30A - Final Reflection

This class was very interesting. For one, I have never had a class that utilized a blogging platform in order to turn in assignments. I thought it was pretty interesting and worked well with what we were assigned to do. The drudgery for sure was the Cupcakes and how difficult some of them were for absolutely no reason. It seemed that the goal was really to trick the student which seems a bit unfair. The fun moments were some of the interview assignments for sure because I was able to pitch my idea to some of my friends. A formative experience was the fact that I had to record elevator pitches. I noticed that I gradually got much better as I progressed through them and the course in general. I see myself as a potential entrepreneur for sure and am excited to see where my new entrepreneurial point of view takes me. One large recommendation that I would suggest to new students is to just watch the lectures and take very detailed notes because that’ll be the way to get a good grade on the cupcakes. I am definitely most proud of accomplishing an entire idea and venture concept in general because I had never really had to do something like that before. 

29A – Venture Concept No. 2 - Student Loan Advice Service (SLAS)

The idea I am pursuing is a service that will provide people with information about student loans and will build them a personalized plan to ensure that they are not being ripped off by student loan companies. We will analyze their financial situation and determine how quickly they want to pay these loans off in order to break down what they should be paying monthly for their student loans. They can then take this plan and send it to their student loan provider to ensure that they are able to efficiently and comfortably pay off their student loans.

This opportunity is created because recent information has come out that has proven that student loans companies are screwing over thousands of students and former students in order to make more money. There is really nothing these people can doe specially because the customer service for these companies is awful. They are forced to scour the internet for information that may not always be accurate and may not be related to their specific situation. Therefore, my service has a large potential market of people that need a problem solved. The market is defined as former and current students that are still dealing with paying off student loans. Customers are currently trying to satisfy this need themselves which is difficult especially because many aren’t knowledgable in student loans and personal finance at the level that they need to be. There is no loyalty to this system because they know they don’t have enough information. This opportunity is huge seeing that hundreds of thousands of people need to pay off their student loans AND make ends meet at the same time, giving this product an infinite window of opportunity.

In terms of innovation, this service hits the mark. Nobody has done something like this before and been successful despite the huge market. We will be radically different in that we will be able to provide completely personal information and only charge a small monthly fee of $20/month. We are able to use this money to innovate even more and scale the company. Since we don’t have very many maintenance fees, all the money can be poured into growth. Even then, we could use the extra money to build a fund for people that aren’t as fortunate to pay for their student loans are college tuition to help them make ends meet.

This service will without a doubt decrease overall student debt because the largest problem many people face is that ability to gather and understand the vast amount of information all over the internet about student loans. Customers will buy this product because there is nothing like this that currently exists so there is no difficulty in getting them to switch from their current situation. There are also no competitors which gives me the entire market to play with. Ultimately, all the money will  be poured into customer support and experience since that is the whole idea for our service. These costs are not high relative to other companies, meaning we can charge a cheaper monthly fee and still do extremely well. I would initially start off with few employees, around 2-3, and scale when we have more customers. Ultimately, the goal is to have a service that can help millions with student debt will providing a personal, friendly conversation to show our dedication to the customer.

Our venture’s secret sauce is that fact that nobody has done this before. We are then allowed full creativity to build the service and not have to rush out something because we are worried about competition. We will get that edge and once people see our success and try to imitate it, we will already be way ahead of the curve and outperform them by simple innovations.

Once we are able to significantly help solve the problem, the next idea would be to build a foundation and have a large amount of our earnings go to the foundation which is dedicated to offering scholarships and providing tuition to children that may not be financially well off.

Overall, the idea is still in its beginning stages and I am looking forward to continuing to tweak and innovate the idea before releasing it to the public. This is something I am extremely interested in and would love to hear anyone’s opinion and advice in order to make the product even better.

I received a few comments, however I did not actually receive any criticism. Instead, I shared it with the people around me and one of the larger criticisms I received was that it would be difficult to hire employees that would be highly educated in student loans. I decided we would have to provide some sort of course or teaching program that will allow the people we hire to be up to date and educated on student loans. What I changed as a result of this criticism was that I realized I could not hire people without educating them and testing them on their own personal knowledge of student plans because we want to ensure that everyone is getting good information when they are using my service. 

28A – Your Exit Strategy

Ultimately, my exit plan is to pour all profits the company makes into a foundation that is dedicated to helping to pay off student loan debt all over the country or preventing it in the first place. This could be in the form of providing scholarships as well as working with colleges to make college cheaper entirely. I intend to find a way to make the business pretty much fully on autopilot so that I am freed up to work on another entrepreneurial venture. I have selected this exit strategy because I want to start this business to help people and the best way to do that is to pour the money into helping people. I think the exit strategy influences the other decisions I make in the sense that it helps me realize that every decision I make should be to help others and not just make us more and more money. It motivates me to want to grow quickly so that I can use the resources acquired to help as many people as I can.

27A – Reading Reflection No. 3 Submit Assignment

The book I read for this assignment was Shoe Dog by Phil Knight. Phil Knight started Nike back in the 1960s. I found it very interesting that he was basically one of the original drop shippers. What he would do is mass buy shoes from Japan and try to sell them to anyone who was willing to buy them. Shoe stores didn’t work so he was forced to try other places until he eventually started Nike with an old coach. I admired his extreme confidence in his idea and his determination to will his idea into fruition. I am not sure there is much to not like about Phil Knight in the sense that he was very passionate about his idea and really did not let much stop him. He encountered a lot of adversity from trying to sign with athletes to shoes stores not wanting to hold his shoes. He pushed forward and pivoted to get those shoes sold. One of his great attributes was his ability to build a team that was able to see his perspective and his view and see the same passion that he had. I think it was a little confusing how he managed his people. I understand that his way of doing it allowed creativity to take effect, but there had to be many times where the guidelines were not given well enough and the final product was not the way it should be. If I were to ask Mr. Knight two questions, one would be about his role as a father and if and how he would change things to be a better father and if that would have affected Nike negatively. I would also ask him whether he liked the small startup feeling of Nike or if he enjoys being the originator of a Fortune 500 company. I would ask these questions because I truly want to know the answer and I am curious whether he would’ve prioritized family more. Also, the final question is a relatively easy one. Knight’s opinion of hard work is that if you want to be successful, hard work is vital but he also feels that luck plays a huge role in it as well. I share this viewpoint completely and agree how important hard work is to success.

26A – Celebrating Failure

In the last semester, I have failed REPEATEDLY on the Cupcakes. At first, I thought that I could get away with playing the lectures in the background while I do other things. I learned pretty quickly that that was not going to work. I got a .4 on that Cupcake. Then, the next week I thought I could watch the lectures at 2x while paying attention. That didn’t work too well either because that week I got a .2. This kept happening for two more weeks until I gave up and decided that I had to take notes. Now, I take notes while I watch the lectures at 1.5x and that helps me do it efficiently and get about a .8 average on the Cupcakes. I learned that if I want to get a good grade on the Cupcakes, I have to actually put in the work and actively take notes while I watch the lectures. I think failure is really just the most effective way of learning something because every time you fail, you know what doesn’t work and you have this motivation to get it right. I see failure as a chance to try again and get it perfect so it is more of a feeling of motivation. This class has changed my perspective on failure in the sense that I now see failing in entrepreneurial ventures is going to happen and it just means you have to find another solution that will work. I am more likely to take risk because either way I will learn something.

25A – What’s Next?

The way I did my interviews this time, I got three of my friends together and we all sat in a room together and basically just had a conversation about what they idea would be and its potential. I started off with my idea and what it could hopefully turn into one day and I got some useful feedback. One of them added that I could even use the extra money to raffle off scholarships to current customers. Another added that maybe instead of making it a service that you pay for monthly, I could even have a one time flat rate that will allow you a years worth of calling or 6 months, etc. This was because she said maybe most people will only need a few calls to fully grasp their student loan.

In terms of my venture, I think makes the most logical sense to initially dump all of the money back into growing the business, but once we become highly profitable, something like giving back money would be ideal to attract more customers and help people at the same time.

A radically different market than my current would be to target the student loan companies themselves and offer to cover their customer service for them. This will lead to happier reviews for them and more people willing to take out loans from their company. Not only that, but these people will have a better understanding of how the loan works so they can pay it off efficiently and easily. It was tough to actually interview companies, so I watched a couple videos and documentaries on this topic and I found that these businesses will have employee competitions to see who can answer the most calls. This would mean that they are rushing people off the phone which means these people aren’t getting the service they need. My solution could solve this problem and make both parties happy.

I find it interesting how these student loan companies work and how they really don’t care about the people they are offering loans to as long as they are able to make money off of them. It is a problem that needs to be solved soon because of how fast student debt is growing.

24A – Venture Concept No. 1 - Student Loan Advice Service (SLAS)

The idea I am pursuing is a service that will provide people with information about student loans and will build them a personalized plan to ensure that they are not being ripped off by student loan companies. We will analyze their financial situation and determine how quickly they want to pay these loans off in order to break down what they should be paying monthly for their student loans. They can then take this plan and send it to their student loan provider to ensure that they are able to efficiently and comfortably pay off their student loans.

This opportunity is created because recent information has come out that has proven that student loans companies are screwing over thousands of students and former students in order to make more money. There is really nothing these people can doe specially because the customer service for these companies is awful. They are forced to scour the internet for information that may not always be accurate and may not be related to their specific situation. Therefore, my service has a large potential market of people that need a problem solved. The market is defined as former and current students that are still dealing with paying off student loans. Customers are currently trying to satisfy this need themselves which is difficult especially because many aren’t knowledgable in student loans and personal finance at the level that they need to be. There is no loyalty to this system because they know they don’t have enough information. This opportunity is huge seeing that hundreds of thousands of people need to pay off their student loans AND make ends meet at the same time, giving this product an infinite window of opportunity.

In terms of innovation, this service hits the mark. Nobody has done something like this before and been successful despite the huge market. We will be radically different in that we will be able to provide completely personal information and only charge a small monthly fee of $20/month. We are able to use this money to innovate even more and scale the company. Since we don’t have very many maintenance fees, all the money can be poured into growth. Even then, we could use the extra money to build a fund for people that aren’t as fortunate to pay for their student loans are college tuition to help them make ends meet.

This service will without a doubt decrease overall student debt because the largest problem many people face is that ability to gather and understand the vast amount of information all over the internet about student loans. Customers will buy this product because there is nothing like this that currently exists so there is no difficulty in getting them to switch from their current situation. There are also no competitors which gives me the entire market to play with. Ultimately, all the money will  be poured into customer support and experience since that is the whole idea for our service. These costs are not high relative to other companies, meaning we can charge a cheaper monthly fee and still do extremely well. I would initially start off with few employees, around 2-3, and scale when we have more customers. Ultimately, the goal is to have a service that can help millions with student debt will providing a personal, friendly conversation to show our dedication to the customer.

Our venture’s secret sauce is that fact that nobody has done this before. We are then allowed full creativity to build the service and not have to rush out something because we are worried about competition. We will get that edge and once people see our success and try to imitate it, we will already be way ahead of the curve and outperform them by simple innovations.

Once we are able to significantly help solve the problem, the next idea would be to build a foundation and have a large amount of our earnings go to the foundation which is dedicated to offering scholarships and providing tuition to children that may not be financially well off.

Overall, the idea is still in its beginning stages and I am looking forward to continuing to tweak and innovate the idea before releasing it to the public. This is something I am extremely interested in and would love to hear anyone’s opinion and advice in order to make the product even better.