Thank you very much, Lois.
I was a small business owner and I was raised in a small business family. I followed that up with further education.
Thank you for the opportunity to talk about WEConnect. Through the partnership fund we are in the process of expanding some of the work we're doing to be even more focused on the small business woman. In my mind it's a redefining of small business. You can look at defining it as having sales of $500,000 a year, or 50 employees and such, but a lot of the small business women I meet with, talk to, and work with have one or two employees and sales that are much lower.
They're looking for an opportunity to better their skills. They're looking for training not only in marketing and sales, but also in accounting, how to run a small business, and how to find that market access. So we are working with WEConnect to add on to what they're doing and redefine small business to ensure that the women who have smaller businesses will have the same opportunities for market access and training.
The businesses can be at all levels. Some need basic financial literacy skills, and others have been in business for five years or longer. There has to be equal opportunity for all, but in my mind the smaller business just starting out has been kind of ignored, and it's usually within the first one to three years that you make or break your business. So that's the focus.