Week 9 -- Continuous Improvement w/ Systems Thinking

Skills:

Every business or nonprofit movement requires continuous assessment by its team to grow in the right direction.  At the heart of this assessment is a "systems" view, understanding that no one part of anything can be viewed in isolation from its broader system.  

We discussed principles from the following video presentations:

Eric Berlow:  Simplifying Complexity
(3.5 min video on systems analysis from ecologist’s perspective)

A Systems Story
(4 min.  really great video.)

Tom Wujek:  Got a Wicked Problem?  First Tell Me How You Draw Toast
(excellent activity in systems thinking and collaborative visualization)

We then explored systems analysis using Tom Wujek's Draw Toast Activities, starting with drawing the process for making toast.  Here is the classes favorite picture, Jin's alternative #2, in which a mother gives birth to a baby and simply names her/him "Toast."  

Each Student approached the step-by-step analysis differently.  We could see how each person's unique approach to this process contributed different elements that could be used in creating a comprehensive, better collaborative process.  We tried this with another process dear to the hearts of our Students:  "how should parents assign chores to their children?"

The Students started by mapping this process individually, and then breaking out into teams of four to collaborate on a group design.  One unique team proposal included a "level-up" approach from video gaming in which the children choose to take on a more challenging set of chores for a reward.  (Parents, take note.)

Thomas took on the tool of collaborative visualization in exploring possible flavors for his cactus juice.  He and a group of students wrote out their best ideas on colored cards and then used clustering and laddering to arrange the best ideas and come up with news ones. 

Guest:

Rob Brunt of Blueline Services.  

Like our Students, Rob jumped into entrepreneurship in high school. He joined DECA and took his marketing presentation to wins at the state and regional championships.  

Rob's training included joint degrees in marketing and Russian at the U of U, an MBA from Thunderbird, time in DC developing foreign-sourcing proposals for the Senate Energy Committee, and work overseas.  
  
After interviewing with global finance firms in New York, Rob realized that his heart was in striking his own path as an entrepreneur.  Instead of taking the traditional track with an established firm, he moved his family to Minnesota to work closely with an investor who helped him launch Blueline.  Rob has since started other businesses and plans to continue doing more.  

Rob continually asks himself, "how can I leverage technology to make something easier?"  He sees answers to this question everywhere, and laments, "there are so many cool ways to make money with new ideas, but so little time."

He challenged our Students to continually ask the key question in considering their businesses and nonprofits:  "is your idea sustainable."  He also encouraged them never to fear making mistakes.  Making mistakes is simply part of the necessary process required to get an idea to market.  

Soapbox:  

Parents, please watch the Systems Story video.  It is short, only 4 minutes long.  You'll love it.  It applies systems thinking to relationships and family life.  

Challenge:  

The challenge this week is to apply methods of systems thinking and collaborative visualization to any aspect of your business.  These tools have powerful application.  

Call Outs:  

Thomas brought in his latest cactus juice recipe to class for taste testing and public feedback.  Everyone loved it, and nobody died.  Great application of basic marketing research principles, Thomas!

Next Week:  

We will study leadership next week and prepare to launch our business / nonprofit offerings.  Next Saturday, Nov. 14, is the Utah Junior Entrepreneurs Fair.  Be there early to set up.  The fair is open to the public from 9:00 - 11:30 a.m.  Please come and support our Students.  

Representatives from the University of Utah's Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute will be at the fair to review our Student's work.   

Week 8 -- Sell

Pillars:

(Coming soon.  David.)

Skills:

We pulled key sales principles (discussion led by the Students) from the following video presentations:  

Jeffery Gitomer's

The Two Most Important Words In Sales

Sales Training - Closing the sale -- the definitive answers you won't like.

Dr. Robert Cialdini and Steve Martin: Science of persuasion

(this is an excellent video on ethical ways to persuade and build commitment)

Then we studied application of these principles while watching Grant Cardone handle two actual live sales calls.  

Key points from the discussion: 

• The first sell is always "you" because either you have established credibility or you haven't.
• Build trust by carrying a positive presence, knowing the customer, knowing the product, and preparing for the sale. 
• Sales are "earned," not "closed."
• Listen well. 
• Asking questions engages people.
• Only promise what you are willing to deliver. 
• Resolve concerns head on -- don't cover them up.
• Lead with small commitments before going big. 
• Make a personal connection and follow up with a personal touch, like a gift.
• Show the reasons why the offering will help the customer.  
• Cement the commitment by asking, "is there any reason you'd change your mind?"
• Ask for other contacts and referrals.  

Guest:

Jeff Kirkham, serial inventor and entrepreneur. 

Jeff has logged 28 years of military service.  He spent his career primarily in the Army Special Forces, serving in various location in the middle east, including Iraq.  

After retiring from military service, Jeff began inventing and building businesses around his inventions.  He currently holds nine patents.  

His inventions that interested our Students the most were his Ready man cards, credit-card size tools for emergency situations.  (He gave us samples of these.)  And his RATS tourniquet.

To generate new ideas, Jeff advised our young entrepreneurs, "walk around Toys R Us."  "That place is full of ideas," he explained.  

Jeff advised us to watch for opportunity amidst change.  He explained that the Internet is quickly transforming the old factory/dealership/distributor/retailer model of business.  He showed us a small package he had recently received directly from the factory in China (after ordering on the Wish app) and asked us to consider how this new exchange model would impact business and create new opportunity.  

Jeff encouraged us to be willing to "fail faster," experimenting with the market.  "Get rid of your ego, and be willing to learn from your mistakes."  He told the story of his experimenting with social-media marketing by trying to sell coffee to a certain market segment.  The experiment was astonishingly successful, and his coffee company is struggling to keep up with orders.  From the experiment, Jeff's team learned that Facebook can be an unprecedented marketing tool with its data analytics, and that its easy to sell humor, a point several Students took to heart.   

Challenge:  

Get out and sell!  Take pre-orders if your product or service offering is not ready.  

Week 7 -- Online Marketing & Social Media

Pillars:

(Coming soon.  David.)

Skills:

Alexis Ohanian of Reddit, “How to make a splash in social media”
Seth Godin, “How to get your ideas to spread”

After watching the following video presentations, our Students led a great discussion around these points: 

• The Internet provides a level playing field for anyone with great idea. 
• The greatest advantage of Internet marketing is that it costs virtually nothing. 
• The disadvantage is that the marketer may have to give up some control over the direction and outcome of the business or movement.  
• The key to getting noticed in the Information Age is to create something remarkable (the purple cow example).  That's what ultimately gets noticed, build, sold, and moved. 
• Taking the traditional "safe" road in marketing can be the most dangerous path of all. 
• Find the people with Otaku, the early adopters who really car about the product or idea you are selling, and they will do the marketing for you.

Guest:

Kelly Cassady, owner of Letter 23, a ad/marketing agency.  (Check out Kelly's print ads in his sample portfolio -- very funny.)

Kelly shared 5 rules to pursuing our marketing plans:

1. Know your goals.
2. Know your audience (customer and competitors).  
3. Be creative (purple-cow principle). 
4. Be consistent.  
5. Repeat often.  

He also helped our crew generate ideas for cheap web development.  

Challenge:  

Get your business online.  Website, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter (even if it is just to show your future customers what you’re up to on a blog).  Explore simple website building tools.  

Week 6 -- Marketing Imagery Set

(We had a shortened week due to the UEA convention.)

Pillars:

What is the difference between money and currency? This week in Pillars we started with this question.  Currency is built upon consumer confidence. It is a medium of exchange, it is portable, fungible, durable and divisible.  Money is all these things as well but stores its value over long period of time.

We then looked at historically every fiat currency has led to overspending by its government, and how for the first time every nation on earth is practicing the use of fiat currency.  History shows that this will open up a great transfer of wealth, and for the young entrepreneur to constantly look for ways to navigate this transfer.

We also examined other economic principles: inflation, deflation, Keynesian economics, and quantitative easing, considering their operation in ancient world economies, and then to discover a deeper thread to help these definitions applicable to the students on their journey of entrepreneurs.  

Skills:

Keeping Promises.  We watched and discussed Alex Sheen’s presentation, “What All Great Superheroes have in Common.”  Alex makes some powerful observations:

• The “superhero ability” is the ability to make and keep a promise.
• In every superhero story (Spiderman, Superman, Batman, etc.) the will to make a superhero promise comes from some extraordinary challenge or difficulty.
• It's not our ability that makes or breaks us (villains have ability too), rather, it is the commitment to do good.

The Students had a great discussion around these points. For example, Will made the point, “if you keep a promise will gain a reputation that you’re trustworthy.”

Soapbox:

"Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising which tempt you to believe that your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires courage."

– Ralph Waldo Emerson