Adventures of Entrepreneurship

I   want to be with the business for about 30 years, growing the business to where I have people working under me as technical directors and other important administrative tasks, while I will focus on overall business ideas and projects. The goals is parking made easy, so as the business grows, I can further expand the idea from universities to cities where parking can be difficult to find, like Downtown Gainesville or New York City. After the 20 years, I want to step back and focus on other ventures and family, but still be there for the company as an advisor, only being called in if there's a situation that the company can't handle or for advice. I chose this strategy because I want to pass on the company to  a new generation and 30 years seems like a good amount of time for me to dedicate to a business that could turn into a company. Plus, that would seem like a good idea for me to retire and start my dream venture.

The book I read was How to Fail at Almost Anything and Still Win Big by Scott Adams. This book was a breakthrough in my mind because of how it tackles the concept of failure and how to rise above it. As college students, we refuse to be discouraged easily and keep our eye on the prize. In reality, college is a big adjustment, and learning how to accept failure and move forward is an even biggest adjustment. We come to realize that failure is a part of the human experience, which Adams discusses heavily in his book. For a class assignment, I would ask students to interview 3 people they think are very successful in their respective field (does not have to be business-related) and ask questions about their viewpoint on failure and what they felt was their biggest failure and how they overcame it.

1) Tell us about a time that you failed this past semester:  I think my biggest failure this past semester was letting myself get burned out. This class has a lot of assignments that require critical thinking or planning, which is hard for me because I wait until the last day or the day of to submit the assignments or do the cupcakes. This got to a point where I kept pushing off the peer review's and cupcake until the last minute and ended up completely forgetting about it until after the deadline. Because of that, I missed out on 4 points and ended up dropping my grade.  2) Tell us what you learned from it:  I learned that I like my GPA more than the 4 hours out of my week that is used to work on these assignments. I also learned that if I finish one assignment a day, it only take maximum one hour each day, which gives me less stress compared to when I'm scrambling to finish all three assignments at midnight the night before. 3) Reflect on what you think about failure: ...

Existing Market  As for what's next, I would expand the product to include cities that are usually crowded and are known for having difficult parking, such as New York City. After interviewing 3 people, I have learned that my existing market could see my venture focus on merging with other parking apps. They have opened up the possibility of combining similar-styled apps with my own, but they would stiff do their respective functions that they were created to do. Based on your own expectations and the feedback you received from customers, set a path for the future. In two to three paragraphs, describe what makes the most sense for your venture in terms of growing in your existing market. New Market I'm sticking with my idea of expanding the app to cities. After interviewing two people from this market, I could see how this app would not be so great for this market specifically. After interviewing these people, I quickly realized that they would not be searching for parking t...

Opportunity. As you know, the University of Florida has one of the most involved student body’s on campus. Because of this, students follow a strict routine and participate in extracurricular activities and on-campus events, meetings, and seminars. Other students utilize campus to meet with friends or study at the library. But while having this set routine, this can change due to the issue of parking. And we all know that parking is not the greatest thing on campus. Especially around the times of 5:00pm-7:00pm, where many events or organization meetings happen simultaneously in the central part of campus, near the library buildings of Marston and Library West. Around those areas, there are 5 big parking areas students will use in the afternoon time to come to campus and continue their activities. But because there is a rush of students coming to campus in that time frame, plus rush-hour for faculty leaving campus, there is a buildup of traffic in those parking areas, causing students t...

My Venture's Unfair Advantage are a mix of 10 human, social and financial capitals: • Empathy : It's valuable, rare and inimitable because it's something that has to come from within. It can be substituted with kindness and empathetic. • Considerate : It's valuable, rare and inimitable because it's something that has to come from within. It can be substituted with kindness and being considerate. • Kindness : It's valuable, rare and inimitable because it's something that has to come from within. It can be substituted with being emphathetic and considerate. • Awareness of others : This is rare and valuable because it's important to understand everyone around you. However, this is imitable and can be subsituted for consideration because the two are similar. • Passion : I would consider this capital to be low on the VRIN scale because many people have different beliefs and passions, especially at the University of Florida, and it can present itself in differ...

A reflection on the feedback you received from your last pitch.  Unfortunately, I did not receive any feedback from my peers so I chose to look at some of my peers' elevator pitches and see what mine was lacking compared to theirs. Something that was missing from my pitch was the comparison. Because I did not have my product already created, my listeners would only be able to imagine the app based on what I tell them. Something else that I noticed was that I needed to follow up on the comparison. I needed to answer the million dollar question after relating the app to other ones out on the market currently: 'How is it similar'? What did you change, based on the feedback? I added more details about the app and specifically mentioning that the app would function as a mix of the Passport Parking app and the RTS Bus Tracking app. I also decided to add the statement at the end saying 'easy and user friendly' because this would make the app more appealing to many pe...

1) What was the general theme of the book?  The book I read was  Makers: The New Industrial Revolution by Chris Anderson. This book essentials argues that we are in the middle of the 3rd industrial revolution due to to available technology and the increased opportunity to create new inventions. 2) How did the book, in your opinion, connect with and enhance what you are learning in ENT3003? Since the beginning of the 21st century, I would say that there has been a general increase of inventions and the release of new products, which can relate to this course because many of these products are the basis for entrepreneurship and creating a new business/industry. This book also related to many of the exercises we do because we are learning how to discover unmet needs, address the issue, create a solution and how to update that solution with feedback. 3) If you had to design an exercise for this class, based on the book you read, what would that exercise involve? Similarly to...

1) This person works for Passport Labs, Inc., who owns the popular Passport parking app students use to easily pay for street parking around the Gainesville area. He is a domain expert because he is familiar with the process of creating an app that extends with parking availability. I found this person after searching through LinkedIn and their website. He explained the simplicity of the structure of the app a little more, but he didn't ask for any favors in return (but I do use the app in Gainesville frequently). This person will help me expand my network for others who are willing to help create and work on this app. 2) This person works at the UF Parking & Transportation Services. She is a marketing expert because she works in the area of parking and is aware of the best way to advertise new products that are used by the department (for ex. the Passport app). I found this person after getting in contact with her thru their website. She explained more about how they ...

1) You. My name is Anisha Patel and honestly, my product will give students one less thing to complain about. I have personally experienced this issue and it brings me no joy to drive an extra 15 minutes just to ensure I have parking on campus. And it sucks extra for students who live on campus and have to park a mile downhill from their dorm, causing them to carry bags of groceries back up to their dorm (and yes, there is emphasis on downhill). I don't want myself, or others, to have this tiny issue because such a crisis during our 4 years in college when we have more important issues to focus on. 2) What are you offering to customers?  I am offering an app that will let students know where the best, available parking is based on the location they would like to arrive at. 3) Who are you offering it to?  I am offering this app to students. My main goal is the University of Florida population, but then expand it to other universities and colleges as the app becomes widely ...

My Avatar is like any UF college student: overly involved, stressing about classes but chooses to procrastinate by meeting with friends or doing any sort of activity that will push off the real stuff they need to accomplish. She is a 22 year old out-of-state college student, about to graduate and move on to medical school to become a surgeon. She lives a basic lifestyle and has many friends, but her closest friends are her roommates. She follows politics, but it is not her main focus. She is a first-generation immigrant college student and is interested in the gym, Netflix, fashion trends and volunteering at a local animal shelter. In fact, she adopted a dog named Rico from that same animal shelter! I would say this avatar is an alternate version of me: we're similar but different at the same time. I kind of gave some of the same characteristics as myself, but also generalized others. For example, I have long, dark-colored hair and a light complexion, but also added glass...

Reflection: Something that stood out to me in the feedback from my peers was the actual delivery of my pitch. A peer recommended that I have a smaller, but more efficient attention-grabber for my listener and use more of my time for the actual solution to the issue. When looking back at my elevator pitch, I realized my peer was right. Because I spent so much time on my introduction, the solution didn't seem as appealing and I went over 90 seconds. Changes I made: I cut some of my elevator pitch, using only relevant details to grab my listener's attention and made the main focus about the solution.