An Applied R&D Lab Serving Solo and Family-based Entrepreneurs in Rural and Distressed Urban Communities
'War College' of the Small Is Good Business Revolution
Why Collaborating With Allan Cohen and Babson College Is Important To Sohodojo
Press Release Backgrounder

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Related pages:  [ Allan Cohen Joins Sohodojo Advisory Board Press Release ] [ Sohodojo Advisory Board and Research Directors ] [ Dig Deeper: Change Insurgency In A Shamrock World ] [ Sohodojo Press Releases ] [ Sohodojo home ]

11 November 2002, Wellesley, MA and Raleigh, NC USA – Allan Cohen, distinguished professor at Babson College and best-selling business book author has joined the Sohodojo Advisory Board to mentor the development of business education materials in support of solo and family-based entrepreneurs in rural and distressed urban communities, it was announced today by the non-profit R&D lab's Founders and Research Directors, Jim Salmons and Timlynn Babitsky. [ Read complete press release ]

Just as our appointments to the North American Rural Futures Institute have a two-level significance, so too does Allan Cohen's joining our community of practice at Sohodojo have significance at both the individual and organizational levels.

A Man For All Entrepreneurial Seasons

First and most importantly, Allan is a great guy at the personal level with a vast pool of knowledge and experience in the domain of leadership, particularly exchange theory as it applies to exercising influence without authority. We know Allan to be a great guy because we have engaged him in a many months-long e-mail conversation in which he suspended disbelief about the Small Is Good Business Revolution long enough to listen and communicate. This communication has evolved into a peer mentoring relationship that is rewarding and valuable to us, especially at this stage of Sohodojo's significant growth.

Highly Recommended
Effective collaboration revealed by Allan Cohen, Sohodojo Advisory Board member, distinguished Babson College professor, and co-author of Influence Without Authority [ More info ]

The Small Is Good Business Revolution is, after all in some respects, a revival of the sustainability dimension of entrepreneurism. Sustainable entrepreneurism has too often taken a back seat during the growth- and acquisition-focused Industrial Revolution and its Grand Finale, the Internet Bubble, that ushered in the 21st Century. Bubble burst, we are all together on the threshold of a new beginning where entrepreneurism is at the heart of our individual and collective experience, both in managing our individual work lives and as leaders envisioning our sustainable businesses.

Allan's interest and expertise in influence without authority – the title, by the way, of one of his and David Bradford's best-selling books – is most appropriate in this new context of work and business. Influence without authority is the essence of effective collaboration, especially collaboration among peers in entrepreneurial small business networks, and among entrepreneurial members of today's grassroots and non-profit organizations. At this level of his personal knowledge and experience, Sohodojo will greatly benefit from Allan's membership on our Advisory Board.

Opening Doors of Opportunity: Babson College Resources and Inspiration

At an equally exciting and compelling level, Allan's joining our community of practice opens doors of opportunity for collaboration between the Sohodojo R&D lab and Babson College, the world's premiere teaching and research institution celebrating and supporting entrepreneurism. Babson's Arthur M. Blank Center for Entrepreneurship is a unique resource and source of inspiration. And, as the Small Is Good Business Revolution evolves into a planet-wide sustainability agenda, Allan's home base at the Glavin Center for Global Leadership will become a strategic resource and source of further inspiration.

If you are not already familiar with the depth and breadth of Babson's programs and initiatives, we encourage you to follow these links for a quick tour of why we are excited about working with Allan and Babson College:

• Visit the Babson College web site
• Be inspired by Babson's Arthur M. Blank Center for Entrepreneurship's mission statement
• Puruse Babson College's news and press release archive to see just how active and how well-respected this unique instititution is, as evidenced by Babson's coverage in local, national and international media.
• Learn more about the depth and breadth of Babson College's faculty dedicated to entrepreneurship.
• Get an inspiring overview of Babson's Glavin Center for Global Management.
• Consider the implications of the Glavin Center's history and its mission in light of Sohodojo's long-range interest in spreading the Small Is Good Business Revolution.

Babson's Glavin Center may, in time, become a valuable partner in our growing collaboration with the Center for Global Partnership of The Japan Foundation.

Sohodojo Co-founder and Research Director Timlynn Babitsky lived and learned for nearly seven years in Japan. She was a resident of Kyoto, living above a local sake factory, while supporting herself by participating in that city's thriving language education community. Kyoto is the long-standing center of Japanese culture and a modern center of Japanese entrepreneurism.

We are encouraging The Japan Foundation to work with us to establish a Japan Rural Futures Institute to partner with the North American Rural Futures Institute. A goal of this collaboration will be the creation of a unique bi-lingual rural futures news and information resource portal web site.

Two other Babson College resources are central to our collaborative interest; the Babson College-Olin College of Engineering partnership and Babson Interactive LLC.

Allan Cohen was instrumental in envisioning and launching the unique Babson College and Olin College of Engineering partnership. It is the goal of this partnership to infuse Olin's technical curriculum with elements of Babson's experiential and industry-relevant entrepreneurism and management training.

Sohodojo's strong technical R&D agenda is focused on breakthrough innovations in software technology leveraging breakthrough innovations in the entrepreneurial business models for Small Is Good Business Webs. You can readily imagine how the Babson/Olin partnership could play into this dimension of our social action strategy in support of solo and family-based entrepreneurs in rural and distressed urban communities.

In addition of our visionary R&D agenda, Sohodojo has an educational mission. Our education mission is necessitated by our need to 'prepare the soil' by helping folks to understand the ideas underlying our innovative business models and software technologies. And, once these business models and technologies are adopted, we'll need effective educational materials to ensure entrepreneurs' success in sustaining their Small Is Good Business Webs.

With so many potential points of collaborative intersection at the personal and organizational level, it is easy to see why we are pleased and proud to announce Allan Cohen as the newest member of the Sohodojo Advisory Board.

--Timlynn Babitsky and Jim Salmons--
Founders and Research Directors
Sohodojo - 'War College' of the Small Is Good Business Revolution
http://sohodojo.com
Director and Entrepreneur/Futurist In Residence
NARFI - North American Rural Futures Institute
http://narfi.org

Postscript: We practice a form of entrepreneurial social action called change insurgency. One 'front' of the Small Is Good Business Revolution is the community of graduate schools of business. To learn more about change insurgency and its role in stimulating social innovation, please read a reprint of our article, Change Insurgency In A Shamrock World, that appeared in the Making Change theme issue of The Permaculture Activist.

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