Monday, 5 March 2018

Week 11 - Leadership - Entrepreneurialism and Crowdfunding 12 February 2018

Entrepreneurialism
We begin this weeks' session by asking questions such as what do entrepreneurs do? Who can be entrepreneurs? Why is this so powerful now? and what must we do as teachers?  Is there risk? Is it managed? Can everyone do it? 
The NZ Curriculum - Education for Enterprise
Education for Enterprise is about promoting an approach to learning – one that is real, relevant, and gives students responsibility for their learning.
The Vision of NZ Curriculum (2016) is for young people who will be creative, energetic, and enterprising, who will seize the opportunities offered by new knowledge and technologies to secure a sustainable social, cultural, economic, and environmental future for our country
Entrepreneurial Skills
According to Aileron (2017), the top skills every entrepreneur needs are
  • Resiliency. 
    • The ability to weather the ups and downs of any business since it never goes exactly the way the business plan described it. This skill enables the entrepreneur to keep going when the outlook is bleak.
  • Focus. 
    • After setting a long term vision, knowing how to “laser focus” on the very next step to get closer to the ultimate goal. There are so many distracting forces when trying to build a business that this skill is not easy to master.
  • Invest for the long-term. 
    • Most entrepreneurs are not patient and focus only on what comes next, rather than where the company needs to go. Overnight success may take 7 to 10 years. Entrepreneurs need to stop, pause and plan on a quarterly basis.
  • Find and manage people. 
    • Only by learning to leverage employees, vendors and other resources will an entrepreneur build a scalable company. They need to learn to network to meet the right people. Entrepreneurs strive to guarantee they will get honest and timely feedback from all these sources.
  • Sell. 
    • Every entrepreneur is a sales person whether they want to be or not. They are either selling their ideas, products or services to customers, investors or employees. They work to be there when customers are ready to buy. Alternately, they know how to let go and move on when they are not.
  • Learn. 
    • Successful entrepreneurs realize they don’t know everything and the market is constantly changing. They stay up to date on new systems, technology, and industry trends.
  • Self-reflection. 
    • Allow downtime to reflect on the past and plan for the future. Always working only leads to burnout physically and emotionally.
  • Self-reliance. 
    • While there is a lot of help for the entrepreneur, in the end, they need to be resourceful enough to depend on themselves.
How does this skill set map to other lists of skills we have examined on the course?
Social Entrepreneurship
Social entrepreneurship aims in some way to increase ‘‘social value,’’ i.e. to contribute to the welfare or well being in a given human community. The key to social enterprise involves taking a business-like, innovative approach to the mission of dealing with complex social needs or delivering community services. (Peredo & McLean, 2006; Pomerantz, 2003).
Social enterprise
Social enterprise is an organisation that applies commercial strategies to maximise improvements in human and environmental well-being - this may include maximising social impact rather than profits for external shareholders. Social enterprises are part of a continuum of enterprise types with different agendas. In class we will look at the akina.org.nz/ventures programmes and consider where they sit on this continuum.
Lean Canvas - Startup Vision
The Lean Canvas (e.g. leanstack.com) maps out a potential startup vision.
Lean focuses on problems, solutions, key metrics and competitive advantages, and promises an actionable and entrepreneur-focused business plan. 
Half-Baked.com
Dave McClure came up with the original concept of ‘HalfBaked.com: Entrepreneurial Improv Theatre.’
Act 1: Start by having people yell out 50 or so random words.
Act 2: Each team given 2 words + ".com"
Act 3: Teams have 10 min to prepare their BlankBlank.com business plan
Act 4: Each team does a 5 minute pitch on their product
Act 5: Vote on who did the best job
In class we will be doing an activity that has been developed by Nick Hindson and The Mind Lab PG team from this idea: Half-baked Lean Canvas which is in the media for this week.
The Mind Lab Process
Create teams of between 3 - 5 people. Gather 30 random words from the group. Each team then chooses 2 words.
1. Start by thinking of real problems that somehow relate to those two words, add that into part 1 of the canvas.
2. Think about who are having the problem you chose to look at. Who are being affected by that? Then choose your main customer group that you want to focus on.
3. Ideate some solutions. Write down your favourite one to your lean canvas. Prepare a 30 sec elevator pitch about your business idea.
Take turns pitching your business ideas. The team that pitches the idea must listen to feedback without replying. Other teams discuss things they 'wonder about' and 'like'.
4. Based on the feedback make updates. Then consider who are your early adopters (the ones that are easiest to market your idea to).
5/6. What channels will you use to reach your customers? (How will you market it?) What resources do you need? (Human, finance ...) How can you make the plan sustainable and possible?
7. Purpose. Why do you want to do this? Why is it important? What is the big purpose behind it?
The Mind Lab by Unitec - Lean Form
We've developed The Mind Lab by Unitec Lean Form that helps you to explain and critique your innovation plan in a lean way. We hope this is a useful tool for your DIGITAL 2 assessment. Note that although Digital 2 and Leadership 2 are submitted together, this week we are just focusing on the Digital 2 component.
Filling in the form and seeking feedback (and feedforward) from your fellow students might help you to explain the innovation and critique it. Remember to keep your answers Lean!
Once you have answered in class, you can view the responses from others and copy your own data to another document for reference.
Crowdfunding
With crowdfunding, an entrepreneur raises external financing from a large audience (the “crowd”), in which each individual provides a very small amount, instead of soliciting a small group of sophisticated investors. 
In class we will look at the crowdfunding projects shared at: tinyurl.com/TMLCFund
Provini (2014) provides the following ideas for how you might raise money for schools with crowdfunding: 
  1. Use crowdfunding for specific projects or needs, rather than general fundraising
  2. Identify a safe, flexible and transparent platform
  3. Start with reasonable goals
  4. Break large projects into smaller steps
  5. Prepare workgroup members to do intensive marketing
  6. Marketing messages matter!
  7. Target different levels of donors (alumni, community members, parents, local business owners, etc.)
  8. Consider offering rewards and incentives for larger contributors
  9. Offer students leadership opportunities and take advantage of teachable moments
Crowdfunding in New Zealand
Davis (2014) provides a useful guide to crowdfunding in New Zealand. One of the crowdfunding platforms he mentions is PledgeMe, who have created a Crowdfunding Canvas to help potential applicants (see tinyurl.com/TMLPMCC).
Some other platforms include
Building an understanding of business
More and more young people are using crowdfunding platforms to gain public support to seed fund new start ups and early expansion plans for businesses.
Other ideas that students can use to build an understanding of business, entrepreneurship, marketing, target markets, sales, budgeting and economics include:
  1. Creating a online shop on a low cost platform such as etsy.com. Online shops can allow students to sell items as diverse as art, crafts, digital assets such as Minecraft characters and simple services eg. car grooming, garage sorting, pet minding etc
  2. Set up a school-wide or community-based pop-up fair where parents with businesses can sell slow moving or end of line products by hiring a stand where the community can shop.
  3. Create a community garden at the school and grow vegetables for sale at farmers markets or to parents. Choose seasonal items that make for great after school snacks (for parents to buy) such as strawberries and carrots.
Resources for teachers and students
Young Enterprise offers a range of enterprise programmes and financial literacy resources that can be used by teachers throughout New Zealand. Each resource is designed for a specific age group, and aligns to the New Zealand Curriculum. www.youngenterprise.org.nz/
References:
Aileron. (2017). The Top Skills Every Entrepreneur Needs. Forbes.com. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/aileron/2013/11/26/the-top-skills-every-entrepreneur-needs/
Davis, V. (2014, Feb). The ultimate guide to crowdfunding in New Zealand. idealog. Retrived from https://idealog.co.nz/venture/2014/02/ultimate-guide-crowdfunding-new-zealand
Peredo, A. M., & McLean, M. (2006). Social entrepreneurship: A critical review of the concept. Journal of world business, 41(1), 56-65.
Pomerantz, M. (2003). The business of social entrepreneurship in a ‘‘down economy’’. In Business, 25(3).
Provini, C. (2014). Raise Money With Crowdfunding: Top 9 Tips for Schools. Retrieved from http://www.educationworld.com/a_admin/crowdfunding-fundraising-schools-tips-best-practices.shtml
The NZ Curriculum Online. (2016). The NZ Curriculum: Vision. Ministry of Education. Retrieved from http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/The-New-Zealand-Curriculum  
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