The Business Innovation Group (BIG) at Georgia Southern University is a place where innovators and entrepreneurs in Southeast Georgia can gain the skills and training to transform their businesses, working with one of our unique clients. to provide enhanced resources to the community.
BIG is proud to serve as a community catalyst, a role BIG has played since its founding in 2014, with Southern Georgia alumnus, Stateboro Block County Chamber of Commerce board member and local business owner Garrett Clark. have cooperated with Leadership, problem-solving expertise, and marketing strategy in BIG’s leadership team and ability to advise fellow entrepreneurs in the industry.
Dominic Hallaby, DPA, Founding Director of BIG and Deputy Provost for Innovation and Commercialization at Georgia Southern University, said that as a current community catalyst, a visionary and innovator, Clarke is an integral part of the environment. I said yes.
“He’s really a growth-oriented entrepreneur, so it’s not just about the business he runs and getting the most out of that business. It’s about developing a growth strategy and the steps needed to get there, and it’s there,” Hallaby said. “Having that perspective from the boots of the field, and having entrepreneurs who are a few steps ahead of what they need the data to help drive those decisions, is what we’re looking for. It really helps us think about what processes we offer other entrepreneurs.”
Clark, who owns Rolling Monkey Ice Cream in Statesboro, began working for BIG in 2019 after rapid success saw him and his team begin to expand beyond the business’s original storefront office space. Clark considered acquiring a larger office space in Statesboro, where he discovered the BIG facility and its operations.
As a thriving business owner with an engineering background, Clark began thinking about ways to add value to BIG’s operations.
“I enjoy adding value to and improving the organization I am a part of. We were excited to make synergistic improvements in between,” Clark said. “As a visionary innovator, it is my nature to question what exists today, see where the underlying opportunities lie, and chart a path forward.”
From there, Clark used his experience in value stream engineering and the models he used to make his business successful, developing a framework tailored to BIG’s environment, which BIG built on its incubator accelerator infrastructure. made it possible to make the most of the
“I used a framework specifically designed to solve complex problems to map and understand the biggest gaps in business innovation groups,” says Clark. “From there, he at the University of Waterloo studies incubators such as the Velocity Incubator to understand what makes them world-class and build on these proven models to develop a vision for the future state of business innovation groups. I planned.”
This led to my current role as a Community Catalyst.
“We have already implemented some of the components such as the VIP Learning Management System and the BigX Accelerator Program, so through its framework and future state map, we are on track to realize our vision.” Clark said.
Learning Management System programs are designed to effectively nurture start-ups and help them reach their goals through a self-paced, on-demand model. We offer detailed learning programs that follow the growth cycle within a specific time frame. BIG mentors and employees provide training and coaching support in specific sections of the program.
Clark also helped launch the BIGx Accelerator Program, a peer-to-peer advising group with a structured face-to-face cohort model with monthly accountability sessions, which launched in 2021. He was also a participant in the first cohort. Number of entrepreneurs running the program to test the model and provide feedback for optimization. The program is now shared at the international level and has been praised for its innovation.
Both programs were fully supported by BIG’s leadership, which invested in leaders to implement two initiatives. Hallaby said Clarke’s data-driven approach to entrepreneurship is of great value to leaders and other entrepreneurs in the field.
“He does a great job of scrutinizing the market and seeing what else is going on, especially when it comes to making data-driven decisions and bringing it back to real advisory capabilities. Yes,” Hallaby said.
Clark says that since using the framework to grow his own business, sharing it with others and helping them solve problems has been part of his joy.
“Doing and giving what I love is a very rewarding process,” Clark said. “My hope is to continue to have a positive impact on the people I work with.”
For more information about BIG and its programs, visit GeorgiaSouthern.edu/BIG.