The HBS African-American Alumni Association (HBSAAA), in partnership with Steven Rogers (MBA 1985), the MBA Class of 1957 Senior Lecturer of Business Administration (emeritus), launched a new webinar series on April 29 aimed at helping members navigate the economic and health impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on the black community.

The series kicked off with “How Black Businesses Can Survive Covid-19” and featured Rogers, and his daughter, entrepreneur and hotel executive Akilah Rogers (MBA 2009), leading a virtual conversation with 50 HBSAAA members. The hour-long session focused on ways black business owners can shore up their finances in anticipation of a long period of economic uncertainty, and included advice on how to apply for loan assistance through the new Payroll Protection Plan (PPP) recently passed by Congress as part of ongoing pandemic relief efforts.

HBS Senior Lecturer emeritus Steven Rogers

HBS Senior Lecturer emeritus Steven Rogers

“They talked about specific tips for surviving the pandemic,” says Jacqueline Adams (MBA 1978), a member of the HBSAAA, who helped coordinate the webinar with club co-presidents Beverly Andersen (MBA 1997) and Sara C. Clarke (MBA 1997), as well as club administrator Mary Brussard Harmon.

Professor Rogers, who taught the course “Black Business Leaders and Entrepreneurship at HBS, approached webinar as a “call to action” for HBSAAA members to help African-American businesses by encouraging them to apply for the low-interest PPP loans. He said that many minority-owned businesses are not applying for the loans “out of fear, myths, intimidation, or misinformation.”

According to Rogers, “if these business owners do not survive, it will leave the Black community as a private-enterprise desert, with devastating consequences.”

To prevent this, he gave an overview of how to fill out the PPP loan application, and shared promising data from Seaway National Bank in Chicago, where most of the 1,114 loan applications had been approved to the tune of $140 million.

Rogers offered three other specific tips for keeping a business afloat at this time.

“Focus on generating new revenue through new products or services, get expenses under control, and load your balance sheet with cash so that you can withstand what is shaping up to be a long period of economic retrenchment.”

“It was a robust conversation,” says Adams. “And we heard from members very soon afterwards that many were sharing the information with small business owners in their networks. We don’t mess around.”

Adams say the HBSAAA is planning other webinars in the COVID-19 series to address topics like emotional coping skills, the food supply, and even one on Gospel music. “We want to lift each other up.”

For the more than 500 alumni participating in 60 HBS Alumni Forums nationwide, the value of a deeply committed “personal board of directors” cannot be overstated. These small, highly organized and facilitated groups, which are run through the HBS global alumni clubs network, serve as a sounding board and reality check for business leaders whose decisions often have significant impacts on a range of stakeholders.

“Forum is a confidential peer support group that helps you sort out your toughest challenges and highest aspirations,” says Robert Halperin (MBA 1982), HBS Alumni Forum president, who co-founded the program in the HBS Association of Boston (HBSAB) in 2011 with Marc Zablatsky (MBA 1992). “Forum is a place where you can get real. It’s where you can meet with others who are in the same place.”

The confidential monthly gatherings of eight or nine alumni from a range of class years and industries offer facilitated conversations full of mentoring, compassionate listening, and expert perspectives to help each other grow personally and professionally.

Under normal circumstances, the support that HBS alumni find in Forum has been invaluable to navigating life and career ups and downs. But in the context of a global pandemic, Halperin says many groups are talking about how to stay calm in these times and exploring coping techniques.

“Many alumni are in positions of leadership where their decisions and actions have huge impacts,” he says. “Some are facing the potential loss of businesses in this new downturn, and balancing the needs of family as well.”

Now that social distancing prevents the usual monthly group gatherings, alumni are turning to their now-virtual forums for deeper connection and reassurance. “Alums are valuing Forum now more than ever,” says Halperin. “They’ve all moved to virtual meetings and attendance and commitment are stronger than they have ever been. Forums are a safe port in this viral storm we are living through.”

Zablatsky agrees, adding that while the pandemic has changed the dynamics of Forum, it has not diminished the positive impact. “I think the virtual meetings are just as impactful, and though they tend to be shorter, we’re meeting every week instead of monthly,” says Zablatsky, who moved from Boston to San Francisco three years ago and helped grow the number of forums at the HBS Association of Northern California (HBSANC) from two groups to the current 11 groups with close to 90 members.

Recognizing that virtual forums are here to stay, the HBSANC forum program will hold its annual retreat online and will feature facilitated discussions and workshops aimed at teaching members a range of “tips and tricks” for getting the most out of virtual interactions going forward.

“HBS is all about deep connections, and forums are a continuation of that,” says Zablatsky. “I see forums as an extension of our HBS sections. Going virtual opens up so many opportunities.”

Some Forum participants had been unofficially experimenting with that virtual connection long before COVID-19. Melissa Weiksnar (MBA 1982) has been deeply involved in her HBSAB forum since it was first launched in 2011. She relocated to Buffalo a few years ago, but stuck with her forum by participating remotely if she couldn’t get to Boston in person. “Given how our lives and identities are shaped so much by our HBS experiences, having this peer group is really helpful,” she says. “I can’t advocate for forums enough, especially in these intense times in our lives and careers.”

For more information on HBS Alumni Forums, alumni can contact Robert Halperin at Robert.halperin@alumniforumservices.com .

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