Growth is often a requirement for minority businesses whose customers include large-scale corporations that are consolidating their supply base around solid, reliable producers. Tuck's Growing the Minority Business to Scale considers three pathways for achieving scale: organic growth (adding customers, contracts, new businesses, and building capacity), growth through mergers and acquisitions (joining or buying other businesses), and growth through strategic alliances (partnering with a complementary collaborator).

You'll learn to apply the latest in business growth thinking and how to critically assess your own organization's opportunities for growth.

Return on Investment

Program participants are surveyed about their business context coming into the program and again six months after completion. In 2005, participants reported:

• 72 percent are now mentoring other small disadvantaged businesses
• 68 percent are effectively using new technology and innovation to drive profitability and growth
• 61 percent are engaged in new strategic alliances

PROGRAM TOPICS

• Growth Strategy and Implementation—assess your business strategy, examine growth simulation mechanisms, design a plan for implementation
• Financial Analysis in Preparation for Growth—evaluate operating performance and financial condition, learn business valuation methods, understand capital structure and possible sources of capital
• Growth Through Innovation—study the foundations of innovation and how they apply to your company
• Planning a Market Growth Portfolio—understand the relationship among customer satisfaction, retention, and profitability
• Lean Operations—identify the process improvements required to achieve lean operations in small companies

WHO SHOULD ATTEND

Growing the Minority Business to Scale is designed for business owners and executives with 5 to 10 years of senior management experience, who have attended Tuck's MBEP program (or gained equivalent educational experience), and whose minority businesses are poised for growth.

PROGRAM FACULTY

Faculty Director

Leonard Greenhalgh, professor of management at Tuck, has a practitioner background that includes work as a purchasing manager in a multinational corporation, founding and running two small corporations, and management consulting. His areas of expertise include strategy and strategy implementation, cross-functional collaboration and strategic alliances, and effective functioning of top management teams. He has extensive experience in executive education, research, and consulting, involving a large number of corporations worldwide. His most recent book is Managing Strategic Relationships: The Key to Business Success.

Representative faculty include Ella Bell, David Pyke, Alva Taylor, Fred Wainwright, and Phillip Stocken.

MBEP ALUMNI GROUP

Successful completion of Growing the Minority Business to Scale qualifies you for membership in the Tuck Minority Business Executive Program Alumni Association—an active network with over 2,800 nationwide members. The association acts as a national advocacy group for minority business education, a strong support network that promotes the business interests of graduates, and a forum for enhanced alumni relations. In addition, the association raises scholarship funds to help minority executives attend Tuck's executive education programs.