The University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business will be the new home of the Detroit Neighborhood Entrepreneurs Project, which has helped nearly 700 small businesses since its introduction in 2016.
The project was originally hosted by the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy. The move was made to better connect Detroit’s budding businesses to the entrepreneurial offerings available at the business school.
“DNEP was successfully incubated at the Ford School as a race/wealth gap intervention as about 90 percent of the businesses we work with are minority-owned,” says Christie Ayotte Baer, managing director of DNEP.
“Ford gave us an economic and community development lens for our work. As the program grew, it made sense to shift the focus to tapping greater entrepreneurship expertise and move to Ross. Plus, our accounting services and our summer internship program both originated at Ross and are housed at Ross.”
The business school is known for its entrepreneurship programs and runs the Impact Studio, an incubator focused on student-led impact businesses. It’s home to a grad course focused on spawning green businesses in Detroit and hosts a DNEP/Impact Studio summer internship program that supports Detroit businesses.
Jerry Davis, faculty director for Business+Impact at Ross, says as DNEP has grown, its contribution to the Ross School has as well. For several years, DNEP has been sourcing clients in Detroit for various classes.
The program is a collaborative effort involving faculty from Ford, Ross, and other schools as well as students from across campus. This includes the college of engineering, Stamps school of art and design, the law school, and the school of information.
As part of the move, the program plans to expand the number of supervising faculty to boost its capacity to serve Detroiters and give more students hands-on experience in the city.
“An important part of doing this work is recognizing our role,” Baer says. “We tell students that as consultants we are never player one. The business owner is the hero of the story — always. But we can be really important nonplayer characters who help the hero succeed.”
In recent years, the program has focused on specific neighborhoods including Jefferson Chalmers, Southwest, and Six Mile/Livernois. Part of the work is to recruit businesses to those neighborhoods.
Lutalo Sanifu, director of neighborhood resilience, safety, and business district services for Jefferson East Inc., says he’s excited about the Ross connection. Jefferson East has worked with DNEP for several years to develop a strong relationship.
“We appreciate the value that’s added to our business owners when they get to sit with a team from DNEP and really dive into their business and figure out what could be done to improve it,” says Sanifu. “Most of our business owners are microbusiness owners or solopreneurs if you will. Having extra minds at the table to help build out their process is critical to their success.”
