A note from our editor, Elizabeth MacBride:
How To See People
Nearly 20 years ago, I was working as the managing editor of Crains’ New York, and keeping my creative writing life alive by taking workshops. I’d wrap up that high-intensity journalism job, leave the office on Third Avenue and walk through Central Park toward my writing instructor’s apartment. When I entered that broad open expanse in the midst of the city, I felt my spirits lift, and I remembered how big life can be.
The writing teacher was novelist Lore Segal; I met one of my dearest friends in that workshop, Adrian Spratt. The story he presented, that autumn in New York, was about how true friendship requires seeing other people in many lights at once. Black, or brown, or a woman, or man, gay or straight, disabled, whatever – these are aspects of a person. What is a full portrait?
Adrian has a rare perspective on that question, as a person who lost his physical sight in his early teens. I use words and phrases like that – “blind,” “see,” “sight,”– with more thought after these years of knowing Adrian and reading his work.
When I launched Times of E, he invested in the company, and as the pandemic closed in on us, he invested again. I was profoundly grateful for the votes of confidence, mostly because I know him to be a brilliant attorney and investor.
Adrian’s fiction is forceful, thoughtful and plot-driven. One reason I value his fiction so much on a deeper level is because it insists that readers see characters’ complexities, and that readers see characters with disabilities in that same, complicated light.
His first novel, Caroline, is out now. I loved it – and so did Kirkus. “Spratt, himself a blind lawyer, presents a remarkable portrayal of the life of a sightless New Yorker … a searing look at a troubled relationship.” Here’s the link to buy it.
Times of Entrepreneurship
Stories of the Week
Kizmet Impact Aims To Be One of the First Publicly Traded VC Funds
A Group of Canadian Investors, Executives and Entrepreneurs Plans to Launch with $50M Later This Year.
How Trailblazers Could Benefit from Executive Coaching
The Pandemic has Launched Many Transformations. How do You Shape Yourself into a Leader for these Times?
Problem Solved: Thinking about Shifting to a 4-Day Workweek? Here’s How One Company Did it.
A Key to the Successful Change was that Employees Wanted to Make It So.
White Men Are Now The Minority Of Business Owners In The United States
Entrepreneurship is Surging in the United States, As People Flee Brutal Corporate Jobs. But the Makeup of This Generation of Entrepreneurs Is Different, as Elizabeth MacBride Wrote in This Story from a Few Months Ago.
You may have missed
REPORT: The Surprising Way Uber and Lyft Spur Entrepreneurs People Use Gigs to Flexibly Finance their Ideas for Growing Startups, Researchers Concluded. Read it here.
The EPA Says It Will Do More to Track Air Quality. Meet a Michigan Entrepreneur Already Doing the Work Working Closely with Communities, Darren Riley Aims to Provide More Intensive Monitoring. Read it here.
California Sisters on Roller Skates Put a Twist on a Hot Dog Car Hop They Knew it Would Add to the Nostalgia Brand. TikTok Helped, Too. Read it here.
Square’s Jim McKelvey On The Messy Business Of Becoming A World-Changing Entrepreneur Jim McKelvey Talks about The Process of Innovation and the People – Wired Differently – Who Do It. Read it here.
Living the dream 💭
Best Practices: Where do you see yourself in 10 years? In his recent article for BBC’s Worklife, David Robson outlines the importance of thinking about the future you and its impact on health, happiness, and financial security. One easy way to start, David says, is to “write a letter to yourself 20 years from now, describing what is most important for you now and your plans for the coming decades.”
Buzzworthy: In a new audiobook, The Cold Start Problem, author Andrew Chen reveals what makes winning networks thrive, why some start-ups fail to successfully scale, and, most crucially, why products that create and compete using the network effect are vitally important today.
Rathskeller 🍻
The 4.5 hour workweek: A productivity hack
One of the best things about being an entrepreneur is that you can make and set your own schedule — which isn’t an excuse to take off every time your favorite baseball team has a home game. John Rampton writes for Inc.: get as much work as you possibly can during the hours when you’re most productive. Once you know when these hours are, make sure that you maintain a strict schedule around them.
Wanderlust : a restaurant or activity from our Top Ecosystems list
The phrase “playing doctor” takes on a new meaning at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. Experience an exhibit based on Disney Junior’s Peabody Award-winning television series “Doc McStuffins.” The interactive English and Spanish bilingual experience transports kids and families from Doc’s backyard clinic to the McStuffins Toy Hospital. Families are invited to help Doc perform check-ups and diagnose toy patients while learning about healthy habits, compassion, and nurturing care.
Made in the USA
This candlemaking company in Washington started as a hobby during the colder months at home. Now, Bee Hive Candles continues to grow – from a kitchen to a spare room, to a garage, to a small workshop, and most recently a large fully dedicated workshop. You can buy 100% beeswax pillar candles starting at $8.95.
Upcoming Opportunities ⭐
To list an opportunity in our newsletter, check out our rates here. We cover the emerging economy of diverse founders:
🔗Link: https://bit.ly/TimesofEOpportunities
1. A Course To Reach the Next Generation of Entrepreneurs
In this free course developed by entrepreneurship professor John Lynn, professors and other entrepreneurship educators get a curriculum and supporting materials based on the influential book, The New Builders.
📅 Date: N/A
🏢 Location: N/A
🔗Link: https://docsend.com/view/s/4gah7gde5yrguz8j
2. Join 4thly for a Special Panel on Access to Capital for Underrepresented Founders
As 4thly writes, “This livestream is designed for entrepreneurs who are concerned that their identity will be a headwind in raising capital.” Join 4thly Founder and CEO, Bret Waters, and an expert panel of diverse entrepreneurs and investors to learn more about the new wave of venture capital.
📅 Date: Feb. 28, 2022
🏢 Location: Virtual
🔗 Link: https://4thly.com/raising-capital-a-livestream-for-underrepresented-startup-founders/
3. NBA All-Star to Provide Funding and Resources to Underserved Communities
NBA All-Star and 2021 NBA Champion, Jrue Holiday, and two-time Olympic gold medalist, Lauren Holiday, through their JLH Social Impact Fund, will provide up to $1M in grants to organizations and small businesses in the Greater Milwaukee, New Orleans, Indianapolis, and Los Angeles areas. Priority will be given to businesses and organizations focused on social impact and creating a more equitable future for underserved communities.
📅 Application Deadline: Feb. 25, 2022
🏢 Location: Greater Milwaukee, New Orleans, Indianapolis, and Los Angeles areas
🔗 Link: https://www.jlhfund.org/
4. New Opportunities at Opportunity Alabama
Opportunity Alabama (OPAL) is a nonprofit initiative dedicated to connecting investors with investable assets in Alabama’s Opportunity Zone. OPAL is growing and has three new openings. OPAL is looking for qualified applicants experienced in accounting, communications, and commercial real estate.
📅 Date: N/A
🏢 Location: Birmingham, AL
🔗Link: https://opportunityalabama.com/news/
5. Render Launches Second Iteration of Reconstruct Challenge worth $750,000
Render has announced a new partnership with Access Ventures to award a second national prize focusing on addressing barriers to employment in the United States. Five winning innovations will receive $100,000 each, with one innovation receiving an additional $250,000 to scale further. The challenge is open to anyone in the United States as long as the beta test of the innovation takes place in Jefferson County, KY, or Floyd and Clark County, IN.
📅 Registration Deadline: April 29, 2022
📅 Application Deadline: May 27, 2022
🏢 Location: N/A
🔗 Link: https://www.reconstructchallenge.com/initiatives/employment
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This story and others on Times of E are made possible by a sponsorship from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation is a private, nonpartisan foundation that provides access to opportunities that help people achieve financial stability, upward mobility, and economic prosperity – regardless of race, gender, or geography. The Kansas City, Mo.-based foundation uses its grantmaking, research, programs, and initiatives to support the start and growth of new businesses, a more prepared workforce, and stronger communities. For more information, visit www.kauffman.org and connect with www.twitter.com/kauffmanfdn and www.facebook.com/kauffmanfdn.
