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Mission-driven entrepreneur business plan competition--deadline October 12th

By Scott Cooney

An upcoming business plan competition hosted by The William James Foundation provides mission-driven entrepreneurs an opportunity to compete for investment dollars, as well as many other prizes. Exclusively for mission-driven entrepreneurs, the competition's volunteer judges (including yours truly!) provide feedback on entrants' business plans.

The William James Foundation's Sustainable Business Plan Competition offers a total of $150,000 worth of services, cash, and investment offers to the best new for-profit plans with social and/or environmental goals. Entrants can be any age or anywhere in the world, but must be starting or growing for-profit companies that are either pre-revenue, or are within five years of their first revenues. All entrants who are accepted into the competition receive an average of 20 pages of feedback a round.

Having participated as a judge for several years now, I can tell you from experience that the applicants receive immensely powerful strategic advice, usually from as many as five judges, and from across industries. In the last competition, a lawyer from Rimon Law Group, a certified B-Corporation, was one of the other judges in my group, and she has since become my legal counsel, mainly because I was so impressed with the feedback she gave to the applicant in the William James Foundation.

So, if you are looking for help and potentially funding on your mission-driven business idea, submit your application soon. Deadline for 5-8 page summaries is Oct. 12. Visit http://www.williamjamesfoundation.org/howtoenter for more information on entering or contact us at competition@williamjamesfoundation.org or @WJF_competition with any questions.

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Scott Cooney is the developer of a new Triple Bottom Line, Monopoly-esque board game, and the author of Build a Green Small Business (McGraw-Hill).

Follow Scott's company, GreenBusinessOwner.com, on Twitter: Twitter.com/GreenBizOwner

Scott Cooney headshot

Scott Cooney, Principal of GreenBusinessOwner.com and author of Build a Green Small Business: Profitable Ways to Become an Ecopreneur (McGraw-Hill, November 2008), is also a serial ecopreneur who has started and grown several green businesses and consulted several other green startups. He co-founded the ReDirect Guide, a green business directory, in Salt Lake City, UT. He greened his home in Salt Lake City, including xeriscaping, an organic orchard, extra natural fiber insulation, a 1.8kW solar PV array, on-demand hot water, energy star appliances, and natural paints. He is a vegetarian, an avid cyclist, ultimate frisbee player, and surfer, and currently lives in the sunny Mission district of San Francisco. Scott is working on his second book, a look at microeconomics in the green sector. In June 2010, Scott launched GreenBusinessOwner.com, a sustainability consulting firm dedicated to providing solutions to common business problems by leveraging the power of the triple bottom line. Focused exclusively on small business, GBO's mission is to facilitate the creation and success of small, green businesses.

Read more stories by Scott Cooney