President, Business

The Acceleration Project (TAP) exists to unlock pathways to wealth creation and economic mobility for small business owners. We equip under-resourced entrepreneurs with the mentorship and resources they need to grow, thrive, and lead in their communities.

Economic mobility in the U.S. has declined significantly, and wage growth has failed to keep pace with housing, healthcare, and education costs. Owning a small business remains one of the most reliable paths to financial security and upward mobility, as business owners have far greater net worth than wage earners, and local ownership strengthens community economies. Yet access to affordable, high-quality support is uneven, especially for entrepreneurs of color, women, immigrants, and rural business owners;

as a result, roughly 20% of small businesses fail within their first year, and up to half fail within their first five years, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

TAP was founded in 2012 in response to these troubling trends, with the goal of supporting small businesses with annual revenues between $100,000 and $2 million, the segment that drives local jobs and economic growth but too often lacks affordable, high-quality advisory support. TAP exists to bring Wall Street expertise to Main Street, pairing tailored support with expert guidance across key functional areas such as finance, marketing, operations, and emerging technologies (including AI) throughout the entirety of the capital lifecycle, thereby empowering these entrepreneurs with the tools they need to succeed economically and uplift their communities in the process.

Powered by a network of more than 200 experienced pro bono consultants and a full-time team of 24, TAP supports small business owners nationwide across a wide range of industries with bespoke guidance that meets them where they are and addresses their most critical barriers – all delivered at no cost to them. What sets TAP apart is a deeply personalized approach and the caliber of the team delivering it: rather than a one-size-fits-all curriculum, each entrepreneur gets the support that fits their needs, driven by a team of accomplished professionals with proven private sector experience and deep dedication to entrepreneurship:

• Deep dive projects: Intensive, multi-week engagements for businesses at an inflection point
• 1:1 consulting: Short-term engagements to work through a specific challenge
• Group-based programs: Peer learning and community-building, paired with 1:1 support

TAP serves as a vehicle for harnessing the talents and expertise of Wall Street to deliver social impact on Main Street. Powered by the deep private sector experience of our team, our organization runs like a business, and our results speak for themselves:
Since our founding, TAP has worked with more than 13,100 small business owners on customized engagements, delivering over 72,400 hours of pro-bono consulting and generating a 10:1 social return on investment as determined by Bridgespan. 86% of TAP clients maintain or grow revenue, 90% retain or add jobs, 94% feel better equipped to manage their business, and every $1 invested generates roughly $10 in community value.

Further, 87% of TAP clients are women-owned businesses and 75% are owned by under-resourced populations.

Building upon this strong foundation and guided by our core values of Access, Innovation, and Impact, TAP is now at an inflection point as we scale our work to operate in new cities, double our consultant network, grow our ecosystem to include 100,000 small business owners over the next 5 years, and set the stage for further explosive growth – all in pursuit of making business ownership a true path to economic mobility for thousands more Americans.

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