31 entrepreneurs to undergo DTI’s Mentor Me program

Josiah Go, chairman and chief strategist of Mansmith and Fielders Inc., discusses Entrepreneurial Marketing Mindset to participants during the first Mentor Me program in Cebu City. Go was among the 30 experts who helped coach the 26 first batch of participant-entrepreneurs.
CDN FILE PHOTO

THIRTY-one local entrepreneurs will learn new concepts, ideas and practices that can help improve their businesses from other successful entrepreneurs and business experts in the second round of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) in Cebu’s Kapatid Mentor Me program.

Most of those who would undergo the program come from the food sector while others are from services, construction supply, trucking and hauling, as well as skin care, among others.

Ma. Elena Arbon, DTI Cebu provincial director, said starting March 17, 31 Cebu-based micro- and small-scale enterprises would undergo a 12-week mentorship program which the agency and the Philippine Center for Entrepreneurship (PCE)-Go Negosyo introduced nationwide last year.

“There are so many that are interested in mentoring. It is really an effective approach to teaching entrepreneurs scale up their businesses because it allows them to dive deeper into what they need to know, unlike shotgun seminars,” Arbon told Cebu Daily News in a phone interview on Monday.

Last year, 26 MSEs from Cebu successfully completed the mentorship program in December after the initiative was launched in October.

Arbon said this year’s participants come from more or less the same sectors as last year, except they now have representatives from farmer organizations and vegetable producers in the latest batch.

Mentor Me is Go Negosyo’s coaching and mentoring project that seeks to help MSMEs scale up their businesses.

In this aspect, DTI has tapped the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI) for prospective mentors.

CCCI produced 30 mentors for the first batch, with more organization members committing to support the program on its second run, said Arbon.
Arbon said that the CCCI has come up with a set of mentors for each of the program’s 12 modules.

This year’s modules include lessons on business model canvas, entrepreneurial mindsetting and values formation, marketing, operations management, and supply value chain, among others.

DTI believes that MSMEs are critical as this segment, which comprises 99.6 percent of registered businesses in the country, was seen to be the next drivers of global growth.

Arbon said the second batch of mentees is expected to graduate by June 3 in time for the launching of CCCI’s flagship project, Cebu Business Month 2017.

The official said mentees from the first and second batches will showcase their products in a trade fair.