Kauffman Campuses

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Social Entrepreneur, Ben Rattray

This week I had the opportunity to talk with Ben Rattray, the 26 year-old Stanford grad who started Change.org. In case you haven’t heard the buzz, this recently launched, but already fantastic, site connects socially minded individuals with opportunities to enact change in any area of the world. From strengthening child labor laws to ending poaching, you can find something you care about on this site. And if you can’t? You can create your own network around your cause…(ahem search for “entrepreneurship education” and join my network!)

 

I found this site when I was doing a little market research for my own idea. His launch date miraculously coincided with my “brilliant idea,” so I thought it was destiny that I call him and find out more. This is what I learned about being a twenty-something social entrepreneur in this day and age:

 

First, being in an environment that supports risk-taking and entrepreneurial behavior only gets you so far. Eventually, you have to make the decision of whether or not you are really going to do this. Ben went to one of the most entrepreneurial and socially innovative schools in the country, yet he did not test the waters while there. He did, however, acknowledge that the stories that circulate at Stanford and the can-do confidence of the students and faculty, helped him ask the question “why not?” That, coupled with the years he spent debating social issues with his friends, made him question the role of individuals in creating change and eventually led him to Change.org. 

 

But first, he went to the London School of Economics, was accepted to law school at NYU (now a Kauffman Campus), and started a “practice” venture helping non-profits apply for state and federal grants.  With all of this going for him, it’s easy to see why when asked what the most difficult part about starting Change.org was, he responded, “deciding to actually do it.”

 

Two, although for-profit social entrepreneurs absolutely exist and have for years, the concept is still fairly new, especially in the private equity sector. After more than a year of bootstrapping Change.org, Ben is finally looking at the role that investors can play in the subsequent versions of the site. But, he’s finding it difficult to connect with investors who share his two-pronged vision, the primary focus of which is social change brought about by collective online activism, but there is also the potential for significant financial gains should the site take off. (Change.org facilitates online, project-targeted giving, keeping a very small percentage for operating costs.) Because Angel Investors, who are far more likely to invest in social ventures, are harder to find than the large private equity firms with offices all over California, Ben is still searching for the right financial partnership to expand the capabilities of the site.

 

Three, there is no single profile for a young entrepreneur. Whoever believes that entrepreneurs are born and not made can stop reading. True many of them share common characteristics—drive, determination, scary Red Bull addictions—but they are truly so different in the way they find their paths to their passion. Sure, some of them will say this is what they have always wanted to do. But more of them, like Ben, will talk about their vision, their dream of something bigger, better, faster, fairer. Their passion for entrepreneurship only comes once they have taken a bite of its bittersweet core.

 

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

A week in the life of a Global Scholar

It's Sunday, about 1700 hours and we have just arrived at our residence in Palo Alto, CA. The sun is shining and my skin feels hot under the heavy coat I've been wearing since I left Kansas City. The bright landscape is chirpy but my mind is being consumed by less than positive thoughts for a few hours now; I'm finding it difficult to understand and adapt to the things that had been happening around me the last few days. The group dynamics had changed as we had been with one another for just over five weeks now and everyone's true colors were shining through and through. We've been pushing ourselves to 100% and over and as mental and physical exhaustion increases, tolerance decreases… You know how sometimes you get a first impression feeling about person that can't quite rationalize? Well, this was the time when everything became clear and exactly when I realized that in trying to be part of the group, I had neglected myself, in terms of my own aims, goals and passions. I felt it was time to spend some time by myself, in solitude, to reset my system into balance. That same night we visited the social district of Palo Alto. In a bar called Nola's, a fine replica of New Orleans, all those thoughts were re-affirmed. The town was not very busy as the next day was a bank holiday… rumor had it that everyone was skiing and would return the next day. There was only about half of us there but it was clear that we had different and perhaps conflicting ideas about social interactions and having fun. Of course, none of this was a conscious or mischievous act; it was just a manifestation of our very different characters. As our taxi drove us back to the hotel, I entered a vicious circle of thought about all that had been happening and I was trying to identify with my own actions. It suddenly was lucid to me that none of those events or changes in my environment had a direct effect on my internal world. Instead, I had directed my focus to the external world and that threw me off balance.

A thought that had consistently passed through my mind was that it would be useful for us to go through some sort of realistic entrepreneurial exercise with limited resources and specific targets and goals. Because no matter how much learning we assimilate in a classroom, it is experience that will ultimately shape our future experiences and ultimately, our success. The more experiences we have of taking something we created from beginning to end, the more likely we are to enforce this pattern in our businesses.

Monday

The next day I woke up I woke up to a new idea. I had a whole week to myself to… do anything I wanted! All our visits would finish around five or six every evening and I could use the rest of the night for a purpose. I've always been fascinated by people and I've been working on my social skills for a while now. Social networking in every form and context has been one of my main focuses in the last few months and here I was, in a new city, knowing no one and wanting to know… everyone! What a perfect opportunity to test and develop my people skills! So I said no to a trip to San Francisco and I got out of bed in the early afternoon all energetic to lead a week of adventure for myself.

I started at Rite Aid where I bought a pocket-size memo book and a small pen. I got some breakfast and headed back to my room to set goals and plan my strategy. First of all, I wanted to make this about me and not about the Kauffman scholarship or the rest of the people of the group so I decided to keep it separate: I wasn't going to use any of the existing resources available, only my very own self. Secondly, I figured that I was only going to be successful in a scenario like this if I was able to meet people on both a business and social contexts. These goals were the result: a) to meet an investor, b) to meet at least three people involved with technology, c) to be invited to a social event on Saturday night, d) to meet a tango teacher and e) to meet at least five people with common interests that keeping in touch with would be effortless. I gave myself seven days to execute this plan and I would assess my success and write about it one week later.

Before I left my room, I searched for people in the San Francisco area on Skype. I added everyone I could find as a contact and when available, I looked at the webpage. Out of the fifty-eight people I added, only two of them had meaningful websites. The first person, Luke, was a big software geek, much like me, that had worked for companies like Microsoft and HP. Bingo! The second person, Liz, owns a blog with restaurant reviews and free recipes and… her latest post was about happy hour at Home Restaurant in San Francisco. Being busy during lunch time, it was most probable for me to meet business people at happy hour. Thinking no more, I e-mailed both of them, announcing my arrival at the bay area and my excitement towards the American culture as well as the anticipation to experience it. I suggested we should meet and have a cultural exchange... of sorts! After carefully sculpting the two e-mails, I left my room for the reception was I was going to get a handful of intelligence about the area.

At the reception, the two ladies greeted me with a smile and gave me a map of Palo Alto. If I was going to make any trips, I had to first know where I was and where I wanted to go! Christine there marked for me the closest Peet's Coffee and Tea and Starbucks, Mountain View's main street and the Stanford shopping centre. The time was almost 15:00 so I set out to get a cup of coffee and do my homework. Peet's was near-empty so I went on to find Starbucks. A mile later, I saw the siren smile at me at the corner of what looked like a restaurant complex. I walked by the outside tables where there was a young-looking girl with "do not disturb" written all over her forehead and a 70-year old lady enjoying the sun. As I went in, I faced five or six tables, all occupied by one person who was either studying over a book or working with a laptop. Strange as it was to me, I could see how caffeine and study mixed well together. This was not going to be the easy ride I had imagined. I grabbed a donut and some mango juice and on my way to the sitting area I made a really quick evaluation of the characters present and the space arrangement. The only free table gave me easy access to three people… the guy working on his laptop at the corner and two girls sat by the window studying. I chose to sit nearest to the girl in the middle… she had a sweet face and a Latin American skin tone; two very good signs of friendliness. I sat down and started studying the Caltrain map, looking to find out where I was and where I could go. Palo Alto didn't seem to be on the map so I figured that my first conversation with a stranger was about to ignite. "Hi", I said before her face glowed with a bright smile. "Sorry to interrupt your study… do you have any idea where we are on this map?" I passed over the map to her and while she was struggling to pinpoint the location, I noticed with the side of my right eye that the other girl sat next to us was glimpsing over her book and to us. Barbara, who turned out to be Brazilian, must have seen this too and she passed the problem on to Naomi, who had grown up in Iowa and moved to Palo Alto when she married her half-Spanish husband. She seemed to know more about the area and I expressed my plans to meet as many people as I can. I explained where I had come from and why and asked where people congregate… she marked another few restaurants and places to be, including University Avenue by Stanford University. Even though the conversation had shifted towards Naomi, it was only a matter of time before Barbara joined in. When I mentioned that I like to dance Argentinean Tango, her face lit up once more and she told me about a Brazilian party that they hold once a month and how much fun they have dancing Samba. Now it was a three-way conversation. Stories of positive experiences involving food and dance were flowing like drink at a Global Scholars outing! Before I left for my next destination, we all exchanged details and Barbara invited us to her husband's birthday celebration on Friday and Naomi spoke of a friend of hers who was an entrepreneur and who she would put into touch with! It was very unclear how, at this pace, I would achieve the goals I had set. It felt like this was going to be a "brute force" job… a series of activities with no apparent connection to the end goal. Well, mystery always makes things more fascinating I thought to myself… plus I was enjoying interacting with strangers and doing my part in connecting them. Even if I wasn't going to see them again, I knew that Barbara and Naomi would see each other again.

I left Starbucks and started walking towards Castro St. at Mountain View, about two miles away, where all the restaurants and bars were located. After what seemed a very long walk I made a left turn and saw a wealth of art shops, cafeterias, bars and restaurants. I walked up and down both sides of this long street carefully looking for the places I should be placing myself later in the week. I found a couple of interesting bars and restaurants but nothing that seemed too business-like. I guessed most business people congregate at San Francisco. One particular bar, the Buddha Lounge, caught my attention so I made a mental note to visit it and made my way back to the hotel. I quickly grabbed some dinner and rushed to my room to get the address of the local tango group as I remembered there was a class on Monday nights. The time was 19:00 and the class was starting at 19:30 so I phoned to reception to get me a taxi, quickly changed clothing and got there just on time. Most of the people there were Russian and I was warmly welcomed. I attended the beginners and intermediate classes and then spent two hours dancing for fun and practice! The teaching style was very different to the classes I had previously taken so even though it was basic material, I was pleasantly challenged. At the end, I spent some time talking to the two teachers who were interested in knowing about the difference in dancing and teaching style at my part of the world…. As interesting conversation never runs out, we exchanged details and promised to keep in touch. Teresa, the Polish lady who was helping teach the class was also going to help me with transport for a milonga (a social tango dance) on Saturday night at San Francisco. Sounds good! Igor, the other teacher gave me a ride back to the hotel and I rushed to my bed knowing I had to get up early the next day.

Tuesday

As I got up in the morning, I realized that staying up late was not a very wise thing to do… we had a full day ahead and I wasn't feeling one hundred percent. When the day finished I still felt tired but I was eager to go on. I took a taxi to Mountain View and looked for the kebab shop I had seen the night before. I conversed with the Turkish owner while enjoying my delicious chicken kebab and quickly moved onto the Buddha Lounge. To my surprise, there was hardly anyone there! What I did not know was that Mardi Gras celebrations were going on in San Francisco and San Jose and so most people would be there. I had a couple of drinks and got some recommendations for San Francisco from the bar maid and left. It was hard to sustain a high level of energy for a full 16 hours and be fresh the next day… I had to respect my priorities and focus on the day activities.

Wednesday

During our morning bus ride, I realized that I had to revaluate my strategy if I was going to achieve any of my goals. Obviously the visit to the Buddha Lounge was a miss and I was struggling to focus from lack of sleep during the day. There was an important lesson there to be learned: it is important to focus on your mission and goals when you wake up in the morning and what it is that you want to achieve during the day… re-examine the strategies and techniques you've been using so far to get there… if they don't seem to get you closer to your goal then it means you need to change them. Profound, isn't it? I call it the breakfast of champions. Unoriginal, I know.

So, with this new insight, I decided to stay in at night and catch up on sleep. I had to at least perform during the day! Later the same evening I received an e-mail from Liz. I had e-mailed her a couple of days ago introducing myself and in my attempt to be hip, suggesting a meeting with her and her "crew"… And as life is full of surprises, her e-mail included an invitation to an MBA networking event that was going to take place in Palo Alto on Thursday… Everything was not lost; I had found my short journey's magic helper!

Thursday

I woke up excited to see what's going to come out of the networking event. I had no idea what kinds of people were going to be there or how many of them… I didn't even know what Liz looked like! All the information that was available to me was her name, the name of the bar and the time. After our day at Stanford finished, I hopped on the bus and went to that bar, arriving half an hour early. It was named "The Blue Chalk" and it was quite big, with retro decoration and friendly atmosphere… I asked the waitress if she knew who Liz was or where exactly the event was taking place. Neither she nor any of her co-workers had any idea. I walked around the place asking people if they are there for the networking event and after two or three blank looks, I saw a lady with a bunch of stickers and pens... bingo. I introduced myself and asked about the event… it was some kind of alumni event for MBA graduates that was organized every two months in an ad-hoc manner through a mailing list. I explained how I had come to get invited so we started talking about the Kauffman scholarship. The first people had started to come in by that time so I asked if she had any idea who Liz was… the answer was "no". Her name appeared on the list of attendants so I kept my eyes peeled for her name tag and started mingling.

Apart from the common MBA background there was not much else connecting this crowd. They had all gone to do different things. There were some people that worked in marketing, others in sales and some managerial people. Come to think of it, they was a common denominator… most of them were now working for large companies - entrepreneurial presence was week. I found it particularly amusing when I met a person from Intel and another from AMD in very close vicinity. Given the history of the two companies, I would have expected them to be involved in some kind of fighting performance. The reality was much less entertaining than the fantasy… Next I met an entrepreneur who was closing down his company to go and work for a large corporation. He said that it was too risky and was looking for safety. I resisted the urge to psychoanalyze him and find out whether his spirit had been broken or if it was never entrepreneurial in the first place and moved on. A few minutes after meeting a lady from Google, I met a young attorney from Wilson and Sinsoni - the company we had visited on Monday. Their way of doing business was very interesting. They are brokers more than they are attorneys… I told her about the program and our visit to her employer. It suddenly struck me that she was the person most likely to know a venture capitalist so I made sure to make a good impression and exchange details. But when it came to meeting a VC, I didn't stop there. I walked around the room and approached all the shrewd-looking characters and "suits" in the room. The furthest I got was CEO. I wasn't going to meet any venture capitalists that night.

After 3 hours of intense pitching and handshaking and as I felt I had made the most of the networking occasion and left. I was already 9 o'clock and I felt quite tired. It was time to get some food, a shower and some sleep.

Friday

The week was coming to an end and my opportunities to meet a VC were becoming limited. It was almost frustrating we were going to visit Burill & Co., one of the largest biotechnology venture capitalist firms. I was going to meet people in the VC industry but I couldn't include any introductions made there… my goal was to meet all those targets without the help of the programme. In the afternoon, we walked around San Francisco and later went to a great Italian restaurant with Wendy. It was also Ade's birthday so we made sure to embarrass him by singing "Happy Birthday" and "He's a jolly good fella" every half an hour.

Saturday

The week was coming to an end as was my little exercise. I had to choose very carefully how I'm going to spend my energy. During the afternoon, we were going to attend the launch of Entrepreneurship Week USA where the week was going to be introduced and my mentor, Carl Schramm was going to give a speech. When we arrived there only about a fifth of the room was full but in the next fifteen minutes it overfilled with students! Some of them actually had to seat on the steps as there were no more seats available! The presentations were all very interesting and packed with energy. I could tell that everyone was really excited to be there, to have been a part in organizing an event like this and to introduce students into a new world, the world of entrepreneurship!

What is however always more interesting than information is… peopled! After the launch, everyone was invited to dinner where we could all mingle and meet others with similar aspirations. It's always interesting to see how different people pick their conversation partners in a group like this. Vicinity is a popular strategy, but also a hit or miss. Someone told me to trust my intuition and go for the person who "feels right". I had nothing to lose, so I tried doing just that. Chance or not, it seemed to work. I start talking to an Iranian lady who turned out to be interested in the same things as I am, like leadership recipes, and trying very similar things that I have tried… like hypnosis. Not bad for a first time. In fact, I'm looking forward to trying it again. We had dinner and talked about our dreams and aspirations while thinking about forming a joint venture…

On the way out, I found Aaron speaking to a girl from Stanford who invited us to a dorm party that night… bingo!

Conclusions

I have to say that this wasn't nearly as glamorous as I had imagined it to be. You can tell by the difference in the enthusiasm levels between the first and consequent days. Nevertheless, it was a very useful learning experience and I did pretty well after all. Sure, I didn't meet an investor, but I got quite close to meeting one. I met a fair few people involved with all kinds of technology, two very interesting tango teachers and perhaps two or three people that I will stay in touch with. Not everything worked out the way I wanted to but I aimed high and nothing ever does work out exactly how we imagine it. Ok, maybe when I'm playing psychic with my niece, but that's different.

The true value of the experience was unconscious for the most part. I knew it would be valuable to me to start and finish something, even small and silly like this. And it was because I had the opportunity to observe myself all the way. I was able to see where my shortcomings are, where my dynamism subsided, where I overestimated my current abilities… It also helped me see that if you want something strongly enough and try for it, things will often fall into place, as if out of nowhere. In my case, it wasn't enough to want it; I had to sustain that motivation over a long period of time. It would have been very easy to quit on day two or three. As I often find inspiration from movies… Alfred when talking to young Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins he said "Why do we fall down Bruce? So we can learn to pick ourselves up".

Psychologists decided to call an ancient Taoist meditation as the "observing ego", in Western lingo. A very useful pattern to introduce in ourselves. The ability to observe our actions, environment and internal state as a third person so that we can later make the adjustments necessary to reach our goals and the character we're striving to be. This is different to the voice inside our head which is often commenting on what's going on… the observing ego is just logging what's going on so you can consciously examine it later.

The profoundness in this experience?

People are fascinating. Knowing thyself is a prerequisite to knowing another.

Georgios Diamantopoulos

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

First Week in Kansas City USA as Global Scholar

I arrived in Kansas city after 20 hours of traveling to the sight of snow everywhere, which covered the ground for the following week. First impressions: cold, white, sprawling.

The week began on Tuesday with a tour of the Kauffman Foundation, an introduction to its CEO Carl Schramm and the rest of the Kauffman directors, including the program organizer Wendy Torrance. Wendy explained to us that over the course of the next 5 weeks we would go through an intensive training course in business and entrepreneurship. In the first week we received lectures from Carl Schramm, Ted Zoller, Craig Armstrong.

Carl Schramm explained to us why we are here learning entrepreneurship in America: because Americans do it best! but the interesting thing to me is why Americans do it best. In Carl's mind is that it practically an accident that it turned out this way, heres his take:

1. American law changed pensions liability from company to individual.
2. American law changed to allow pension fund holders to put money into venture capital.

The reason these laws changed at the time had completely different political motivation but the effect was dramatic towards entrepreneurship.

1. Moving liability to individual made the workforce more mobile as they were no longer tied into one company, they could work where they wanted to more easily.
2. Pension funder holders could choose to invest there capital into high risk high return VC market, which gave Venture Capital Funds a huge boast in money to invest in start up companies.

One final piece which makes the American people entrepreneurial is that employment is at 95%.

If I'm an American employee and I want to start a company there's very little risk (compared to other countries).

* First I can be practically guaranteed a job should my venture fail due to the very high employment rate.
* Second should my start up require funding there is plenty of Venture Capital available.
* Third my pension is still fine, as its connected to me personally and not my company.

So the American Entrepreneurship culture is an accident? I certainly don't think America has been engineered to be this way; but there is certainly more to it than just these 3 chance factors, otherwise it would be straightforward for other countries to copy.

And there'd be no reason for me to be here Thank goodness thats not true! By Luke Walsh, http://lukewalsh.co.uk, email me at: luke.wal5hy at gmail dot com

Monday, February 19, 2007

DePauw Entrepreneur With a Great Mentality

The Kansas City Star did a short article about a local student entrepreneur attending DePauw University.  Ryan Tinker, a sophomore, started Booksnag.com with his friend Zach Koch.  The basis for the company is not necessarily that unique.  Booksnag provides an online alternative to the campus bookstore, where students can make offers on used books or can be directed to outside retailers like Amazon.com for harder to find titles.

But, what I loved about this story is the last quote from Tinker.  When asked what he was thinking about for his future, he said that he would like to work for another company while running his own business.  He posits, "I think I could bypass quite a few problems by learning small-business tactics and techniques from successful companies.  Why should I experience all the failures myself if I can learn how the successful avoid them?”

This, to me, is the missing element in a lot of entrepreneurship education.  Yes, post college is a great time to take some risk and develop a new idea for a venture.  But it's just as good of a time to learn those early pitfalls on someone else's dime, while developing your network and fine-tuning your vision.  Often in entrepreneurship courses, we are so focused on creating the business plan, that we forget all of the real-life factors that make entrepreneurs successful.

While internships are a wonderful opportunity, they do not replace a first job.  With internships, there is an expiration date or there is a conclusion to the project at hand.  In the "real world" of working day in and day out, you come across so many different opportunities.  You learn about how different industries work together, and you find people that complement your own skills.  Sure, you might experience all of this in starting up a business right away.  But, the bits of wisdom you pick up at the water cooler might actually be your ticket to success.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Introducing Georgios

The Kauffman Foundation currently has 16 scholars visiting from the UK in a program that we are calling the Global Scholars.  These students range in academic background, but share the unifying interest in learning about entrepreneurship in the United States.  For the first 5 weeks of their program, they will be learning about entrepreneurship theory and practice from some of the leading researchers and professors across the country.  They will then spend 3 weeks traveling to Stanford and Harvard.  Following their travels they will each be placed in a three month internship with innovative firms around the country. 

We have asked them to blog about their experiences as they go.  Our first post is from Georgios Diamantopoulos.  Let us know if you'd like to hear more!

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

To VC or Not to VC?

At our recent Kauffman Campuses meeting, we had an Angel Investor and a Venture Capitalist join our discussion to help shed light on what we should be teaching students in entrepreneurship courses. Our conversation led to these suggestions.

There are two schools of thought developing in entrepreneurship courses around the country. The first, is the more traditional method of creating business plans that vary from 1 to 40 pages and up, taking these b-plans to venture competitions, and then encouraging the students to pursue the plans that score the highest and/or receive funding.

The second method can also include a business plan, but the idea of this plan is to keep it as flexible as possible, using mentors, potential clients, and your own gut to push forward ideas that have potential. My friend Bijoy Goswami calls this latter method “Bootstrapping.” In fact, he’s so committed to the success of this model that he has created the Bootstrapping Network and Bootstrapping Bootcamp to bring lessons from the trenches to entrepreneurs all over the country.

Either method is a great way to get started in thinking about your entrepreneurial venture. But here are a few tips to help you avoid messy (and expensive) battles down the road.

Lesson 1: If you are going to start a business with your friends, make sure you have a contract that clearly indicates what is required to have long term ownership in the company. Often students will form equal partnerships because the idea came to them jointly over a game of beerpong one night, and no one really remembers whose idea it was in the first place. This is not a way to create a business. As paranoid as it might sound, it really makes sense to create a contract that ensures that the people who stay with the business, own the business. We hear all of the time that students graduate and one goes to the corporate world while the other pushes the business forward. If the student is looking angel or venture capital, he/she might have a tough time, as investors are usually unwilling to buy out partners or include non-contributing partners in the deal.

Lesson 2: Try to avoid paying people with ownership in your company. While it is tempting to woo that brilliant computer programmer with a few percentages of your future millions, this kind of ownership structure will make it difficult to bring on investors for the same reasons as above. Find a way to share early profits if you must, but try not to create a situation that is hard to get out of later.

Lesson 3: Don’t get hung up on lessons 1 and 2. There are other ways! Most businesses start with funding from “friends, family, and fools.” So, try going that route. You’ll be a lot more cautious, thrifty, and innovative when you know you’ll have to look Uncle Bert in the eye at Thanksgiving to discuss the company’s progress. Also, many VC’s blame too much money as a reason for a failed venture. Money takes off a little bit of the pressure that fuels broke entrepreneurs through the wee hours of the morning. If you do go the family loan option, I would again avoid ownership and aim for repayment with a decent interest rate, which can, of course, be zero.

Lesson 4: Beyond money, think about the first thing you can do to get your idea moving. Maybe that’s researching the competition, writing a vision statement, making a list of your personal barriers to entry, or sketching a logo. It can be anything, really. Because at the end of the day, entrepreneurship is a lot of project management, networking, and grunt work. You have to be good at all of it, so you might as well start now.

Lesson 5: Follow up with your LLC. This is from personal experience. If you start an LLC, it doesn’t just disappear into the netherworld of the world-wide web. LLC’s have annual fees even if the company never makes any money. And, if you do not pay those fees, you have to pay additional late fees. Suddenly your $200 company you thought was a brilliant idea senior year can be your $1000 headache a few years later. So, if you’ve registered an LLC anywhere, make sure to dissolve it or keep it in good standing.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Columbia Organization of Rising Entrepreneurs Event

Earlier last month, Brian Model, Vice President of Stonehenge Capital Company, was invited to speak at Columbia University by the Columbia Organization of Rising Entrepreneurs (CORE). Building on his experience as an entrepreneur of an online clothing store, Model decided to join the venture capital business and has been with Stonehenge Capital since 2001. Combining both his experiences as a venture capitalist as well as an entrepreneur, Model shared his insights about the industry with students - telling them what challenges they might face and how to solve them. As a venture capitalist, Mr. Model has reviewed numerous business plans and he focused on the "dos and don'ts" in writing one at this CORE event. On top of a powerpoint presentation, Mr. Model also illustrated his points with real-life examples, making it really easy for the audiences to identify with.

I am an aspiring entrepreneur myself, but I am still far away from the stage of writing a business plan. Nevertheless, it was an extremely rewarding experience to learn from Mr. Model. His tips are not only useful in writing business plans, they can in fact be applied to all types of pitching material. However, the most interesting part of this CORE event was to interact with Mr. Model afterwards. Since he has been involved with both the entrepreneur side as well as the investor side of the business, he offered a unique view of the start-up process and definitely provided valuable advice to my future endeavor at being an entrepreneur.

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

Entrepreneurship Week Student Activity Competition

Well, it's official.  We are going to host an EntrepreneurshipWeek USA Award to the student organization that proposes the most innovative activity during the Week.  The winning student organization will get $5,000 to use towards future events.  We are also going to try to make the sign-up sheet include enough information so that visitors to the EntrepreneurshipWeek USA site can contribute to your ideas and, hopefully, help fund your events before you have to spend any money.  Also, ANY student organization that signs up will receive a banner promoting EntrepreneurshipWeek USA.

We're still in the planning phase, so the website is not set up for your organization to sign up...yet.  But send me an email (dvargas@kauffman.org) with the details of your ideas and we'll post them when the sign-up launches.

For more information on EntrepreneurshipWeek USA go to: www.entrepreneurshipweekusa.com.

Happy Planning!

~Desiree

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Introducing the Columbia Organization of Rising Entrepreneurs

This is the first in what I hope will be many entries about the Columbia University Organization of Rising Entrepreneurs (CORE). Ms. Desiree Vargas invited us to post on Kauffman's website, and we thank her for the opportunity!

We are Columbia University's only undergraduate entrepreneurial group. Our agenda centers around providing students with the knowledge and resources to start their own business ventures. CORE's events serve this purpose. In our seminar series, guest speakers, including venture capitalists, intellectual property lawyers, advertising gurus, give our members valuable insights into the entrepreneurial process.

However, the centerpiece of our agenda is the Entrepreneurial Challenge. It's a nationwide competition to find the most promising business plan among America's college students (both undergraduate and graduate). We invite aspiring entrepreneurs to create and submit their business plans for consideration to a panel of experienced judges. Finalists are then invited to present their ideas and pitch their business plans as they would to any venture capitalist or financier. The three most promising submissions are then awarded seed capital for the execution of their idea. In the past seven years, several of the competition winners have burgeoned into successful, profitable enterprises. Some of the notable successes include World Around Toys, an enterprise focusing on manufacturing and marketing cultural learning toys through partnerships with local producers in countries around the world, and CUSnacks, an organization specializing in campus food delivery.

To date, CORE has awarded more than $100,000 to promising young entrepreneurs. This would never have been possible without the generosity of corporate and individual sponsors who donated the entire prize money for our past E-Challenge competitions.

This year, we're expanding the scale of our competition, and seeking out corporate sponsors. We'll keep you updated on our progress, our events and speaker events and I promise that future entries will be infinitely more entertaining than this one! Also, check out our website, CORE .

Cheers,

Asghar Alam

Columbia Organization of Rising Entrepreneurs (CORE)

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

The Student Business Spotlight

Because this website is designed to be a living resource, we are constantly looking for new ways to bring you pertinent information. One way we thought we could do this is to have you all tell the stories of your businesses, or even just business ideas.

We are going to start highlighting student businesses on the main page of the Collegiate Entrepreneurship site, as well as in the Student Center. Beyond free marketing, the idea of this spotlight is to connect like-minded students to share resources and war stories.

To have your business considered, answer the following questions in an email to dvargas@kauffman.org.

Business Name:

Founders:

Status of business (i.e. ideation, incorporated, growth-minded):

What's your elevator pitch?

Who/what inspired you to make this more than just a great idea?

What do you know now that you didn't three months ago?

What keeps you up at night?

Besides money, what could your business use the most?

What's the best advice you were ever given?

If your life right now had a soundtrack, what songs would be on it?

Anything else?

Please include all contact information including a link to your website.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Don’t be afraid to buy the land before the house is built. 

Incorporation sets the base to develop and establish your business. Aspiring entrepreneurs may fear incorporating their business and wait until they are ready to operate but by that time the idea and name may be taken. Incorporate the name to secure the purpose of the business and don't be afraid to adjust your goals as other opportunities reveal themselves.

Natalie Nicole Koller,19, current student at Florida International University, President of GREEN GLOBE DEVELOPER LLC

Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Applying the Entrepreneurial Process to Your College Career

Imagine you are your own venture and your college career is the start-up phase. What kind of organization do you want to build? Are you the next dot com, the next dot org, or like nothing the world has ever seen before?

This question may sound like an exercise from grammar school when your teacher asked you what kind of animal you wanted to be, but what it really speaks to is the vision you have of yourself--a vision of who you want to be and where you want to go.

At Miami University of Ohio, they define entrepreneurship as, "the process of identifying, developing, and bringing a vision to life. The vision may be an innovative idea, an opportunity, or simply a better way to do something. The end result of this process is the creation of a new venture, formed under conditions of risk and considerable uncertainty." If you accept this definition, then entrepreneurship can be applied to nearly every area of life--including your college career.

The key to approaching college entrepreneurially is to look at your life in the same way an entrepreneur would conceptualize a new enterprise: observe, create, act, and reflect. In entrepreneurship terms, that means recognizing opportunities, taking calculated risks, networking, marketing, and constantly reevaluating your business plan.

Recognize Opportunities

Entrepreneurs recognize opportunities and act on them. In college you are exposed to so many that it can be difficult to decide which ones you want to pursue. If you're like a lot of students, you walk into the student activities fair freshman year and gravitate towards the booths offering things you did in high school; to booths where your friends are already scribbling their email addresses; or, worse yet, out the door you just entered because you're tired of saying the words, 'I don't sing a cappella." But the truth of the matter is that fairs like these are an excellent way for you to see what your campus has to offer--or what it's missing.

If people find you funny but you're not sure why, join an improv comedy group. If you like fencing but there's no club, start one. Or, if you have an interest offered by an organization, but you're not the joining type, contact the faculty advisor about doing an independent study. Hold your groans. Independent studies are becoming increasingly popular as students take greater control over their own educations.

But recognizing opportunities does not mean taking every opportunity. The important thing is to find clubs, courses, hobbies, etc. that you are passionate about. They make you more interesting, more versatile, and more appealing to a future employer. Not to mention, most entrepreneurs cite passion, not money, as their leading motivator.

Take Calculated Risks

This does not mean joyriding in an abandoned security vehicle at 2 a.m. or banking on the fact that your roommate has already done her chem lab. Taking calculated risks means changing your present path when it makes the most sense for your goals. Entrepreneurs take risks when they think it will help grow their ventures. The same should be true for your college career. Whether you decide to take extra electives, leave for a semester, or even quit an athletic team, it's important that you measure the consequences against the expected gains.

If you know that changing your major to a subject you actually care about means an extra year of school, but you can red shirt a year to extend your scholarship--do it. The same can be true with traveling abroad. Even if it means foregoing a leadership position, you're bound to find a part of yourself you never knew existed. Take the risks that expose you to new cultures, new ways of thinking, and, most importantly, new opportunities.

Network and Market Yourself

Whether you believe it or not, college is one of the few times in your life where you are surrounded by people who want you to succeed and who are willing to help you do it. Use them. Most successful entrepreneurs recognize their own strengths and weaknesses. They find ways to highlight those talents, and, more importantly, they create teams to compensate for those shortcomings. If you're working on a group project, identify the students that complement your abilities with their own strengths. You'll learn more, make new friends, and impress the professor with the depth of your project.

Marketing yourself may sound more related to a job interview than a classroom, but that's not the case. In marketing, you recognize the needs and demands of your target audience and then present your goods in a way they will find appealing. Learn your professors' demands by going to office hours and study sessions. Most professors are there because they want to make a difference in your life. Show them they are by showing up. You'll be surprise how well your products sell.

Write a Business Plan for Yourself

People succeed when they have a goal and a plan of how to achieve it. Entrepreneurs succeed when they take a realistic look at their target, recognize the resources necessary to get there, and treat every obstacle or change of plan as a new opportunity to learn from their mistakes and grow. The same is true for your career. If your plan is to be an international banker, but you fail out of Econ 101, pick yourself up, realize why you failed, and take the course again--this time go to class, find a study group, visit office hours. And who knows, maybe the Brazilian banker interviewing you just might overlook that grade when he sees you know capoeira.

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Dinner with ECIRMAC Staff

As a group, we began to understand social entrepreneurship as a way to apply the principles of a regular for-profit business to a social enterprise to create social value. We were searching for the underlying problem for our case which we hoped would help ECIRMAC become more of an asset to Champaign-Urbana. The student volunteers work at ECIRMAC for their community-based learning class. These classes are set up with community partners such as ECIRMAC to help students gain real-world experience speaking Spanish. On the other hand, ECIRMAC receives volunteers to help run the organization. The volunteers are hard workers and have a strong desire to help, but often their only function is answering the phone. To try and figure out the role of a volunteer in ECIRMAC, we invited three staff members that we frequently dealt with to dinner. Our first main question was if the staff felt the volunteers were helping. The answer was a resounding yes, but there were a few areas the students could improve on. We also discussed how the students felt they were capable of taking a more active role with clients. The answer to this question was not as clear, the staff of ECIRMAC spent years building relationships in the community which would be hard for students of a one semester course to replicate. We left the dinner with a better understanding of the function of volunteers in ECIRMAC as well as information on how the staff would like to improve the organization. However, the underlying problem in our case did not present itself. We knew it had something to do with the volunteers role at ECIRMAC, but more work would have to be done to identify the real problem.

Monday, March 27, 2006

Case Writing Workshop and Criticism

Our group signed up for a case writing workshop put on by the Academy of Entrepreneurial Leadership. From the moment we arrived we felt out of place. Everyone there was either a professor or a graduate student. Setting our fears aside, we went to work analyzing, trying different writing techniques, and discussing our results. I was proud to describe our case and ECIRMAC to the group. Then our whole world was turned upside down. On our break, we again found ourselves talking about our case and social entrepreneurship. We were talking to Bob, who had worked extensively in Africa, helping to teach entrepreneurship. He worked to help teach the people how they could be more self-sufficient. After describing social entrepreneurship to Bob he replied, “In my opinion that’s a bunch of bologna.” He asked us if we were really helping to stimulate change in the community and beyond. If we were only helping an isolated group of people, were we really doing any good? The scary thing was that we couldn’t refute his questions. Later on… Bob’s words plagued me all weekend. I questioned everything from ECIRMAC to my senior thesis. Although discouraging, Bob’s words left me with the underlying question of social value. Basically, the question of how much ECIRMAC helped the community and worked to incite change. This theory would go on to help us find the basis to our case.

Sunday, March 05, 2006

Personal Inforamtion, Social Entrepreneurship, and the ECIRMAC refugee center

My name is Matthew Ossman and I am a senior at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Campaign. I am working towards majors in finance and Spanish. My interest in Spanish started in high school and continued into college. I always had at least one Spanish class in my schedule. It was my base, one of my true passions. After visiting Spain my junior year of high school, I knew I wanted to study there. That led me on the University of Illinois Spanish Department year abroad in Barcelona. The program provided me with everything I ever wanted out of studying aboard. I was able to focus on learning Spanish, start to learn Catalan, the native language of Barcelona, as well as travel Europe. After ten and a half months aboard I returned home. Almost immediately, I felt like I was losing my Spanish. I also feared that I would continue to lose what I learned since there was no room in my schedule for any Spanish classes. I contacted Professor Ann Abbott about any special project or senior thesis that I could work on to continue developing my Spanish skills. We discussed many different options, my first choice being a literature study. We worked to find a professor to supervise my work, but no match could be made. Then Professor Abbott told me of a project she was working on with two other students. The project dealt with Social Entrepreneurship, a topic completely new to me. Not knowing exactly what I was getting myself into, I agreed to join the group. The social enterprise that we work with is the East Central Immigrant and Refugee Mutual Assistance Center or ECIRMAC. Our goal as a group was to volunteer at ECIRMAC and formulate a case study of our experience to compete in the Wake Forrest KACE competition. While volunteering at ECIRMAC, we would study social entrepreneurship and at the end combine the shortcomings of ECIRMAC and the tenants of social entrepreneurship into a case. The short term goal was to learn about these two different topics in order to write a useful case to compete, but also to help teach students about social entrepreneurship. The long term goal was to hopefully help implement social entrepreneurship into ECIRMAC to help make the organization more self-sufficient as well as increasing its overall social value.

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