People

Strong Start

Tito Gil founded a website that provides online community engagement for entrepreneurs via a virtual tool that maps professional resources and lists small businesses in Miami and beyond.
Text by Cristina Zuazua | June 9, 2018 | People

Did you know that Miami is considered “The Entrepreneur Capital Of The World”? Well it is, and with good reason. “Miami is going through a very important identify-defining time,” says Tito Gil, Founder of MapYourStartup.co. “The community itself is leading a lot of the activities occurring, and that implies a lot of powerful things. It’s an adventure to be one piece of that puzzle.”
As the leader of a young and nimble startup that provides an online community engagement tool mapping and listing entrepreneurial resources in Miami and elsewhere, fostering community is a big part of Gil’s mission. He’s all about creating a better way to connect emerging entrepreneurs in the community: “We wanted to do our part to better engage the community as a whole and educate them on all of the awesome activity occurring in the entrepreneurial world,” he says.
Gil wasn’t always the head of a thriving company, but his roots in achievement go back to his beginnings as an athlete and a strictness when it came to honesty, transparency and doing things right. Early on, Gil was an All-County basketball player at Southwest High School who played against Udonis Haslem and Steve Blake — both who currently play in the NBA — several times during high school. “Those were amazing times,” he recalls, “and many lessons learned during that time help carry me today.”
Later, Gil got into cycling and rode in a 100-mile bike race in Georgia that included 11,000 feet of climbing: “What made this extra special was that I was able to do the race with my younger brother,” he says. “Of course, I use the term ‘with’ loosely, since he whooped me from the very first mile!” These moments, he explains, help him in the business world by allowing him to gauge risks instead of being afraid of them, and pushing on when the going gets tough.
So what advice does Gil give to rising leaders and emerging entrepreneurs? Clarity is the main point, he stresses, and regardless of one’s chosen field, individuals must first define precisely what they’re seeking to accomplish. “If you don’t,” Gil says, “you’ll find yourself drifting from time to time and falling short of your goals.” That’s not all there is to it, though, he adds. “Once you get started, nothing is more important than surrounding yourself with the smartest and most ambitious people you know. Even if your company is small, create a board of advisors, even if it’s on an informal level.”
As for his career choice in an alternate universe, Gil just shrugs off the though: “Thankfully, I’m doing what I want to do, but if I had a magic wand, I’d probably choose to grow a few inches and be an NBA player!”
MapYourStartup.co is located at 1825 Ponce De Leon Blvd., Ste. 233 in Coral Gables. For more information, call 877.687.6422 or visit MapYourStartup.co.