By Pharoh Martin | SACOBSERVER.COM WIRE SERVICES

WASHINGTON (NNPA) - Sherrie Gilchrist, the first woman to chair the 95,000-member National Black Chamber of Commerce, says she will focus on business empowerment and education as difficulties mount for small African American owned businesses in a turbulent economy.

“The primary focus is bridging the empowerment gap in our communities and I think if we can accomplish that it'll be a great year,” said Gilchrist, who has sat on the board of the Black business advocacy group since 2000 and has headed the Tennessee Multicultural Chamber of Commerce since its inception in 1999 as its president and chief executive officer.

Under Gilchrist’s NBCC chairmanship, which begins in January, the Washington-D.C.-based organization will undergo a total restructuring in order to strengthen its reach at the local level. Amidst America’s ailing economy, already hard on small businesses, she will be tasked to hold NBCC’s local affiliates accountable and to assure that the national chamber is able to provide the chapters the necessary support and expertise to forge growth.

As a part of its strategy, the Chamber plans to write and publish a number of new training manuals for their local chapters and, under Gilchrist’s leadership, will unveil a new affiliate evaluation process that local chapters must meet to be certified as viable NBCC chapters.

“Training is going to be a big factor,” says Harry Alford, NBCC co-founder, president and CEO. “We will be training the trainers so we can provide people in Cleveland, Denver and places that have local chapters [with information] that will be viable to their communities and help start new businesses that help provide capital access and create jobs."

Gilchrist will have plenty on her plate for her first year with small businesses operating in the faint economy that shows double digit job loss nationally and diminished bank-lending opportunities that are sorely needed to expand resources. Small businesses are also tremendously affected because they must remain competitive with large companies in order to attract quality employees, who desire benefits such as health care.

“Many of the difficulties that face small businesses are tenfold than those that face large corporations,” Gilchrist said. “But the burden - although 80 percent of the businesses in America are small businesses - [is that] the larger corporations get the major discounts. Small business owner pay three times the price point per individual employee than a large corporation. Although we are not against large corporations getting a discount for a number of employees, but it should not be triple the amount that small businesses pay.”

Gilchrist is hopeful that that the economy will make a significant recovery in the next 12 to 18 months and that the NBCC can help eliminate some of the disparity gaps that exist in the Black employer and employee sectors.

NBCC leaders naturally anticipate obstacles. But, as small business advocates, they sometimes encounter hurdles in unexpected places.

For example, when President Obama held a forum on “Jobs and Economic Growth," at the White House Dec. 3 to seek job creation ideas, the forum included union leaders, economists and corporate executives but not much in the form of representation of the small business sector, Alford observes.

“There were no small business people there! We weren’t invited,” Alford said. “The U.S. Chamber of Commerce wasn’t invited. The Federation of Independent Business wasn’t invited. They didn’t have one small business there! So what are they doing? That was going to Harvard or Princeton or something. That wasn’t the real deal.”

Conversely, the Department of Labor reported the lowest monthly job losses last month since the recession began almost two years ago. In November, U.S. jobs declined by 11,000. But the Black jobless rate remained consistent with the previous month’s numbers at above 15 percent.

That’s where the NBCC comes in.

“We have to go out and address unemployment ourselves,” Alford said. “We can't depend on government to do it. The government hasn't done it, doesn't know how to do it. So it's going to have to come from non-profit organizations and associations that are living out there with the people. Until elected officials learn how to do it we have to do it. So we’re not going to sit back and wait for something to happen. We are going to shake the trees and make it happen.”

Alford anticipates his organization's new chair and her successful background as an accomplished business leader will pay big dividends when she takes over in January.

Under Gilchrist’s leadership, the Tennessee Multicultural Chamber of Commerce secured $233 million in contracts for local black-owned businesses over the past six-years. It also established a populous and ethnically diverse membership that forced the organization to change its name from the Chattanooga African-American Chamber of Commerce to the “Multicultural” name that it uses today, according to the group’s Web site.

“Sherrie is an expert manager from the way she has run her Chamber there in Tennessee,” said Alford. “She brings a lot of good quality administration skills that will compliment what we do. We work the outside and she works the inside as manager. That's what she's going to bring to the table.”

Pharoh Martin is an NNPA national correspondent.