Week 8 Reading Reflection

Chapter 8: Sources of Capital for Entrepreneurs

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? 

What stood out to me was the information about business angels. I did not know much about them before I read the chapter, so it was very interesting to find that there are actually five different types of business angels that are commonly practiced. Each angel is specific to a type of investor, their attitude, and likely hood of the types of things they would invest in.  

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

The section on private placements was rather confusing. The book wen into depth about different “rule’s” that exist when it comes to placements at a certain level of money. Apparently these rules count as exceptions to the original rule about private placements, so that I just found rather contradicting and confusing.

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

First question: Why is it a feasible option to use equity financing over other financing options? I would ask this because I am not aware of other financing options that are available out there, so just curious.

Second question: Could better and more effecting fundraising be created other than using social lending or crowdfunding? Since the book says it acts as a last resort sort of thing, what else could businesses use to raise funds?

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

Once again I am not the type of person to say whether or not another person is right or wrong, so in this case I would say the author was fair about the information presented. The part when the author talks about asking the “right questions” to venture capitalists was interesting and arguable, as well as the part when its mention that venture capitalists have a specific attitude and interest. Such characteristics are wavering and could easily be changed from person to person.

Half-Way Reflection

1)    Tenaciousness is a skill. What are the behaviors that you have used (or developed) to keep up with the requirements of this course? 

Well there is definitely a lot of work that comes into this course. With that, I have had to develop more of a constantly working on this course everyday kind of behavior. I began to do at least one assignment every day in order to keep up with the work load. Also, I had to get over my fear for talking to strangers and recording myself. This course requires that of me, and I am still trying to overcome it.   

2) Tenaciousness is also about attitude. Talk about a moment or two when you felt like "giving up." What pulled you through? Do you feel like you've developed a tenacious attitude during the past two months? What experience or experiences most contributed to this?  

I felt like giving up when there was an assignment for having to interview an entrepreneur and ask them questions. I felt that I would be awkward and I would be a little scared to do the interview. In the end however, I pulled through by just getting over my fear. I picked up the phone and called an entrepreneur and asked him my questions. In the end it was much easier than what I thought, so I feel very accomplished for successfully completing that assignment. Therefore over time in this course, I have gained more experience on using recording devices and posting them to YouTube and my post, so I am not nearly as camera shy as I was before.  

3) Three tips. What are three tips you would offer next semester's student about (1) fostering the skills that support tenacity and (2) developing the 'tenacious mindset' ?

Tip one: Don’t be lazy. Stay on top of your work.

Tip two: Don’t be afraid. Go out and try it!

Tip three: Read people’s comments! They are helpful and may point out mistakes you may not have noticed before. 

  

Elevator Pitch No. 2

Reflection from my first elevator pitch:

Wow! I really was not sure on what people would think about my proposed pitch, but it seems that it would actually be a good thing people would use!

It was neat to read some of the comments I had about my video. Some things that were said about my elevator pitch was that it was dynamic, clean, concise, and that I was enthusiastic. This was a real confidence booster for me!

Some things that I appreciated hearing about was the view point that it may be difficult for the user to sing some rhythms and things like guitar solos because they perhaps may be “bad singers” or have difficulty remembering the sounds exactly, so that was a good point to mention.

I also didn’t know that there is an app online that allows you to put out beats by tapping them with the keyboard, so that was cool to know.

Overall I really didn’t change anything about my pitch. I kept the main elements that people seemed to enjoy, so the enthusiasm, the clarity, and the fun musical approach. Some wording was different I suppose, I described more on what the app actually does. Also the song I used as my example was “Seven Nation Army” by the White Stripes. 

Week 7 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? 

What stood out to me in this reading was the chart on page 9, talking about what is at stake with issues in a business and the decisions made about them. The chart showed a neat representation about the shallowest to deepest decision making, and then if it is a business issue to be addressed, a consumer’s concern, and what the segmentation is trying to find out.  

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

A part that was confusing was when the article starting going on about different segmentation for advertising and for developing new products. The chart sort of just used some lingo that I don’t fully understand, and the overall structure of the chart is not very helpful. I understand it is supposed to be a visual stimulus for the reader to take a look at, but it still does not fully get the point across.

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

First I would ask, could you expand upon the whole idea about “drifting into nebulousness?” Secondly, I would ask if there is another example besides World War II they could think of for this idea of nebulousness.

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

I suppose I would just bring up the point that segmentations are very much opinion based. They are used for people’s change in needs, attitudes, and behavior, which are all things that change and depend on the individual. So how can one choose in a business which segmentation is best for which purposes? That is all based on opinion, so is anything ever right or wrong in this case?

Week 6 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? 

What truly stood out to me was the fact on how influential government policies can be for companies interesting in introducing new products, or a new company introducing itself to the market in general. Rules and regulations really do effect the potential strategies that can exist in the competitive market. 

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

          What was confusing to me was the section on strategic action. The article during this section was talking about the ways, “a company can improve its strategic posture by finding suppliers or buyers who possess the least power to influence it adversely”. You see, I am not very knowledgeable about the whole suppliers and buyer’s dynamic, and even less on the power influences that exist between them. So this section was difficult to understand do to my lack of knowledge on the subject.  

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

          Well I would first ask to describe some examples on the power dynamic between buyers and suppliers because I do not really know anything about that. Secondly, I would ask if the author could elaborate more on the section about “influencing the balance” between industry competition because it was a bit vague and once again, I do not know much about it.

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

          I cannot really disagree with the author, I was really out of my comfort zone and area of knowledge with this topic. I suppose I would like to hear more about the ideas from the author about what they think to the question, “what is the potential of this business?” Because that seems like a difficult and highly opinionated answer to have.

Idea Napkin No.1

1)    You.  Who am I? That is an excellent question. I couldn’t help thinking of the song from Les Miserables “Who am I” sung by Jon Val Jon. I suppose that example of how my brain works pretty much explains me as a person. I am a quirky, young, music student trying to figure out their place in the world.

 So far I have come to the conclusion that I am somewhat talented in the art of music and in its performance; even though I had a band director tell me one time that there is no such thing as talent, but hey I must have been at least good enough because I made it into the music school here at UF to play trombone so…

Besides music though, I would say that I have a skill for people, for communication. I love to talk, and with that I love to know what is going on, what’s new, how is the world in another person’s view today? With speaking to others I learn about how their minds work, their emotions, different perspectives on life, and I end up getting ideas for how I can change my life for the better.

With that skill of having no fear to talk, I have come to embrace public speaking and I got an amazing experience in my senior of high school to make a 45-minute presentation on the issue with Syrian refugees in front of a panel of judges representing different sectors in the community, as well as in front of my classmates.  Strangely enough, performing music in front of others has also given more experience when it comes to presenting oneself to strangers or to the public. In high school I did so many trombone auditions to community bands and to state ensembles, as well as performing solos, trios, and quartets in front of judges just to receive feedback. It was all getting me ready for how things work in college. Preparation and finally no fear, just confidence when it comes to the actual performance, or presentation, or anything for that matter. It is all just one huge learning experience.

So with that, I am definitely still learning. I’m figuring out my likes and dislikes, my limits to what I can do. For instance, when I came to UF I was on a Pre-Health track in combination with music performance with the dream of becoming some top medical surgeon. This semester however that idea completely changed. I figured out that maybe the whole STEM career thing just isn’t for me. So now I’m trying business because it is diverse, it is used in everything, and well I just have no clue what I want to do now and I had to pick something so here I am.

With that though, I do not want to limit myself to doing something just because I may profit from it in the end, or because people may see it as a so called “successful” occupation to pursue. That is not what I aspire to do at all. To me there is more to life than just working to live. I just want to live. It may sound naïve; I mean you can’t go around living without realizing the reality of the world. I see that reality, I get it, but that shouldn’t mean I can’t pursue the true riches that life has to offer. I wish to find those simple pleasures in life that people have lately been missing out on because they are too busy looking at their phones or worrying about petty things.

Alright so now how does all of this and my potential business venture tie into my life? Well fingers crossed if it is even possible to do it and have it become some huge success, my life would be made in the shade. I first of all would be a huge success in the technology world, I would be helping people everywhere, and I would be making profit. From there who knows what other ideas I might get, any improvements I could make to it, the possibilities are unless.

  

2)    What are you offering to customers?  My idea is to develop an app that can recognize people’s voices and humming’s of different parts of songs. It is to solve the issue when let’s say you have a song stuck in your head, but you don’t know any of the lyrics or who the artist is. So with this app, you can sing to it parts of the song you do remember. Whether that be the guitar solo, rhythm of the drums, or humming along the melody, the app would be able to recognize it and find the song for the person.  

3)    Who are you offering it to?  My customers are the general public. Essentially everyone and anyone who has the capability of hearing music and the ability to vocalize sound can use my product. In the end my customers would all have in common the trouble of not remembering lyrics to a song, so my product will help them find out what song they are thinking of. The demographic goes from young children to the elderly, from any social, religious, and ethnic background.

4)    Why do they care?  Well the example I could think of to use in my argument is how popular the app Shazam got. Its functionality is to identify any song playing from the radio and tell the user what song it is. So my app is similar in that sense. It is just simply informing the user of the song they are trying to identify, only difference is that my app can identify the song by picking up vocalizations made by any human voice singing any main part of the song. Therefore, the user doesn’t have to know the words to the song, all they have to do is sing some part of the melody they remember and the app will pick it up. Imagine how helpful that would be for people who just can’t remember lyrics well? For anyone who just heard a song and want to know who it’s by. Music business people would be all over this kind of technology, and would definitely buy into it, and afterwards, so would any technologic company interested in having a stake in the music app section. 

5)    What are your core competencies? 

It is the technology that I have that no one else does. It is the capability of taking any human voice and being able to decipher it to find a song that matches it, is something completely different than what is currently on the market. 

Evaluation

I believe these elements do indeed fit together. My prospective business correlates with my love and enthusiasm for music while at the same time, fulfilling other people’s love for music as well. The potential that other people who listen to music would be interested in my app is highly likely, and therefore would deem success for my business. 

Elevator Pitch No.1

  

1) As any person may have had this experience, I am terrible at remembering lyrics to songs. For me I seem to always remember how some part of the song went, like a bit from a guitar solo, or the vocals of the background singers or the rhythm of the drums. So I figured, I cannot be the only person out there who can't manage to remember the words to some song they heard and turned out to really like, but didn't manage to catch the name. That is when I thought of my opportunity to cater to people who want to find out what sing they are obsessed about without having to know the words or the name for that matter. 

2) So my solution was to pitch the idea of developing an app that anyone could sing to, repeat rhythms, scream the guitar solo and the app would be able to recognize the song and inform the user. I would call it Thought Sounds, sponsored by my company Sound and Mind. Better get ready for the next best app to have!