Well, it has been far too long since my last post. I have experienced the void that befalls most bloggers at some point in time as other challenges in life present themselves. I believe their is momentum in tendencies and habits, for good or bad. We are all “creatures of habit” and a lack of posting can be considered just as much a habit as its slightly more costly alternative of posting in terms of time, energy, effort, etc… But without further discussion I would like to present the Spring 2010′s blog feeds, discuss what changes I’ve made, and highlight a few of the better ideas from last semester.
First, while there were many great businesses last semester, more than I could discuss in this post, I would like to note two of particular interest:
An eco-friendly laundry detergent: http://madisell.blogspot.com/
A second (and still operating) example is rebound hoof-pack: http://reboundhoofpack.blogspot.com
Rebound is particularly noteworthy for how it was discovered by accident, the opportunity arising like a phoenix from the ashes of a project that just didn’t work out.. Very similar to the story of 3m’s post-it notes…
Second, what I learned from last semester is that by having teams focus their efforts on only one venture leads them to stall actually starting up until they feel that they have found a sufficiently innovative and compelling venture to start. This is not entrepreneurship, and had to change. Entrepreneurship is about starting many ventures, seeing what works out, and then putting your effort behind the venture that seems most promising. It is difficult to predict the success of many new ventures and thus deciding between opportunities is really challenging. When the costs/barriers to entry are low, some times its worth just jumping in and seeing what you learn along the way. Sometimes what you learn will turn a non-innovative business into the next big thing… but the thing is you need to “be in it to win it” and I feel that entrepreneurs often underestimate the value of learning by doing when costs are low. So this semester teams are rewarded with credit for each venture they put substantial documented effort behind. I expect that with a a portfolio of ventures, individuals will also be more willing to admit that some of their ideas were a failure and thus be more open to learning from these failures. Here’s to another great semester, glad to be back!
Finally, here are the blog feeds for the new start-up teams this semester. Great examples, albeit only one or two posts into telling their stories, of what young entrepreneurs are capable of starting with limited resources.
Here is the 2pm class (8 teams): http://goo.gl/pHPH
Here is the 5pm class (4 teams): http://goo.gl/USZW
