A Change of Direction?

From the O. C. Metro — January 25, 2001
By Barbara DeMarco-Barrett

Women's Opportunities Center and SCORE are two resources.

You can count on certain things in life: growing older with time. Growing wiser with age. And working well into your 60s (unless you become an heiress like I almost did — but that's another story).

But are you sure the work you're doing will provide satisfaction into the future? Are you doing what you've always wanted to do? Or is there a dream that's been lurking, that wakes you up in the middle of the night and gnaws at your stomach and brain?

If you don't know where to begin, start with the Women's Opportunities Center (WOC) at the University of California, Irvine. Every year 2,000 people, including a small percentage of men, walk through their doors. Some need help deciding what they want to do. Others desire networking information or support. And yet others attend WOC classes or enroll in programs they offer.

WOC offers a two-weekend course called "Considering Entrepreneurship" designed for the woman entrepreneur. "When we developed this program," says Vickie Curtin, the Center's director, "we wanted to try to prevent the high failure rate of new businesses by helping the women entrepreneurs figure out if the business they want to start is right for them, if they have the right aptitude and if they have what it takes. Often people want to leave the corporate world to be their own boss, but they start a business that grows to a similar size as the one they left, which isn't what they wanted. It's not just about growth; it's about satisfaction."

The Center now has a high-tech program and also one in how to acquire financial security. Scholarship assistance is available for most services and classes, including the membership fee to the Center, so that no one is ever turned away. Where WOC leaves off, SCORE comes in. Once you know what you want to do, or have begun to do it, SCORE: Counselors to America's Small Businesses can help with writing a business plan, marketing, strategizing how to grow your business and financing.

SCORE operates under the umbrella of the Small Business Administration and is mostly made up of retired male and female executives. They offer one-on-one counseling and will act as an advisory board for people with businesses too small to have their own board of directors. "We usually meet with the business owners once every two months, usually to bounce off questions," says past chair, Bette Otte. "There's no charge for most of what we offer, including acting as a board, because if we charged, that would limit the number of people we serve. We charge minimally for workshops and seminars because we hand out a lot of material and need to be reimbursed."

Otte, SCORE's 25th cybercounselor, raves about the cybercounseling they're doing (www.score.org) because more than 800 counselors nationwide can answer business-related questions online.

So, if you've realized you're not satisfied with where you are professionally, here's a starting place. There are more and more opportunities out there for women, and so much low cost and free help available. As Mary Delarivi're Manley said way back in 1696, there's no time like the present.

You can reach the Women's Opportunities Center at 949-824-7128 and SCORE at 714-550-7369.