Katherine Baker

Faculty Expertise and Achievement

Kate Baker has been the Director of the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) hosted by the University at Albany since October 2021.  She joined the SBDC in 2006 as Business Advisor and served as the Interim Director for 1.5 years prior to her role as the center’s Director.  In her work with SBDC, Kate has worked with 1,500+ entrepreneurs assisting them in launching their business, securing capital for their ventures and providing mentoring services, creating multiple in-person and virtual training programs for entrepreneurs and small business owners and assisted in the creation of the SEED program, a character based loan program for underserved entrepreneurs in a public private partnership between the SBDC, University at Albany and Broadview Federal Credit Union.  She sits on several statewide SBDC committees and chairs the NY SBDC Operations Committee.  Prior to joining the SBDC, Kate had a 10+ year career in the hospitality field working as a corporate troubleshooter for hotels in crisis.

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