When Hart’s Sports received — and fulfilled — an incorrect order for apparel items, Kris Hart went to SCORE Akron & Canton to steer the situation in the right direction.
“It was a customer mistake, but we know them. We had done business with them for a while,” says the co-owner of the Atwater business that provides screen printing, embroidery, vehicle wraps and more. “We needed help navigating a solution that would be a win-win for both us and the customer.”
An organization that provides free guidance, workshops and mentorship to small businesses and nonprofits through the work of volunteers, SCORE Akron & Canton was able to help resolve the situation by recommending a sit-down meeting between the client and the business. Following the rectification of their initial issue, Kris and his wife, co-owner Lacie Hart, began meeting quarterly with those at SCORE — including their mentor, Mike Johnson.
“We would talk about how our business was doing. We didn’t have a real business plan at all, so they helped us develop a business plan. They helped us develop a marketing plan,” Kris says. “They helped us grow.”
Currently a mentor for SCORE, Johnson also served as chapter chairman and as a district director in the past, overseeing 11 chapters of SCORE in Ohio and Pennsylvania. When he decided to exit the corporate world — he had previously worked at three Fortune 500 companies, including General Electric and Timken — Johnson entered a post-corporate phase of life. He wanted to write a quality book about World War II — a goal that eventually turned into the authorship of nine more tomes.
He first encountered SCORE at a program for a writer’s guild based on some of the books he had written, including Fate of the Warriors. As he finished the program, a woman came forward to buy signed copies of the books — and asked him if he would join her at an upcoming SCORE meeting. Johnson accepted.
“Within about 15 minutes of that meeting, I was concluding that these people are doing something that’s really good, really helping a lot of people and I’d like to be part of it,” Johnson says.
Being a mentor allows one to stay connected to the business world without being completely immersed in it.
“SCORE enables us to give back to what I call the community at large,” Johnson says. “It feels really good to see a light shine in a client’s eyes when they see a little more clearly the pathway to great or greater success.”
Working as a mentor provides a sense of belonging.
“We enjoy the camaraderie that goes with being with a bunch of people like those who are with SCORE and who want to give back to the community,” Johnson says.
Those interested in becoming a mentor for SCORE Akron & Canton can register via the chapter’s website, on which they must sign off on a code of ethics.
“The next step is a new mentor is assigned to work with two or three of our current members, to co-counsel with them, to kind of get a feel for how different mentors proceed with working with clients,” Johnson says. “And then after they’ve done three of those kind of sessions, they can be assigned to become what we call a … lead mentor. And by the way, we often work in teams.”
Mentees are matched with their SCORE mentors either by specifically requesting them — whether they know of the mentor ahead of time or find their profile on the SCORE Akron & Canton website — or requesting to be matched with someone who best fits their needs.
“It’s not infrequently that we have new clients who have an idea, but the foremost thing they need is focus,” Johnson says. “They need to really focus on what is going to be required to get their business or their nonprofit off the ground and in a position to sustain it over a long period of time.”
Meetings with mentors, which are confidential, can take place in person or remotely. Typically, Johnson focuses the first meeting with clients on mutual learning.
“I want to learn more about the client, what he or she, or if it’s an organization, what the organization hopes to achieve by working with SCORE,” he says. “I start to get a grasp of what their situation is, and then I give them a bit of my background, so they have some sense of what they can expect to learn from me.”
Johnson likes to keep communication open, so he often advises clients not to wait to call or email with questions. Plus, he doesn’t want clients to feel as though they must agree with everything he says.
“In fact, conversations are enriched if somebody sees things a little differently from the way we do,” he says.
Kris says the mentorship program helped establish key performance indicators for Hart’s Sports.
“We built a system that would work for us for what we wanted our key performance indicators to be, and then we could start tracking it,” he says. “And I want to say the first year, we grew like 30 percent. The next year, we grew another 30 percent, and then the last time we met them … we doubled the company.”
He recommends that those considering becoming mentees through SCORE go through with their plans.
“I would say do it, 100 percent,” he says. “There’s three main reasons why. One, sometimes your ideas aren’t as good as you think they are, two, if you’re having trouble with anything, most likely your mentor has been there or can point you in the right direction of where to get help. … And then number three …. they give you confidence. … They’re going to help you succeed.”
Stark State College, Business & Entrepreneurial Center, 6200 Frank Ave. NW, Suite M331, North Canton, 330-379-3163, score.org/akroncanton
Kris Hart
