Blue Mountain Community College Small Business Development Center (SBDC) Director Carol Frink has announced her retirement. Her last day is set for March 31.
Frink arrived at BMCC in 2016, during which time the SBDC was the lowest contribution center in the Oregon Network, with just 197 clients served with 797 advising hours, assisted clients with just three new business starts, created 25 jobs, retained 24 jobs and helped obtain $77,000 in loans. Fast-forward three years later, and the Blue Mountain SBDC is a top-producing center in Eastern Oregon and one of the top-producing SBDC centers in the state.
BMCC said that under Frink’s direction, the center in 2018 assisted 418 clients who received 2,046 hours of business advising, assisted 29 new business starts, helped to create 91 jobs and retain 12 more, and had $1,783,803 in loans obtained.
The center received two major awards from the Small Business Administration in May 2018 – the Center of Excellence and Innovation Award from the Small Business Administration for the state of Oregon, and for the Pacific Northwest Region, covering Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Alaska.
“The past three years as the director of the Small Business Development Center have been a lot of fun developing the team, creating systems, getting into compliance, securing special grants for rural Oregon, setting and achieving goals, and focusing on serving the business owners of Umatilla, Baker and Wallowa counties well,” Frink said. “If you do the work, and do it well, the impacts from your work always show up.”
BMCC serves as the host for the SBDC, and Frink said the center wouldn’t be successful without the college’s support. Frink praised her team of seven – six business advisors and one support staff member – for their hard work in turning around the success of the SBDC in a short time period.
The decision to retire didn’t come easy for Frink. Her husband, however, retired for the second time in December, and quickly began to fill up the couple’s travel calendar for 2019. Frink also noted her three grandchildren are counting down the days until her retirement, and she looks forward to slowing down, traveling and spending an abundant amount of time with her grandchildren. She hasn’t left out the possibility of setting new goals and keeping a pulse on business for a possible work project or two.
BMCC will fill Frink’s position in the coming months.
Carol Frink and her SBDC staff have been terrific to work with. In the past 17 months, City of Umatilla Community Development Department and SBDC worked together on ten different projects, including existing business owners looking for advice and guidance on how to expand and individuals looking to start a new business. The bi-lingual staff have been critical to the success of several business owners. We wish Carol the very best in her retirement.
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