Small business owners may be looking to brighter days ahead with a new sense of mission and understanding on what it takes to grow a business—from navigating inflation and labor shortages to new ways to secure funding.
CNBC’s Small Business Playbook will bring together some of the top experts in entrepreneurship to offer insight and advice to help your business succeed in the short-term and long-term.
For CNBC Small Business Playbook editorial coverage, stories and video, visit www.cnbc.com/small-business-playbook/.
Eva Chen is a business mentor and brand strategist who proves great branding is not just for big companies, but also for small businesses & entrepreneurs who want to realize their uniqueness and talents. A business consultant and brand strategist for over 20 years, she combines an experienced intuition for what makes her clients stand out with the business expertise to turn ideas into authentic, successful brands.
After leaving Corporate America, she started Brand From Within, a brand strategy consultancy, and then Second Callings, a coaching mentorship for people who want to find fulfillment and have a career or business they never want to retire from. What she has been most passionate about is helping her clients get clarity and confidence as they evolve into the business and brand they always aspired to have.
Owner of the Dominique Dawes Gymnastics & Ninja Academies, Dominique opened the gyms to continue her commitment to developing a healthy and compassionate culture in the sport of gymnastics. Her first academy opened in the midst of a global pandemic, July 2020 and her second location is slated to open in early 2023. Dawes also holds minority ownership of the Washington Spirit of the National Women's Soccer League, and served as the co-chair of the President’s Council for Fitness, Sports and Nutrition under the Obama administration alongside Drew Brees. Alongside LeBron James and Maverick Carter, she recently served as Executive Producer of the Peacock docu-series “Golden”, the journey of USA’s elite gymnasts on the road to the Tokyo Olympics, which has been nominated for a Sports Emmy.
Dawes holds her degree from the University of Maryland and was inducted into UMD's prestigious Hall of Fame in 2022. In 2023, her hometown of Montgomery County, Maryland will honor her career and legacy with a life size statue to continue inspiring the next generation to follow in her footsteps.
As a wife, mother of four, Olympian and business owner, Dominique Dawes has transcended the world of sports, politics, entertainment and culture.
Isabella Casillas Guzman serves as the 27th Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) and was sworn in on Wednesday, March 17, 2021. Administrator Guzman represents the more than 30 million U.S. small businesses and is committed to helping small business owners and entrepreneurs start, grow and be resilient.
A lifelong proponent of small businesses, Guzman grew up as the daughter of a small business owner and learned at a young age how important small businesses are to the communities they serve, the people they employ, and the economies they help power.
Administrator Guzman previously served as Director of the California Office of the Small Business Advocate, a position she held after being appointed by Governor Gavin Newsom in April 2019. In that role, she served as the voice of small businesses and innovative startups in the 5th largest economy in the world. She administered and advocated for programs and initiatives to help small businesses access capital, markets, and networks for stronger outcomes. She and her team helped connect entrepreneurs in every community with the resources needed. As the economic recovery support function coordinator for the state, she focused on resilience and most recently worked to help small businesses access relief during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In California, Administrator Guzman oversaw a network of small business centers focused on expanding assistance to underserved business groups. She launched new public private partnerships and collaborated to deliver cutting edge resources to small businesses, including through initiatives like Get Digital CA to increase technology and e-commerce adoption and Source Diverse Source Local to strengthen supply chain readiness. She advocated fiercely for financial relief for small businesses, leading to the expansion of state supported lending and the largest COVID-19 grant relief program in the nation at over $2.5 billion. Guzman's office launched the Entrepreneurship Task Force to serve as a bridge to small businesses and create content and programs to help strengthen the competitiveness of startup and small firms.
Administrator Guzman has previously served in leadership at the SBA as the agency’s Deputy Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor during the Obama-Biden Administration, where she oversaw policy and new program implementation. She was a small business entrepreneur herself, and an advisor to fellow founders including in accelerating technology commercialization and in helping small business contractors leverage the federal marketplace. Administrator Guzman earned a Bachelor of Science from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business.
Karim R. Lakhani is the Dorothy & Michael Hintze Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He specializes in technology management, innovation, digital transformation and artificial intelligence (AI). His innovation-related research is centered around his role as the founder and co-director of the Laboratory for Innovation Science at Harvard and as the principal investigator of the NASA Tournament Laboratory. Karim is known for his original scholarship on open source communities and innovation contests and has pioneered the use of field experiments to help solve innovation-related challenges while simultaneously generating rigorous research in partnership with organizations like NASA, Harvard Medical School, The Broad Institute, TopCoder, The Linux Foundation and various private organizations. His digital transformation research investigates the role of analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) in reshaping business and operating models. This research is complemented through his leadership as co-founder and chair of the The Digital, Data, and Design (D^3) Institute at Harvard and as co-founder and co-chair of the Harvard Business Analytics Program, a university-wide online program transforming mid-career executives into data-savvy leaders.
Karim has published over 150 peer-reviewed papers in leading management, economics and natural science journals, executive-oriented articles in Harvard Business Review and MIT Sloan Management Review, and Harvard Business School case studies. He is the co-editor of two books from MIT Press on open and distributed innovation models including Revolutionizing Innovation: Users, Communities and Open Innovation (2016) and Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software (2005). He is the co-author of Competing in the Age of AI (2020) a book published by the Harvard Business Review Press. His research has been featured in BusinessWeek, The Boston Globe, The Economist, Fast Company, Inc., MarketWatch, The New York Times, National Public Radio, Science, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, WBUR, WGBH, and Wired.
Karim has taught extensively in Harvard Business School’s MBA, executive, doctoral and online programs. He has co-developed new courses on Digital Innovation & Transformation, Digital Strategy and Innovation, and Laboratory to Market. He co-chairs the HBS executive program on Competing with Big Data and Business Analytics, various custom executive education offerings and developed the HarvardX online course on Technology Entrepreneurship.
Karim was awarded his Ph.D. in management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also holds an SM degree in Technology and Policy from MIT, and a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering and Management from McMaster University in Canada. He was a recipient of the Aga Khan Foundation International Scholarship and a doctoral fellowship from Canada's Social Science and Humanities Research Council. Prior to coming to HBS he served as a Lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. Karim has also worked in sales, marketing and new product development roles at GE Healthcare and was a consultant with The Boston Consulting Group.
1:00pm
Inflation remains the number one concern among small business owners across all industries. With interest rates expected to rise again, and the threat of an economic recession continuing to linger, we’ll examine the economic outlook for the remainder of 2023, and beyond, and what it means for your business.
Dana Peterson, The Conference Board Chief Economist
Interviewer: Kate Rogers, CNBC Restaurant & Small Business Correspondent
Finding qualified workers continues to be a top challenge, but the founders of a fast-growing franchise believe they have come up with the perfect solution. They’ll share their story of building their business by employing workers from an untapped demographic, and how you can, too.
Amy and Ben Wright, Bitty & Beau’s Coffee Owners
Moderator: Sharon Epperson, CNBC Senior Personal Finance Correspondent
The hype around artificial intelligence platforms like ChatGPT has reached fever pitch, with many predicting it has the potential to transform the way businesses operate. We’ll learn how business owners should be thinking about AI, and specific ways in which they can tap into this new technology to optimize operations, enhance the customer experience, and drive growth.
Karim Lakhani, Harvard Business School Dorothy & Michael Hintze Professor of Business Administration
Interviewer: Kristina Partsinevelos, CNBC Reporter
Despite continued economic uncertainty, growth opportunities do currently exist for small businesses. But growth often requires capital, which has become a major focus of the Small Business Administration. We’ll discuss the agency’s programs that offer financial assistance, and access, for US-based small business owners, and what the govt is doing to elevate businesses from historically marginalized groups.
Admin. Isabella Casillas Guzman, U.S. Small Business Administration
Interviewer: Kate Rogers, CNBC Restaurant & Small Business Correspondent
Athletes and entrepreneurs possess similar qualities, like grit, determination, and perseverance. A three-time Olympic gymnast will join us to share how she is now applying the same mindset that earned her a gold medal to her newest endeavor as a small business owner, and how you can too.
Dominique Dawes, Olympian, Owner, Dominique Dawes Gymnastics & Ninja Academies
Interviewer: Dominic Chu, CNBC Senior Markets Correspondent
Are you experiencing challenges running your small business?
Now’s your chance to receive advice straight from the experts!
During this interactive forum, we’ll be answering your questions on how to best navigate the obstacles that are holding your business back and help keep you on the path to success.
Eva Chen, SCORE Business Mentor and Brand Strategist
Moderator: Sharon Epperson, CNBC Senior Personal Finance Correspondent
2:30pm
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Asahi Pompey is Global Head of Corporate Engagement and President of the Goldman Sachs Foundation. She is a member of the Management Committee, the Global Inclusion and Diversity Committee and a sponsor of the Firmwide Black Network.
Prior to assuming her current role, Ms. Pompey was Co-Chief Compliance Officer of Goldman, Sachs & Co and Global Head of Investment Banking Division Compliance, and had responsibility for conduct risk. She joined Goldman Sachs in 2006 and was named Managing Director in 2010 and Partner in 2018.
Prior to joining the firm, Ms. Pompey was an associate at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, where she worked in the New York and Frankfurt offices.
Ms. Pompey serves on the Board of Managers for Swarthmore College. She also serves on the Advisory Boards of Forbes’ Next 1,000, Glamour Women of the Year and the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream.
Harley Finkelstein is an entrepreneur, lawyer, and the President of Shopify. He founded his first company at age 17 while a student at McGill. Harley completed his law degree as well as his MBA at the University of Ottawa, where he co-founded the JD/MBA Student Society and the Canadian MBA Oath. Harley is an Advisor to Felicis Ventures, and one of the “Dragons” on CBC’s Next Gen Den. He received the Canadian Angel Investor of the Year Award, Canada’s Top 40 Under 40 Award, Fortune’s 40 Under 40, and was inducted into the Order of Ottawa. From 2014 to 2017 Harley was on the Board of Directors of the C100, and from 2017 to 2020 he was on to the Board of Directors of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). He is currently on the Board of Operation Hope, a non-profit providing financial literacy empowerment and economic education. Harley starred on Discovery Channel’s I Quit, and recently co-founded Firebelly, a modern high-end tea brand.
Damian Lillard of the Portland Trail Blazers is a 7-time NBA All-Star & a member of the NBA’s 75th Anniversary team. Lillard won a gold medal with Team USA Basketball at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, and is widely regarded as one of the premier players in the NBA.
Damian is a Co-Founder of Move Insoles, a new athletic health and wellness brand which makes performance insoles for athletes and consumers looking to improve their foot health. Move Insoles was founded in 2020, and has quickly gained momentum as the top insoles product worn among NBA and top college basketball players.
In the offseason, Lillard also known as DAME D.O.L.L.A. is an emerging hip-hop musical artist, who has released 4 studio albums to date under his Front Page Music label.
Jill Martin is an Emmy Award-winning television personality and New York Times bestselling author. Martin is the Lifestyle Contributor on NBC’s TODAY show known for her wildly popular “Steals and Deals” segments. She also serves as a guest co-host for the 3rd Hour of Today. After writing three fashion self-help books, Jill wanted to create a line of products for women to bring ease, comfort, and accessible elegance into their lives. Jill created a lifestyle brand for QVC that is coveted by the world’s most famous celebrities and adored by women (& men) across the world.