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Interested in your thoughts on business growth
Welcome to this web site.
There are so many major challenges facing small businesses.
It will be interesting to read replies,
LUCKIEST

I assume you want (or are required) to choose a topic that's aligned with your field of study, expertise, and future career path. Perhaps the following will trigger an idea or problem statement that you would find enjoyable to explore:

Obviously, small businesses fail at a high rate (so staying in business and growing the business are universal challenges). When small businesses fail quickly (first or second year), my perception is that they do so because the business concept was ill-conceived or poorly planned. I believe when they struggle and fail more slowly, however, the reason is almost the result of actions taken (or not taken) by the founder/leader.

Larger employers typically have some type of leadership development program, and are mandated to provide people in formal leadership roles with regular training on a variety of topics to ensure compliance with federal, state, and local laws. They don't give untrained or inexperienced supervisors the authority to make decisions that might devastate the company. This kind of responsibility is reserved for senior executives.

In contrast, a small business owner can become a "boss" (with all the responsibilities of a first line supervisor, mid-level support manager, and senior executive rolled into one) in the span of time it takes to drive to the county clerk's office and a local bank. Not only do they have the authority to make decisions that might bankrupt the company, but the business is usually too small to be subject to the employment laws that guide larger companies -- so these bosses can really screw up people's lives. Of course, competent small business leadership can result in huge positive differences that affect families, neighborhoods, communities, and sometimes even entire industries.

Given that potential, and the fact that more than half the businesses in the U.S. fall into this category, why is there not a broader interest in developing small business leaders? Granted, universities and private firms offer a wealth of valuable and relevant courses, and the SBA has a few things, but it is generally up to the business owner to voluntarily pursue these -- and most never do.

I'm not advocating that federal, state, or local governments pass more laws that impact free enterprise -- but what if they required people to actually know something running a business before they could create and register one? What if people had to know something about managing employees before they hired them? What would be the positive and negative consequences? Have any jurisdictions actually done this, and if so, to what outcome? What knowledge, skills, experience, judgment, traits, and actions differentiate the leaders of successful small businesses from those of failed or failing businesses (in other words, what competencies or proficiencies should be demonstrated, tested, or verified)?

Those are just some of the questions and problems to explore there -- perhaps something interesting has jumped out at you. If not, I still wish you the very best on your research and presentation.