Formed in 1976, the Small Business Institute® is the premier organization dedicated to field-based student consulting and outreach to small businesses. Our members are actively involved with small businesses, entrepreneurial firms, and organizations in their communities and regions.
We are especially proud of the field-based student consulting projects that many of our members supervise each year. These individual programs are operated by colleges and universities across the country. These SBI programs bridge the gap between subject competency provided by courses in business and the entry-level training that companies critically need. Teams of qualified university students, under expert faculty supervision, provide consulting to small business owners and managers as part of their education. These programs emphasize practical, realistic, and affordable solutions to problems confronting small businesses.
Our organization offers our members a number of benefits, including, but not limited to the following: annual conference, awards, student project competition, two (2) journals, a newsletter, and much, much more.
New issue of the Small Business Institute® Journal (Vol. 7, No. 2)
We are pleased to announce that a new issue of the Small Business Institute® Journal (SBIJ) is now available on the journal's website (www.sbij.ecu.edu).As the founding editor, Don Bradley did a wonderful job in establishing the journal, and we hope this issue builds on that excellent foundation. Continuing the legacy of providing high quality papers that appeal to a diverse readership, the current issue includes an eclectic collection of papers for both academics and small business practitioners. In this issue you will find a teaching case and an empirical examination of teaching business plan writing, a look at the cutting edge trend of using social media/groupons for small business, an examination of the importance of legitimacy for entrepreneurs, a conceptual piece on project novelty in the small business arena, and an examination of the use of bootstrapping by franchisees.
It is our hope that these articles are both enlightening to our readers and provide fodder for a myriad of research projects in the future. In addition to the new issue, all past issues of SBIJ have been added to the website and can be browsed by issue, author or article title.
Michael L. Harris, Shanan G. Gibson & William C. McDowell
