Harrison Leffel-Jones WINS by Supporting Entrepreneurs

Join Carrie Richardson and her guest, Harrison Leffel-Jones, Executive Director of the Lansing Regional SmartZone.

In this episode of WIN, Harrison shares an overview of how the Lansing Smart Zone assists new and existing entrepreneurs.

Learn how you can connect with other experts, mentors and start-up enthusiasts in mid-Michigan.  

Carrie Richardson and Ian Richardson host the WIN Podcast - What's Important Now?

Carrie helps businesses improve their sales and marketing teams.

Ian is certified in Eagle Center For Leadership Making A Difference, Paterson StratOp, and LifePlan.

Learn more at www.foxcrowgroup.com

Book time with them here: https://randr.consulting/connect

Be a guest on WIN! We host successful entrepreneurs who share advice with other entrepreneurs on how to build, grow or sell a business using examples from their own experience.

Transcript

Harrison Leffel-Jones WINS By Supporting Entrepreneurs

[00:00:00] Hi there, I'm Carrie Richardson, half of the consulting group Richardson & Richardson, and I'm here today with Harrison Leffel-Jones, who is the Executive Director of the Lansing Regional Smart Zone. Harrison, how are you doing today?

[00:00:12] Doing well. Excited to be here and excited to chat with you today. 

[00:00:16] Yeah, Lansing is perfect right now. We were out this morning walking, leaves are turning, weather is exactly what I want. If we could have this all year round, I don't think I'd ever leave.

[00:00:25] I completely agree. It's definitely one of those kind of knock on side effects is, yes, we've got a thriving business culture, but we also have pretty lovely weather except for, I don't know, December through March I could do without, but.

[00:00:38] We're big fans of leaving from February to mid March and then coming back when things are getting a little calmer again.

[00:00:45] Yeah, yeah, definitely. 

[00:00:47] But it is an excellent place to start a business. There's a lot of support here and that's one of the things that we wanted to talk about today. When I was going through the Goldman Sachs program through TechTown in [00:01:00] Detroit, one of the things that I was unaware of was how many resources were available to me right here in Lansing.

[00:01:07] So I looked towards the things that were being promoted more aggressively online, and that's how I was connected with TechTown but then I was redirected back to Lansing, so I wanted to talk a bit about the programs that are available to entrepreneurs in this area. Who qualifies for them and how we would go about applying for them.

[00:01:27] So you mentioned that you are in the 2nd year of a 5 year plan where the priority is relaunching smart zone to re energize or reinvigorate different areas of Lansing and the technology ecosystem here. So tell us a little bit about what's been going on at LEAP right now. 

[00:01:46] Sure. Yeah. So Leap as an organization is the Lansing Economic Area Partnership, which is in charge of all sorts of things for economic development.

[00:01:55] And so business retention, growth and attraction of great companies from all [00:02:00] around the world to set up shop here in the greater Lansing region. So the world is more focused on our small businesses. So our entrepreneurship and innovation and growth of our high tech, high growth sector, so the Lansing Regional Smart Zone has been around for about 15, 20 years now, but we've just recently come into our Latest chapter of funding, which has allowed us to really expand our programming.

[00:02:27] So if you're a high tech high growth business anywhere in the Tri County region, so Clinton Ingham or Eaton counties, we provide non dilutive grant funding through both statewide and local dollars, which is a fantastic way to help you get some of the services for your businesses as you're getting started.

[00:02:45] But we also work with a ton of amazing partners across our region, particularly the businesses. Folks over at Spartan Innovations, the MSU Research Foundation Startup Grind Lansing have been amazing partners of ours as [00:03:00] we've relaunched a lot of our programming and as we were talking, I think really, we can be viewed as a kind of clearinghouse or at least a navigator my good Colleague friend Joe Carr often calls us the Sherpas, so we can't carry the entire load for you, but we can hopefully at least get you along that journey to that next step of where you need to go.

[00:03:22] So for people who are just starting businesses and may not be aware of all the terminology around things like this, what is non dilutive grant funding? 

[00:03:32] Yeah, so a lot of times, especially in the high tech world there's dilutive funding, which somebody's taking making an investment in your idea or your business, and they're taking some sort of stake or ownership in that business or idea.

[00:03:47] Whereas non dilutive means that it is simply either a check directly to your company, but in our case, we provide payment in lieu of services, right? So if you are starting your business and you need support on [00:04:00] getting incorporation paperwork done, if you need a marketing plan, put together things like that, we can help pay for those services on your behalf so that you're not immediately pulling that out of your own pocket.

[00:04:12] So now I have another question. How would an organization that provided services like that get in front of smart zone so that they could be considered as an expert or a service provider for the startups that are requesting those services? 

[00:04:26] Yeah, a lot of those service providers come into our network in a whole host of different ways.

[00:04:33] We do have kind of a trusted provider network that we work with across both the state of Michigan but more even locally. I highly recommend people reach out to us if you're a service provider. A whether you can get involved through our programming on our website, but then also coming to our events, getting involved in the greater Lansing tech ecosystem is a great way to do that.

[00:04:56] We host monthly venture hours where we invite our companies and service [00:05:00] providers to come in and meet with each other. We also partner with startup grind Lansing on their events as well as a way to bring those companies and service providers into the same space. 

[00:05:11] Yeah, I've been watching the startup grind documentation, marketing kind of taking shape.

[00:05:21] I know that Ruben to Washington Avenue is deeply embedded there. And Julie from M Connections has been a huge driving force behind that. And I'm really loving what they're putting together. There's panels, workshops, in person networking, virtual networking, which is nice. 

[00:05:37] There's a lot of events coming up in the next month, like September, October, November have some really great things scheduled. I know that I'm participating in a couple of panels in October and I'm super excited about that. We're going to talk about startup companies that look for clients instead of investors.

[00:05:55] So instead of teaching people how to pitch, we're going to teach people how to go out and find their first. [00:06:00] customers and have those first customers essentially be investors in their tech businesses. So that'll be something to look out for. What do you, what programs are you excited to see launching?

[00:06:10] Yeah. Coming up in just a couple of days, the MSU research foundation is hosting their second annual data science summit, which is an amazing opportunity where they're bringing in experts from all across the state and here locally to talk about. Data science. Obviously the buzzword of the year is definitely AI and the implementation of large data models.

[00:06:33] So how can both universities, academia, private industry all be collaborating with one another on how we approach data in the 21st century and going into 2024, which is a really exciting full day long event. So huge shout out to them. I'm also getting really excited for Michigan Tech Week, which is going to be hosted down in Ann Arbor at the.

[00:06:59] And then [00:07:00] Michigan Founders Fund, which has been a truly great organization and supporting the tech ecosystem across the state of Michigan. And then all of our new programs that the Lansing Regional Smart Zone has funded for this year are starting to come online. So MSU Research Foundation and their community mentor and residence program.

[00:07:20] Our next cohort of FundHer acceleration will be coming up whole host of things. I would recommend our website stays up to date and changes on a weekly basis. We have a live calendar of events on there that kind of covers both regional. So again, local stuff, but then statewide and even national events are updated on there on a weekly basis.

[00:07:41] So I highly recommend people check that out. 

[00:07:43] Yeah. And if you're listening today, in the show notes you will find links to everything that Harrison has mentioned today or anything that I'm talking about today. So don't worry, don't leave, don't scramble to go find a pen. We'll get it all over to you. Tell me a little bit more about how the ecosystem has [00:08:00] changed in the last year.

[00:08:00] I know I've been living in Lansing since 2020. Now, obviously 2020 was a little bit quiet, but I had the opportunity to go to one of the and I'm going to Kelly's a few weeks ago. It was the Pints and Politics event. And I hadn't been downtown in a little while. We moved to East Lansing last year. So there's a new bookstore.

[00:08:22] The game store expanded. I saw three or four new restaurants and coffee shops. Really exciting as when we lived downtown, everything was closed. So tell us a little bit about how smart zone is getting involved in the growth of the downtown core. 

[00:08:37] Yeah. First and foremost, a huge hats off to the team over at downtown Lansing Inc, which has really gone from strength to strength and making a lot of those amazing projects happen in partnership, especially with the Lansing economic development corporation and, some of the regional partners as well.

[00:08:54] In terms from a smart zone perspective, we try and support those businesses. [00:09:00] If they're developing their own tech products, how can we help them explore that? In some ways in 2023, all businesses are tech businesses, right? It's impossible to do anything and a fully analog way.

[00:09:12] And so how do we help empower those businesses to make sure that they're using up to date tools and really functioning to the best of their ability. Thank you. And we have even had some conversations with companies that are moving from fully retail to saying, okay I want to make sure that I've got, I'm utilizing the latest AI tools so that people can virtually try out my clothes from home are some of the interesting opportunities that are starting to arise from there.

[00:09:40] The, differences between high tech, high growth and main street businesses continue to blend in a really cool and innovative way. 

[00:09:49] It's amazing. I think about in my mother's lifetime, especially, and I was just out visiting my mother for a bit and thinking about there were no computers.

[00:09:57] Her first job was working as a operator [00:10:00] for the telephone system where they had to unplug and plug in to connect the calls, just the change in the, tools that you need to do your job. Over the last 50 years, imagine the next 50, what are you most excited about for the next iteration of business?

[00:10:17] Yeah, I think there's a real opportunity, particularly when I look at the Lansing region to take a lot of very traditional businesses and empower them with really amazing products that are already available on the market and painting that picture of what the efficiencies could look like. I think a lot about it our more traditional manufacturing was even speaking with some folks around the, some of the new battery opportunities with Altium coming in and the.

[00:10:46] The work that's being done in that type of new factory environment is much more reminiscent of playing an esports game right on an iPad than it is physically manipulating and moving things on a production line. And so [00:11:00] as I look to that kind of next 50 years, how do we paint that picture that you can have an amazing life and do really cool and innovative things?

[00:11:09] Utilizing the technology that's available. I think giving that computer literacy and the ability to dream big is really important as we head into this. This kind of next chapter of technology. 

[00:11:22] So for Lansing based companies that are looking for support from SmartZone or similar organizations, what should they look like before they come to apply?

[00:11:32] At what stage can you assist them? What types of businesses can you assist? And what does the process look like for getting engaged with Lansing SmartZone? 

[00:11:42] Sure, so from a Lansing regional smart zone perspective, we do speak with businesses at all stages, whether you're somebody who's just starting out with an idea and maybe the back of a napkin, all the way up to a growing and scaling company.

[00:11:57] Now the service offerings obviously look very different at each of [00:12:00] those. And I think if you're on the larger scale, it's a lot more connection to M E D C the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, some of the statewide programs, and at the micro level, it's much more kind of hands on one service where we can provide that.

[00:12:17] And then if you're not a tech business still let us know. We work with partners all across the Tri County region who can help support and grow your business. Leap runs the one and all program, which is. Michigan Technological University Specifically focused on people from underserved or minor minority backgrounds.

[00:12:35] We have the Elevate Program, which is an all black elevated elevator program to support those businesses. And so if it's not specifically through the Smart Zone, we definitely have opportunities to connect you to other resources. Both around our community, but also statewide. I think being in the center of Michigan gives a lot of benefits.

[00:12:56] You're an hour to Grand Rapids, you're an hour down to Ann Arbor [00:13:00] hour and a bit to Detroit. And so you have that flexibility and freedom to really tap into an amazing statewide network of resources, both here locally, but also across across Michigan. 

[00:13:12] All right, Harrison, thank you so much for taking some time to be on wind today. It's always a pleasure to chat with you.

[00:13:18] And we're looking forward to some of the things that we'll be doing in partnership with those organizations this year. As I said before, everything that Harrison and I talked about today will be available in the transcript and the show notes. And those link you right through to the partner websites that Harrison mentioned.

[00:13:32] Harrison, any parting comments for us today? 

[00:13:35] I think the only parting comment is to leave that we're super excited for this chapter of the Lansing Regional Smart Zone. Today I'm sitting in the Technology Innovation Center, which is a bustling hub of innovation partnerships with Michigan State University and the Research Foundation right here in downtown East Lansing.

[00:13:53] So if you ever need a place to come in, grab a coffee, and meet with interesting and innovative people, definitely make sure [00:14:00] you stop in next time you're in East Lansing. 

[00:14:02] All right, thank you so much, and we will see you at an event in Lansing soon. 

[00:14:06] Yes, much appreciated. Thanks, Carrie.