So how cool is this? The Startup America Partnership is offering a collection of real business tools and resources, mostly web-based, to help startups and small businesses do better.
This is the White-House-sponsored small business program announced a year ago. Here’s what I wrote then on may main blog:
The Obama White House [Feb. 1, 2011] announced its Startup America Partnership yesterday with some very slick online video streaming, some serious financial commitments, and the good sense to lead with real entrepreneurs including Steve Case and Brad Feld, and real information provided by the Small Business Administration and the Kauffman Foundation. That was a great start.
The announcement now is that the partnership has come out with actual resources people can use. We’re talking about software tools like web apps, analytics tools, accounting, legal forms helps, and of course business planning, things people can use, made available to people who need it. If you are an entrepreneur, business owner, or in the process of starting, you can join the program for free and take advantage of different tools and resources, depending on your stage of business.
You can use this link to register your business, started or about to start.
And I’m proud to say, by the way, that we at Palo Alto Software are doing our part. We are one of the participating companies.
And another note, just because it should be said: I don’t like the sentiment that says this is like “at last” the federal government is helping small business. I’ve posted on this blog often about how much I respect the government’s Small Business Administration (SBA) programs to help small business. I cooperate with the SBA whenever I can, and I blog for the SBA community site, and I have business plan tutorials on that site too. I also work often with the SBA-funded Small Business Development Centers (SBDC), which offer help to small businesses in 1,000 locations; they are excellent. And I am a member of SCORE, a mentorship program, sponsored by the SBA. The difference between these and Startup America is that Startup America isn’t using tax dollars at all.
Tim Berry is the founder and chairman of Palo Alto Software and Bplans.com. Follow him on Twitter @Timberry.
