Harvard Business School Club of New York Launches its Recover & Rebuild Initiative to Support Local Area Small Businesses

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Harvard Business School Club of New York

Jan 13, 2021, 13:21 ET

NEW YORK, Jan. 13, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Harvard Business School Club of New York has launched the Recover & Rebuild Initiative to aid New York local area small businesses to survive, rebuild and grow in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

This Initiative has assembled a growing pool of over fifty HBS alumni volunteers with significant and varied business management experience, including many who themselves run small businesses. Originally focused on small businesses in Harlem and Chinatown, this Initiative has now broadened its outreach to include businesses from anywhere in the New York Metro Area. To date, HBS alumni have provided coaching to over 150 business clients and this total is rapidly growing.

The Harvard Business School Club of New York's Recover and Rebuild Initiative offers a number of support options to New York Metro Area small businesses:

One-on-One Coaching. Individual coaching that focuses on the 1-2 most pressing challenges or opportunities faced by the small business. Sessions are virtual and include one or more Harvard Business School alumni volunteers with both broad-based general management and specific functional expertise relevant to the small business being coached.

"Office Hours" group coaching sessions. Live Zoom sessions with a group of 8 to 10 neighborhood businesses, moderated by Harvard Business School alumni. The sessions are open-ended in terms of topics discussed, very interactive, and allow a small business entrepreneur to ask questions and gain insight from both the moderator/coach as well as the other businesses participating in the session.

Topic Specific Webinars. Webinars are recorded live events about a topic of interest that are then archived and available on the Harvard Business School Club of New York's Recover & Rebuild website (https://recoverandrebuild.hbscny.org/). Topics to date have included:

Digital Marketing strategy and tactics – frameworks and perspectives on how to devise a focused digital marketing strategy and tips or approaches to execute a digital marketing plan.

Marketing and Sales – identifying and understanding the needs of your customer base and outreach efforts, including how to manage any "real time" pivots to a new business model during these challenging times.

Scenario Planning – details how to think through, lay out, and evaluate various potential business outcomes posed by COVID-19, including financial analysis that helps a small business proactively plan for future cash needs and financial options under various potential business scenarios.

Small businesses can learn more at the Harvard Business School Club of New York's Recover & Rebuild Initiative website: https://recoverandrebuild.hbscny.org/ and find additional resources at https://recoverandrebuild.hbscny.org/resource-library/.

About Harvard Business School Club of New York: Founded in 1920, the Club's mission is to make a difference and to support Harvard Business School by engaging alumni, impacting community, and fostering leadership and lifelong learning.