Westwood Non-Profit Opens Door to Entrepreneurship

In the current economic climate, failure just isn't an option for those running - or looking run - a small business. 

But sometimes, it's not so easy to find the information needed to avoid failure. Unless, that is, you've heard of student at Step-Up Venture University. 

The Westwood-based non-profit does exactly that - informs prospective entrepreneurs on how to start a business . . . and keep it running. 

"There's a great opportunity of more or less people understanding how to start the business and reduce the risk of failing," said Henry Shterenberg, founder of Step-Up Venture University.

Shterenberg, who also founded the New England Sports Academy in Westwood in 2003, is also an adjunct professor at Bentley University, where he teaches Entrepreneurial Thinking and Sales. 

It was through his experience at Bentley that prompted him to launch Step-Up Venture in February 2009 after realizing many of his students weren't as keen as to how to get their ideas off the ground when looking to start a business. 

"I saw that a lot of kids were coming out with a lot of great ideas about businesses they wanted to start," he said. "The problem was that after we provided the education for them, the excitement was there, but they had no idea how to go about actually doing it - starting the business - without making mistakes that a lot of businesses make. 

"At some point a couple of years ago I calculated that it cost me over $600,000 of mistakes that I made, that I would not have made if I knew what I know now," he added.

Step-Up Venture provides courses that aim to help students of any age learn to reduce the risk of having a business fail in four distinct ways: education, support, outsource management, and actual funding.

"We realized that over the last 10 to 20 years, the cost of starting a business was reduced to practically zero in some cases," Shterenberg said. "Due to technological advancements, opportunities are so big and grand that a lot of the businesses don't need a lot of capital to start and become profitable. A lot of people make the assumption that the businesses need a lot of money to start. We are here to prove otherwise."

After Step-Up launched, courses were held in a beta-test phase (i.e., a free trial) at Westwood High School. Shterenberg sent surveys to parents regarding their interest, then decided to interact with the students themselves by setting up a booth during lunch. It was enough to catch Matt Hurley's attention.

"It was kind of like a regular class, only low-pressure and I'd say it was very interesting," said Hurley, a senior at Westwood High School who took a course through Step-Up when he was a sophomore. 

Hurley, who runs his own DJ and MC service called Muzicology, said while he didn't need Step-Up to start his company, the education he received there helped him to keep it running.

"I started a DJ and MC company and now we do almost all of our events around Westwood," Hurley said. "We do lots of events in the local area and do events downtown. It's definitely taken off since then and the Step-Up program helped me with marketing and advertising, really promoting my business."

Currently, Step-Up Venture offers the following educational courses:

• Leaders in Training - focuses on development of leadership and communication skills, as well as financial literacy, public speaking and community involvement.
• Introduction to Entrepreneurship - focuses on those who wish to learn what it takes to start and run a business and how to be successful.
• Idea to Reality - focuses on those who have an idea and are ready to launch a business.
• Taking Business to the Next Level - focuses on those who have existing businesses.
• First Time Over 55 - focuses on those who are retired and want to start their own business. 

Hurley, for one, said while he isn't looking to get into business in college, the Step-Up experience was definitely worth the time.

"It was a lot of business, not just about marketing, but stocks and every aspect of business and being a good business person," he said. "It was a really good, well-rounded education." 

Registration is now open for Step-Up Venture University's Fall 2010 courses. For more information, visit http://stepupvu.com/default.aspx.