Week 15 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? 

I thought it was interesting when the author explains how to make money at the bottom tier of the economic pyramid while raising the living standards of the people who occupy it.

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

There was nothing in this reading that was particularly confusing to me. 

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?

I would ask Akula what inspired in the most in deciding to start a firm which provides loans to poor women in India.

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?

I don't think there was anything in this article that the author was wrong about.

Final Reflection

2) What sticks out to you as the most formative experience? The experience that you'll remember years later? What was your most joyous experience? What experience are you most proud of yourself for accomplishing?

I think the experience that I will remember years later are the ones that involved recording videos. These assignments pushed me out of my comfort zone, especially since I am studying abroad and struggled to find English speakers that I could use to complete the interview assignments. The most interesting one for me was Free Money, since the people I recorded didn't really understand why or what I was doing, so it was a confusing and frustrating experience to say the least! I think the parts I am most proud of our my venture, capital, etc. posts because I actually put a lot of thought into writing those, and it helped me to realize what I would excel in if I were to become an entrepreneur.

3) At the beginning of the semester, I mentioned that I wanted each of you to develop an entrepreneurial mindset. And we repeated the mantra -- I am an entrepreneur. Now, at the end, do you see yourself as an entrepreneur? Do you think you have moved closer to developing an entrepreneurial mindset?

I don't see myself as an entrepreneur quite yet, but I definitely feel like I've developed more of an entrepreneurial mindset. It's something I didn't put that much thought into before taking this class.

4) What is the one recommendation you would make to the students who are going to journey down this path in the future? What would you recommend they do to perform best in this course? What would you recommend they do to foster that mindset?

I would recommend that they use the mindset to "just go for it." I was hesitant to complete a lot of these interview and recording assignments, and I skipped a few of them because I didn't know how to approach it. I would recommend planning ahead of time so you don't have to miss out on points like me!

Venture Concept No. 2

For my venture concept, a lot of people gave me feedback that this service would be useful and successful to a wide range of people. However, I also got a lot of feedback saying my idea is too common and needs to have something that will make it stand out from the rest.

Instead of repeating everything I wrote the first time around, I will sum it up. My idea is almost exactly the same as that business idea we had to do a survey on for extra credit. (An app for food deliveries, help moving, as well as ride-sharing like Uber, the options are endless.) Seeing my exact idea come to life in the video those people provided was really cool. It makes me feel like I know I came up with an idea that could be useful. On the downside, I had no idea until taking that survey that there is someone in Gainesville trying to make this idea into a business already. I guess time will tell if my idea really is something that will work. I am thankful for this feedback and for taking that survey because I honestly didn’t plan an actually becoming an entrepreneur anytime soon but it would be interesting to see hypothetically how it would work out.

If I did want to develop this app the one advantage I would have is that I actually live next to UCF campus in Orlando. UCF has the largest student population in the country and it’s so close to so many other schools. For an app that is especially helpful to students, and ran mostly by students, I think that would put me at an advantage over someone starting the business in Gainesville. There are also a lot of young professionals living in Orlando, as well as families from all over the world, retirees, and many many tourists that I think could benefit from using my app. The advantages I would have just from the market size in my area are what I think would really help this app to take off. With all that being said, the main thing I would change is to focus on a broader range of demographics than just students. 

Week 14 Reading Reflection

What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations?

The biggest surprise for me in this reading is that the part on corporate entrepreneurship is at the end instead of closer to one of the opening chapters. Seems like this is something that would have more opportunities and is more common in general.

Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

The only part that was a little confusing to me was the section on sustainable entrepreneurship.

If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?

What made you decide to organize the book the way that you did? Is there a significance to the order of the chapters in the book?

Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?

There was not really anything in this reading that I thought the author was wrong about, or that I disagreed with.

Google Gold

Honestly I didn’t do much for SEO since this is for a class and not a business idea that I have solidified or plan on actually implementing in the near future. It’s a good idea I think, but I have to focus on finishing school before I really put my ideas out there. I don’t have time to do both.

I opted not to include my social media in this blog for the above reasons. I made sure to comment on other posts in this class with a link to my blog in order to get feedback from other students in the same boat. I don’t believe that linking my social media to my blog for this class would be beneficial, since I am not planning on becoming an entrepreneur until I am finished with my degree.

My venture concept and my social capital had the most traffic from my blog. They each had the highest number of views as well as the most comments. I’m not exactly sure how, but I think it’s because I put the most time and effort into writing these posts. I tried to be as thorough as I could be in answering all of the questions and explaining my ideas. I’ve seen a lot of blog posts that have hardly anything written and those that didn’t seem to follow along with the assignment guidelines very well. I think maybe people found my blog and chose to comment on it because there was a lot of substance put into my work on these occasions. According to a lot of the comments, people who take this class seriously tend to appreciate those other students who put time and thought into their blog posts.

Very Short Interview, Part 2

What is the best advice you can give a prospective entrepreneur?

To go for it. Most people have an idea of what they want to do but they are hesitant to make it happen and end up working for someone else and staying there.

Do you plan on staying with your current business, or selling it?

My plan is to eventually sell it, once we get things going here and are able to make a good profit. As much as I love my job, and owning a business, I don't want to work in a bar for life. As I get older I have other ideas that I want to pursue.

My plan is and has always been to get my business going and to sell it.

The hardest thing for me to overcome as an entrepreneur is when we had a some trouble with our first college bar and eventually had to close it down. Business was always good, but the place would get trashed, we had problems with underage kids trying to drink on property, and it was hard to keep a consistent staff. These students would graduate or transfer, and their class schedule changed every semester so it was a little chaotic to plan around that. We sold the business and decided to open a new and improved one, which turned out to be much more successful.

I felt a little more comfortable interviewing him now that I have a bit more background and insight on being an entrepreneur myself. However, this is someone that I used to work for and I had a good idea of what his answers would be because I have asked him before.

Week 13 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? 

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?

The thing that most surprised me in this reading was the detail of the due diligence and checklist of analyzing a business.

There was not really any part of this reading that I found confusing. It all made pretty good sense when explained in the text. The two questions I would ask are do you think a business owner could do without the due diligence evaluation, and how do you handle the control factor when in the process of buying a business? I don’t disagree with anything the author mentioned in this reading.

Celebrating Failure

1)      Tell us about a time this past semester that you failed -- whether in this class, or outside of this class. Don't spare any details! It'd be even better if there was something you tried several times this semester, and failed each time.

There have been several occasions where I feel I have failed in this class. Almost all of my interview exercises didn’t go as planned. For a lot of them, I just gave up and opted to do the extra credit instead.

2)      Tell us what you learned from it. 

I learned that it’s okay to accept the fact that not everything will be perfect. It’s ok that I don’t want to post videos for some of the assignments in this class as long as I know that I can still earn an A by doing extra credit. I tried my best for some of these and being that I am studying abroad, there was only so much I could do.

3)      Reflect, in general, on what you think about failure. Failure is hard, isn't it? It's embarrassing, sure, but it also means that we have to change something about ourselves. Talk about how you handle failure (emotionally, behaviorally). Finally, talk about how this class has changed your perspective on failure -- are you more likely to take a risk now than you were four months ago?

Honestly this class has helped me to take risks a little more, because I did push myself out of my comfort zone and tried to complete the video assignments, even though I failed. At other times in life I have failed, and it only made me realize that I was either not trying hard enough, or it was just not the right thing for me to by trying. That is okay. Everyone has something that they excel in, and things they will never really be that great at. Accepting failure is a big part of accepting yourself.

My Exit Strategy

My exit strategy for this business is to let it grow for 5-10 years and then ultimately sell it. My entire business idea is based off an app that could be widely popular today because it is a fairly new market. I don't think that this type of service will be relevant 10+ years down the road and if it is, it may have a lot more competition. My plan would be to get it to it's peak, and then sell it and invest in a new idea, and then repeat. This way I won't lose everything I put into it. I would of course invest a lot of the money I make along the way in case my plan doesn't work out. I want to make a lot of money and start investing as soon as possible so 10+ years down the road I will have a steady income from my investments. An example of how I think my plan will work is when Myspace Tom sold his business for millions of dollars and then not too long after, it's use began to plummet immensely and it is now mostly irrelevant.

Week 12 Reading Reflection

1)      What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations?

The part that surprised me the most was when the author explained what the best strategic plan would be influenced by. Usually an author would point out what was absolute best so that’s why it surprised me.

2)      Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

The part where the author talks about participation by subordinates in a strategic plan being appropriate. It kinda makes sense to me but I suppose it’s situational.

3)      If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?

I don’t really have any questions that I would ask the author for this section.

4)      Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?

There isn’t really anything I think the author was wrong about in this chapter. I agree that the