Case Study

Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC)

Learning resources for women entrepreneurs that go beyond the basics. A new model was reimagined for flexible delivery, and coaching support.

Women Executive Shacking Hands

Learning resources for US women entrepreneurs that go beyond the basics.

Who is Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC)?

The Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC) is the largest certifier of women-owned businesses in the U.S. and a leading advocate for women business owners and entrepreneurs.

Their mission is to fuel economic growth globally by identifying, certifying, and facilitating the development of women-owned businesses. With this goal in mind, WBENC provides the most relied-upon certification standard for women-owned businesses and the tools to help them succeed.

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The Challenge

For several years, WBENC has partnered with financial service leaders to produce education and resources for women entrepreneurs on key financial topics, including funding and corporate accounting.

The COVID-19 crisis highlighted the opportunity to reimagine and expand this model and tackle the broader needs and challenges facing women business owners in today’s complicated business environment. One of the challenges identified by existing WBENC programming was the need to provide additional financial acumen resources to maximize the success rate of women-run businesses.

WBENC LIFT is a product of that reimagining, with a comprehensive model designed to support women business owners year-round.

The new model was reimagined within the context of developing a comprehensive program with core financial competencies, a flexible delivery model, and coaching support.


WBENC selected Onlea as a partner to support designing an asynchronous and hybrid delivery model that incorporates self-paced, on-demand learning and live facilitated interaction.

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Our Solution

Starting in 2023, WBENC, Onlea, and a team of financial acumen subject matter experts collaborated to update this program for a new audience interested in the flexibility provided by modern learning platforms and tools.

Based on a review of the needs of women business owners and the current WBENC financial acumen courses offered, the following topics were identified as priority information for this audience.

  • Business Owner Basics: Income Statement and Balance Sheet
  • Operating Your Business: Understanding Your Cash Flows and Ensuring Liquidity
  • How Businesses are Valued and Ways to Increase the Value of Your Company
  • Act Now to Exit Your Business Successfully

Within this context, Onlea provided expertise in User Experience (UX) and Learning Design (LX) to create an environment conducive to increasing the value this program provides to WBENC members.

The program started with a deep understanding of the audience for this program and the design of a modular user experience. Four eLearning modules were scripted and developed to be hosted within the Thinkific platform.

During development, the program was reviewed from different perspectives with the goal of increasing the reach and accessibility of the framework, including competency mapping and accessibility for screen reader users.

The Results


The new LIFT program has four initial courses already live for WBENC members at: https://elearning.wbenc.org/collections/lift You can also find more information about WBENC LIFT Financial Center of Excellence at their website: WBENC LIFT

The initial feedback for the program has been positive, as seen in the first month of user survey results:

  • 93% of respondents (13/14) said the site was easy to navigate.
  • 100% of respondents said the timing of the course was just right.
  • 79% (11/14) said content was taught at a level that matched their needs.