The Critical Role of Workforce Development in Nuturing Future Entrepreneurs

In a vibrant and informative discussion at TEDCO's Entrepreneur Expo in Baltimore, Chris Frew, CEO of BioBuzz Networks, sat down with Ellen Flowers-Fields, Vice President at the College of Southern Maryland and Chair of TEDCO's Board of Advisors. Ellen shared insights about her dual role, highlighting her work overseeing credentials and licensing programs across three counties in Southern Maryland as well as her contributions to TEDCO. She emphasized the importance of creating a connected entrepreneurial ecosystem through TEDCO's efforts, focusing on inclusivity and technological advancement.

Ellen also elaborated on the critical role that workforce development plays in nurturing future entrepreneurs, underscoring initiatives in growth industries like healthcare, education, and tech fields including artificial intelligence and cybersecurity. The event, which brimmed with energy and connection, encouraged entrepreneurs to come together, share ideas, and build lasting partnerships. The discussion illuminated how educational institutions like the College of Southern Maryland do more than just prepare students for employment; they foster the skills necessary for students to consider entrepreneurship, aligning closely with TEDCO's mission to drive innovation across Maryland.

About Ellen

Ellen Flowers-Fields serves as Vice-President for Continuing Education and Workforce Development at the College of Southern Maryland. She is responsible for the oversight of all areas of the non-credit economic and community development programming including the Center for Trades and Energy Training, Maryland Center for Environmental Training, the Workforce Center, the SBDC, the Non-Profit Institute, the Transportation Center and adult basic education.

Ellen has over 25 years of progressive professional experience in the field of workforce development and human capital management. Her diverse background includes supporting entrepreneurship and small business development efforts, acquisition, project management and implementation of various federal, state and local programs that address community economic development needs. Throughout her career she has acquired and managed over $100 million dollars in support of various economic and community development initiatives. Affiliations include Executive Board member Tri-County Council for Southern Maryland; Member of the National Association of Workforce Development Professionals and the Maryland Economic Development Association. 

About the TEDCO Expo

The TEDCO Expo is a premier event in Maryland showcasing various resources from across the State and is jam-packed full of workshops, roundtable discussions, exhibiting companies and pitches, opening up great opportunities for entrepreneurs to network, learn, and be inspired. Learn more at: https://www.tedcomd.com/tedcos-2024-entrepreneur-expo.

Watch the full interview or dig in with the transcript below. 

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:00:04]:
Welcome to TEDCO's Entrepreneur Expo in downtown Baltimore where the region's top business owners, innovators and investors have gathered to network, grow and celebrate the vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem in Maryland. I'm Chris Frue with BioBuzz Networks and I'm honored today to be here with Ellen Flowers Fields, Vice President at the College of Southern Maryland and Chairman of TEDCO's Board of Advisors. Welcome.

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:00:29]:
Thank you so much.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:00:30]:
Would you take a minute to just introduce yourself and tell us about some of the work you do with the college and with TEDCO?

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:00:35]:
Thank you. As the Vice president of Continuing Education and Workforce Development, I oversee all of the credentials and licensing programs for the college. We serve a three county region in Southern Maryland. Calvert, Charles and St. Mary's counties work very, very closely with economic development and our business entrepreneur, entrepreneurial and business stakeholders such as TEDCO and the Small Business Development Center.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:01:03]:
And what about your role with TEDCO?

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:01:06]:
I'm currently serving as Board Chair. I've been on the TEDCO board for three years and I'm very excited about the work that we're doing and the opportunity to bring the ecosystem together today.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:01:17]:
And could you talk about some of the priorities that you have right now on the board of TEDCO and where your focus is as an organization?

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:01:25]:
I'm going to steal a phrase that our CEO Troy Stovall uses all the time. It's about stitching. It's helping entrepreneurs find each other and find resources that can help them grow and scale. It's about ensuring that there's inclusion and access for individuals from all backgrounds to have an opportunity to grow their businesses. And it's about advancing technology in the state of Maryland and ensuring that Maryland remains a competitive state when it comes to technology.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:01:59]:
Stitching is a great kind of visual to think about everything that TEDCO does because it's a lot that the organization does, including an event like today's Expo, which you and I were talking about before. This is been a few years since we've had this thing. How important is an event like this for stitching together the ecosystem?

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:02:17]:
I think it's extremely important. As entrepreneurs will often tell you, it feels very lonely sometimes trying to grow your business. I think entrepreneurs innately feel like they have to know everything and it can be overwhelming just researching and trying to find information on your own. So being able to connect with resources, both those that can help you and those that are often in the same space that you are, can help you. 1 feel 1. You're not in it alone. 2. You do have Some really great ideas you can help someone else with.

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:02:51]:
And so coming alongside these entrepreneurs, helping them to think through their own thoughts and bringing resources to the table to help them grow, is really the benefit of connecting to TEDCO.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:03:02]:
The energy, even. It's energizing to leave the Expo every year. It's one of my favorite events of the year. And the energy that you can kind of as an entrepreneur get from this event really is helpful.

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:03:13]:
Yes. I already have a wallet full of business cards. The connections that you make, I mean, and truly none of us does anything that's of any magnitude or scale on our own. And so being able to make those connections and build those lasting relationships, it's like a reunion when you come back here. People who are in this space often become serial entrepreneurs and they're from one endeavor to another, and. And so it's important that we just come alongside them.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:03:39]:
Yeah. At your work with the college, can you talk about some of the workforce development initiatives that you're working on? Right now?

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:03:48]:
We are heavily focused on looking at growth industries in our region. Healthcare continues to dominate. There's certainly needs in that field. Teacher education is really, really important. And so we've been working with our K through 12 partners in terms of creating pathways so we can get more teachers into the system and the pipeline. Similar to TEDCO's mission, it supporting cyber and that workforce and artificial intelligence and those very important areas, quantum and machine learning. Expanding programs in those areas becomes critical. And something that we're starting to really investigate is how we look at environmental sustainability and how we build the competencies for the future workforce, for jobs that don't exist today, that are really going to help human beings be able to survive effectively on this planet as the environment becomes more volatile.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:04:45]:
Those are a lot of different industries. How unique is it to be in a state like Maryland where you can develop so many different pathways?

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:04:54]:
Well, what do they say? Maryland is America in miniature. Right. So it does allow for that diversity of thought. But I also think it's the strength of Maryland's 16 community colleges. We work independently but collaborate collaboratively to ensure we're meeting the needs of our region and collectively the needs of the state. And so we leverage that capacity and support of each other and really use trend data and analysis to make sure that we're building competencies for the future.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:05:27]:
We're here at an entrepreneur event. How important is the entrepreneurial ecosystem? When you think of workforce development and when you think of introducing that to.

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:05:38]:
Students coming through your college, it's very important. So many of the students that come to us through workforce development programs are entrepreneurs, many of them getting their certifications and licensing so that they can start businesses of their own. We also have people who are career changers coming back and maybe after lifelong doing work in a certain field or vocation, find they need skill advancement or they're looking to do something a little bit different. So we are a host institution for the Small Business Development center for the State of Maryland. And so we connect our students to that resource so that as they're learning competencies in the classroom that they might apply to day to day work, they can also consider how they can use those skills to establish businesses. I've often said entrepreneurs are just problem solvers. They're individuals who can find a problem and want to lean into that problem toward the solution. And so we're teaching our students how to be problem solvers, to think critically.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:06:40]:
That's great. You're, you're really stitching together not only an entrepreneur ecosystem, but a workforce development ecosystem with what you're doing. And, and, and really seems like what you're doing in, in the colleges there is really the first phase of, of a budding entrepreneur ecosystem that, that can kind of evolve into what TEDCO supports.

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:06:59]:
Absolutely.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:07:00]:
Well, thank you for joining me today and for everything you do to support TEDCO's mission and to help repair the workforce that, that all these companies definite and for Maryland to continue to grow and thrive.

Ellen Flowers-Fields, Chair, TEDCO Board [00:07:13]:
Thank you.

Chris Frew, CEO, BioBuzz Networks [00:07:14]:
My name is Chris Frew. I'm the founder of Biobuzz Networks and we're here today at TEDCO's Entrepreneur Expo in Baltimore.