When the Goldman Sachs’ 10,000 Small Businesses program came to Iowa in 2018, it wasn’t expected to stay. Iowa was one of two states selected to pilot a statewide model of the program, which normally operates out of cities like Chicago and Detroit.

Jacki Boldt had 10 years of experience working for Des Moines Area Community College in workforce training and business support roles when she was asked to be a program manager for the new pilot.

“There was a team of us … we didn’t really know what [the program] was. We didn’t think it was going to stay in Iowa. The initial plan was they were going to do a couple cohorts and then be done. It wasn’t intended to be a full site,” Boldt said.

But two successful cohorts led to the decision to keep the program running. Boldt stepped into the role of executive director for the third cohort, where she and the team helped lead business owners through the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2023, the program marked five years in Iowa.

Under the statewide model, DMACC administers the grant for the program but all 15 of Iowa’s community colleges are partners, and businesses across the state are eligible to participate.

The 10,000 Small Businesses program is funded by the Goldman Sachs Foundation, which partners with Babson College, a well-known college for entrepreneurship, on the curriculum design.

Before DMACC, Boldt was a high school business teacher in Johnston, where she also supported work-based learning initiatives. We recently caught up with her about the program’s first five years, the effects of the pandemic and the statewide model.

Responses have been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

What kind of companies is the 10,000 Small Businesses program designed for?

It is unique because it’s for businesses that are looking to grow and so what it is not, it is not for startups and really early stage. They have to be in business for two years to be eligible. We get a lot that are just in year two or three, and they’re trying to stabilize a little bit and figure out how can I scale? I want to start adding employees but I need to do that in a way that I can be successful and not crumble. But then we also have businesses that have been around for 40 years where they’re family businesses or, for whatever reason, they’re maybe a little bit stagnant or they’re now looking for what’s next. We do see some family businesses where someone has taken over and they’re looking for the next step. There’s a lot of reasons and a lot of stages. It really is somebody who has a foundation that they can improve upon and evaluate, and then figure out what’s the next best course for their business.

How does Iowa’s program operate differently, being statewide?

The other sites run three cohorts a year. We do two. We do one in the fall and one in the spring. Because we are statewide, we’re a hybrid model. For each module of the curriculum, other sites would meet for one full day in-person. What happens in Iowa is the entire cohort comes together in Des Moines for three days. They really get united upfront and they get to know each other and come together. We do three days in person and then we go and do most of the program virtually, and then we finish with four days in the end. That’s a really unique aspect to where they have time in the evening, and I think they really do connect on a different level than maybe some of the other sites just because it’s a different environment.

Did having the hybrid model from the beginning help when the COVID-19 pandemic hit?

With cohort three, Covid hit right in the middle of their program, so we essentially just stopped and halted and said, “OK, we can’t continue, we have to figure out what we’re doing.” Then it really turned into survival mode for those businesses, to be honest. We finished out the cohort but it just took a completely different turn. It wasn’t let’s finish out all of this content but let’s finish it out in the survival mode and pivot mode. I think some people really did continue on with a focus on the planned content where others were like, no, what do I need to do to keep my doors open? It was honestly a time when even Goldman Sachs had a better picture of the value of the program, because COVID unified everybody. We ended up meeting weekly with not only our current cohort but then our alumni. Then it was, what is everybody doing? How are you surviving? Everybody was like, “How does this work? How do I handle it?” There was a lot of coming together, and I think that was when — not that the program wasn’t valuable before because it definitely was — but there was a new light on just how significant that connection between small businesses actually was. We had a couple cohorts then that were fully virtual. The fact that we were hybrid really set us up for success because a lot of the sites then really struggled with how do we do this virtually? We eventually transitioned back out and now we are back to our hybrid format.

Did the pandemic affect any other aspects of the program?

There’s a larger focus on crisis management. I think it’s interesting because crisis management has always been a part of the program, but I think it was something that I don’t know if people necessarily gave as much weight to and then now it’s a much bigger thought of OK, you actually don’t know what could happen and are you set up for whatever could take place? The program partners with Babson College on the curriculum, and it is nice because as the economy changes and as small business needs change, they make modifications to the curriculum so that it does stay relevant. In those cohorts that were all virtual, there was a large shift in the curriculum to talking about pivoting and we’re talking about survival.

When the program started, the thought was, is this sustainable in Iowa? Are there enough small businesses to keep this program going? For anything, you have to apply and it’s difficult to let people know about it and even though there’s this market that is eligible, there’s only a fraction of them that are going to be interested. The unique thing now is we have businesses that started in the pandemic but a lot of them, for whatever reason, realized through the pandemic that I want to do my own thing, or now I’m home with a little more independence and I want to take a different route. So now we have people that started during the pandemic and they’re now eligible to go through and have even participated and graduated.

What is the role of Iowa’s community colleges in supporting participants and alumni of the 10,000 Small Businesses program?

Each community college, they know their region better than we know their region, for sure. They are really great about referring people to the program and supporting them through that, and then the thing with the program is it’s 12 weeks and then they’re done. So it is nice then for those businesses to be able to go back and receive support in their communities from other resources. One of the aspects of the program is to introduce or ensure collaboration among resources across the state so that they do have that because when they’re with us they’re building a plan for growth and so then how can they go implement that growth? To be able to go back and use the community colleges and some of the other services in their region is a big asset and that really is a lot of the partnership. Then the majority of our team, the faculty and the business advisers, come from across the state so they are a part of the community college system or have been at some point.

What differentiates the 10,000 Small Businesses program from other entrepreneurial resources in Iowa?

There are a ton of programs. A lot of the programs that you see, or when people think about entrepreneurial programs, they think about the idea of “I want to start a business.” There’s a lot of things to get you started, and then once you’re there and you’re going, there’s maybe not as many resources. There are still resources, but maybe not as many on “OK, so I’m here and I’m doing it, am I doing it right? How can I do it better?” We get a lot of people who join the program because they’re really at a tipping point and they need to take the next step and they’re just not sure how to do it without their foundation crumbling.

What is memorable to you from the program’s first five years?

I think what’s remarkable, honestly, is the alumni. We have 255 alumni businesses in Iowa that have gone through and then we have 23 currently in the cohort and their stories are amazing.

Every time I’m completely blown away by the amazing things that people in Iowa are doing. I’m always amazed whenever we get a new kind of applicant pool or a new group of scholars I typically have heard of, maybe one or two out of the whole cohort across the state. I think it’s always amazing to me as they come in and you start learning their stories and the things that they’re doing and they are really going back and serving their community and growing their jobs.

I think one of the things recently that we hear more about that we didn’t hear about in the beginning is just that focus on the rural communities and some of the succession planning needs and the number of businesses that potentially could close in the near future and so figuring out how to support those businesses and those communities.

What goals has the program worked toward in its first five years and what are you focused on next?

Our main goal has always been to make sure that it remains a statewide program. The three of us that work full time on the program are here in Des Moines, so it’s difficult. We always wanted to make sure that we had alumni representation in every community college area and we do. Now our goal is, can we get a business from every county? I think we have around 66 counties. Our goal has always been to make sure that we have representation across Iowa. 

What we really wanted to see, too, outside of the program delivery things, was really to have a strong alumni network. I don’t know if it’s Iowa Nice, but our alumni are very engaged and really work together to support one another and do come together. With Iowa being so big and being statewide, it’s a unique thing to witness. … We want to continue to develop the partnerships and the relationships, keep the program very collaborative, and then to also make sure that we are involving businesses and communities from across the state. We want every pocket of the state to be represented. Outside of that, we do have a lot of goals around expansion of services and programming. The 10,000 Small Businesses program will remain, but we do see gaps where there’s things that we would like to do on the whole spectrum of services.

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At a glance

Hometown: New Hampton, Iowa

Education: Bachelor’s degree in secondary education, Buena Vista University; bachelor’s degree in business management, Waldorf College; master’s degree in business analytics, University of Iowa

Hobbies: Spending time with family, camping

Family: Husband and two children

Contact: jlboldt@dmacc.edu