The transcript, case study guide and video for Put your Products In Orbit, a study of the U.S. government's SBIR program as examined with Dr. Larry DeLucas, the NASA SBIR folks, and Don Wilkes and his team at AZ Technology as seen on Small Business School the series on PBS-member stations and the Voice of America around the world. The best little show on television about the American spirit.

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last update: May 2007

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About the case study guide

The guides are all being consolidated with the video clip, the transcript, and a brief profile.

There are nine key points from this episode of the show. Just cick on any of those that interest you in the box on the right.

You and your team can return to school without leaving your desk. The first purpose of these case study guides was to inspire people to find ways to improve their bottom line from real people who are doing it every day with integrity and grace. Business ethics is not an oxymoron!

A little background: Back in 1994, for our very first episode of the show, we prepared a case study guide for the PBS Adult Learning Service special broadcast of the show to every college and university throughout the USA. By 1996 we were working with hundreds of business school professors around the country to use these case studies guides within their classrooms. Students were assigned cases to read online. Today there are well over 2000 questions and answers about starting, running and growing a business, and the number grows every day.

We have brought all these study guides on line within this community. Virtually every aspect of starting, running and growing your own business is addressed. Take one step at a time. You have choices. You can work through the FREE section of the site within our Eight Steps (above) – four to start and four to grow a business.

The weekly show and this website, SmallBusinessSchool.org, is the foundation of the Small Business Index of Learning Companies.

Complete a few classes at SmallBusinessSchool.org and you will find that you can selectively use parts of every one of your answers to generate your own case study guide and transcript automatically. Then, you open the options to display those pages back under your state, your type of business, your business name, and your name.

You also automatically are part of the local list of businesses to be considered for an empisode of the show. Again, nobody has paid to be on this show. It is all about the good people doing good things.

Later you can opt to use your answers to generate a business plan, raise debt capital, or even generate a SCOR or offering memorandum to raise equity capital.

Helping business students has its own rewards but the goal of this show and website has always been to help fellow small business owners. Even in 1996 the goal was to have this interactive mechanism online so owners could answer the same questions and develop their own episode of the show.

Thanks.

For even more:

1. Search the emerging site

2. Go to our vision statement or Open letter

3. Go to an introduction to the dynamic pages

4. Learn a little more about the profiles

5. Learn more about the Indexes for Growing Companies

WATCH TELEVISION THAT TEACHES

Key Ideas of this episode

1.		Win A SBIR Grant
2.		Recruit Friends
3.		Specialize
4.		Put Customers On Your Team
5.		Consider Government Work
6.		Outsource Technology
7.		Build Beyond Yourself
8.		Share The Glory
9.		Make The Web A Real Place

EIGHT STEPS IN BUSINESS

Step 8. Exit at the top	$$$$
Step 7. Sustainability	$$$$
Step 6. Growth	$$$
Step 5. Employer	$$
Four steps to run / grow your business.

Step 4. Sole proprietor	$$$
Step 3. Incubate	$$$
Step 2. Start-up	$$
Step 1. Initial idea	$
Four steps to start / run your business.

By lifting up successful people with warm hearts and big spirits, and studying their motivations, insights and inspirations, SmallBusinessSchool serves eight large constituencies, each on one of the steps along this path of life and business.

Steps 1 to 4 – you create work for yourself.

Steps 5 to 8 – you create work for others.

At each step we examine the ways people also create wealth (an abundance of value). Every story is a very personal story of one person's journey to become successful in his/her work. Each person has worked through (and is constantly reworking) the problems associated with the first four steps of growth. A few have worked through all eight steps. Their insights, advice, and example are powerful lessons for all of us to learn about the meaning of life and work. These people are not Hollywood models, but role models. These are people who give our culture ethical fabric and depth.

What Happens to a case study guide?

It all starts with a case study guide. By answering these questions, you'll begin to articulate evergreen truths about your business. You'll be challenged to see how your business is a good business. You'll be developing your first principles (i.e. something similar to those you hear with the opening of every episode of the show).

These kinds of case study guides are now used in schools all over the USA and around the world.

First, in 1997, Prentice Hall asked to insert these case study guides as chapter endings in their best-selling business textbooks. Millions of those books are used by business students around the world.

Since 2001, Thomson Learning adopted Small Business School and has included the case study guides and video clips for their best-selling business textbooks. Today, thousands of business schools and management classes, many high schools, and one elementary school (Holmes Beach, Florida) have used these case studies in their classroom.

Thanks.

The Small Business Index of Learning Companies
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