Contributor: Jinell Smithmyer

Tatie (at right) with her brother in front of her bakery. Tatie's Bakery is helping to rebuild Haiti. Join MicroMentor and grow more businesses like Tatie's in the U.S., Haiti, Nicaragua and more. Photo: Jinell Smithmyer/MicroMentor

Tatie grew up in a family of seven children, and wanted to own her own business since she was a little girl. While just a young student, Tatie's mother passed away and Tatie began raising her younger brother and god-daughter. She made them fried fritters to take to school for lunch, which were so delicious that they would sell them straight out of their lunchboxes. Seeing the potential in her culinary talents, Tatie began slowly building Tatie's Home, her bakery and catering business. After a number of years as a small, informal enterprise, Tatie's Home began to expand and land larger customers.

Then the January 12 earthquake hit, and everything changed.

When the earthquake struck, Tatie was taking public transportation to drop her brother off at the airport. Walking from the airport to the tap-tap (public bus), she heard a deafening noise and felt the ground rumble under her feet — her first thought was that a plane had crashed. Shaking and worried for her brother, who was about to board a plane, Tatie turned and ran back to the airport. She spotted him running out of the airport as she arrived, unharmed. Others were not so lucky.

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Photo: courtesy of MicroMentor

Starting with just a sewing machine, Aida Mayorga and Oscar Garcia built a business that now employs more than 50 workers and promotes positive environmental and social business practices. Entrepreneurs have the potential to bring great opportunity and change to their communities, but they often face tough challenges along the way — challenges that a business mentor can help to solve.

Join MicroMentor (a Mercy Corps initiative) and Agora Partnerships as we work to connect volunteer business mentors with entrepreneurs in Central America, starting with Nicaragua.

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Business mentoring isn’t a new concept for many professionals — but the way these connections are happening is changing faster than ever. Breaking out of the mentoring program mold is the Mercy Corps program MicroMentor, best described as a Match.com for business mentoring. With online profiles and connection tools for participants, MicroMentor is catching on amongst entrepreneurs and business professionals around the world as a simple, convenient way to get connected.

A match and business advice through MicroMentor helped Rose Sabel Dodge get her fiber arts and crafts business off to a good start. Photo: Ian Wagreich for MicroMentor

Essentially MicroMentor is a platform for providing business mentoring and expertise to small and growing businesses: growth-oriented startup and micro-businesses, as well as cooperative and small and growing enterprises that help fight poverty and create lasting jobs in nations around the world. But in addition to being an online service that connects small business owners with business mentors, MicroMentor provides training, tools and continuous support to help enterprise development organizations deliver high-quality business mentoring and advising cost-effectively and at scale.

Small business ownership presents its own special set of challenges – by providing access to business expertise, knowledge, and connections through mentoring, MicroMentor is assisting entrepreneurs as they build robust enterprises that will thrive in 2011 and beyond.

In the U.S. alone, MicroMentor has engaged more than 7,000 people and facilitated over 2,400 mentoring relationships, with participating businesses reporting significant revenue and employment gains. Building on its success in the U.S., MicroMentor expanded to Nicaragua in late 2010, with plans to launch in Haiti in early 2011.

To find a mentor, go to the website and create a profile and mentoring request. Volunteer mentors will be able to view your request and offer to help (you can also request help from specific mentors). Business professionals can go to the website and sign up as volunteer mentors through a similar process.

Find a mentor. Be a mentor. Build a business. Visit MicroMentor today to get started.

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