On RFD-TV: Shawn Kaskie

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04/09/2025 Added

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Today we’re joined by Shawn Kaskie, a community development educator with Rural Prosperity Nebraska at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. He leads a program to build local entrepreneurship capacity, or the eCommunities program, a statewide effort helping rural communities recover, grow, and strengthen their small business owners & entrepreneurs.

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[00:00:00.000]The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is working to support small business owners.
[00:00:04.180]Their eCommunities program connects trained coaches with local businesses to build rural entrepreneurship capacity.
[00:00:11.400]And Sean Caskey with Rural Prosperity Nebraska joins us now for a closer look.
[00:00:16.520]Sean, good to have you with us today.
[00:00:18.280]Let's start with the big picture here.
[00:00:20.400]What exactly is the eCommunities program?
[00:00:22.960]Yes, thanks for having me today.
[00:00:27.140]The eCommunities program, which is short for Building Local Entrepreneurship Capacity,
[00:00:31.800]which isn't very much fun to say, so we shortened that for eCommunities.
[00:00:34.760]It's a program designed after the pandemic had a really bad impact on our small-town,
[00:00:41.380]rural, and retail and service businesses.
[00:00:43.060]So in response, we had a two-step program.
[00:00:46.060]One is we've hired and trained local business coaches.
[00:00:49.960]We call them eCoaches for short, and those are placed in six rural counties across Nebraska,
[00:00:54.860]and they work directly with a local team of people.
[00:00:57.120]We have a system of mentors to set up and support businesses that are kind of struggling
[00:01:00.860]or need help with strengthening their operations or need help with the startup process.
[00:01:05.280]And so we have a system of support through direct client consultation with our coaches.
[00:01:09.720]And then we have a local committee that sets up and mentors, so even after the coaches are done
[00:01:14.320]or there's a change in, like, the chamber economic development director,
[00:01:17.140]they have somewhere to go to for years to come.
[00:01:19.280]You know, you mentioned the fact that a lot of these communities suffered after COVID.
[00:01:24.680]So let's talk about why it was so important.
[00:01:27.060]Why did you start this program in the rural areas for these rural businesses?
[00:01:31.400]It was very important.
[00:01:35.920]how to find, you know, as many of our small towns, there was a workforce issue, how to find employees
[00:01:40.480]or how to transition. Maybe it was about the times where we had a lot of retirements during COVID.
[00:01:44.940]And so our coaches work directly with that business, that family, or that startup, where
[00:01:49.960]they're at in their family situation to help them get through and navigate the changes. And there
[00:01:55.240]was some funding that came through. And one of the sponsors that help is helping pay for our
[00:01:59.340]economic, our coaches is the U.S. Economic Development Administration. And now currently
[00:02:03.500]the U.S. Rural Department of USDA through their rural government, and they're paying our coaches
[00:02:10.200]while we transition into a system where the local economic development directors will pay for a
[00:02:15.900]number of coaches. Those coaches work directly with referrals from the local chamber and economic
[00:02:21.680]development office and help navigate those changes, whether it be for finding new employees to
[00:02:27.020]increase their efficiency or to work through that startup process. It's been a very effective
[00:02:31.480]program for us.
[00:02:32.880]So what has been the impact so far? What have you seen?
[00:02:35.400]So we've had five coaches over the three years, thanks to support again from the USEDA and USDA,
[00:02:43.800]and we've impacted over 230 Nebraska small businesses. Those 230 businesses have added
[00:02:51.960]or saved 130 jobs in rural areas, and they've leveraged $13 million with their private revenue
[00:02:58.340]to increase their profits by about $13 million as well. So it's done very well.
[00:03:03.280]That is quite an impact. That's community development educator with
[00:03:07.000]Rural Prosperity Nebraska, Sean Caskey. Thank you so much for your time today.

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On RFD-TV: Shawn Kaskie

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