22A- Elevator Pitch No. III

1) https://youtu.be/6HSTVglqze8

2) A reflection on the feedback you received from your last pitch.

            Within my last pitch, the feedback provided was all positive reinforcement of my attire (keeping with the Warrington/UF theme), adjustments towards the limited numbers I have, and the overall enthusiasm injected into the pitch. 

3) What did you change, based on the feedback?

Truly, I have no negative feedback that I need to take into account and tweak within my pitch. I have a new type of service proposal, so much of what I do is in the dark in terms of not providing as many statistics as other proposals with existing services/ industries. If any adjustments were made, it was simply due to me running through the pitch for a third time.

21A- Reading Reflection No. II

In this exercise, I'd like you to select a book from the second half of the Official ENT 3003 Reading List and report on it. This part of the list focuses on books that cover, generally, entrepreneurship, business, and learning. I'd like you to address the following in your post:

1)    What was the general theme or argument of the book?

a.     The book, “How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big,” by Scott Adams revolves around teaching readers how to be successful through failure—almost exactly what the title reads. 

2)    How did the book, in your opinion, connect with and enhance what you are learning in ENT 3003?

a.     While we have talked about all the various ways to go about beginning a business off of a simple idea or “opportunity,” it is important to recognize that sometimes, no matter how good the idea or the resources behind it, the initial idea will not work out. Understanding how to launch yourself forward after a failure is essential not only in the business world generally but also especially within the context of entrepreneurship. 

3)    If you had to design an exercise for this class, based on the book you read, what would that exercise involve?

a.     I would ultimately ask them to create a business idea and plan, just like we do within this class, and about halfway through the creation of all the little details, I would give them a specific reason as to why their product or service will not work out in present conditions. Because of this initial failure, I would ask them in the next assignment to adjust their plans or possibly their pitches to accommodate the inhibiting factor. 

4)    What was your biggest surprise or 'aha' moment when reading the book? In other words, what did you learn that differed most from your expectations?

a.     I really liked the point that “withholding praise is immoral.” As someone who’s “work love language” is words of affirmation, I require recognition, feedback, and praise in order to feel valued and productive. For me, this was an essential idea on how to reconstruct workplace praise and feedback into something more productive than mandatory works on a critique form. This was an idea I simply had never considered before. 

20 A - Growing Your Social Capital

1.     I reached out to a friend of mine who lives in New Jersey and utilizes her YouTube channel following to promote her clothing that she creates through her college’s fashion program. The usage of video to connect customers to her growing business is why I chose her as my domain expert. 

a.     I was able to reach and call her within the last week to get her thoughts on my idea napkin. 

b.     I was looking for her opinion in scoping out my business plan more and also wanted to catch up since we have not spoken in some time due to school being crazy for both of us. I would assume the return expectation would be to catch up as well. 

c.     It would help to expand my network to better include her since she sees alternative industries’ usages and perspectives that could be helpful in properly promoting the service. 

2.     I also reached out to my aunt who happens to work in HR for her branch of NBC, making her perfect to speak with terms of considering her for the market expert. 

a.     Because this interview is family, I reached out to her over the phone to talk through my idea with her. 

b.     I was not expecting anything beyond simple feedback surrounding my idea napkin from an HR perspective and interest, and I could see her watching to catch up with the family as well. 

c.     This perspective from HR will allow me to utilize these perspectives later on when I am looking to a) work with employers again come the fall or b) actually end up pitching this product. 

3.     Because this idea is generally run through the BCS, I reached out to someone on the team to assess the aspects of my idea napkin to what would be the up-and-coming industry supplier. 

a.     As a student who regularly goes to the BCS, I thought it was appropriate to “go with what you know” as they say and work with what would be the possible foundation of the service. 

b.     While I was not sure of any thing I could do for them, I was interested in getting an additional perspective as to my revised idea napkin. 

c.     Working with the BCS regularly allowed me to recognized how in-depth their process went in order to help each and every student no matter the industry. 

For other classes, I was asked to complete multiple occupational interviews in regard to my industries of interest, and so I have found that I am accustomed to reaching out and expanding my network. I enjoy gaining different perspectives of others and look forward to these kinds of assignments. 

19A- Idea Napkin No. II

With the comments I received, I was able to work with the positive feedback into my idea napkin. They spoke on my “why” and “what” were well-defined and detailed. Below I expanded upon it. 

1.     I am a second-year business student who has found her passion through relationship development, working in a number of capacities throughout Heavener to better first year students’ experiences and understanding of the college. I would associate part of my drive for this specific type of service and work comes from my Gallup’s StrengthQuest strength of individualization. While I have a keen interest in moving into management consulting post-graduation, I could see this business concept as becoming my side project that continues to fill my “why” as I look to bridge the gap between students, the universities, and recruiters. 

2.     The intended service is a internet-based platform that would allow students who were unable to attend in-person company speakers/recruiting events on campus to view the information sessions on the platform. We would be able to work with the data that the schools collect on popular speakers to upload prominent and popular companies, rather than bombarding students with all possible information, which can be convoluted. At the same time, the viewership and a comment/ Q&A portion per college’s site would be linked to recruiters, who would also be able to work with those students and utilize this data to better improve their recruiting tactics/ expand their own reach. 

3.     While designed for the purpose of helping students, the service would be offered to business colleges, since they would have to assist in the live recording of these companies and approve the compatibility of their website to ours. With business schools already acting as the gatekeeper between recruiters and students, we have to target the liaisons rather than who we truly wish to benefit. 

4.     With technology becoming more and more prominent in every aspect of a company, this allows for an additional point of contact and data point both for schools and companies. Teaching students that not everything will be face-to-face and learning to be comfortable with that fact allows for greater adaptation later on in the workplace. 

5.     Our service is set apart by its core purpose. Just as Southwest and Apple have aspects of their company with allow them to remain at the top of their competitive fields, ours is about promoting positive connections that will lead towards successful, long-lasting jobs rather than a check-in-the-box for both recruiter and student. This service is looking to better connect a generation of workers to transformative jobs rather than to make one institution prominent or to provide a competitive edge. 

6.     Because it is an internet-based service, we are up against hundreds of thousands of websites vying for user attraction and retention. There has to be specific needs and purpose marketed to customers in order to demonstrate relevance and need rather than just the service itself. Like apps, there are many throughout the market that have great ideas but little traction. The focus must be on marketing the “why” rather than the “what.”

18A - Create a Customer Avatar

My customer avatar is a male or female business faculty member, generally revolving around the associate dean/dean level, who truly cares about the innovative processes that can be added to aid students’ career aspirations. Generally, they would be parents, with kids between middle school and college age. This age of the consumer is a driving motivator as they understand the importance of the next generation succeeding and being a promoter of it. 

Additionally, he or she is involved in some sort of exercise—more than likely triathlete/ runner) in order to deal with the stress of the position. 

Beyond that, it is difficult to ascertain more personal details since truly anyone can be in that position within an institution. Because this business is a service towards those in need of it, and the need circles around careers, there is no more specific of a measure to go by. 

Below are only two examples of potential clients and customers. It should be noted that there is no “normal” or “stereotypical” appearance in this particular role. 

                                  

My commonality to these customers if that I still embody the students they look to promote and the future careers we can have. I have chosen an opportunity that comes across my personal life and these customers are those in charge of the potential changes and implementation of new processes for students. 

17A - Elevator Pitch pt II

1.  https://youtu.be/LfIa3-FylBo

2.  While I chose to wear a Warrington shirt in the pitch despite the recommendation to dress professionally, I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of positive feedback I received from that adjustment (thank you!). Additionally, there were requests for more information surrounding cash flow, which is difficult when there isn’t an exact service that I can mirror projections off of. While I can talk some numbers surrounding demand and general pricing strategies, it is difficult at my stage to add additional numbers to a projection.  

3.  Through my feedback, I will be highlighting the need of varying business schools with a few more numbers and highlighting the revenue model of the company. This was something since the pitch I have been working to consolidate. However, I look to maintain the same comfortability and UF-wearing ethos that brings more credence to my overall pitch. 

16A- My Secret Sauce

1. One of my very unique abilities is the recall I am able to have. Not necessarily with school material, but conversations from months/years ago, obscure book/movie lines (or who scenes), specific lines within lecture, and especially random facts. Much of this can be attributed to one of my strengths assessed by Gallup—input. 

I also have moved several times throughout my life, almost ten and I remember all of them. Therefore, I have learned not only to adjust and often but also have begun to expect change to occur.

As someone who is highly organized, it plays a large part in who I am and how I operate on a daily basis. Schedules are stuck to specifically and color coordinated. Simple, repetitive tasks are completed per week without fail. School tasks are thought through and completed early rather than the day of. Holding myself accountable early on allows me to be effective in everything I do. 

While I never would have considered this before, we did an activity in one of my organization’s forums for Valentine’s Day where we write things we appreciate about other people. My paper included the same three things across the board: my positivity, energy, and passion for those around me. 

Even while “purpose” is a hard thing to discover personally and professionally, I believe I am specifically working towards discovering my “why” as Simon Sinek calls it. Filtering much of my involvement through high school and thus far in college to center around “relational development” as a core theme, I believe it has allowed to be more intentional in my actions and pursuits.   

2. https://soundcloud.com/jszbibzwr2pm/sets/16a-ent

Dad—While this was a recording with my father, he actually works within Fintech, so I asked him as someone who analyses incoming products for the company to give me a fair, business-related assessment of myself. Overall, I noticed that his analysis struck some of my core strengths: discipline, analytical, and deliberative. 

Mom—As someone who used to work in PR and now deals with students on a daily basis, I asked my mom to give me ger perspective on a general level. To her credit as well, she hit many of my core strengths as well, hinting to situations dealing with my input, analytical, and presentational skills. 

Morgan— I have gotten to know her very well within the last year, and she broke me down into three contextual categories with characteristics that I present. These were my organizational and forward-thinking nature with school, my individualization when it comes to caring for people, and my prioritization when it comes down to relax and have fun.

Dani— With both very driven mindsets, she highlighted that for me in our interview. She noted my way to multitask and prioritize effectively. 

Lexi—My roommate has seen me go through every sort of preparation for the various situations I have encountered as a business student. She noted that even while I plan everything out, there is a definite balance to it all. 

3. I think the assessments given have been fairly aligned to my own perception of myself. While going through college, I strive to be the fullest extent of myself. It is fulfilling to see that viewpoint noticed by those closest to me in so many different aspects of life. In regard to any changes within my original list, I would more than likely not alter a single thing. 

15A - Figuring out Buyer Behavior, No. II

1)    Faculty member who works closely with students

a.     This proposal for a service has not been approached, and while most if not all HCW services have been “in-house,” there hasn’t been much consideration to expand in this capacity. 

b.     Because it is more of an internal operation, they work directly with the company to host them in person within Heavener, with no recordings of the presentations. 

c.     With this idea being a groundbreaking proposal compared to what is traditionally prepared, they would have to consider the target audience’s usage rate and retention. Depending on the percentages in maybe some sort of pretesting, they would consider. 

d.     Ultimately, I understand now that this is pretty uncharted territory for consideration by multiple levels and parties involved. 

2)    Additional faculty member who works closely with students

a.     The sentiment remains the same. This proposal for a service has not been approached, and while most if not all HCW services have been “in-house,” there hasn’t been much consideration to expand in this capacity. 

b.     Due to the direct nature of contact between Heavener and individual companies, all presentations are hosted live and in person. The only virtual aspect of the event is the announcement and promotional features of HCW. 

c.     This is different than the traditional approach, and for it to simply be considered, there would have to be some testing and polls within the student population for demonstration purposes of the necessity for it. 

d.     This proposal would definitely be something not considered or enacted yet. There would have to be a lot of in-depth pre-launch testing to make sure this was enacted smoothly and efficiently. 

3)    Third member of the team with close advising relationship with students

a.     Again, it seems like all faculty are on the same page. This proposal for a service has not been approached, and while most if not all HCW services have been “in-house,” there hasn’t been much consideration to expand in this capacity. 

b.     There is no buying component to setting up the event since it is hosted live within Heavener. From what I was able to gather, it is end-to-end control between the contact of faculty here and the various companies that wish to come to campus. 

c.     With other programs that were innovative not launching as well as hoped, there would have to be a resounding need from both students and other resources demonstrating the helpfulness of this platform. Special consideration would have to come in from companies as well depending on the nature and restrictions of their presentations. 

d.     With the nature of this endeavor, there would have to be a portion of resources placed on this launch in order for it to be communicated and utilized efficiently on either end.