Posted on Sun, Jan. 02, 2005
Starting over with start-up help
By Jessica Guynn
CONTRA COSTA TIMES
OAKLAND - The ravages of poverty on a distant continent left their mark on Farhana Huq when as a child she visited her father's native Bangladesh.
"Coming from a place where we have so much to one of the poorest countries in the world changes you. It humbles you," said Huq, the 28-year-old daughter of Asian immigrants who grew up in the relative affluence of New Jersey. "It gives you a different perspective on life." While studying economics and philosophy at Tufts University, Huq searched for ways to step into the breach. She discovered microenterprise -- a philosophy pioneered in the mid-1970s by Bangladeshi economist Muhammad
Yunus, whose Grameen Bank has made millions of successful small loans to lift people out of poverty through entrepreneurship.
Now Huq is leaving her mark on poverty by creating what she said is one of the nation's first programs to help low-income immigrant and refugee women simultaneously learn the basics of starting a business while improving their English skills.
Here in Oakland's eastern flatlands amid the bustle of one of the nation's most ethnically and culturally diverse communities and the babel of 40 languages, Huq helps these women from all over the world realize their Horatio Alger-fueled dreams.
Huq said her nonprofit, Creating Economic Opportunities for Women (C.E.O. Women), builds on the same drive and discipline that bring immigrants and refugees to the United States in hopes of working their way up the economic
rungs.
"We are foreigners. We don't know much about the business over here," said Komal Rattan, a 56-year-old Indian immigrant and mother of three who works two part-time jobs, runs a catering business, and plans this year to open a child-care center in her San Pablo home. "C.E.O. Women is constantly helping me. They are always in touch to help their students," she said. The organization, which began nearly five years ago with a $1,000 check from a philanthropist, now has an annual budget of nearly a half million
dollars and a growing track record. Through private donations, partnerships with school districts and community groups and the help of program director Kate Hamilton, C.E.O. Women has dramatically increased its reach in the
immigrant community.
Out of 21 graduates, 76 percent either started a small business or found employment, and 50 percent showed marked improvement in their English skills. In all, C.E.O. Women has helped more than 200 low-income women, from El Salvador to Kenya, many of whom were unemployed and had little education, few of whom had any experience in the American business world. This month C.E.O. Women will launch a program with West Contra Costa Adult Education and is fielding similar requests from organizations and schools around the state. Through an alliance with the Oakland Adult Education, C.E.O. Women gets free rent and access to English-as-a-second-language teachers for its programs. It collaborates with Berkeley-based AnewAmerica Community Corp., which also trains immigrants to open businesses and manage their finances, to provide 15 individual development accounts for entrepreneurs. It also works with Count Me In, an online loan fund. "What we are doing is building the training tools, the modules and the framework for how to serve this population and get them into the economic mainstream," said Huq, who hopes C.E.O. Women can train 150 more women this year.
Like Sylvia Rosales-Fike, who runs AnewAmerica, Huq is one of a growing number of social entrepreneurs who are blending social conscience with market savvy. Huq brings the same vigor to this microenterprise mission that she does to her swift footwork and pirouettes in dance performances of Kathak, a form of North Indian classical dance. The door to her tiny office, located one flight up from the aromatic kitchen of a Thai restaurant and a noisy, smoke-filled Asian cafe on a run-down stretch of International Boulevard, is always open to students.
Any immigrant woman with a certain proficiency in English, a business idea and some experience in her chosen field is eligible for the programs that teach everything from basic math and computer skills to the formal and informal rules of doing business in America.
"No one is a number. Farhana knows everyone's story from beginning to end," said Lori Barra, executive director of The Isabelle Allende Foundation, which in 2004 recognized C.E.O. Women's efforts at a private award ceremony at the Chilean author's Marin County home. "She helps them take every small
step."
The inspiration to help immigrant women create their own jobs and become their own bosses came from Huq's family. After a troubled marriage left her destitute, Huq's aunt supported three children by opening a beauty salon in her living room.
Microenterprises often begin at home. They are small businesses that start with less than $35,000 and employ five or fewer people. But they make up a vital part of the economy.
There are more than 20 million microenterprises in the United States, with more than 2 million owned by low-income entrepreneurs. In 2001, more than 3 million Californians either ran or worked for a microenterprise, representing nearly 18 percent of all state employment, according to the California Association for Microenterprise Opportunity. Entrepreneurship can turn into a one-way ticket to financial independence.
A five-year study that tracked low-income entrepreneurs found that more than half had household gains large enough to lift them out of poverty, with family income nearly doubling in most households.
These small businesses don't need handouts, but they do need a hand up.
Starting a business in California can present unexpected challenges for anyone, let alone a foreigner with limited knowledge of the language and business mores, no credit record, and no experience navigating a complex web of legal and regulatory requirements.
"It's a very, very specific segment of people that we're trying to help here," said Flora Sun, a C.E.O. Women board member and vice president of customer marketing for Providian Financial Corp.
The East Bay is home to a large and growing immigrant community: 19 percent of Contra Costa County residents and 27 percent of Alameda County residents are foreign born. And more immigrants are starting their own businesses.
Research shows that those immigrants who get business and language training beforehand are more likely to buck the odds and succeed. "These women have the will, but they don't have money, know how, the support and mentoring and, in a lot of cases, the confidence to start their own businesses," said Sun, who was born and raised in Hong Kong. "C.E.O. Women provides that kind of motivation and confidence."
Amanda Feinstein, program officer with the Walter and Elise Haas Fund, which recently gave C.E.O. Women an $80,000 grant, applauds the organization's "Shine Your Brilliance" seminars in which students host workshops to showcase and test market their talents to the public, and a business coaching program created by Hamilton that pairs immigrants with successful businesswomen.
"I was impressed by their focus on empowering immigrant women to realize their dreams," Feinstein said.
Take Wen-Fei Hsu. This 31-year-old Taiwanese immigrant used to weep out of frustration after emigrating to the United States 31/2 years ago. She had to drop out of art school because she couldn't understand the teachers or the assignments. Her attempts to start her own business foundered because she couldn't figure out the rules. "It was all so hard. I felt like a baby again," she said.
Through C.E.O. Women's training programs, Hsu improved her English and learned everything from how to get a business license to how to market her business.
When she graduated from the program in June, C.E.O. Women paired Hsu with a business coach, Barra, who was a graphic designer before she joined The Isabel Allende Foundation. "Wen-Fei does three times what any of us does, and yet she is tireless. She never complains," Barra said. "She is so eager and excited."
Now Hsu is building a portfolio, interning at a magazine, taking a full course load to get her master's degree in fine art, and teaching Chinese to support herself. When she gets her design studio off the ground, she plans to donate 20 percent of the proceeds to C.E.O. Women.
"I feel more strong than before, and I feel more confident than before," Hsu said. "I don't cry anymore."
MICROENTERPRISE ORGANIZATIONS
AnewAmerica Community Corp.
Berkeley
510-540-7785
California Association of Microenterprise Opportunity
Oakland
510-238-8360
Creating Economic Opportunities for Women (C.E.O. Women) Oakland www.ceowomen.org 510-879-2947
Reach Jessica Guynn at 925-952-2671 or jguynn@cctimes.com.