Business Planning for Belize Business Owners
Author: Katelyn Pierce | Majors: Accounting and Economics
My name is Katelyn Pierce and I will be a Junior this year in the Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas. I am double majoring in Accounting and Economics. This summer I participated in the Belize Summer internship program lead by Dr. Amy Farmer in the Economics department at the Walton College. While this research project was intended to be completed in Dangriga, Belize for two months, it was moved to a virtual internship and research program.
Our goal this summer was to create a business plan for local Belize businesses to draw more customers to their stores, help them become more organized, and aid them in any other business needs. This program and research project being moved online was a challenge and created many obstacles along the way. There were times communication was not possible and this made it harder to meet the needs of the business owners. However, despite these obstacles, I am extremely proud of the work that was done this summer. We showed the business owners that we partnered with different ways to transform their business and gave them better skills in order to run their business more effectively and cost efficiently. We helped them create financial spreadsheets, set up access to email, and create marketing mockups for their businesses.
Dr. Farmer and my fellow researchers were a big reason that this summer project was so successful. I could not have been as useful in assisting the businesses. if it were not for the help of my mentor, Dr. Farmer, and my team. Dr. Farmer was an essential aspect of this research program. Over her many years of visiting Dangriga and making connections, she was able to find people for us to work with and give us a key point of connect directly in Belize. She assisted us in creating a business plan and was a major help when we were creating our business workshop.
The business workshop that my team and I put together was the biggest success of the summer. It was a five weeklong workshop with an extra week of overview where we watched them put our tips and practices into place. Every week we put together an overview of what the week would look like which would include activities, videos, and different tasks for the business owners to complete. Some of the tasks and activities included creating a Gmail platform, basic business financial outlines, and marketing strategies. In my opinion I believe this workshop was extremely successful in helping these businesses prosper and succeed.
While the summer internship and research project is concluded, there is still more that can be done for the people of Belize. I am currently working on a training program that can be passed on to the next group of students to continue the successful program that was created this summer with new business and store owners. I am also brainstorming and talking to the other members of my team about putting together a continuous program that can assist the business owners we have already helped. This summer we covered the basics of running a successful business, but there is so much more to learn and teach the people of Belize. I believe that creating a continuous plan that can be shared with them and worked on at the pace of these businesses would be very useful and helpful in the continuous success of the businesses.
This summer was challenging and came with many obstacles and hard moments. I could not have succeeded with the assistance of Dr. Farmer and the rest of my team. This being said, this experience was rewarding in so many ways. Watching the success of the local businesses and watching myself grow and move past the obstacles that arose was the best feeling, and I am so thankful that I was given this opportunity.