for direct conversation on issues relevant to the network. Questions: please contact Kelly Flint at kelly@americassbdc.org
Learning Objectives:
Associate State Director Roundtable #2 of 3 (90 minutes) Exclusively for Associate State Directors, this roundtable provides a private, in-person forum for peer connection and candid discussion among leaders within the SBDC network. The session creates space for open dialogue around operational priorities, leadership challenges, and opportunities facing Associate State Directors. Participants will engage in a facilitated conversation designed to encourage the exchange of perspectives, experiences, and practical approaches from across the network. Topics will be announced closer to the event. Questions: please contact Kelly Flint at kelly@americassbdc.org
Learning Objectives:
Through America's SBDC Women Entrepreneurs & Leadership Interest Group’s monthly guest speaker series, participants have heard powerful stories and practical insights from women leaders across industries.
These conversations have revealed common leadership themes: resilience, influence, confidence, and the ability to navigate challenges as you build impactful careers. This interactive session will highlight the most meaningful lessons shared by these speakers and translate them into practical leadership strategies for SBDC professionals.
Participants will engage in small-group discussions and collaborative exercises to explore how these insights can be applied when advising entrepreneurs, building stronger teams, and supporting women business owners in their communities.
Attendees will leave with actionable leadership tools and one personal commitment to strengthen their own leadership practice while helping foster the next generation of women entrepreneurs.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will:
Associate State Director Roundtable #3 of 3 (90 minutes) Exclusively for Associate State Directors, this roundtable provides a private, in-person forum for peer connection and candid discussion among leaders within the SBDC network. The session creates space for open dialogue around operational priorities, leadership challenges, and opportunities facing Associate State Directors. Participants will engage in a facilitated conversation designed to encourage the exchange of perspectives, experiences, and practical approaches from across the network. Topics will be announced closer to the event. Questions: please contact Kelly Flint at kelly@americassbdc.org
Learning Objectives:
SBDC advisors are often challenged to serve a high volume of clients and complex demands, while being responsive, supportive and effective. With constant demands on their time and energy, many advisors experience stress and burnout.
This workshop focuses on self-leadership as an essential skill to manage stress, strengthen communication skills, and sustain high-impact advising over time. Participants explore how patterns such as taking responsibility for client outcomes, difficulty setting boundaries, and perfectionism can influence advising style, decision-making, and advisor-client relationships.
Through guided reflection, discussion, and practical application, attendees increase self-awareness and identify where they may be leading reactively rather than intentionally.
This session introduces a practical self-leadership framework that supports emotional regulation, clear communication, and effective boundary-setting.
Participants learn techniques to strengthen communication and human relations skills, including setting expectations, navigating difficult conversations, and empowering clients to take ownership of their decisions. Stress management strategies are integrated throughout the session to support advisor resilience without compromising service quality or professional standards.
Strengthening self-leadership not only supports advisor well-being, it also improves the quality of advising through clear communication, setting realistic expectations, and guiding entrepreneurs toward stronger decision-making.
Designed for both new and seasoned advisors, this session connects personal enrichment directly to professional effectiveness.
Advisors will leave with actionable tools they can immediately apply to manage their energy, reduce stress, and prevent burnout to support sustainable success for themselves, their clients, and their SBDC Center.
Learning Objectives:
State Director Roundtable #3 of 3 (90 minutes) Exclusively for State Directors, this roundtable provides a private, in-person forum for peer connection and candid discussion among leaders of the SBDC network. Facilitated by Andy Donahue, the session encourages open dialogue around current priorities, challenges, and opportunities facing State Directors. Topics will be announced closer to the event. One of the three State Director roundtables will feature a fireside chat with Bruce Purdy, offering an opportunity for direct conversation on issues relevant to the network. Questions: please contact Kelly Flint at kelly@americassbdc.org
Learning Objectives
Back by Popular Demand: Grant Freeman will be back to share how your clients can compete in the marketplace using AI tools. Last year, we saw very high engagement with the presentation “From Local to Legendary”.
The workshop was standing-room-only! You don’t want to miss this year! Check out Grant’s presentation from the 2025 Orlando event. Thryv President Grant Freeman returns to share a growth framework that helps small businesses master the customer journey with AI. Attendees will learn how to help SMBs stop spinning their wheels and start converting potential customers into lifelong fans. The growth framework outlines the steps to take and how to use AI to help a business get found faster online, win more customers, and keep them coming back.
Learning Objectives:
Small business owners are overwhelmed by marketing. Advisors are expected to help them clarify strategy, understand competitors, execute promotions, and make sense of digital channels—often with limited time and resources.
Artificial intelligence changes what’s possible, but only if advisors know how to frame and apply it responsibly.
This session equips SBDC consultants with a practical, human-centered approach to using AI as a support tool for core marketing work. Participants will explore how AI can accelerate market and competitor analysis, clarify positioning, support strategy development, and streamline execution across promotion, advertising, websites, and social media—without replacing advisor judgment or client insight.
The focus is not on tools for tools’ sake, but on where AI fits naturally into existing marketing principles. Advisors will learn how to use AI to help clients measure market share, identify competitive opportunities, test assumptions, and move from analysis to action faster and with more confidence. Attendees will leave with clear frameworks, language they can reuse with clients, and a stronger understanding of how to introduce AI in a way that reduces overwhelm, supports decision-making, and strengthens the advisor–client relationship.
Learning Objectives:
Artificial Intelligence is transforming marketing, sales, and customer engagement—but it’s also flooding the internet with automated content and “AI slop.” Many small businesses worry they can’t compete in a world where larger companies can generate unlimited marketing and automate everything. This session introduces AI² for Main Street, a practical advising framework designed to help small businesses compete in an AI-dominated world. Participants will explore how advisors can guide clients in using AI strategically for research, market insights, promotional ideation, and operational efficiency—without losing the qualities that make local businesses successful in the first place. But Artificial Intelligence is only half the story. Attendees will discover the second kind of AI that truly differentiates Main Street businesses and learn how advisors can help clients leverage both to build stronger customer relationships, stand out in crowded markets, and compete effectively in the age of AI. Advisors will leave with practical strategies they can immediately apply with small business clients navigating this rapidly changing landscape.
Learning Objectives:
Artificial intelligence tools are rapidly becoming part of how small businesses approach marketing. Yet many entrepreneurs struggle to use these tools effectively because they are asking AI to create marketing without first defining the strategic information that drives it. When businesses skip the foundational work of identifying customer segments, value propositions, messaging, and marketing priorities, AI-generated results are often generic and ineffective.
This session shows SBDC advisors how to guide clients through a simple process that turns real business data into actionable marketing plans using AI. Participants learn how to help clients organize the information AI systems need to produce useful marketing insights, messaging, and strategic recommendations.
Using practical demonstrations and real examples, this session illustrates how AI tools can analyze business information such as customer segments, CRM data, website analytics, competitive positioning, and industry trends to support marketing strategy development.
Advisors see how structured business inputs dramatically improve AI outputs, allowing entrepreneurs to generate meaningful insights, targeted messaging, and realistic marketing plans. The session also demonstrates how advisors can help clients transform this information into a structured marketing plan that includes defined target audiences, messaging strategies, marketing channels, and measurable goals.
Attendees will see how AI can assist in building these plans while still relying on the advisor’s strategic guidance and the client’s real business knowledge. By the end of the session, participants will understand how to move beyond basic AI prompts and use AI as a strategic tool to support informed marketing decision-making.
Advisors leave with practical techniques they can immediately use with clients to organize business data, guide marketing conversations, and help entrepreneurs turn insights into a clear marketing strategy.
Learning Objectives:
Artificial intelligence is transforming how businesses operate, yet many professionals still feel overwhelmed by where to start. This interactive session turns AI confusion into a practical skill in under an hour.
In “From ‘I Don’t Get AI’ to ‘That Actually Works!’ – Practical AI for Everyday Business,” participants learn how to use modern AI tools to complete real business tasks faster and more effectively. Rather than listening to a lecture about AI theory, attendees actively use AI during the session to create useful business content in real time.
Through guided exercises, participants discover how to write a professional follow-up email in seconds, generate engaging LinkedIn content in minutes, and apply AI to solve real business challenges they face in their daily work. The session introduces a simple prompt framework that dramatically improves AI results by providing clear roles, context, tasks, and constraints.
This beginner-friendly workshop requires no prior AI experience and uses free, browser-based tools that attendees can access immediately. Participants only need a laptop or smartphone and a willingness to experiment.
By the end of the session, attendees leave with practical workflows they can use the very next workday to improve productivity, streamline communication, and save hours each week. They also gain a deeper understanding of how AI works, why many people struggle to get good results from it, and how to guide AI effectively to support real business goals.
Designed for business leaders, entrepreneurs, sales professionals, and marketers, this session focuses on practical application rather than technical complexity. Participants walk away not just with ideas—but with content, tools, and repeatable techniques they can implement immediately.
Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
Search behavior is changing quickly. Entrepreneurs still hear advice about “doing SEO,” yet many struggle to understand why their websites are not appearing in search results or attracting customers online. At the same time, AI-powered search tools and Google’s evolving search features are changing how businesses are discovered and recommended. SBDC advisors are increasingly asked how websites, content, and search engines work together and what practical steps small businesses should take to improve their online visibility.
This session helps SBDC counselors better understand the fundamentals of search visibility and how to guide clients through the key decisions that affect whether their business can be found online. Rather than focusing only on technical SEO tactics, the session connects search strategy to the underlying business questions counselors already address with clients, including target customers, service offerings, geographic markets, and competitive positioning.
Participants will learn how search engines evaluate websites, how content and website structure influence visibility, and how emerging AI-powered search experiences are changing the way information is surfaced to potential customers. The session also explores common situations advisors encounter when working with clients, such as new websites that are not ranking in search results, service businesses competing in local markets, and entrepreneurs relying heavily on automated website or AI content tools without a clear strategy. Through real examples and practical guidance, participants will see how counselors can help clients clarify their messaging, identify relevant search terms, and structure website content in ways that align with how customers search.
Attendees will also receive two practical tools they can immediately use with clients: an SEO Easy Audit for Clients, which walks entrepreneurs through the key elements that affect search visibility, and an SEO Project Intake Form, designed to organize business information so AI tools can be used more effectively for keyword discovery, content planning, and website development. The goal is not to turn counselors into SEO specialists, but to equip them with a clear framework and practical resources they can use to help clients make better decisions about their websites and online presence.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
Scroll. Post. Hope for the best. Try to figure out if it worked. Repeat. Sound familiar? Social media is one of the most mystifying and frustrating marketing platforms for advisors and small businesses alike, and the landscape changes faster than most people can keep up.
This interactive workshop cuts through the noise to give business advisors a clear framework for guiding clients toward a smarter, more intentional social media strategy. Attendees will learn marketing fundamentals to build a foundation for a strong social media strategy; how major platforms rank and distribute content; how to help clients build a content mix that aligns with their business goals, connects with their audience, and drives real engagement; and strategies for responsibly integrating generative AI into the social media planning process.
Advisors will also receive two resources they can use with clients immediately: a social media content audit tool and an AI prompt library tailored specifically for social media strategy.
Learning Objectives:
This workshop explores the power of storytelling as a marketing tool for engaging and connecting with customers. Topics will include how to help clients craft authentic brand narratives that resonate with customers, align visuals and messaging for maximum impact, and how to use stories across different marketing channels.
Attendees will leave with practical tools and frameworks to guide clients in building an authentic brand story and sharpening their messaging, along with ready-to-use handouts.
Learning Objectives:
Social media has become one of the most powerful promotional tools for small businesses, but it also carries legal obligations that most entrepreneurs have never heard of.
The Federal Trade Commission requires clear and conspicuous disclosure any time there is a material connection between a business and the content being posted. This includes paid partnerships, gifted products, affiliate links, brand ambassador relationships, and even employee posts about their employer.
In 2023, the FTC updated its endorsement guidelines for the first time in over a decade, making it more important than ever for advisors to guide their clients on this topic. Understanding FTC compliance is an essential component of helping clients develop and execute any responsible digital promotion or advertising plan.
Advisors who can speak to this topic are better positioned to help their clients avoid risk while building a more credible and trustworthy online presence.
This 60-minute workshop gives SBDC advisors at every experience level a clear, practical understanding of FTC compliance as it applies to social media marketing. The session is built around three real-world client archetypes: the brand-new business just beginning to build a social media presence, the growing business starting to work with influencers or affiliate partners, and the established business with an existing social media presence that has never been reviewed for compliance.
Each archetype makes the content accessible to newer advisors while offering meaningful depth for more experienced advisors.
Learning Objectives:
The Mississippi SBDC Network delivered Digital Marketing Bootcamp 2.0 across rural and urban communities throughout Mississippi, serving over 500 entrepreneurs. Led by SBDC professionals Dr. Alexandria White (Training Specialist), Kendall Causey (Digital Transformation Lead), and Shirley (SBDC leadership), this initiative partnered with local organizations, universities, chambers, and nonprofits to increase digital literacy, AI adoption, and marketing readiness statewide.
Learning Objectives:
You know this client. Their financials look solid, their market opportunity is real, but they keep failing to execute on your recommendations. They can't delegate. They make decisions out of panic rather than strategy. They're working 80-hour weeks and burning out fast. You give them a clear action plan, and six months later, nothing has changed. Here's the truth: sometimes the problem isn't the business. It's the human running it.
Seventy-two percent of SBDC long-term clients are established, growing businesses. These aren't struggling startups. These are profitable companies with real traction, led by owners who are drowning in their own success. And when your best advice keeps hitting a wall, it's usually because you're solving the wrong problem.
This session gives you the frameworks and language to address what's really blocking your clients without turning into their therapist.
Miara Shaw brings a unique combination of high-stakes decision-making experience and strategic tools designed for leaders who need to address the human side of business without leaving their lane. She spent 15 years of her 27-year corporate career as one of the few Black female energy traders in the oil and gas industry, managing million-dollar transactions under extreme pressure.
That's where she learned to recognize the difference between a strategic problem and a capacity problem, between a business decision and a fear-based reaction. For the past 12 years, she has translated those insights into frameworks that help leaders guide clients through the messy human challenges that financial statements don't reveal.
In this session, Miara teaches you her frameworks for identifying when business problems are, in fact, human problems. You will learn five coaching questions that create client awareness without requiring you to diagnose or fix them. You will practice using business language to discuss sustainability, delegation, and leadership so it sounds like strategy, not self-help. And you will leave with clear boundaries on when to coach versus when to refer, plus scripts for starting these conversations without losing credibility.
You didn't sign up to be a therapist. But your clients would actually need more than technical advice. This session gives you practical tools to bridge that gap while staying exactly where you are in your zone of genius.
Learning Objectives:
Some of the most resilient entrepreneurs in your community are already doing the hard work. They just need a program built to meet them. SNAP recipients, immigrants, justice-involved individuals, people with disabilities, necessity-driven founders, veterans — these are people who have already demonstrated extraordinary resilience, resourcefulness, and motivation just navigating their daily lives. They're not waiting to be convinced that entrepreneurship is hard. They know it's hard. And they're already in your community, already hustling, and already closer to business ownership than most programs give them credit for.
They're not your hardest clients. They're your lowest-hanging fruit — and your single largest untapped source of new business creation outcomes. The missing piece isn't their drive. It's the program design.
Designing for the Edges introduces three frameworks that the most effective advisors are already using — they just didn't have names for them. The Curb Cut Effect. Universal Design for Learning. Asset-Based Framing. Together, these frameworks form a practical architecture for redesigning how you recruit, serve, and retain entrepreneurs who sit outside the traditional SBDC client profile.
You'll hear from three practitioners who have done exactly that — across programs serving DHR/SNAP participants in rural Alabama, rural artisan networks in Yucatan, Mexico, and community entrepreneurs navigating the gap between their skills and what formal systems require them to prove. Each case study traces a real before-and-after: what the program looked like, what was changed, and what happened when it was redesigned for the hardest client first.
The through line: every fix made for the most constrained participant made the program better for everyone. You'll leave with a program redesign table you can apply immediately — not as a complete overhaul, but as a targeted intervention. One intake question. One delivery format. One barrier you stop asking people to climb over before they ever get to the content.
The advisors in this room are already good. This session is about building systems as good as the people running them — and the language to make the case for it back at your center.
Learning Objectives:
Employing nearly half of private-sector workers, small businesses create economic opportunity in local communities and help drive innovation in the economy. Given this national significance, the Federal Reserve provides timely information and research on small business conditions and characteristics, credit experiences, and owner demographics.
The 12 Reserve Banks of the Federal Reserve System launched the annual Small Business Credit Survey (SBCS) to provide policymakers, service providers, and lenders with timely insights into small business conditions.
The survey is a national sample of small businesses (firms with fewer than 500 employees) and is a collaboration between the Federal Reserve and a diverse network of community and business groups throughout the country, including nearly 30 state and regional SBDCs.
These organizations encourage small businesses in their networks to complete the survey. This session will provide an overview of the SBCS survey and its reports, including recent findings from the 2026 Report on Employer Firms: Findings from the 2025 Small Business Credit Survey.
Attendees will discover the benefits of partnering with the Federal Reserve to distribute the survey, including free partner reports, which compare the organization’s network responses to the full national sample. Current SBCS partners are encouraged to attend and share their experiences with the SBCS partnership and data.
Learning Objectives:
This is a train-the-trainer session for SBDCs that want to design, launch, and scale AI training in their region, without necessarily needing to be AI experts themselves. This is for delivering real, timeless, practical AI training, not showing off shiny new AI tools.
West Central Minnesota SBDC shares the behind-the-scenes playbook for how we built and delivered a multi-phase AI training strategy from scratch, including the logistics, structure, sequencing, and go-to-market decisions that made it work.
This session does not teach AI tools or use cases. Instead, it focuses on how SBDCs can confidently deliver AI training through clear frameworks, repeatable formats, and realistic execution models. Many SBDCs know they need to “do something with AI,” but struggle with where to start, how to structure offerings, or how to move beyond one-off workshops.
This session breaks down the practical recipe we used to move from early experimentation to a cohesive, scalable training system aligned to the four stages of AI adoption:
Attendees will see how we layered multiple delivery formats under a single framework, including self-paced bootcamps, live demos, cohort-based learning, full-day conferences, peer learning, and paid custom engagements, all designed to meet entrepreneurs where they are and grow with demand. We will walk through what worked, what did not, and the adjustments we made along the way in real SBDC settings.
This session is designed for SBDC leaders, program developers, and advisors responsible for building or expanding AI training in their region. It is especially relevant for those navigating limited capacity, varying advisor comfort levels, and wide differences in client readiness.
Participants will walk away with:
This session is for SBDCs ready to move from “we should offer AI training” to “here’s how we actually deliver it.”
Learning Objectives:
Capital access is the number one service requested by small businesses, yet many SBDC networks lack a standardized system for training advisors to effectively guide clients through the increasingly complex capital landscape.
Many consultants support loan requests without formal training in identifying and mitigating the risks that a business owner or business brings to a funding request. At the same time, entrepreneurs are overwhelmed by a growing number of online funding platforms—many of which prioritize broker commissions over the best interests of small businesses.
This session presents a practical, scalable model for strengthening capital advising across an SBDC network while incorporating modern fintech tools that help advisors navigate today’s expanding funding ecosystem. Participants learn how to design or expand a Capital Center that standardizes advisor training, improves competency, and increases measurable capital infusion outcomes.
The framework includes advisor certification, structured curriculum, governance through a capital committee model, and tools that support consistent capital readiness guidance.
Using NorCal SBDC’s Certified Capital Advisor Program as a case study, presenters outline a training and certification process that equips advisors to help clients assess loan readiness and mitigate risks in funding requests.
Core curriculum elements include understanding the capital ecosystem, capital vocabulary fluency, risk mitigation strategies, credit memo literacy, loan product knowledge (including SBA and state programs), and the three primary drivers lenders evaluate when determining access to capital: credit, collateral, and cash flow.
Fundica CEO Mike Lee joins the presentation to demonstrate how responsible fintech platforms can expand an SBDC’s capital toolbox. Fundica’s AI-powered funding intelligence platform helps advisors and entrepreneurs efficiently identify legitimate city, county, state, and federal funding opportunities—including public loans, grants, and tax credits—through a white-label platform used by economic development organizations, lenders, and SBDCs.
Participants leave with a replicable blueprint to strengthen advisor skills, build diversified lender ecosystems, reposition declined deals, responsibly leverage fintech tools, and deliver consistent, high-quality capital advising across their network.
Learning Objectives:
Clients are increasingly arriving in your office with polished analyses and confident recommendations already in hand. The ideas sound well-researched and data-driven — until you start asking questions. That’s when you realize that your client’s eager new 24/7 employee — generative AI — may be involved. This 102-level session focuses on strengthening the consultant’s role when AI enters the conversation. Participants will explore how to move clients from interesting AI outputs to meaningful business insight. Using a realistic client scenario, attendees will examine a confident AI-generated recommendation, surface the assumptions behind it, and determine what questions should be asked before acting. The session introduces a practical framework for guiding clients through problem definition, assessing whether AI is appropriate, and refining outputs while keeping human judgment at the center. We will also discuss how context — including business constraints, data quality, and operational realities — shapes AI results, and how techniques such as context engineering and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) improve relevance without replacing expertise. Designed for SBDC consultants who have basic familiarity with AI tools, this session provides practical coaching strategies for navigating AI-driven client conversations. Participants will leave better equipped to reinsert professional judgment, manage risk, and help clients use AI as a support tool rather than a substitute for sound business fundamentals.
Learning Objectives:
This session equips SBDC professionals with a practical, outcome-driven way to guide small businesses through digital transformation without falling into “tool-first” recommendations. Digital transformation is framed as the intentional redesign of how a business creates value, delivers value, and learns, enabled by digital tools and data, with clear ties to resilience, competitiveness, and measurable business results.
Participants use systems thinking to diagnose what is really driving common client symptoms such as being “always behind,” recurring errors, unreliable numbers, and limited capacity to scale. Instead of treating these as software problems, the session shows how structures, workflows, incentives, and feedback loops often produce the outcomes clients experience, and how small changes in the right place can create outsized impact.
Attendees practice a lightweight advising workflow that fits real client engagements: clarify outcomes, map the work, identify leverage points, build a 90-day roadmap and pilot, then measure and learn. A simple People, Process, Technology, Data framework helps advisors pinpoint root causes, sequence improvements (simplify, standardize, then automate), and define success metrics before making any technology recommendation.
The session includes a practical digital maturity model (levels 1-5) and a rapid 10-question assessment that advisors can use immediately to baseline a client and prioritize next steps. Realistic case examples for service and product businesses illustrate common traps, quick wins, and metric sets that strengthen operational visibility and cash flow, such as days to invoice, A/R aging, stockout rate, inventory turns, and error or rework rates. Cybersecurity is treated as part of operations, with baseline controls that advisors can normalize and connect to business impact.
Participants leave with a repeatable way to facilitate stronger client decisions, design simple measurement loops, and deliver digital transformation guidance that sticks because it improves the whole operating system, not just the tech stack.
Learning Objectives:
SBDC advisors working with business owners of retirement age know succession planning belongs in the conversation. Getting it into the conversation is another matter entirely. Every owner will eventually leave their business. The question is whether they leave on their own terms — with the value they built intact, their employees taken care of, and their community anchored — or whether the business closes because no one had the conversation soon enough. This session draws on Philadelphia Commerce's Passing the Torch program and on behavioral research from ideas42 on why owners delay succession planning and what shifts when an advisor approaches the conversation differently. The centerpiece is the Succession Readiness Index (SRI) — a 10-question owner self-assessment and a 7-domain advisor interview, used together in a single conversation. Advisors leave with three ready-to-use tools: the SRI, the Succession Pathway Reference Card, and the Succession Planning Practice Guide. The SRI was developed in direct practice with 10 Philadelphia corridor businesses — it surfaces what owners have been privately circling, provides a structure for the conversation, and moves them toward a concrete action plan. We want to hear how it works for you—how you use it with clients and the adaptations you make in practice.
We're asking the network to help us make it more useful — because succession planning can make the difference between an owner closing the business or leaving behind something worth taking over. For center directors, succession planning is infrastructure. McKinsey's February 2026 analysis finds that the small-business support ecosystem is built for founding companies, not transferring them — a structural gap that leaves succession planning without a clear institutional mandate.
Baby Boomers, 30% of small business owners, and exiting at an accelerating pace, are the current wave. Gen X, the largest ownership cohort at nearly 49%, is right behind them, and Millennials, at 21%, and growing fast, are right behind Gen X. Three successive generations, each with different timelines, structures, and expectations. Centers that build this competency now are not preparing for a single demographic event — they are building a permanent practice area.
The capital activity that follows successful transitions — acquisition financing, employee ownership conversions, business sale transactions — is the return on that expertise, for clients and centers.
Learning Objectives:
The conversation about AI in small businesses has centered almost exclusively on generative tools: chatbots, content generators, and prompt-based assistants that respond when a user asks them something, but Agentic AI operates differently.
These are systems designed to take autonomous action on behalf of a user, executing multi-step tasks, making decisions within defined parameters, and interacting with other software without requiring human input at each step.
Agentic tools are already entering the small-business market through customer service automation, sales pipeline management, scheduling systems, and operational workflow platforms. Most small business owners encountering them do not have the vocabulary to evaluate what they are buying, and most SBDC advisors do not yet have the framework to help them. This session closes that gap.
Participants will develop a working understanding of how agentic AI differs from the generative tools that dominate current small-business AI conversations, what agentic systems can and cannot reliably do at the current state of the technology, and where governance and operational risks diverge from those associated with standard AI tools. The session draws on enterprise-level experience in agentic AI governance. It translates it into advisory frameworks that SBDC consultants can apply immediately to clients evaluating, purchasing, or already running agentic tools in their businesses.
This session is structured around the advisor role. Participants are developing the analytical and conversational competency to ask the right questions, identify the conditions under which an agentic tool is appropriate for a client's situation, recognize warning signs in vendor claims, and help clients establish the minimal governance structure needed before an autonomous system is deployed in a customer-facing or operationally critical context.
Learning Objectives:
Every SBDC network is required by statute to undergo an SBA financial examination every 2 years. In this presentation, we will provide an overview of the SBA financial examination process, as well as updates to the requirements and best practices for the financial administration of SBDCs. We will have time for attendees to raise questions of specific interest to their SBDC network.
Learning Objectives:
Every SBDC advisor in this room has fielded the same question in the last six months: "Should my business be using AI?" The AI for Main Street Act now formally requires our network to answer it. America's SBDC AI U gives advisors foundational knowledge through five excellent modules — but module completion alone doesn't prepare you for the moment a client sits across your desk and asks where to start.
This workshop bridges that gap. Advisors learn a three-phase discovery framework — Problem Profile, Solution Map, Readiness Assessment — they can run in a single client conversation without any technical background. The framework surfaces where a business loses time or money, maps those friction points to practical AI application categories, and scores readiness on three axes: data availability, process maturity, and team capacity. The core of the session is a 30-minute hands-on simulation. Participants work in work through realistic client profiles across four industries, run the full discovery sequence, and share findings, generating the same cross-portfolio pattern recognition that advisors need in the field.
Advisors leave with two tools: a one-page AI Conversation Starter card for client meetings, and a mapping guide that connects discovery outputs directly to AI U modules for targeted follow-up. This is not a technology overview or a product demonstration. It is a train-the-trainer session that gives advisors a practical method for the AI conversations they are already having — and a framework that improves with every client interaction.
Learning Objectives:
*Intended Audience is Associate State Directors and State Directors
Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) are vital engines for local and state economic growth—providing counseling, training, and tools to help entrepreneurs start, scale, and thrive. To extend impact and build sustainability beyond public funding, thoughtful sponsorship engagement is becoming an increasingly strategic tool for SBDC leaders.
This moderated discussion will bring together directors from across the SBDC network to share actionable insights, tested approaches, and peer-to-peer learning on how sponsorships can bolster program capacity, deepen community partnerships, and amplify your center’s reach.
Sponsorship isn’t just revenue—it’s relationship building. Many state and national SBDCs have successfully integrated sponsorship into major events and program offerings. Many SBDC programs have offerings with sponsorship opportunities that deliver brand visibility, thought leadership roles, and direct engagement with SBDC attendees. Learn from your colleagues and show up willing to share what has worked in your program. A survey will be offered where results will be shared to attendees on what sponsorship activities are working across the country.
Learning Objectives:
This session will provide SBDCs with up-to-date knowledge of Administration priorities, SBDC Program policies, and highlight recent efforts to increase Program efficiency and streamline processes. We will also discuss the CORE Award Reporting Schedule to maintain compliance and prioritize report submissions.
Further, we will also address and review policies for matching funds and program income. Finally, we will provide guidance on completing the required financial forms effectively, using practical examples for clarity.
Learning Objectives:
Intellectual Property (IP) decisions are beyond 'paperwork' for innovation-focused clients—they shape critical funding, product timing, licensing leverage, and competitive survival. Yet many SBDC advisors are asked to help clients make IP decisions without crossing into legal advice or appearing to endorse a provider.
This practical, advisor-first workshop uses a real-world case study of inventor Lonnie Johnson to illustrate how patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets interact with business strategy. We will walk through key decision points (disclosure timing, ownership and contributors, protection mix, and monetization path), then connect those decisions to downstream outcomes such as bargaining power, copycat exposure, partnership options, and avoidable risk.
Attendees will not be asked to become IP experts. Instead, they will practice a repeatable advising workflow built around 'Decision Checkpoints'—a short set of questions and documentation prompts that help advisors: (1) spot stop-sign issues early (timing and ownership), (2) capture the facts needed for counsel, (3) guide clients toward the right type of IP help, and (4) refer in a neutral, referral-safe manner.
Learning Objectives:
Participants leave with up to three ready-to-use handouts (an IP triage worksheet, a checkpoints map, and a referral-safe language pack) they can implement immediately in innovation and technology advising engagements. The session is educational, contains no product pitch, and includes compliance-friendly scripts that reduce endorsement risk.
Learn all about the SBDC National Information Clearinghouse (SBDCNet), the official nationwide research service and support program for SBDCs. As your partner for success, the SBDCNet works one-on-one with you to provide in-depth, customized market research and other business development resources to support you and your client’s information and resource needs.
Attendees will learn about the variety of SBDCNet’s research services and capabilities, how to gain access to valuable business research and tools, advising best practices, on-demand business resources and more! Help you and your clients succeed with business intelligence and market research from SBDCNet - Your Partner for Client Success!
Learning Objectives:
Attendees will leave the session with:
Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing how small businesses manage their finances. For SBDC advisors, this creates an exciting opportunity: using AI-powered tools to help clients move from reactive bookkeeping to confident, informed decision-making. In this engaging and practical session, Popstart—a national training organization specializing in QuickBooks Online education and financial literacy—will introduce the newest AI Agents inside QuickBooks Online and demonstrate how advisors can use them to strengthen the financial conversations they have with clients.
Popstart is known for turning complex financial topics into clear, actionable learning experiences that build confidence and real-world skills. In that same spirit, this session will break down AI-powered features into practical tools advisors can immediately apply in client meetings, workshops, and financial coaching sessions.
Participants will explore how QuickBooks Online’s AI Agents support small businesses by: Automating transaction categorization and identifying discrepancies (Accounting Agent) Improving cash flow visibility through invoice management and payment predictions (Payments Agent) Delivering KPI insights, forecasting, and board-ready financial summaries (Finance Agent) Streamlining payroll data collection and identifying inconsistencies (Payroll Agent) Tracking project profitability and cost allocation (Project Management Agent – Beta) Identifying leads and supporting customer follow-up (Customer Agent)
Beyond the technology itself, this session focuses on how advisors can use AI-generated insights to guide deeper financial discussions with clients—including cash flow strategy, profitability analysis, and growth planning. Attendees will leave with actionable ways to integrate AI-driven financial intelligence into client meetings, training sessions, and ongoing advisory support. AI is not replacing advisors — it’s amplifying them
Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
This is a train-the-trainer session for SBDCs that want to design, launch, and scale AI training in their region, without necessarily needing to be AI experts themselves. This is for delivering real, timeless, practical AI training, not showing off shiny new AI tools.
West Central Minnesota SBDC shares the behind-the-scenes playbook for how we built and delivered a multi-phase AI training strategy from scratch, including the logistics, structure, sequencing, and go-to-market decisions that made it work.
This session does not teach AI tools or use cases. Instead, it focuses on how SBDCs can confidently deliver AI training through clear frameworks, repeatable formats, and realistic execution models. Many SBDCs know they need to “do something with AI,” but struggle with where to start, how to structure offerings, or how to move beyond one-off workshops. This session breaks down the practical recipe we used to move from early experimentation to a cohesive, scalable training system aligned to the four stages of AI adoption: Awareness, Consideration, Adoption, and Integration. Attendees will see how we layered multiple delivery formats under a single framework, including self-paced bootcamps, live demos, cohort-based learning, full-day conferences, peer learning, and paid custom engagements, all designed to meet entrepreneurs where they are and grow with demand. We will walk through what worked, what did not, and the adjustments we made along the way in real SBDC settings.
This session is designed for SBDC leaders, program developers, and advisors responsible for building or expanding AI training in their region. It is especially relevant for those navigating limited capacity, varying advisor comfort levels, and wide differences in client readiness.
This session is for SBDCs ready to move from “we should offer AI training” to “here’s how we actually deliver it.”
Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
SBDC advisors are expected to deliver high-quality guidance to entrepreneurs while managing growing caseloads, administrative responsibilities, and reporting requirements. As demand for advising services increases, advisors must find ways to maintain quality while improving efficiency and consistency.
This session introduces the 4C Advisor Framework — Capture, Clarify, Create, and Convert, a structured advising method developed through real-world advising experience.
The framework functions as a practical operating model that guides advisors from initial client intake to clear action plans and documented next steps.
Participants will learn how to implement a structured workflow that begins with intake preparation and a value-based post-intake email that sets expectations before the first advising session.
During the session, the Clarify and Create stages help advisors identify the client’s real priorities and develop practical guidance.
The Convert stage ensures each meeting produces clear action steps, documentation, and follow-up accountability. The session also demonstrates how artificial intelligence can support advising by helping advisors organize intake information, generate structured outputs, and draft follow-up documentation while maintaining responsible use of de-identified client information.
Participants will leave with an Advisor AI Toolbox, including templates, an AI prompt bank, and implementation guidance designed to help advisors improve efficiency, strengthen documentation, and support better client outcomes.
Learning Objectives:
Building Collaboration for Connection: Operating a Rural SBDC like a High Performance Small Business
Rural Small Business Development Centers often serve large geographic areas with limited staffing and modest resources, yet they are expected to deliver measurable economic impact and high-quality advising.
This session explores how rural SBDCs can expand their reach and effectiveness by operating strategically like the small businesses they support.
Presented by three experienced rural SBDC leaders from Iowa, this session demonstrates how collaboration, partnerships, and systems thinking allow lean teams to increase capacity and strengthen regional entrepreneurial ecosystems.
Participants learn how reframing a rural SBDC as a professional consulting organization with defined markets, clear value propositions, and measurable outcomes can improve focus and impact. Through practical examples from three rural centers, the presenters share strategies for building structured partnerships with colleges, workforce programs, Chambers of Commerce, economic development organizations, financial institutions, and peer SBDCs.
The session also highlights operational systems that allow small teams to scale programming through repeatable workshop series, cohort models, contract trainers, and data-driven decision making.
Attendees leave with a practical collaboration framework and a simple replication blueprint that can be applied within their own centers.
The session introduces a four-level collaboration model that helps advisors strengthen partnerships and move them from basic information sharing to integrated programming that expands services for entrepreneurs.
Designed for SBDC advisors, counselors, and center leaders, this session provides practical strategies to strengthen impact while operating within the realities of rural service environments.
Learning Objectives:
Rural SBDCs with lean staffing can operate like small businesses using collaboration, partnerships, and systems thinking to expand reach, capacity, and measurable impact.
A few years ago, I hit a wall. During the pandemic, my team and I were doing everything we could to help small businesses survive. The demand never stopped—more clients, more crises, more urgency. I pushed myself hard and expected the same from my team. Eventually, the cost became clear. Some of my best coaches burned out, and I realized the same pressure was quietly taking a toll on my own health, relationships, and work–life balance.
That moment forced me to rethink how I approached productivity, client demand, and the way we do this work. Over the next year, I tested dozens of productivity systems, focus strategies, and work–life balance techniques—trying each for 30 days and keeping only what actually worked in the real world of SBDC coaching.
In this session, I’ll share the practical playbook that came out of that experiment—simple strategies to manage client demand (or create it!), stay productive, and protect your energy so you can keep helping entrepreneurs without burning yourself out.
Learning Objectives:
Agricultural clients bring unique opportunities—and unique complexities—to the advising relationship. From production cycles and seasonality to land access, capital intensity, regulatory considerations, and evolving market channels, working with farmers and ag-based businesses requires a nuanced approach that goes beyond traditional small business counseling.
This interactive session will introduce “10 Essential Questions” every SBDC advisor should have in their toolbox when working with agricultural clients.
These guiding questions are designed to spark deeper conversations, uncover hidden risks, and identify growth opportunities across the full spectrum of agricultural enterprise—production agriculture, value-added products, direct-to-consumer sales, wholesale markets, agritourism, and emerging verticals.
The session will begin with brief updates and announcements from the Rural/Ag Special Interest Group, followed by a structured networking breakout to allow participants to connect in small groups and share their roles, regions, and experiences serving agricultural clients.
This format builds peer connections while maximizing engagement. The core of the workshop will be a facilitated discussion centered on the 10 key questions and considerations. Topics may include operational realities (production cycles, labor, infrastructure), financial structure and capital access, risk management, market diversification, pricing pressures, supply chain challenges, generational transition, regulatory environment, and the intersection of lifestyle and business goals common among agricultural entrepreneurs.
Rather than a lecture, this session is designed as a collaborative exchange. Participants will be invited to share how they approach these issues in their states and regions, what tools or strategies have proven effective, and where they encounter challenges.
The goal is to collectively refine a practical, adaptable framework that advisors can immediately apply in their work.
Attendees will leave with a clearer understanding of the distinct dynamics of agricultural businesses, a stronger peer network within the Rural/Ag SIG, and a structured set of guiding questions to enhance their advising effectiveness. This session is ideal for any SBDC professional seeking to deepen their confidence and competence in serving agricultural clients.
Learning Objectives:
On May 6, 2017, The Economist published one of its most widely shared articles titled “The world’s most valuable resource is no longer oil, but data.” Nearly a decade later, that statement still holds true.
Across the SBDC network, we collect extensive data on our clients, our services, and the broader economic environments in which small businesses operate. Yet many centers lack the time, tools, or capacity to fully unlock the value hidden within these datasets.
At the Georgia SBDC, we have made a deliberate investment in building data capabilities to move beyond reporting and toward insight-driven decision-making. This commitment has translated into measurable improvements in performance and stronger ROI for our stakeholders.
This session creates space for SBDC management teams to learn from several data projects we have conducted over the past two years and, just as importantly, from one another. We will walk through real-world examples, including how we identify high-impact clients, help consultants pace their efforts throughout the year, and extract actionable insights from open-ended client feedback.
For each project, we will discuss the data used, the analytical approach, and, most critically, how insights were translated into concrete actions and tangible results. While many analytics efforts stop at insights, our focus is on operationalizing them.
By sharing our methodology, lessons learned, and common pitfalls, we hope to encourage participants to apply similar approaches within their own centers.
We also invite attendees to share their experiences and innovative practices, fostering a collaborative exchange of ideas across the SBDC network.
Learning Objectives:
When a small business owner tells their SBDC advisor “I can’t keep anyone,” the conversation rarely turns to mental health. But stress, anxiety, depression, and burnout are quietly driving some of the most common workforce problems advisors encounter — absenteeism, conflict, declining performance, and turnover that small businesses cannot absorb.
This session helps SBDC advisors recognize the mental health dimension underneath workforce challenges and respond with confidence. Using AskEARN.org resources, participants will learn how to help small business clients distinguish between voluntary wellness practices and ADA-required accommodations, build low-cost support structures that reduce risk and retain talent, and navigate sensitive employee situations without overstepping legal or ethical lines.
Learning Objectives:
Accreditation Part 1: Standards - The session will present the Accreditation Standards 2024-2028, preparing the self-study and suggested supporting documents to accompany the self-study. Content is appropriate for state/regional directors and all SBDC staff preparing for an upcoming onsite review.
Learning Objectives:
The session will share how to prepare for accreditation, write the self-study, manage onsite visit logistics, and review outcomes from an accreditation review. Content is appropriate for state/regional directors and all SBDC staff preparing for an upcoming onsite review.
Learning Objectives:
Are you feeling that you are constantly hustling, overwhelmed, exhausted, yet unsure how to break the cycle, without sacrificing your career? Burnout doesn’t just zap your energy. It’s like carrying an ever-growing backpack of stress that weighs you down and makes every step harder. Constant pressure can lead to mental exhaustion, health challenges, and strained relationships. But dropping everything isn’t the only solution.
In 7 Ways to Beat Burnout – Without Quitting Your Job, you’ll discover how to lighten the load, regain your strength, and reclaim your energy, focus, and sense of well-being. Learn how to spot early warning signs, identify burnout triggers, and implement actionable steps to protect your health.
Through thought-provoking discussions and the S-O-S Principle™, you’ll craft a personalized resiliency plan to navigate stress effectively. The Transformation? Imagine feeling energized and engaged at work, thriving under pressure, and enjoying a healthier work-life balance. Through this program, Beverly offers the guidance and expertise to make that transformation possible—not just for you, but for your entire organization.
Burnout doesn’t have to define your journey. Shed the weight of stress and take action today. Let Beverly guide you in building resilience and finding fulfillment in your professional and personal life.
Learning Objectives:
Participants Will:
Entrepreneurs are often praised for being strong leaders, but behind that strength, many are quietly carrying overwhelming pressure. They manage financial risk, make constant decisions, lead teams, and solve problems daily while feeling responsible for every aspect of the business.
While advisors frequently support entrepreneurs with strategy, operations, and growth planning, many business owners struggle with leadership overload that affects decision-making, clarity, and long-term sustainability.
This session introduces a practical leadership framework called P.A.U.S.E., designed to help entrepreneurs recognize pressure early, evaluate responsibilities, and reset their leadership approach. Participants will learn how decision fatigue, responsibility overload, and constant problem-solving impact entrepreneurs and their businesses.
More importantly, this session equips SBDC advisors with a structured coaching tool they can use in conversations with entrepreneurs who feel overwhelmed or stuck in reactive leadership patterns. Through guided discussion, a real-world business scenario, and an application activity, attendees will explore how the P.A.U.S.E. framework can help entrepreneurs regain clarity, focus on high-impact priorities, and build sustainable leadership systems that support long-term business growth.
Attendees will leave with a practical framework and conversation tools they can apply immediately when advising entrepreneurs under leadership pressure.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
In today's fast-paced, high-pressure work environments, success doesn't just depend on skill or strategy—it depends on the ability to perform when it counts. That's where the Mental Arena Begins.
The Mental Arena speaks to people whose roles demand composure, clarity, and execution when the stakes are high. It frames pressure as part of the performance environment and teaches practical mental strategies to stay focused, regulate stress, and perform with confidence when it matters.
The Mental Arena keynote reframes your workplace as a mental arena—where the stakes are high, the lights are bright, and how you respond matters. We unpack the science of pressure, share stories from sport and business, and give people a practical mental performance game plan they can use immediately.
Learning Objectives:
SSBCI update. This is for State and Associate State Directors only.
Who will you trust to care for your children without childcare centers? Unfortunately, that is a grim reality nationwide, as more parents enter the workforce and more childcare providers struggle to stay open.
In this session, you’ll learn how the CARE Model equips business advisors and communities with a collective impact framework to support businesses and strengthen local economies, and why business consultants and advisors play a critical role in being change agents in the solutions.
This session breaks down the childcare industry’s key operational and workforce challenges, the nationwide economic impacts, and the barriers that limit the sustainability of child care businesses. Participants will explore high-impact, economic-driven solutions and learn how the CARE Model equips advisors to strengthen child care businesses, support employers, and drive community-wide workforce stability. You will leave with a wealth of data and actionable strategies for your clients!
Learning Objectives:
Small business advisors are often the first resource entrepreneurs rely on when navigating federal tax responsibilities. This lecture-style session, presented by the Internal Revenue Service, will equip SBDC advisors and community partners with practical knowledge to better support the small businesses they serve.
Participants will receive an overview of key IRS online tools that streamline tax administration for small business owners, such as resources for obtaining an Employer Identification Number (EIN), making payments, accessing the IRS Business Tax Account, and retrieving business tax information online.
The session will also cover frequent tax challenges entrepreneurs encounter, including recordkeeping, estimated tax payments, and reporting self-employment income. Practical tips will be provided to help advisors guide clients toward stronger compliance and improved financial management.
In addition, attendees will receive updates on recent tax law changes and small business-related incentives, along with guidance on where to find accurate IRS educational materials and trusted taxpayer resources.
This train-the-trainer session will equip advisors with actionable, up-to-date information they can immediately apply across diverse client needs and business stages.
Learning Objectives:
Something big is happening in commerce, and it's moving fast. We've all watched businesses adapt to wave after wave of change: the rise of e-commerce, the explosion of online marketplaces, social shopping, and mobile-first everything. Each shift rewired how customers find and buy products. And now, another transition is underway, one that could be the most significant yet.
It's called Agentic Commerce. Instead of customers browsing, searching, and clicking their way to a purchase, AI assistants are beginning to do it for them, researching options, comparing prices, and in some cases, completing the transaction entirely on the customer's behalf.
For advisors working with entrepreneurs and small businesses, this isn't a distant trend to file away for later. It's something your clients will need to understand and prepare for, and they'll be looking to you to help them make sense of it.
This session breaks down what agentic commerce actually means, how it differs from the conversational commerce tools many businesses are already experimenting with, and what the shift means for how products are discovered, marketed, and sold online.
We'll dig into the practical side too, covering what infrastructure businesses actually need to show up in this new landscape. That means structured product data, connected commerce platforms, and omnichannel systems that tie together online and in-store experiences. It also means understanding how point-of-sale, ecommerce, and inventory systems aren't just operational tools anymore.
They're the foundation on which AI systems depend to function. You'll walk away with a clear, usable framework for guiding your clients through this transition, helping them strengthen their digital foundations, clean up their product data, and position themselves to compete as AI plays a bigger role in how buying decisions are made.
Learning Objectives:
The WI SBDC at UW–Madison has expanded its client offerings and strengthened internal operations by embracing experiential learning opportunities for students. To support this work, the center has created a sandbox environment that currently houses five distinct student engagement experiences.
Experiential learning gives university students the chance to apply classroom knowledge to real-world challenges. Within an SBDC sandbox, learning becomes practical, repeatable, and mutually beneficial for both students and the center. At its core, experiential learning emphasizes doing, reflecting, and iterating.
Students who support internal projects or work directly with businesses learn to analyze real problems and develop solutions with tangible impact. This approach builds critical thinking, communication, and professional-readiness skills while also increasing the SBDC’s capacity and visibility.
Building an SBDC sandbox requires clarity about who is involved, what activities students will take on, why the model benefits both the center and the host institution, and how it will operate. Students may conduct market research, financial analysis, or digital marketing audits for clients, or they may support operational goals within the center—all within a structured framework that ensures quality and consistency.
For SBDCs, the sandbox model expands capacity, increases outreach, and enhances service quality. Students bring fresh perspectives and additional bandwidth, while staff maintain oversight to ensure deliverables meet professional standards.
Over time, the sandbox becomes a valuable asset to the university, a standout résumé experience for students, and a powerful community engagement engine for the SBDC.
Learning Objectives:
Cohort-based programs offer a powerful approach to supporting hospitality businesses while building advisor expertise and fostering lasting community engagement with lower center investment. Restaurants, cafés, catering operations, and specialty food producers benefit from structured peer learning and guided implementation, yet many SBDC centers struggle to design and deliver cohorts that truly create measurable impact.
This session equips SBDC directors and program managers with strategies and frameworks to design, implement, and sustain cohort-based programs that drive both client and center-level success. Participants will explore how cohorts can accelerate client learning, strengthen advisor capabilities, and produce measurable milestone outcomes such as increased sales, improved financial performance, business starts, job creation and retention, and long-term sector stability.
Through a balanced mix of strategic vision and practical exercises, attendees will learn how to structure cohort programs, sequence content for maximum impact, and incorporate interactive activities that deepen learning and accountability. Special emphasis will be placed on aligning cohorts with program goals.
Learning Objectives:
Childcare businesses are essential infrastructure for community development, workforce participation, and long-term economic growth. When childcare providers struggle, employers struggle, and regional economies feel the impact. Yet these businesses operate within a uniquely challenging environment, balancing thin profit margins, workforce shortages, regulatory compliance requirements, and increasing operational costs.
This session will showcase two years of the Kentucky SBDC Childcare Initiative's implementation, highlighting how the program has evolved from a pilot to an expanded impact. In year one, the Kentucky SBDC established sector-specific consulting tools and built strategic partnerships with organizations such as the Southeast Kentucky Economic Development Corporation (SKED).
The focus was on understanding childcare business models, identifying financial pain points, and delivering targeted technical assistance in areas such as startup feasibility, financial projections, and operational stabilization. In year two, the initiative expanded its reach and refined its approach based on lessons learned.
We strengthened collaboration with economic development partners, employers, and workforce stakeholders to align childcare capacity with regional needs better. Business coaches enhanced tools for enrollment forecasting, tuition pricing analysis, cash flow management, and staffing sustainability. We also incorporated outcome data and real-world case studies from centers that stabilized operations, accessed new funding, expanded capacity, or launched successfully with SBDC and partner support.
This session will provide practical, field-tested strategies developed through direct engagement with childcare entrepreneurs over the past 2 years. Topics will include funding and capital acquisition pathways, funding readiness, marketing strategies tailored to childcare providers, operational efficiency improvements, and community partnership development.
Participants will gain adaptable templates, assessment tools, and best practices that can be replicated within their own SBDC networks. By sharing both the successes and lessons learned from two years of implementation, this session equips consultants with a proven framework for supporting childcare centers as viable, sustainable businesses.
Attendees will leave prepared to deliver high-impact consulting that strengthens childcare providers, supports working families, and contributes to stronger local economies.
Learning Objectives:
Entrepreneurship is one of the most powerful pathways to economic mobility, yet millions of Americans with disabilities remain largely excluded from traditional startup ecosystems. Despite representing one of the largest untapped talent pools in the country, aspiring entrepreneurs with disabilities often face systemic barriers including limited access to capital, mentorship, and inclusive business training.
At the same time, the mortality rate for new businesses and products is stunning. Most begin with high expectations, yet many fail because founders do not test their assumptions early enough or focus on the wrong risks.
This session explores how entrepreneurship ecosystems can better support founders with disabilities while also strengthening the development of early-stage ventures. Drawing on real-world experience from Synergies Work, one of the nation’s leading organizations focused on disability entrepreneurship, participants will gain practical insights into how inclusive entrepreneurship programs can help founders turn ideas into sustainable businesses.
In this fast-moving and hands-on session, participants will explore practical actions that dramatically improve the odds of startup success.
The session introduces methods commonly used in startup accelerators to help founders reduce risk, test ideas quickly, and focus on what matters most when launching a new venture.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will learn how to:
Your calendar is full. Your staff is stretched. Your partners want more collaboration. And entrepreneurs are still navigating a fragmented support system. SBDCs are expected to be everywhere at once, yet many centers are operating in silos; duplicating services, reacting to partner requests, and absorbing more referrals than their capacity allows. Collaboration is encouraged, but without structure, it often creates more noise, not more impact.
This session challenges the assumption that more partnerships automatically equal stronger ecosystems. Instead, it introduces a practical framework for moving from siloed activity to intentional ecosystem design. Participants will explore how SBDCs can serve as backbone organizations within their regions—clarifying roles, aligning missions, and building collaboration models that expand reach without overwhelming staff.
The focus is on strategic alignment, not additional programming. Attendees will learn how to identify high-value collaboration targets, assess mission and customer overlap, and address partner pain points in ways that create mutual benefit.
The session also addresses operational concerns:
Through guided application, attendees will leave with a customized collaboration worksheet that identifies three priority targets, defines alignment points, outlines potential collaboration structures, and includes three concrete action steps to implement within 90 days.
This is not a discussion about partnerships in theory. It is a working session designed to help SBDCs create stronger ecosystems, improve impact organically, and protect advisor capacity while doing so.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
The Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)/ Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Programs, also known as America’s Seed Fund, represents the largest source of non-dilutive capital available to deep tech entrepreneurs. With close to $5 billion in non-dilutive capital awarded annually, America’s Seed Fund supports the innovators and innovations filling critical market gaps.
The SBIR/STTR Reauthorization was a major conversation for deep tech entrepreneurs throughout 2025 and 2026. SBIR/STTR stakeholders including small businesses, local, state and federal officials, SBIR/STTR agencies, industry partners, research institutions, and investors have had robust conversations regarding how best to commercialize and secure SBIR/STTR-funded technologies and connect deep tech entrepreneurs with the technical and business services needed get their technologies to market. This one-hour session will provide an overview of America’s Seed Fund and highlight program changes stemming from reauthorization.
The session will provide SBDC counselors with the information necessary to best support their deep-tech entrepreneurs.
SBDC centers around the country have been key to the success of many small businesses' success in competing for SBIR/STTR funding and this session will equip the centers to continue driving that success. This session will feature SBA’s Office of Investment and Innovation (OII) (the coordinating office for the entire SBIR/STTR programs) on the different ways a SBDC can incorporate assistance to deep tech entrepreneurs into their programming and ensure innovators are aware of program changes.
The session will build upon past SBIR/STTR training by OII with the SBDCs and incorporate feedback from previous sessions.
Learning Objectives:
Each year, approximately 200,000 service members transition into the civilian workforce, yet many veterans—particularly those with disabilities—face barriers to employment despite bringing highly valued leadership, resilience, and technical skills. Veterans with disabilities represent an underutilized talent pool for employers seeking skilled workers and stable workforce pipelines.
At the same time, many employers and accommodation professionals report uncertainty about how to navigate disability employment laws, workplace accommodations, and veteran-specific protections. Misunderstanding these requirements can lead to missed hiring opportunities, compliance concerns, and unnecessary workplace risk.
This session will equip accommodation and leave professionals with practical strategies to recruit, hire, and retain veterans with disabilities while navigating the intersection of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA), and veteran employment programs.
Participants will learn how to translate compliance obligations into practical workforce strategies, including building veteran recruitment pipelines, implementing effective accommodations for common service-connected disabilities, and leveraging federal resources to reduce employer costs.
Through real-world scenarios and case-based discussion, attendees will leave with tools they can immediately apply to support veterans with disabilities while strengthening workforce retention and resilience.
Inside the Consumer Mind: Using behavioral science in marketing to target, position, and communicate more effectively
Our clients come to us for help with marketing to attract and retain more customers. They have limited time, budgets, and resources to devote to marketing, so their tactics must be optimized for results.
The secret to optimal marketing is understanding their market, tailoring their brand to appeal and stand out, and using communication methods that draw attention and persuade effectively.
Enter “Behavioral Science” as a genius practice for better marketing. In this session, we will discuss using behavioral science to help clients deeply understand their target market, define an appropriate brand identity, and communicate effectively.
We’ll explore behavioral nudges for “hacking” the consumer brain, like the illusion of effort, social proof, and cascading ‘yeses’. You will leave the session feeling better equipped to engage clients in behavior science in marketing and to help them make the most of their marketing efforts.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will:
This session addresses a critical evolution in AI for SBDCs: the essential shift from custom AI assistants (GPTs) to workflow automation Agents. While GPTs provide immediate answers and help streamline basic tasks, they leave advisors to manually complete multi-step processes, such as combining intake notes, prior records, templates, and research.
This presentation makes the case that the SBDC's future advantage lies in turning information into action faster by standardizing recurring advisor tasks. We demonstrate that the real transition is moving from generic prompting to designing structured, actionable workflows. Agents are designed to complete repeatable, multi-step work using specified rules, files, tools, and necessary approvals, protecting quality and trust.
Attendees gain practical tools, including a clear framework for selecting the best first workflow, an instruction checklist for building effective Agents, and a live demo showcasing the power of Agents like the BizPlan Outliner and MarketingPro Agent.
Ultimately, this presentation prepares advisors to move beyond simple prompting and embrace the future skillset of system design, empowering them to identify, design, and govern useful AI-supported processes that save time without lowering the quality of client support.
Learning Objectives:
For many micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), innovation is often misunderstood as something reserved for technology startups or companies with large research and development budgets. SBDC clients don't need to believe in innovation. They need their next revenue breakthrough — and advisors need a structured way to help clients find it.
For SBDC advisors working with scaling MSMEs, the gap rarely lies in a client's willingness to grow. It lies in the absence of a practical advising framework for uncovering the growth levers already embedded in their business model, customer relationships, and market position. Most of those levers have nothing to do with technology — and everything to do with how value is created, delivered, and captured.
This interactive workshop introduces the SHIFT Innovation Framework, a practical advising tool designed to help SBDC professionals identify and activate innovation opportunities within growing MSMEs.
The framework helps advisors guide entrepreneurs through five key innovation lenses:
Using the case method, participants will analyze real-world examples of MSMEs that achieved growth through strategic innovation—often without developing new technology. The session integrates practical insights from innovation frameworks such as the Ten Types of Innovation, developed by Larry Keeley, along with tools used by leading innovation consulting firms such as Board of Innovation.
Participants will work through structured case exercises and advising scenarios designed to simulate real SBDC client interactions. By applying the SHIFT framework, advisors will learn how to uncover hidden innovation opportunities within existing businesses and guide entrepreneurs toward sustainable growth strategies.
By the end of the session, attendees will leave with a clear advising framework, practical tools, and replicable exercises that can immediately be implemented with MSME clients.
Learning Objectives:
In this interactive workshop, we will provide five live product demonstrations showing how to get more from Google’s AI tools, specifically NotebookLM, Google Gemini, and Gemini for Google Workspace. Attendees will benefit from seeing the tools in action, creating output useful for small business owners. We will also highlight the most recent updates in each of these quickly evolving tools.
Learning Objectives:
Attendees will leave this session knowing how to:
Artificial intelligence is transforming how small businesses operate and compete. Global spending on AI systems is forecast to surpass $300 billion in 2026, with 68% of U.S. small businesses now using AI regularly.
This session provides an educational foundation on what AI is and the different types of AI technologies available. The AWS team will facilitate a discussion covering the differences between AI, machine learning, agentic AI, and other key concepts, helping SBDC advisors understand which AI approaches match their clients' needs.
What is AI, and Why It Matters. AI refers to techniques that enable computers to mimic human intelligence. For small businesses, AI represents tools that automate tasks, enhance customer experiences, and drive growth with limited resources. Small business cloud spend is projected to reach $325.8 billion by 2028, with 87% of businesses globally purchasing technology through partners.
Real-World AI Use Cases Across Industries Retail: AI is revolutionizing retail through automated product marketing and hyper-personalization by leveraging real-time customer data.
Healthcare: Healthcare organizations are using AI to automate patient history summarization and advance cancer research by analyzing complex genomic data.
Manufacturing: Manufacturers are implementing generative supply solutions with demand-sensing capabilities, providing proactive advisory on demand changes.
Financial Services: Financial institutions are transforming fraud detection with AI that analyzes complex patterns in real time. Understanding AI Types: The AWS team will lead an interactive discussion demystifying the AI landscape. Advisors will learn about generative AI for content creation, machine learning for pattern recognition, agentic AI for autonomous task completion, and natural language processing for customer interactions. The AWS team will also facilitate conversations on challenges and ethical considerations, including data privacy, algorithmic bias, and responsible AI deployment.
The Path Forward SBDC advisors play a role in connecting their clients with qualified technology partners. This educational session, led by the AWS team, equips SBDC client advisors with the knowledge to guide their clients through the AI landscape, helping them understand what's possible and how to begin their AI journey securely and responsibly.
Learning Objectives:
This two-part workshop will discuss taking the next steps in the AI education that began with the AI U program. It is aimed at individuals who have been working on AI for some time and would like advanced training. This workshop is designed by members of the AI Interest Group.
Part 2 of this workshop will immediately follow at 2:45 pm
Learning Objectives:
Artificial intelligence video tools are rapidly changing how small businesses create marketing content, training materials, product demonstrations, and customer communications—often without the cost, time, or technical barriers of traditional video production. This session demonstrates how SBDC advisors can introduce practical AI video tools to clients who need affordable ways to improve visibility, explain products, and communicate more effectively.
Through live demonstrations, attendees see how current AI video platforms can create avatar presenters, convert slide decks into narrated videos, generate product promotions from a single image, and produce event or social media content from simple prompts. The session compares tool strengths, highlights realistic business use cases, and shows the outcomes small businesses can achieve right now.
Examples include training videos, personalized client communication, product demonstrations, multilingual messaging, event promotion, and storytelling designed for real-world small-business applications. In addition to showing what these tools can do, the session addresses practical considerations such as ease of use, cost, limitations, authenticity, and where AI-generated video works best.
Participants also explore how AI video tools continue to evolve and what emerging trends may mean for future business communication. Attendees leave with practical examples, resource links, and ideas they can immediately use in advising sessions to help clients evaluate AI video tools in realistic, strategic, and client-ready ways.
Learning Objectives:
In this interactive workshop, we will provide five live product demonstrations showing how to get more from Google’s AI tools, specifically NotebookLM, Google Gemini, and Gemini for Google Workspace. Attendees will benefit from seeing the tools in action, creating output useful for small business owners. We will also highlight the most recent updates in each of these quickly evolving tools.
Learning Objectives:
Part 2 of this workshop, taking the next steps in the AI education that has begun with the AIU program, is aimed at individuals who have been working on AI for some time and would like advanced training. This workshop is designed by members of the AI Interest Group.
Learning Objectives:
Most professionals are using AI the same way they used Google in 2004 — search, get an answer, move on. That approach costs time, produces inconsistent results, and forces you to rebuild from scratch every single session. This workshop changes that. "Build It Once. Use It Forever: Projects vs. Custom GPTs" is a practical, hands-on session that moves participants from prompt users to system architects.
In a world where AI tools are becoming table stakes for competitive professionals, the real advantage doesn't belong to whoever asks the best questions — it belongs to whoever builds the best systems.
This session introduces the A.I.M. Framework — a simple, memorable decision tool for identifying when to use AI flexibly and when to build for scale. Participants learn to spot the difference between one-time creative tasks and workflows that repeat, disguised as manual work, and they leave knowing exactly what to do with each category. The session goes beyond theory.
Participants watch a Custom GPT built live, step by step, from naming and instructions to knowledge file configuration and structured output. The demonstration uses a real-world scenario — generating rubric-aligned essay feedback — that is immediately adaptable to communications, reporting, client deliverables, and operational documentation in virtually any industry. Whether you lead a team, run a small business, manage programs, or work in education or community development, this session meets you where you are. No technical background is required.
What is required is a willingness to stop rebuilding what you've already built. Attendees leave with the A.I.M. Framework, a step-by-step Custom GPT build guide, a knowledge file template, and a clear path to turning their highest-frequency workflows into reusable AI systems. The shift from user to architect starts here.
Learning Objectives:
Many SBDC Centers face two operational challenges: increasing the number of successful business starts with limited staff capacity and reliably obtaining client confirmation once businesses are formed so that milestones can be recorded. At the same time, many entrepreneurs struggle to navigate the practical steps required to start a business.
Without clear guidance and structured support, entrepreneurs often spend unnecessary time and money on outside services or delay taking the steps needed to launch their businesses. One way to address these challenges is through technology-enabled structured programming that converts educational programming into measurable client outcomes.
The Greater Los Angeles SBDC has implemented this approach through a structured program model that combines educational programming, guided small-group advising, and technology-supported workflows to move clients from learning to taking concrete action. Technology and process design are central to improving operational efficiency. Online questionnaire tools streamline client intake, automate information collection, and capture key data needed for advising and milestone reporting. Virtual meeting platforms allow advisors to guide multiple clients simultaneously, while templated materials, automated follow-ups, and structured workflows ensure consistent delivery across advisors and Centers. Together, these timesaving tools reduce administrative burden while allowing Centers to serve more clients effectively. This session will demonstrate best practices for designing technology-enabled structured programs that increase business starts, improve milestone tracking, and maximize advisor capacity. The session will highlight one example implementation used by the Greater Los Angeles SBDC - a structured LLC program - to illustrate how this model works in practice.
Attendees will leave with a replicable operational framework that can be applied across advising areas - such as licensing, tax preparation, financial readiness, or business formation - to convert educational programming into measurable client outcomes while improving SBDC operational efficiency.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
In the Mississippi Delta, the crossroads is where everything converges — old roads, new directions, and the decisions that define what comes next. It is the right metaphor for where SBDC networks find themselves today.
The demands on SBDCs have changed. Clients expect streamlined intake. Funders expect timely outcome data. Programs require auditable reporting. Ecosystem partners expect digital collaboration.
Advisors deserve systems that make their jobs easier, not harder. The question: Does the technology we rely on today match the work we are being asked to do tomorrow? For most networks, the honest answer is no — and that is not a criticism. SBDC technology stacks often evolve one tool at a time, each solving an immediate need. The result is a patchwork: session logs in one system, program management in another, client records in a third, and reporting requiring manual reconciliation.
Advisors toggle between platforms never designed to work together. State directors assemble reports from fragmented data. Security is only as strong as the weakest link.
This workshop gives SBDC leaders a structured way to answer the question: What should our technology infrastructure look like over the next decade?
Participants explore capabilities necessary to support SBDC Core advising, program administration across multiple funding sources, outcome tracking and auditable reporting, secure management of sensitive client data, ecosystem collaboration, and a foundation for intelligent automation. Sharon Nichols will share Mississippi's 2025 journey to evaluate its infrastructure — the assessment, the criteria, the gaps identified, and the phased modernization across advising, program management, multi-grant tracking, and reporting. Mississippi's story is not the answer — it is a case study in asking the right questions.
David Ponraj adds the technology architecture lens: what separates systems built to last from tomorrow's patchwork, covering unified client tracking, cybersecurity, ecosystem integration, and the emerging role of agentic AI in automating administrative workflows so advisors spend more time with business owners.
Every taxpayer dollar invested in SBDCs needs to yield a measurable return. Every hour reconciling data is an hour not spent with an entrepreneur. This session gives attendees the framework to evaluate where they stand, envision where they need to be, and build a plan to close the gap — on their own terms, at their own pace.
Learning Objectives:
Following this session, attendees will be able to:
This session addresses a critical evolution in AI for SBDCs: the essential shift from custom AI assistants (GPTs) to workflow automation Agents. While GPTs provide immediate answers and help streamline basic tasks, they leave advisors to manually complete multi-step processes, such as combining intake notes, prior records, templates, and research.
This presentation makes the case that the SBDC's future advantage lies in turning information into action faster by standardizing recurring advisor tasks.
We demonstrate that the real transition is moving from generic prompting to designing structured, actionable workflows. Agents are designed to complete repeatable, multi-step work using specified rules, files, tools, and necessary approvals, protecting quality and trust.
Attendees gain practical tools, including a clear framework for selecting the best first workflow, an instruction checklist for building effective Agents, and a live demo showcasing the power of Agents like the BizPlan Outliner and MarketingPro Agent.
Ultimately, this presentation prepares advisors to move beyond simple prompting and embrace the future skillset of system design, empowering them to identify, design, and govern useful AI-supported processes that save time without lowering the quality of client support.
Learning Objectives:
Artificial intelligence video tools are rapidly changing how small businesses create marketing content, training materials, product demonstrations, and customer communications—often without the cost, time, or technical barriers of traditional video production.
This session demonstrates how SBDC advisors can introduce practical AI video tools to clients who need affordable ways to improve visibility, explain products, and communicate more effectively.
Through live demonstrations, attendees see how current AI video platforms can create avatar presenters, convert slide decks into narrated videos, generate product promotions from a single image, and produce event or social media content from simple prompts.
The session compares tool strengths, highlights realistic business uses, and shows outcomes that small businesses can achieve right now. Examples include training videos, personalized client communication, product demonstrations, multilingual messaging, event promotion, and storytelling designed for real small business applications.
In addition to showing what these tools can do, the session addresses practical considerations such as ease of use, cost, limitations, authenticity, and where AI-generated video works best. Participants also explore how AI video tools continue to evolve and what emerging trends may mean for future business communication.
Attendees leave with practical examples, resource links, and ideas they can immediately use in advising sessions to help clients evaluate AI video tools in realistic, strategic, and client-ready ways.
Learning Objectives:
America's SBDC Event Information Desk is located on the Marquis Level (ML). This is one floor below the hotel entrance. The desk is located at the Marquis Ballroom
America's SBDC Event Information Desk is located on the Marquis Level (ML). This is one floor below the hotel entrance. The desk is located at the Marquis Ballroom
America's SBDC Event Information Desk is located on the Marquis Level (ML). This is one floor below the hotel entrance. The desk is located at the Marquis Ballroom
America's SBDC Event Information Desk is located on the Marquis Level (ML). This is one floor below the hotel entrance. The desk is located at the Marquis Ballroom
The Attendee Registration for this event is located on the Marquis Level (ML) this is one floor below the hotel entrance. Registration is at the Imperial Ballroom Registration Desk
The Attendee Registration for this event is located on the Marquis Level (ML) this is one floor below the hotel entrance. Registration is at the Imperial Ballroom Registration Desk
The Attendee Registration for this event is located on the Marquis Level (ML) this is one floor below the hotel entrance. Registration is at the Imperial Ballroom Registration Desk
The Attendee Registration for this event is located on the Marquis Level (ML) this is one floor below the hotel entrance. Registration is at the Imperial Ballroom Registration Desk
This is a self serve light continental breakfast with coffee and assorted teas.
This is a self serve light continental breakfast with coffee and assorted teas.
Lunch is available to all registered attendees and will be served in the Sponsor Hall, Marquis Ballroom located on the Marquis Level (ML) floor Across from the event registration area
Lunch is available to all registered attendees and will be served in the Sponsor Hall, Marquis Ballroom located on the Marquis Level (ML) floor Across from the event registration area
Lunch is available to all registered attendees and will be served in the Sponsor Hall, Marquis Ballroom located on the Marquis Level (ML) floor Across from the event registration area
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