Final day of my learning at Global Entrepreneurial Experience
The final day of Global Entrepreneurial Experience, was an equally enriching experience. I was excited and equally nervous that I had to pitch my idea to the successful entrepreneurs and classmates. It was an action packed day for sure, and had a chance to meet more successful entrepreneurs.
One such entrepreneur was Angie Hicks founder of Angie’s List, a successful company through which businesses can hire employees. It is meant for people who want a job done and want to hire someone easily. Instead of having to put ads everywhere, you can just post your profile on the website. Each person profile also has a review that was created by the customers. Companies then can just look at the reviews, and hire the person they think is most suitable for the job. This is like a global network of workers for hire. Angie Hicks told the main reason for her success was that she didn’t pay attention when others told her it wouldn’t work. She kept trying no matter what.
Sean O’Sullivan talked about Resiliency. Resiliency means the capability to bounce back. He said that a main trait that entrepreneurs need is resilience. They shouldn’t just stop when things go bad or when they fail. Without this key trait of an entrepreneur, your business, idea, or company will never succeed. New businesses are bound to have some failures. It is part of the learning curve. Entrepreneurs or in other words you, are the face of your company. You have to give the impression that nothing can stop you. You will just get up and keep going. Without a doubt, you are going to run into trouble and challenges more than once. I thought that was a very interesting idea to share.
Kayla Michelle, another successful entrepreneur and expert in marketing discussed about marketing. Marketing capabilities is an essential skill for anyone to have when running a business. It helps to spread your products faster. Some key points she mentioned are, first try to put yourself in your customers shoes. Ask yourself what your customers would think of this product. Next she said, you should try to ask the customers what they think of the product, and what they would feel would be the best way to advertise the product. Then you could use all the information they gave to use it on the advertisements. Finally she said that not to bore your customers so much of content in advertising. Make sure to make it short and sweet. However, you should add the key points of your product. Marketing if done right can really help your company grow.
Finally it was time to pitch our ideas. Pitches are like business presentations that can explain your product. We had to use all the things that we learned over the past four days and use it all in this one presentation. We had to create a product to solve a problem that people are facing in the world today. My product was a pair of Artificial Intelligence (AI) enhanced glasses that can be used by doctors to help diagnose patients faster than they can currently. It was called MediLens. We were split into groups of 10. We all listened to each other’s pitches and gave each other constructive feedback so that we could help improve the product and presentations. All of our products were really good. Most of them could be ready for release in a day. This was a very fun and engaging time.
Finally came the end of the class. We ended the day with all the coaches telling us about how we did over the session. Then we had a chance to have real fun too. Antwan Davis, the founder of Melodi, a music and percussion group, awed us with his dance moves. He is more unique than most dancers. His way of dancing includes him literally using every part of his body to create music. After he did his little show it was time for good-byes.
What I Gained
I went into this seminar wanting to know what being an entrepreneur entails. I wanted to know what is behind a successful company. I learned a lot from this course. Being an entrepreneur requires a lot more skills than most people realize. During this seminar, I got the chance to talk to and listen to some very successful entrepreneurs. They taught me some very important lessons that I can use for the rest of my life.
NytroMind 