Small business owners are great teachers. updated: April 2007 | view homepage

The Weekly Television Show Signature Series #14: Take time to Build Your People — they'll Build your business. Signature Series #13: On Being An E-Culture where there is "One Workplace for All." Signature Series #12: The future (even of this show) is "Innovation & Invention." Signature Series #11: Home Alone is the story of 19± million small business owners who office at home. Signature Series #10: Automate Your Art is the story of Ken Duncan's trek to find the the meaning of life. Signature Series #9: Moving On is the story of three business owners, all baby boomers, who sold their business. Signature Series #8: A study of employee stock ownership is "The Ownership Nation." Signature Series #7: For Presidents' Week we study "Leaders with followers." Signature Series #6: Women who break glass ceilings are Women Who Go Beyond. Signature Series #5: In 1993 Steve Hoffman started Modern Postcards. It is all about "California Kaizen." Signature Series #4: Visit the Navarro family; their pharmacies "Solve Big Problems." Signature Series #3: Owners talk about "Exit Strategies" - being faster, cheaper and better. Signature Series #2: A TV special about security because "Data is King Not Cash" Signature Series #1: Friends for life can change the world. Break molds, Breakthrough! Stories about the soul of every economy Key Episodes for all of us Selection: "Loved within their community and respected in their industry" is the bottom line of the selection process. Nobody has paid or can pay to be on this television show. More... On the Air: Join us first by watching the show every week on your PBS-member station. Airing: Listings for just one of these episodes. Without A Break Since 1994 There are thirteen episodes per season and, of course, four seasons per year. A New Season called the Signature Series, a Review of Key Episodes: This season runs from January 2007 to April 2007, a season of changes. Small Business School (SBS) will increasingly be the responsibility of others. SBS will involve more and more producers in national and local productions. Links to the four seasons of 2006: 1600 Season: April 2007 - June 2007 1500 Season: October - December 2006 1400 Season: July - September 2006 1300 Season: April 2006- June 2006 Other ways to find an episode of the show: You can search by business, owner, business sector, topic, Diversity I & II, Family, nation, State, or Women! View prior episode: On most of these legacy pages, usually just below the header on the right, click on "View prior episode. You can click over 150 times and go back several years. Specials: These episodes are a compilation from the best points of many episodes; we explore key small business issues. Television to make a difference Key pages: Each episode has its own home page, an overview with links to that business, the complete transcript, a case study guide prepared for business schools, and streaming video. Today, these case study guides are part of the curriculum of almost every business school in the USA and the around the world. Perspective: We live in the present; we reflect on the past; we project the future; and we struggle to know what is important and good within life, ie. creating harmony. Everyone helps to select a business to be on the show A discussion about this working business model, by Bruce Camber, Executive Producer First, we turn to the PBS-station manager and get permission to do an episode of the show in their neighborhood. Next we contact every local Chamber of Commerce within reach of the station's signal. Usually there are 40 to 70 local chambers. We invite each to nominate four or five businesses that have the qualities outlined within our selection process. Usually there are over 200 businesses nominated. We invite their local small business advocates (Economic Development, Better Business Bureau, the mayors, the Governor, Workforce Initiative, people among the SBA-SBDC-SCORE, the business press, business professors, CPAs, and others) to vote. These are the people who know the hearts and minds of these business owners. They vote and we emerge with a list of the top ten. We then re-engage the station manager, the CPAs of each company, and each of their national trade associations to make the final selection. Nobody can pay or has ever paid to be on this show. We are looking for the finest roles models for each of us, our industries, and our children. Today, everybody is a producer: We believe that part of television that lifts up exploitation as an art form (glamorizing violence and corruptive behaviors) can and should be replaced with the vibrant heart of creativity, value-laden work, and hope for the future. We have invited our loyal stations and our legacy sponsors of the show to take over SmallBusinessSchool for the future. We also invite all the Chambers and National Trade Associations to join them. By working together the productions can be increased from our 26 per year to 100, then to 1000, 2000 and eventually as many as 4000 per year where 3948 are local episodes. Fifty-two of those episodes are selected for the national and global feeds of the show There are 210 Designated Market Areas in the USA. I believe there should be at least local 10 episodes per year within each DMA. In several of the most heavily populated DMAs there should be as many as 26 new episodes per year. Also, the show is broadcast in over 100 other countries via the Voice of America. We wll work with every station and every country to produce local episodes and to be part of the new management of SmallBusinessSchool. One clear hope to cure the madness within the world is to lift up the best role models that we can find, knowing, of course, that we all have clay feet. None of us are perfect. Yet, inspiration to create is better than incitement to exploit. -BEC