- PNC is proud to support "Business Forward", where community leaders discuss the issues confronting business in central Illinois.

(gentle music) - Welcome to "Business Forward".

I'm your host, Matt George.

Joining me tonight, Joanne Corbett from SCORE, Peoria chair and mentor.

And Gary Ebeling, SCORE mentor.

Welcome, Joanne.

- Thank you, Matt.

It's great to be here.

- I appreciate you both being here.

Gary, welcome.

Let's start off, I always like to start off and know a little bit about each of you.

So, in your own words, Joanne.

Because we met, it was interesting, because we met, we had a friend, mutual friend, introduced us.

And I'm really big into mentoring.

A mentor actually changed my whole life when I was about 28, 29 years old.

And actually I'm a CEO because of that mentor.

And so, when I got talking to you, I got so fired up because there's so much opportunity right underneath everyone's nose.

But really a lot of times people don't even know it.

So let's talk about you and then we're gonna go into what SCORE is.

- Okay.

So I started out as a child.

Not sure how deep you want us to go.

- No, let's start out with your career because I found it very interesting, high level.

- Well, sort of, yeah.

I started out as a loader unloader for United Parcel Service, laborer, Union, Local 688.

I did that for a few years.

They promoted me to part-time supervision, and then eventually they made me a full-time supervisor, moved me to Paramus, New Jersey to do computer programming, which I did for a number of years for UPS and then eventually for other companies.

I've worked at Delta Airlines, Merrill Lynch, Abbott, and Caterpillar.

And I retired a couple years ago.

My family's been in Peoria for, oh my gosh, almost 50 years.

- [Matt] Oh, that's cool.

- Yeah, yeah.

I've actually lived here full-time since 2007.

- So you were brought back because of the job.

Is that when Cat brought you back?

- No, actually, my family brought me back.

There was a family need and so I came.

If I'd been fabulously delighted with the place where I was living, maybe I wouldn't have done it.

But yeah.

- I mean, you're talking some of the biggest companies in the world.

I mean, UPS is a monster.

So that's pretty neat stuff.

- It's a great company to work for, and they've always had an ethos of promoting from within.

So people who were laborers can become executives.

- And they're right now, that company is focusing on female leadership too.

- Carol Tome is amazing.

- I know, she's a boss.

- Yes - Yes.

All right.

Gary, how about you?

- Well, I guess I can't hold a job.

I don't know, I've done a lot of different things.

I actually got a job after my junior year at Bradley with Channel 25.

The late Tom Connor hired me.

I gave up a job at Yellowstone National Park to do that and spent a decade at Channel 25 as a street reporter, Sunday night anchor.

And SoCo came calling and served as news director for SoCo if you still remember that name, now Amrin.

And then later was our state lobbyist working with Dick Newmiller in Springfield.

And then finally was head of investor relations when we sold SoCo to the AES Company.

So long career at SoCo, that was my main occupation.

After that though, John Sane, whom I worked with at SoCo, came calling and said "hey, how would you like to work with me at the Proctor Endowment home?"

So I spent a decade with John.

We kind of ran Proctor Place and had a wonderful time together.

And ironically, John Sane is the reason I'm in SCORE.

Because he had been a SCORE volunteer ahead of me and convinced me that it was the right thing to do in retirement.

- I mean, you talk about another smart guy right there.

- Oh yeah, yeah.

Good friend.

- That's pretty cool stuff.

So, SCORE, I went back to when we met I think a month ago and I just thought it was just a joy to talk to.

It was a great conversation.

And I get fired up when you're talking about entrepreneurs and people who want to start businesses.

And one of the things that we've talked about a lot on this show is we've had Larry Winezimmer from Bradley and we've had some great guests all with that entrepreneurial mindset.

And one of the things that we've kind of not on purpose focused on is after COVID, we saw a lot of the negative of businesses closing, but then, people weren't talking about the positives of new businesses and new ideas and entrepreneurs coming up and saying "you know what?

I've always been on the sidelines.

I've got some cash, or I've got a great idea and I want to go in and start something new".

So that's how our conversation kind of started and I was excited about.

So tell me and the viewers, what is SCORE?

- So SCORE is a national nonprofit organization basically dedicated to promoting vibrant small business communities.

Our vision is that everyone who wants to become an entrepreneur have the support and the encouragement they need to succeed in business.

And that's the sum of it.

We are largely a volunteer organization.

Our mentors are primarily volunteers, almost exclusively, and they're really the backbone of what we do.

These are skilled people, many retired, but some working full-time who choose to try to help other people start businesses or grow businesses or change businesses or even wind down businesses and sell them.

We handle the whole business life cycle.

- Well that's interesting because I wasn't thinking that piece.

And that piece is actually one, I had an mentor once tell me as I was starting a side business and what he told me was "I know you're excited, you're going into this new business.

What's your exit plan?"

- It's an important thing.

And you're right, people don't think of an exit plan usually when they start something, it's natural.

Like you say, I'm excited, this is new, it's gonna go great places.

- I'm gonna make a million bucks.

I'm gonna employ 100 people.

- And some of them do.

But even the ones who make a million bucks or many million bucks and employ many people, at some point in time, they are no longer gonna be associated with that business.

- Yeah, good point.

Good point.

So Gary, how did you get involved?

- John Sane certainly was one of the people that influenced me and some of the mentors that were on board when I joined were people like Jack Russell, who was a great mentor for people who wanted to start a franchise because Jack and Bonnie ran the KFC franchises here in the Peoria area.

So I think it was those interpersonal relationships and the success and satisfaction that they got out of mentoring startups, mentoring people who had a business idea but didn't yet have a business plan.

And it was those those influencers for me that convinced me that, well, maybe I have something to bring to the table.

I never owned a business, but I did supervise employees.

I was responsible for large budgets.

And I think I knew what a business plan involved.

So it was those interpersonal relationships and these were people who had deep ties to the Peoria community.

And that was another factor for me was to be able to give back to this community where I've lived for more than 50 years.

- I like that because I say all the time, I give a speech and I'm pretty blunt in the speech and I say, no matter what you think, because this is my opinion, it's your job if you live in this community to take care of your community.

So I don't care whether it's picking up litter or just mentoring someone or being on a board or whatever it may be.

That is what we need in this community.

We need more bonding and more of those ties.

- And it appealed to me that it's a volunteer organization.

We don't get any compensation other than the satisfaction of helping someone with their business or get into business.

And so that was appealing to me because I've served on a number of boards in this community, and like you've said, I really care about the future of this community.

I'm not leaving anytime soon.

- Jack was on my board at Children's Home many years and he was the true definition of somebody that cared.

Pretty cool stuff.

- We still have clients who talk about the influence that Jack had on them.

- Yeah, I think in the nonprofit world, I think every one of us, CEOs and former CEOs, sit there and still think of somebody like Jack and Bonnie, and there's a whole list of people like that, and none of those people do it for the credit.

They do it to take care of people.

And that's what I love about it.

So SCORE mentors are experienced business professionals.

I'm giving what's right off the website, but I want to just because one of the things that we want to do is we want people, we wanna pique their interests.

We wanna say "hey, we need more mentors".

Because I'm guessing, Joanne, that when you're asking people to volunteer and you're doing those things, it's not like you have volunteer coordinators and you have all these different people, marketing people, and you have a group like Semantle coming in and doing all this stuff for you.

It's like a non-profit, it's a shoestring budget.

So you absolutely do what you can to get the word out.

So let's use this to help people.

- It's an opportunity.

I love it.

So I think Gary said it, you did not have a small business before you started working with SCORE.

Some of our mentors don't.

But that can be taught, business understanding, business knowledge, how to handle a business plan, how to deal with finance, that can be taught.

But what can't be taught is the drive to help, the drive to wanna make the community a better place.

I got into it personally through Volunteer Match all very online and, you know, 2020, 2021.

And I didn't have a whole lot of specific small business experience, but I had a dozen or more fantastic mentors to show me that stuff.

We have an entire national organization that has been doing this for almost 60 years.

- [Matt] That's crazy.

- And there are literally thousands of mentors out there, some of whom have extremely specialized, sophisticated skillset.

One of my first clients wanted to do specialty crops.

I was like "okay, I think I know how to spell that.

I sort of know what it means".

But after the first interview, I'm like, I need help.

So I got online and I found three different SCORE mentors in various places in the country who knew something about agriculture and crops.

And within 10 days I was able to put him on a call with myself and a mentor who had a specialty crop business in Arizona who had mentored multiple clients through the process of starting.

So there's just vast network of skills.

So people who wanna help and who are interested in entrepreneurship shouldn't be too worried about, well, I've never had a small business, maybe I'm not the right person.

We can support you in that.

It's the drive to want to help people.

It's the excitement of watching something be created from nothing.

- And you know what too, another point is when someone's starting a business, like I felt like I was a pretty smart guy, but I'll be honest with you, I've probably had four or five side businesses.

I've failed in two or three of them.

And when you sit there and you go "all right, what did I learn from this?"

Oh, I was more worried about money first than I was a business plan.

Or there's just so many things you look at and that entrepreneurial spirit will make you typically get up and do it again, and your ideas.

But one of the things that a mentor did for me, and I think this is what you and Gary are both talking about is it's really I have a lot of ideas but I need someone to corral them and put them in an order.

I need to focus, or balance.

I like the word balance.

Because I'm never balanced.

I'm just all over the board.

- And sometimes our biggest success stories, and this seems a little bit backwards, but is leading a person to conclude after they've looked at their situation, looked at their business plan and decide not to go forward.

Sometimes we keep people from making a mistake.

We don't make that judgment early in the process.

But in the course of mentoring a client, sometimes the client comes to the realization that their idea is never gonna work or they don't have sufficient funding to make it feasible or they're not willing to commit the time to it that really it takes to succeed in small business.

So sometimes, although we love our successes, and I still talk to some of those who are still in business today that I mentored, sometimes it's keeping people from making a mistake about starting a business that maybe doesn't have a really good chance of succeeding.

We don't do that early in the process.

We follow a slate methodology, but sometimes that's beneficial for both the mentor and the mentee to come to that conclusion that maybe another idea is a better idea.

- Yeah, I'm a business coach with an institution and it's highly regarded.

And when I have my group, I'll bet you six out of, I usually have groups of eight, six out of eight ask me, "how do you ask for a mentor?"

And these are people that are paying a lot of money to do something.

They want to get better.

They have access to people, but they don't know sometimes how to even ask or how to get there to get to that point.

- Or they're uncertain about what kind of a mentor they're going to get.

Our profiles as mentors are out there on the SCORE network, and there are about 10,000 SCORE mentors around the country.

And they will find you if you have in your profile a background in a certain type of business.

I just had one the other day that was looking for a certain type of mentor and saw something in my profile and reached out to me.

And I guess that segues into another point about, since the pandemic and the whole Zoom phenomenon, we have picked up a lot more clients from all over the country because you don't need to be right there in the community to mentor this person.

And that's been a big change since the pandemic began.

We're getting a lot more clients from all over the country because they see something in a mentor here in Peoria.

- And I think it's important to remember that almost every business, at least at the very new stage, needs general mentoring in basic business.

Because to be a business owner, you've gotta be a leader.

You've gotta be a doer.

You've gotta understand your line of business, you've got to understand your financials, you've gotta understand how to market or how to pay for all those things.

And eventually you've gotta be HR.

- [Matt] I was just gonna say that.

- So many things you have to be an expert in.

It's nice to be able to go to one place and have somebody who's pretty much grounded in all of the above at a basic level and then can reach out to somebody who's way more expert for a specific need.

Whether it's an industry like specialty crops or whether it's HR issues, how do I hire a COO when I'm ready to turn over some of the business finally to somebody else.

These are big questions in business and it's not all at the starting stage.

Sometimes it's a lot farther along.

- Just had a client who approached me and he's been in business for a half a dozen years and he's looking for a senior executive to join him on his team.

So he's not a startup, it's a $10 million business.

And those are the kind of clients that we all don't see all the time, but when we do, we really want to help them because they have a very specific need and they've turned to us because they think we can help them with that particular problem.

I will say though that most of our clients, the very first thing that we need to talk about is the business plan.

That's fundamental.

And oftentimes somebody's way ahead of the game with an idea, they've got a product that they think is fantastic.

But do you have a business plan?

Well, not so much.

- Yeah.

That's the process.

I think when you look at starting a business, you have to start with the process.

And I went through and studied and you have to plan and you have to start.

And to do it alone is hard, no matter who you are.

And there's so many different great ideas out there.

I mean, just like right here with Eureka and ICC and Bradley and Illinois State, you've got some of the smartest people, but if they don't have that next step plan, it gets very hard, doesn't it?

- It is.

And there are a number of organizations, especially in Peoria, I mean, if you look at Distillery Labs, if you look at the Turner Center, the Illinois Small Business Development Center is right there at Bradley, they have experts in foreign trade, they have experts in government contract.

There's that ton of resources out there.

But even navigating that can be difficult.

- Well, even like with SCORE, I've never heard of it.

And that to me, I'm embarrassed to even say it.

- 59 years later, seriously.

- And you know, you sit here and I'm like, I'm intrigued because I'm looking at it two ways from a personal standpoint.

One, I kind of like the idea, maybe I'll throw myself in there and become a mentor, but there's another piece over here going wait a minute, I need some more help too.

- Where were you when I wanted to start a business?

- We still deal with that name and for good reasons, we changed the name to SCORE, simply SCORE.

But previously we were known as the Service Core of Retired Executives.

And when I tell people that's what we were before, they go "oh, now I remember that".

We've been around as a chapter for 57 years now.

So we're not a new kid on the block.

- No, some of my colleagues as chapter chairs, I am really tired about hearing we're the country's best kept secret.

We don't wanna be a secret anymore.

- I hate when people say we're the hidden gem.

At Children's Home for many years, I mean we'd been around 156 years before I stepped down last year.

And 156 years.

And people would go "oh, is that the building on Knoxville?"

I'm sick of being the hidden gem.

So you have to almost in your head remarket and rebrand everything that's happened pre-Abe Lincoln time.

- Well, and SCORE has a tremendous impact.

I mean, last year something like well over 30,000 new businesses were created with the support of SCORE and over 100,000 total jobs.

People who were working with SCORE mentors on some level or had worked with SCORE mentors.

- Well, think about this, think about, one, the economic impact to a community of growing a business, number one, think about fulfilling someone's dream.

That's the most successful piece like as a mentor over the years, watching someone grow into whatever they become is the most fulfilling thing that can happen as a mentor.

- Just the other day, a young lady came up to me and I mentored her five years ago for a salon that she started and she's doing great today.

And that is what really makes it all worthwhile when one of your previous clients is still in business today doing well and remembers the relationship that we had and how it led to maybe a better business start for her.

- Isn't that cool?

So you plan, you start, you manage, you grow, and then transition and exit, potentially.

- I mean, those are all phases of the business cycle.

Every business goes through them one way or another.

And we can assist and have assisted at every point in the process.

We have some mentors who are specialists in divesting, spinning off, selling, transitioning businesses.

- I think the best way to think of this is to get to your probably unknown destination faster.

Because if you think about it, like when you're starting, let's say you start a restaurant and we had a Triple Dipple on here and he starts a coffee shop and he has these little mini cheesecakes and it's very successful.

And he turned it into a family business, and he was on the show, great guy.

And you sit here and he does not know where he's going to end up.

And now it's turned into, now that the family's all in, now it went from a little bakery to a bigger bakery to now a coffee shop too.

And it keeps growing and growing.

You don't know what's gonna happen one, three, five years down the road if you have someone helping you.

- One of our fellow mentors had a client who thought that he wanted to focus on the retail side of this business and discovered that maybe that wasn't his strength or the market wasn't right.

Today he's very successful on the wholesale side.

And our mentor Rick was able to work with him, see where the market and his target customer really is.

And like you've said, it evolved into something that he probably didn't anticipate when he first started, but with the help of a mentor was able to see this is where your business is really heading, and this is where you're going to be successful.

- And for you, Gary, I was thinking.

You said "well I didn't own a business", but experience trumps everything.

And so when I'm looking at everything that your focus areas are, I mean, you're talking about you were television, you can write, I think a lost art right now is business writing.

They don't even teach that anymore.

- Exactly.

- My dad said "make sure you go into business in college and minor in speech because if you can talk, you'll win".

And so it's that type of, but you've got manufacturing arts and entertainment, marketing, management and operations, business planning and strategic planning.

And the list goes on.

And I think that's what people, when they have a business idea, don't be embarrassed to sit here and think that you've gotta go on this journey alone.

Because some of the best businesses ever were with help.

Correct?

- Get there faster.

- Absolutely.

- [Matt] Good point.

- But I have a family member who has a successful business that he started about 15 years ago and I helped him a little bit, set up QuickBooks, this and that.

But I remember metaphorically smashing my head against a wall trying to figure out how to deal with the state of Illinois website to certify and get licensed.

And had I known there was an expert whose free advice we could have gotten through the Illinois SBDC, wow, or a mentor from SCORE who would've known to call somebody from the Illinois SBDC.

You're right.

The solo journey is very difficult and we're here to help.

- So if you wanted to become a mentor, you can go to the website.

- SCORE.org.

Volunteer.

- SCORE.org.

Do you have to put slash Peoria?

Is it just automatically-- - Just SCORE.org and go to the place where it says volunteer.

They will eventually direct you to us.

- That is awesome.

That is awesome.

- We cover about 14 counties by zip codes in Illinois.

So the national organization knows to send them our way if they're within that general area.

- Okay.

Well thank you for coming on.

This was a fun topic.

It's one of my all-time favorite talk topics.

Joanne, thank you, Gary, thank you.

Good stuff.

This wraps another show.

I'm Matt George and this is "Business Forward".

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) - Thank you for tuning in to "Business Forward" brought to you by PNC.