Examples of homework high scores

Business Basics Homework #1

(1)

I do not believe that these 3 different prototypical pitches effectively and efficiently describe good pitchers. However, I do believe that the first prototype given, the Showrunner, is a ‘good pitcher’ and that the second type, the Artist, certainly can get by and succeed as a ‘good pitcher’, but the 3rd prototype, the Neophyte, I highly doubt that this particular prototype has what it takes to be a ‘good pitcher’. I consider the first pitcher a good example of a good pitcher, because this prototype is an intellect. Showrunners are charismatic and can pull you into what they are telling you. They attract their audience and have a way to make the catcher believe what they are saying. They come over very promising and due to their intellect, their ‘creative thinking’, their passion and their ability to “improvise”, they give the catcher a feeling as thought they know what they are doing and that they are a person the catcher can put his faith into. They seem as though they are on the same level as the catcher. Therefore the pitches given by this type has a high success rate for being taken up by the catchers. Further, the second prototype comes over as a successful pitcher, because of their creativity and the passion that they exude. This type has ideas and brilliant ones as well. These ideas do not come in the form of a singular unit, but they are a fraction of many more ideas this person can come up with. With a character like this, the catcher knows he can get much out of this type. This type is like an investment, where the benefits can be reaped from various angles. Also, because this type shows so much passion and vision in their ideas, they pull the catcher into it. This type lives in their own world and during a pitch they pull the catcher into it, until it becomes their world too. They engage the catcher and because their world becomes the catchers’ world, the idea becomes the catchers’ idea as well, and who really says “No” to their own idea. That’s why I also believe that this type is a good pitcher. The last type I do not consider a ‘good pitcher’, because this type sounds too gullible and undeveloped. The research was done on Hollywood people and allegedly Hollywood folks are known to be self-absorbed. That’s why in this research a positive/good pitcher would be someone who gives the Hollywood person a chance to make up the idea him-/herself and to make it seem as though they know better/more than the pitcher. However, outside of Hollywood I highly doubt an ignorant, innocent, gullible character would succeed when pitching an idea. In most cases, someone who sounds like they don’t know what they are doing or what they are about, they rarely have a chance to succeed. Also, there is a difference between involving the catchers in the idea making and having them do most of it themselves. In that case you become redundant and they wouldn’t need you anymore. My 4th prototype would be the Comrade. A friend, an associate, someone you can work with and trust in. A person that sounds like they are on your level and that they are thinking in your direction. This is a person you can trust to fulfil your mutual goal. This person is knowledgeable on the issue at hand, but he/she can talk to the catcher like he/she’s been his (best)friend since junior high. A ‘Comrade’-pitcher is a person who can gain the catchers’ trust and devotion while pitching. I consider someone like this to have a high success rate and to be a ‘good pitcher’.  (10/10)

The article points out that a catcher doesn't just judge the idea, but also judges the pitcher. If the pitcher is categorized as incompetent then he or she will be rejected, regardless of the idea. This places some pressure on the pitcher to not only have a good idea, but also to appear as a person that can come up with good ideas! The three prototypes – the showrunner, the artist and the neophyte – do not necessarily describe good pitchers when it comes down to the content of the pitch. But according to the author's research, they do describe effective pitcher stereotypes. If you look like one of these three prototypical pitchers, then your chances of your idea being liked go up, according to the author. This can actually result in the situation where a pitcher is so good at appearing competent, that he can convince catchers to accept bad ideas. One thing I do not like about the stereotypes that the author came up with, is that he seems them mostly on how creative they appear. Perhaps because the author originally created his theory in the movie business. In entrepreneurship, the creativity of the pitcher is not as important as in thinking of new movie or tv show ideas, and other traits might be more important. In the article on “Opportunity Recognition as Pattern Recognition” it is mentioned that inexperienced entrepreneurs might focus only on the novelty or newness of an idea, while experienced entrepreneurs focus on more important aspects, such as cash flow and manageable risk. I would suspect that good catchers in the entrepreneurial world will therefore not focus solely on creativity, but also on other aspects of the idea, and thus also on other aspects in the pitcher. The pitcher needs to appear like a good entrepreneur, not just as a good idea creator. For this reason I would assume that the 'artist' type will not be as successful in convincing catchers in the entrepreneurial world. He might have a novel idea, but how will he make it work? Can he stay focused and determined and deal with all the problems that will come up? The artist stereotype might be good at making up wacky ideas, but not at running a business or creating a good business plan. So I wouldn't go for the artist prototype if I were to pitch my idea. A fourth prototype could be “The Expert”. This would go to the opposite extreme as “The Artist”, by not focusing on crazy creativity, but by focusing on excellent entrepreneurial qualities. There is already the showrunner, who combines some know-how with creative thinking and passion. But in the business world, it might pay to appear less flashy, but very knowledgeable, reliable, intelligent and experienced. To appear like you know how to run a business, and will be able to handle any problem that comes your way.You know how it works, you've seen it before, and you know that the idea you have now will work. I guess that this person could be a somewhat older person, dressed in a stylish and professional way, looking attractive, calm and confident. Ideally the pitcher would have some sort of reputation that would impress the catchers. This whole appearance would have the effect of “Well, I guess he knows what he's talking about!” on the catcher, and would in this way convince him or her. (10/10)

If we take the assumption that we are stereotyped in less than a second, the 3 pitches presented to us are in a way extremes and would not be the most effective and efficient categorizations. The reason for this is the oversimplification of the candidates. If a candidate has an obvious category attached to them, other factors for choosing them must be considered. The section “Catchers Beware” warns catchers to not fall for these stereotypes, which means this topic is an issue and is thought about before choosing the pitchers, meaning once the stereotype is identified they can look for more subtle characteristics of the person and even ask questions which could break loose there stereotype. As an example let’s look at “The Showrunner”. This pitcher contains characteristics such as charisma and wit, and practical intelligence. They can do a beautiful presentation and show off their know-how and even provide an implementation process, however when you looking at this pitcher as the “complete package”, if being aware of the stereotype, an obvious question comes into mind. Does this pitcher’s idea meet the expectations of his actual presentation? I have looked up there example Ron Popeil online, and I perceive him as a typical infomercial appearance presenter who gain there sales from gullible people sitting in front of their TVs. Meaning a person like this surly cannot sell something, to more serious, above average intelligent people portraying themselves as the catchers. Another example of this is a person who sells body training equipment on TV. They don’t look for an idea which is “innovative” and effectively improve your body but rather an idea which shows off sex appeal on TV to catch enough buyers in a 15 minute interval. Such things I would assume should not catch the attention of catchers. Similar arguments can be given to artists and neophyte. For artists there are “posers” who I think would actually be able to fake being an artists and steal someone else’s idea during the presentation, and if further question would be asked he/she would crack under the pressure. For neophyte cases it seems as more accidental situation characteristics because they can easily be classified as a pushover. The only category which should exist is “The Natural”. First the person shows his high intelligence and understands of the world, looking at it from the top. Then the person presents his idea constantly asking the “right” and in some cases rhetorical questions to his catchers. He would answer the questions with them, and keep the catchers in suspense until the climax. He would put them in his place, and lead them through a deductive logical construct of his presentation, without giving away the final “twist” of his idea until the very end, where people would go “Oh yeahhhh”. This person would be considered as “the mastermind”, he would show calmness, confidence, clear vision, possibly a few jokes to show off his creative side, and most importantly show how he is able to complete something from beginning to the very end with a general framework in mind.  (10/10)

(2)

Entrepreneurial opportunities exist because people have a different opinion about the value of resources at a given point in time. They develop different beliefs, because the prices do not contain all the information necessary to make decisions about the value of the recourses. The essence of entrepreneurship is being different, being different because one has a different perception of the situation. This difference leads a person to believe that prices do not accurately represent the value of goods and services, and that the potential exists to generate a better alternative to buying or selling resources than the one that currently exists. Necessary is that all others must not share her opinion, because then the prices for the resources would go up and then there wouldn’t be entrepreneurial opportunities. For example the entrepreneur Daniel Ox thought that to combine an online platform with selling of fruit, he could make a profit of it. He made profit because the subcontractor of fruit sold the fruit for less then Daniel Ox could sell the fruit online. If the subcontractor gave the same value to the fruit as Daniel Ox did, Daniel Ox couldn’t make a profit of it, and there wouldn’t be an entrepreneurial opportunity. (10/10)

Entrepreneurial opportunities can exist because prices do not contain all of the information necessary to make decisions about the value of resources. In economic theory, prices contain all the information from all the participants in the economy needed to allocate resources. But the price system has limits. For example, prices do not contain information about future goods and services, and prices don't contain information about a way of producing or organizing that requires technology that does not yet exist. Nor do prices contain information about the actions of competitors in response to entrepreneurial entry. If resource owners actually did have this information about the future, if there was no uncertainty at all, then the resource owners would know exactly how much their resources would be worth to entrepreneurs in recombined form, and could adjust their prices accordingly, thus making the entrepreneurial profit zero. However, resource owners do not have this information, and prices do not contain information about future events or possibilities. There is uncertainty, and it is thanks to this uncertainty that entrepreneurial opportunities can exist. Entrepreneurs can make decisions based on non-price based factors and come to the conclusion that current prices do not accurately represent the value of goods or services. The entrepreneur can then in some way recombine resources and sell the output at a higher price, making entrepreneurial profit. So for an entrepreneur to perceive an opportunity, he must believe that the value of resources is higher than the cost of obtaining and transforming them. Furthermore, others must not share this opinion about the value of the resources. If everybody believed that the resource was more valuable than its price, then of course the entrepreneurial opportunity would quickly cease to exist. So entrepreneurial opportunities can only exist when people have different opinions or beliefs about the value of resources. The entrepreneur must either possess different information from others, or interpret the same information differently to find a profitable entrepreneurial opportunity. For example, if all other entrepreneurs think the same as you do, and there are many entrepreneurs looking for opportunities in the same place, then the odds of you finding a good entrepreneurial opportunity is very small. Because the future development of resources, technology, et cetera is uncertain, creativity is necessary for the entrepreneur to form opinions about assumptions that can't be proven yet. The best decisions cannot be calculated, but need to be made using creativity. Even if it can be objectively said that new opportunities exist, an entrepreneur must still creatively make new means-ends frameworks first. Entrepreneurial opportunities exist because an entrepreneur can know something the resource owner does not, so the resource owner will sell or lease resources at a price low enough for the entrepreneur to earn a profit on the recombination. Entrepreneurial profit is possible when the entrepreneur can better judge things like production, new market opportunities, new ways of producing existing products or new products that satisfy customer wants or needs than resource owners, and could obtain resources for less than they ultimately proved to be worth. The entrepreneurial profit is the reward that the entrepreneur earns for exercising judgment about a new means-ends framework. An example of this now is Groupon. Groupon is a website, on which businesses can post deals. The deals are at least 50% off of the normal price. The deal only goes through when a certain number of people buys the product of service from Groupon, and this number is determined by the business that offers the deal. So, basically, the business is guaranteed a big influx of new customers, and the customers get a great discount on Groupon. The theory above can be used to explain why Groupon is effective. The men behind Groupon made up a new means-ends framework. They observed that people on the internet buy products in large numbers to get discounts, and they realized that the new social media could be utilized as a means to let people buy a certain product or service in large numbers. This means for the buyer that he gets a good deal on the product (at least 50% off), and it means for the company that offers the deal through Groupon that 1) the deal is shown to thousands or even millions; 2) the company only pays when a person actually buys the product or service; 3) the company is guaranteed a self-determined minimum of buyers, and only pays when this minimum of buyers is achieved. Otherwise the deal will not go through. Because the deal needs a minimum number of takers to go through, Groupon urges people to tell all their friends on social networks to take the same deal. Groupon can offer businesses advertisement, potentially creating new, loyal customers and increasing revenues, while giving the customers a very attractive deal. So the power of the new social media and the way that people can communicate and work together on the internet was not yet incorporated into current prices. The powerful ways of using these media to sell products on mass-scale were not yet utilized. Groupon has created this means-ends framework and now reaps the benefits, by making huge profits. (10/10)

(3)

In his article, Shane discusses three factors that influence the likelihood that people will gain early access to information valuable for recognizing opportunities: prior life experience, social network structure and information search. According to me, it is important to gain access to information that facilitates the discovery of opportunity; therefore, it is important to search for that information. The logic of this argument is that people are more likely to find information that is useful to the discovery process through deliberate search than through random behavior. I think that searching for information is essential in our Minor, because even though we all have different knowledge and background, most probably very few of the participants have work experience or other activity that gives preferential access to the knowledge necessary for opportunity discovery. Furthermore, not everyone can find information about entrepreneurial opportunities through their social network either. Therefore, in my opinion it is substantial for our Minor to search for and find information ourselves, especially in places where others do not look. As Shane suggests, we will be more likely to find information useful to the discovery of entrepreneurial opportunities, by searching for relevant private information than through random efforts, or efforts to examine public information. (9/10)

Life experience - Social networks - Search processes. I think at this moment the most important source of information for identifying entrepreneurial opportunities is my social network. Although my social network is not that large it is filled with people who have entrepreneurial spirits and are happy to discuss ideas for new ventures. Talking to these people brings me a lot of new insights. For example, yesterday I was telling my sister about this minor. She has two kids and she told me that pregnant women are extremely eager to buy stuff, because this is one of the few ways how they can express their care for the unborn child. So pregnant women are a very interesting target group. Wow, I would have never thought of that! I'm a good listener so the stories, opinions, experiences and critique from people in my social network are a source of information I'm happy to tap into. (9/10)

According to Shane everybody has access to information from 3 sources. This information makes it possible for a person to know that an entrepreneurial opportunity is present. These 3 sources are: life experience, social networks and search processes. In my case, social network would be the most suitable for our minor to identify entrepreneurial opportunities. In daily life I am constantly in contact with many people. As each person is different I have access to a wide variety of information. This information will be valued differently by different people, this way I get a better sense of what is going on around me, what could finally lead to opportunity discovery. In my personal life I am member of several sport clubs and a student fraternity while I am also actively involved in university. Furthermore I frequently meet new people, which is a source of gaining information and leads to a continual exchange of information. However this cannot always be valued as trustworthy. Shane mentions the so called strong ties with people you trust in his article. In my case this would be my relatives. My relatives have great experience in different sort of markets and areas of expertise. This provides me with information that I highly value. In case of the minor I am sure this will be of great help. However I believe that combining my social network with information search is the best way to identify entrepreneurial opportunities.  (9/10)

(4)

I am most interested in practical aspects of the theory: what can I use now? First of all, the author explains that students must be taught to look for opportunities in the best places in the best ways, and to connect the dots in a good way. It is only hinted at what the best places are, and little is said about what the best way of looking for opportunities in these places is. Knowing more about how to look in the best places in the best ways would of course be very beneficial to anyone looking to be an entrepreneur. According to the article, pattern recognition or 'connecting the dots', is crucial in recognizing new opportunities, and this can also integrate three factors important in recognizing opportunities (searching for an idea, alertness to ideas and previous experience). How does one become good at connecting the dots? What it comes down to, according to the author, is mainly experience. Through experience prototypes and exemplars are created in our minds, as well as a general cognitive framework that can aid in finding ideas. However, when you take a look at real life, you find that many of the most experienced people couldn't come up with successful entrepreneurial ideas if their lives depended on it. Even the most capable, intelligent or successful people in a particular field are not necessarily good entrepreneurs. In the article itself it is also mentioned that some entrepreneurs start many businesses, but still are not very successful, and apparently lack the good prototypes and exemplars and so on that should be gotten from experience. Yet it is suggested in the article that entrepreneurs-to-be should gain experience in many fields. So to me, important and as of yet unanswered questions are: How does one benefit the most from gained experience? What is the quickest, best, most efficient way to a successful entrepreneur's cognitive framework? Clearly, gaining experience for the sake of gaining experience is not a guarantee for success. Even repeated experience in entrepreneurial ventures is not a guarantee for success. So apparently, some people gain experience and are capable of using that experience to aid in pattern recognition, while others seem to be unable to learn any lessons from experience. This is especially important because gaining experience in many fields is VERY costly. If there is a most efficient way for doing this, it's important to know. Relevant and useful experience seems to be the most crucial factor that separates good entrepreneurs from non-entrepreneurs or bad entrepreneurs. The author also suggests that students could be exposed to many examples of businesses, some successful and some not. Then they could generate good exemplars and learn what are important features of good businesses. This seems easy enough. Could this process be used to generate useful exemplars in any field of interest and relevance? Wouldn't this be a great shortcut to generating exemplars that are normally gained from years of experience? If a program could be devised that teaches students what works through useful examples, it could speed up their journey to becoming a successful entrepreneur.  (10/10)


Cases in Entrepreneurship homework for Week #2

(Short Answer 1)

This short phrase has rather big applications for practices of creative management, entrepreneurship, R&D management, HRM, information management etcetera. For example, traditional scientific management was concerned with maximizing productivity of labor. More recent approaches, such as SWOT analysis, emphasize minimizing threats and weaknesses, while utilizing strengths to capitalize on opportunities. However, both models are primarily concerned with risk avoidance. New notions argue that managers responsible for guiding creative teams, need not to manage creativity – i.e. they do not need to order their subordinates to produce creative output; rather – managers need to foster an environment which will nurture the production of creative output by teams of creative professionals. There is a multitude of strategic approaches to how can one manage for creativity, you can see for example: Eisenhardt (2001), Amabile & Khaire (2008), Kaiser et al. (2007). What most of the work has in common, is the fact that creative teams really do need a certain level of autonomy in which they are free to experiment, design and create. What managers must provide, are platforms that at the same time give teams autonomy, yet direct creativity in the spheres that the company wants to go. In sum, I think that it is a reasonable assumption, that if a manger wants his team to be creative he needs to give it a certain direction, but from that point on let the team work out the way to the given direction. However, this only applies to teams/firms where creativity is required. One does not want to give too much creative power to a train driver, or an assembly-worker responsible for car air-bags. In creative teams, creativity is indeed a process, not the outcome. (7/8)

(Short Answer 2)

To answer this I will attempt to make a complete list of the people and companies needed to design and commercialize the VIdCard service: - Logo and company image creator - Website builder - Card designer - Printing service - Postal service - Marketing partners So far, VidCard appears to bear the characteristics of a company needing low-complexity organizational decision making. The above listed ‘actors’ each represent their own knowledge set (N) and these knowledge sets have a very low degree of interdependence (K factor is low), making the venture decomposable (of low complexity). Due to its low complexity an experimental or directional search towards the best solutions, in the VidCard venture, will be rather easy. This experimental search is made possible by the fact that the ‘actors’ are independent of one another. Thus, making changes in the organization can be done without affecting the whole system. For this venture knowledge sharing between the actors is unnecessary because they can perform the work we need without knowing about the other aspects of the organization (eg. The postal service does not need to know how and why the cards are being made to do the work outsourced to them). The governance mode that will be most effective for our venture is markets because that is the one best suited to low complexity decision making. “The most significant fact about this system is the economy of knowledge which it operates, or how little the individual participants need to know (about other actors) in order to be able to take the right action”. (7.5/8)


Cases in Entrepreneurship homework for Week #3

(Short Answer 1)

Overall, I think that all the information in the article is applicable in some parts to the context of the Minor. However, there are some parts that may seem too extreme and beyond the situations we face during this minor. The article is in some ways too advanced and it lacks a lot of consideration for “green” entrepreneurs—entrepreneurs who are completely new to the game and who need to learn the very basics. The article places a lot of emphasis on experience, which almost all of us within this Minor will lack. The article states that we should be familiar with the industry and that will guarantee us more success, however most since we are all still in university, the kind of experience this article asks for of its readers is not applicable for us. Secondly, the article speaks of a long process for a venture that an entrepreneur may try to begin. The article mentions how the venture and the process of the venture can change over time, due to the venture itself or external circumstances. This is also not applicable within the Minor because we only have a short period of time to do all that we may need for our venture, whereas the article leans towards a much longer time. Though circumstances may affect us and it may change aspects of our venture, the time that the article implies is not for us within this minor. Lastly, the article speaks about seeking financials from investors, particularly “big-time” investors. For the minor seeking such investors will be very unlikely, primarily because of the projects we are doing in the minor. For us, most of the financial resources may need to come from our own pockets or generous sponsors. However, finding the kind of investors the article speaks of, us not likely for us in this Minor. (7/8)

One thing the author seems to assume in the article on “How to Write a Great Business Plan” is that the reader has certain beliefs about what should be in a business plan and how one should approach the writing of a business plan. According to the author, many of these commonly held beliefs are wrong, and the author points out in the article what a great business plan does look like. Since many of the students in the Minor have very little experience with and knowledge of writing business plans, these assumptions may be incorrect. In explaining the details of a good business plan, the author also seems to make the assumption that the reader is in a relatively advanced stage both with his venture and the organization of his team, as well as with his knowledge and experience in entrepreneurship and the industry of the venture. One paragraph in particular that does not fully apply to our Minor is the part about “the people” (pages 3 and 4). It is true that the people in our teams are very important for the success of our venture, and I definitely believe that potential investors look at the qualities of the team members and the team as a whole. But the author of the article emphasizes how important it is that the members of the venture's team know the right people and that they are familiar with the industry players and dynamics. Extensive knowledge in the venture's type of product or service, as well as experience in management, are highly valued according to the author. Furthermore, it is important that the team members have worked together successfully before. These criteria are not realistic in the context of our Minor. Some of the qualities we may be able to develop during the Minor: we can learn about the industry we are in, get to know some of the “right people”, and we can learn about our venture's type of product or service. However, almost all of the Minor students are young students who have not yet gathered extensive experience in entrepreneurship or management. Second of all, the groups were formed quickly and chaotically during the bootcamp, and the team members usually did not know each other before the minor. Finally, the teams in the minor had to come up with a good idea for a venture in a short period of time, and it is extremely unlikely that all the members of a team have “extensive knowledge in the venture's type of product or service” and so on. So this part of the article does not apply to the context of our Minor. If anything, it explains what we still lack and have to work on. Later on in the article there are more examples of how the author makes assumptions about the reader that do not apply to the students in the Minor and their ventures. For example, the author generally assumes that the venture has already hired employees and managers and so on. The article talks about the venture's lawyers and accountants for example. These are things that will probably take place after the Minor, but not during the Minor. The author says that “management might be able to have an impact on regulations or on industry standards through lobbying efforts”, which again assumes a bigger and more powerful team or venture than what we generally have in the Minor. In the article, the author also gives examples of getting key raw materials from Namibia, or taking evidence from the past week for the best of 50 locations and extrapolating. In the Minor we do not have the money, the people or the technology to start up big, so we have to start relatively small. In the article, it is mentioned that a venture should first start small and experiment, to find out the true economics and risks of their venture. This is what we CAN do during the Minor, and what will potentially help us to get to the level where we need to be according to the article. And of course, the piece about “Intrapreneurial ventures” does not apply in the context of our minor, because we are entrepreneurs and do not work inside an established company. (7/8)

(Short Answer 2)

These percentages confirm the articles description of the different kinds of entrepreneurial activities. The percentages of those that have started a business and those that have given up are very much higher than those that are still trying. I find this quite surprising, because those that are still trying are not showing much intensity or activity, however they still choose to continue with their activities, although it clearly shows that they are not being very successful. The activities that the minor supports are: Models/Prototype development, Organize a start-up team, Look for facilities and equipment, Invest our own money, A prepared plan. Besides the prototype/model development, all these activities rank high as activities businesses should take, within the first 5 years. The minor does not: Look for funding or financial support, devote full time to the project, hire employees (particularly since we do not have any money) or actively involve sales (there might not be enough time to guarantee this). To continue after the minor we will definitely have to: Save money to invest or use the other to forms of funding mentioned in the article, because there is no business without money. Without the right amount of money a business cannot operate, so if we want to continue after the semester, we will definitely need future funding. Also we will have to ensure that our product sells. These two activities show very high percentages for continuing and starting a business. Also we might need a license or a patent, as the article shows this is also very important for starting business. Also we will need to buy facilities and equipment and not just look for them. The article shows that 85% of the starting businesses engaged in this activity. Last we will need to file federal taxes, or taxes in general to continue our business. This is one of the highest-ranking “Start-up indicators” in the article with a percentage of 71%. All the other categories do not engage in this activity, so for a continuing or a starting business my team will also have to do this.  (7.5/8)