PEMBROKE — The Thomas Entrepreneurship Hub has welcomed Beth Wilkerson as the new Executive Director of the Thomas Entrepreneurship Incubator.
Wilkerson has a passion for innovation and leaderships as she aims to set the Hub up for success and growth. Wilkerson is an alum from UNC Pembroke.
“My goal was to help people not have to learn all those lessons the hard way when it came to business,” she said.
She started at UNC Pembroke in 2007 at the Office for Regional Initiative with the Small Business and Technology Center (SBTDC). She would stay with SBTDC until May 2018 because she was promoted to regional director and transferred to Fayetteville State.
She had an office at the Hub and knew the organization well. Her previous job was affiliated with the Hub and they would partner on a lot of trainings and many programs. They have also partnered on clients and co-counsel clients.
When the position opened for the executive director in the Hub’s Incubator, she said previous executive director Tom Hall encouraged her to apply.
She felt encouraged to apply because her first initial reason to coming to the SBTDC was to help small business owners like her mother and father.
“I applied to SBTDC to help people like my mom and dad. They were small business owners and it seemed like they had to learn every lesson the hard way,” Wilkerson said.
Wilkerson wants to be able to help small businesses get the resources and space that they lack or need to be successful. She said that some small businesses only have one or two people who do everything in the business.
She would like to continue to add resources like funding opportunities, trainings and networking opportunities for the local community as well as the tenants in the hub.
Wilkerson’s long-term goal is to continue to make sure the Hub’s partnerships with the town, the Tribe and the community continue to expand and to find more opportunities to work with them in various ways. She never imagined herself as the executive director of the Hub and said the experience has been surreal for her.
“I’ve had so much support, just so many people have been reaching out to me. We got a lot of work to do, but we’ve got the resources and the team in place to do it,” Wilkerson said.
She said that working with the students at UNCP has been great. She plans to get in front of all of the student departments at UNCP and not just business students. She thinks that a lot of the students on campus are not aware of the Hub and its resources for them.
“And there’s also internship opportunities. We don’t just want students from the college of business. We want interns from the mass communications department and other departments. There were clients that needed students from that department, especially project based learning type and internship availability,” Wilkerson said.
She wants students to be encourage to participate in entrepreneurship and hopes it becomes a major at UNCP in the future.
“I see the Hub as the pathway between the community and the university. I see it as a natural catalyst for the university and the community. The goal, the plan is to really increase the student engagement here,” Wilkerson.
The Hub has several rental spaces that are affordable for businesses to use and comes with various resources that can be used. The light, water, garbage pickup and fax machine are all included in the lease. She said the Hub has some office space that is currently available for use and encourages anyone who needs it to reach out.
“Hopefully we’ll be able to encourage that entrepreneurial spirit and the students and get them heading in that right direction,” Wilkerson said.
The Hub plans to announce its lineup for the One Million Cups series soon.
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