The challenges of starting a business are immense. Even if an entrepreneur has completely mastered the core aspects of their business, there are dozens of things required to run a business that may have very little to do with the passion that caused them to launch their venture in the first place. Legal red tape, accounting, human resources, building relationships with suppliers, even putting together a plan for engaging customers can be brand new considerations even for the well prepared.
When navigating the many challenges of a new business, advice from somebody who has been through it all before becomes invaluable. And that’s where SCORE comes in.
SCORE provides pro bono business mentoring and workshops from experienced advisors, entrepreneurs, and corporate executives with diverse industry experience and specialties. The SCORE mentors help small business owners in the launch, development and growth of their operations.
The Fairfield County chapter of SCORE recently paired Rakesh Chandra, a recently retired vice president of sales management support at IBM, with Deborah Moss, the founder of the Westport-based Windowful Creations, which provides custom drapes, shades, curtains, valances, top treatments and shutters.
“Rakesh has been a beacon for me since I founded Windowful Interiors,” Moss said. “Initially, he called my attention to SCORE resources and workshops to help me establish my company. When the Covid pandemic hit, he offered support and survival resources that enabled Windowful Interiors to endure during that very difficult period.”
Chandra described his approach as following the steps he learned while doing internal consulting when he first started at IBM.
“Even though Deborah Moss was already established when she became my ‘client,’ I still insisted that she go and do a business plan,” he said. “Because you use the business plan as a way of executing your business, and making an estimate of revenue and how much every contact means.”
Chandra described how the exercise revealed that a new approach to building a new client base was necessary so that new commissions would come in a steady stream that can be handled reliably.
“You’ve got to make sure that you are known in the local area and that people will come to you,” he continued. “How do you do that? Either you become a member of a local organization, or you do advertising, and it’s not always obvious that that may be the help they need.”
Chandra, who previously served on the board of the Fairfield County SCORE chapter, also touted the many resources that the program makes available to mentors to help them provide the best services possible to mentees.
“There are dozens of volunteers in my chapter. Each one is coming with some expertise in a certain area. So if I’m not an expert I can draw on the experiences of my colleagues, the other mentors, and volunteers,” said Chandra.
Chandra said he has tapped into that network to provide his mentees with access to other SCORE members for legal expertise, or to understand a permitting challenge particular to their field. He noted that as of 2022, the Fairfield County chapter had 84 volunteers and helped launch 164 new businesses which in turn created 253 jobs.
Moss counts her business among the number that have benefited from the organization’s involvement.
“During Windowful’s initial start-up I attended many SCORE workshops to help develop my marketing strategy and set up my online accounts. I attended a presentation by an IP attorney and hired them to trademark my company name,” Moss said. “Rakesh guided me through the early challenges of establishing Windowful, counseled me through the Covid ‘Valley of Death,’ and now as my company thrives and expands, he motivates me to continue pushing the boundaries to find new opportunities.”
Ashwini Bhaskar, the current co-chairman of the SCORE Fairfield County chapter, said that those numbers illustrate the organization’s entire ethos.
“Getting small businesses to thrive is really what the aim of SCORE is,” Bhaskar said. “And we’re part of a [Small Business Administration] program, so the mentoring, education, and networking all comes at no cost to the person who is availing themselves of the services. Remember, it’s all volunteer – if you think about our organization, if we were a 30-person management consulting firm our budget would be a hundred million dollars.”
Bhaskar described a current mentee in the program who is a performer looking to grow her social media following, and said she represents the kind of business they would love to support.
“People who are doing it on a shoestring budget, she has no resources to hire anybody but she can hire a senior vice president of IBM who was in business for 52 years at no cost,” Bhaskar noted. “You would be charged a thousand dollars an hour for Rakesh’s time if he were still at IBM.”
For more information about either mentoring or being mentored, visit https://www.score.org/fairfieldcounty.
