Week 15 Reading reflection

Finally the last article or textbook chapter I will have to read for this class. But I have to say this is by far the most interesting one I read and it’s obvious why this was the last article assignment. Before I read this I had never heard of a think called micro finance and after ire ad it I thought to myself “why didn’t I think of this!” this is such an entrepreneurial idea, so much risk and possibility of failure involved, who would just wake up and think to do this. But this idea is just so amazing and it actually makes a difference. This article tells the story of an Indian women and how she was given a small loan of $200 with that she got a buffalo, solve its milk paid back the loan and made a small profit. She then reinvested her money got another loan and kept doing little things like buying chicken for eggs to sell. She eventually highbred her families daily income from $1-$10. That’s just amazing. The other thing about this venture concept is customer loyalty. When I say this idea has risk involved I don’t mean just customers not paying back your loans i also mean its surroundings. While this company was doing great in villages and helping poor families there where those villagers that robed the company and sues them, eventually kicking them out. But the company stayed ethical. They didn’t give in to threat and didn’t give the bullies any money they just simply left, this gained them customer loyalty from the rest of the village allowing their company to grow substantially in other areas. This is just another point in how much a customer really means to a company and how they are the backbone of the companies over all existence.

Elevator Pitch No.4

Most of the feedback I received was to talk louder and to practice my speech a little more so it comes out clearer. I tried that out for this take. I think that after doing this for so many times you just get better at it.  Mostly everyone liked my other pitches, they likes the short but simple but also informative so I tried not to change a lot of it. 

Final Reflection

Looking back through my blog the ones that stick out to me the most are the assignments that needed to include anytime of video recording. I dreaded these assignments and if it wasn’t for that I would have given this class 100% in the great scale. I have to say this I did very much enjoy this class. I loved that this teacher decided to so something really different by not having exams and my having us do these blogs. We were in charge of our own grades and I think that was also a nice twist because it separates the responsible from the not so responsible. But that leads to my other concern. The fact that we are in charge of our own grades means that it might separate the responsible students but it doesn’t mean it separates the hard working ones. In order for you to get the fullest amount of knowledge from this course you have to take the assignments seriously and you have to be willing to put in the work. There where so many blogs I read that where boring and did the minimum just for the grade, and they probably have the dame grade as me. This problem leads to lack of motivation in my opinion because it doesn’t allow much room for competitiveness. Other than that, I have to give this teacher props. I like his approach of the entrepreneurial concept and I honestly think I have a better understanding of opportunities and how to approach them because of this class. I do not think I’m an entrepreneur but I think this class has laid the foundation to a future entrepreneur.  My best advice for this class is one to stay ahead of the game. This class has a lot of assignments and at some points it can get over whelming but at the same time if you stay on top of it can be an easy yet very interesting effective class. My next piece of advice is to actually take it seriously. If you want to get the most of the 800 or so dollars you paid for this course try and put in the effort and learn a bit. This class has a lot of potential and you can see that it has actually fostered for future entrepreneurs. 

Venture Concept No. 2

Here in Gainesville towing companies make a fortune charging individuals for parking were they are not “suppose to”. Student who live off campus must take the bus to get to class. The bus ride can take up to 40minutes and take into consideration that campus is only about 10-15 minutes away from almost all apartment complexes. Here scoters are more popular because of their size, but not everyone can afford one. Many students have cars but they just sit on the apartment complexes parking spot, not being use because there’s just nowhere to park. My company, Advanced Construction, would build the most efficient, ecofriendly, underground parking garages, eliminating the parking issue in this city.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 62.4 square miles, of which 61.3 square miles is land. The population of Gainesville in the 2013 US Census estimates was 127,488, a 2.4% growth from 2010. Gainesville is the largest city in the region of North Central Florida. But to understand how my opportunity came about we might need a brief history lesson. In the fall of 1906 the University of Florida opened as a university for white men. Over time the university kept growing and so did the city. But the city of Gainesville was one of the many cities that was drastically affected after WWII. After the war The University of Florida had a dramatic increase in enrollment from U.S veterans coming home with their G.I Bills. This resulted in a 95.3% increase in the 1950s population in comparison to the 1940s. Growth staged in the 1960s but as a result of some of the universities expansion efforts, Gainesville saw a major population growth in the 1970s of 117.2%. Here, The University of Florida is a major financial boost to the community, in all the University of Florida contributes nearly $9 billion annually to Florida's economy and is responsible for more than 100,000 jobs. As you can see no one in the early 1900s thought this school will grow as it did. Gainesville was not build to hold such a big population. This has led to many problems, in the 1990s for example, the city went through a huge redevelopment effort to organize the population. Also we have one of the worse homeless problems in the United Sates.  Gainesville was ranked as the "5th meanest city" in the United States by the National Coalition for the Homeless twice, first in 2004 and the again in 2009. We also face another big problem parking. And although in my eyes parking problem is not as important as other issues the city might be facing, this is the issue where I saw an opportunity.

As you have read, parking is a huge opportunity for the city of Gainesville, but my company would have to act fast. But before we move forward let me clear your thoughts and worries about underground construction in Florida. It is possible. If you actually look how Disney was build you will come across a lot of underground tunnels and bunkers and this is all possible through a lot of maintenance. Everyone seems to have this idea that Florida is this huge sponge, well it is, but don’t underestimate the power of technology. We live in a period of inflation, meaning prices are always increasing. Over time equipment, labor and material cost could increase. Right now constructing such a project would be very costly and over time it is expected to get even more expensive. But my company would have a big and productive research and development team, meaning that over time my company could find cheaper but still of good quality materials to build the garages we could also perfect the way we construct the garages to be as efficient as possible. But cost is not the only reason why my company would have to start soon. My vision was build the garages underneath the buildings. So whatever building you had to go to, there would be parking available. Sadly most building at U.F are already built, making it impossible to build something underneath then. But if we start building the garages for all future building we should be able to alleviate the parking burden.

I believe my opportunity is huge. Imagine if we could figure out a way to build these garages here in Gainesville. We would be able to build them in even more populated areas. Especially populated areas which are still under infustructural development. Places like India or China, where there population is abnormally huge, we could find a way to fit all these people but underground. This might be far- fetched, but over time our population will continue to grow, maybe to the point where there is not enough space to hold such a big population. If we could figure out how to build something like garages under the ground we could eventually do even more, maybe homes or other building to give us more space. 

  

Many people seem confused about certain aspect within my idea and I think it’s important to address them here. For starters Gainesville is above sea levels, many seem to ask that question, although there are some areas that are not, so my company would have to run a lot of test just to make sure the areas we are building the garages will have space. Also my garages will only be of 2 floors or less. We would create more space by expanding sideways (horizontally) rather than downwards (vertically). The second and third points go hand in hand. Another point which I briefly hit on was my revenue base. My plan is to make money through the decals but we are a construction company, not a service provider. So businesses, schools or even the government would contract us and pay us to make these garages and it would be up to them to monitor them. And lastly something I care deeply about is our environment. Construction period is not environmentally friendly, usually when contactors go out to build something they start by clearing the land. My company will sadly have to do that, but we will also create a natural environment above the garages if building are not going to be there. This was we will be using a space efficiently and giving back to the environment as well.  

A lot of the feedback I got was positive. Mostly everyone liked my idea and where ready to support it if it were possible, that where I run into some trouble. Although I have extensively done my research and have found that Gainesville is well about sea level and that building  underground is possible to some extent (obviously not 20 stories underground), people tend to still question its possibility. This leads me to believe that my words are just not convincing. Other than that I was given some advice on my word usage and to put the history lesson a little after I explain my opportunity so I don’t put my readers to sleep, and I have applied all of these suggestion onto this post. The key difference in this post is the order and the extra information about elevation and underground construction in Florida. 

Underground Disney 

Week 14 Reading reflection

First let’s start off with chapter 3. This chapter talks about the entrepreneurship mind set. I would have thought that we would have been assigned this chapter at the begging in of the school year but it makes sense that we are doing this now. This whole class is about the mindset so this is a really important chapter for this class. I personally think this chapter is really relevant, even if you aren’t getting ready to open a business it’s so important to have a positive outlook on life. My favorite part about the chapter is the chart on page 58. This list common obstacles that you might face in a new venture and solutions. I think this could be really helpful because personally I think it’s better to be aware of the possibilities instead of finding things out on your own. This would save you time money and headaches. There’s nothing really in this chapter that I don’t agree with. Like I said before I think this chapter is really relevant and important. And it’s funny because a couple months ago I would have thought differently. If I could ask the author a question it would be when did he start getting into the mindset and how did things change for him afterwards. Chapter 4 goes hand in hand with chapter 3 and it’s probably why we were assigned to read them at the same time. This chapter talks about ethics and ethical challenges. If you think about it how you go about your morals really affects your mindset in your business and this is why I think this is an important topic to discuss. Also ethics is something really recent too. Before ethics wasn’t something you were taught in school, if anything ethics and morals derived from your atmosphere at home or your religion. But, I believe at least, after social media took off and the internet it is now a lot easier to see when someone does something wrong or controversial this allows us to form opinions and punishment. And in effort to try and prevent further ethical problems, our society has imbedded ethics into schools at an early age. Environmental awareness is one of my favorite sections. We really need a green revolution in this day in age but not enough people are taking it seriously or doing something about it. Even something as simple as recycling can make such a difference. If I could ask the author one questions it would be what were some of the hardest ethical challenges he has faced in his life time?

Going for Google Gold

1) A discussion of your general approach and strategy to search engine optimization (SEO). What were some of the activities you did for each blog post to pursue SEO? 

My strategy wasn’t really anything special. I just wrote my blog post like how I susually write. Then if anything I would go back and make sure I was using descriptive words like “Gainesville” “Florida” “University of Florida” etc.

2) What were your keywords? How did you select those keywords? Did you change or refine your keywords through the semester?

My idea was really broad. It was building underground parking garages in Gainesville to minimize the universities parking problem. So I would use general key words like “parking” “parking garages” “construction” “underground construction”, but then I would also use more specific words like “University of Florida” and “Gainesville”.

3) How did you use social media to enhance your SEO efforts? What your surprises or general impression of using social media to improve your blog's profile? Was social media generally receptive of your blog, or did it get ignored?

Other than my blog and YouTube I really didn’t market it on any other social media platforms. If I was really going to pursue my venture sharing my blog on Facebook and etc. Would have been something I would have done. But I did add key words about my project on the bottom of all my customer interviews. This helps when users are searching for videos on YouTube.

4) What was your most "viral" post? In other words, which post obtained the most traffic? Why do you think?

My most popular post was a more recent one, it was the “What’s Next” assignment. On that blog post I have 8 comments and 22 views. To be honest I am not sure if this has anything to do with the key words I used on the assignment. What I’m thinking is that this was one of the longer assignments we’ve had this year and not a lot of people did it so a lot of people got assigned to review mine. And my other thought is that most of those views could have been me constantly clicking on it and changing spelling errors.

5) Finally, did you make it to the first page of Google results for your keywords? If not, what page of results did you make it to?

I Googled “Underground Parking Garage Gainesville Florida” and I was not the first or the second or the third lick to come up. Actually I wasn’t even on the first page. But my first result was the downtown parking garage website for downtown Gainesville. I looked to see if I could find my page on google but after passing the 7^th page I gave up. 

Very Short Interview Part 2

Bellow in Grey is my old post and interview for convenience. 

Who I interviewed was Eduardo Cortez, he is a tested business entrepreneur and a clergyman. He first came to this country from Ecuador at the age of 30 with his family, with only one goal, to establish a Hispanic church. Eventually he found a work opportunity with the United Methodist Church. He started with a congregation of 5 members and is now the biggest and growing Hispanic Methodist congregation in Central Florida. Before that, Eduardo was very much involved in the business world. In Ecuador, Eduardo learned at an early age the tactics and strategies it would take to become a successful entrepreneur. By the age of 25 he was managing several male boutiques in 3 central malls in the capital. Finally here in the United States, he decided to dedicate his time to his ministry. A few years later, he would make a bad business decision and invest a large amount of his savings into a business called “The Natural Home” which would eventually go under. But business is trial and error. With this failing business venture came lessons, tactics, and strategies, which he put into practice with his church and his current successful day care business.

I started off by letting him know about my assignment and I just had a couple general questions for him to answer. After he agreed I started the interview.

My first question was, what does it mean to be an entrepreneur? And he responded as follows…

“It means to be persistent and consistent, and you need to shows dedication towards your projects at all times. It’s a challenge in someone’s life, but it’s definitely a reachable goal. Entrepreneurship isn’t always about money, but money is something that’s critical in a starting business. You have to realize that when you are an entrepreneur, you are helping other people, not just yourself, you’re a part of what’s helping your community and this country prosper.”

I went on to ask him my second question, which was, what should I learn from this course? And he said…

“You have to have a vison, and entrepreneurship vision, with a goal. This class should teach you how to focus on that goal and how to identify it. It should help you take those beginning steps in becoming an entrepreneur. It should help you have a general idea of those first steps, so when you do start your own business you have a solid foundation that will sustain you.

Another thing that I usually notice is that people usually start off with an emotional plan, an emotional business. When you first start off you need to start with a profit point of view. A lot of people don’t like to hear that. But in order to be successful you have to be organized and start off on the right foot or you could potentially lose a lot of money.”

Lastly I asked him if there was anything in school they wished they would have taught him, or if there was anything he wished he would have known before starting on this entrepreneurial path. Which he responded as follows.

“I always had a vision of what I wanted to do, but I never had a vision with a strategic plan. These two things go hand in hand. Something I wish they would have taught me in school is how to manage people. Also I wish I would have known, but also accepted that failure is inevitable. Lastly, it’s important to save money, to have something to always fall back on just in case, because business is not always good.”

Revisiting this interview, my thoughts haven’t changes. I think Mr. Cortez answered the questions really well, and I think his advice was good also. This time around I got to ask him my own questions. I contacted Mr. Cortez but due to both of our busy schedules I had to interview him on the phone.

My question where as follows:

What do you regret the most about pursuing your entrepreneurship dream and why?

“What I regret the most is the strain it had on my family. I moved here from Ecuador not knowing English and not with a lot of money as you know. And there were times where I found myself questioning if it was all worth it, leaving my family behind, putting my kids in such a new environment, and having to struggle just to provide for them. If I regret anything is what they went through for me and I am very grateful for my family.”

If you could go back in time would you change what happened?

“If I could, at the end I wouldn’t do it. Everything that happen to me, the failures, the bankruptcies, the division of my church, all of these things collectively are what have brought me where I am today. All my kids have gotten or are in collage right now, they all have good jobs, they got a better education that I could have ever offered them in Ecuador, my business is doing great, and the church is stronger than ever. Everything just happens for a reason.”

What the one main advice/ or tip that you could give me?

“Never give up, it might sound and seem simple but that has to be one of the hardest things about all of this. I had my wife and my kids to always keep me motivated, but some don’t have that. I was lucky enough that I did, but there have been plenty of tie where I’ve just wanted to give up or just retire and move on. But I’m still here, and I am glad that I am.”

I feel like the interview I did 3 months ago was sort of an ice breaker, this time around I felt more comfortable asking more personal questions. I could definably see that he was more comfortable talking to me too. It didn’t feel like much of an interview but more like a conversation. This could have also been in part to the fact that I did it over the phone. Either way this class has really drilled in us to talk about entrepreneurship and keep our minds open to possibilities. 

Week 13 Reading Reflection

This chapter mostly talks about how to value your business. This chapter was an interesting read because I’ve never really studied this topic in debt in any class. This chapter is mostly math but it does talk about an emotional side to this process which is what I found most interesting. People value a business strictly for informational purposes other times for is to sell the operation. The emotional side to this comes in when you start a venture. Its almost like a child, you have to nurture it through early growth and help with others perception of its value. But there’s a number of ways in which you can value your business. But all these different ways share some underline steps. First you have to analyze your business. And there are many different ways you can do this threw rations and stock analyzing. What I didn’t like much about this chapter is that if focuses a lot on companies that have sufficient resources to value their ventures at this scale. A lot of companies make their own accounting statement, because they are small companies that can’t afford to hire a CPA firms. These business are prone to financial error and thus prone to errors in valuation. And some business don’t even do financial at all, because that’s just how small their business are. Hence, I wish the author would have focus on other way to valuing the ventures, simple way in which small firms could use and afford.

Celebrating My Failure

I had graduated with my AA from high school, so I was only supposed to be at U.F for two year. Meaning I would graduate at 19 years old. Well that didn’t happen. When you do dual enrollment in high school you have the choice of just getting rid of general classes like english and algebra, or concentrating your AA in your field and getting rid of some of your pre-recs as well. Well I was an optimistic little senior and I got my AA in business administration. I don’t regret getting my AA but I regret doing my pre-recs. While in high school I took financial and managerial accounting and calculus, to mention a few. I got practically perfect 100 in these classes. But I have failed at a lot of things in recent year. I was not much to take failure lightly because it rarely used to happen to me, but ever since I’ve started collage that’s not the case anymore. My freshman year here I was very optimistic and motivated, my adviser put me in 3 semi-easy classes. I took management and marketing and I had a solid B in these classes and then my grandma passed away on the same week I had both those finals. While my family all left to go arrange the funeral in Puerto Rico I was stuck here in Gainesville taking finals. I did awful on them and ended up with C+s on both classes and I was so mad about that. Other than that all was good that fall. But my dual enrollment days where about to catch up to me.

I’m an accounting major so when I came to U.F with all these credits my adviser stuck me into junior level accounting classes. So my first spring semester I was taking FAR1, BP, CAL2, and International business writing. Well I didn’t remember anything from Financial and Managerial, and these classes I was taking now where 10x harder than what I took in my dual enrollment days. It was awful to say the least. At the end of that semester I dropped FAR1 and got a W and I did alright on the other 3 classes. At this point in my life I thought things could not get worse, I would just retake FAR1 in the fall if I anything I would be graduating a semester late, well I was wrong again.

After finals my doctor saw that my spine was twisting on me, to bare you the details this is really bad and I was scheduled for emergency surgery June of that summer. I was in the hospital for a really long time, I lost a lot weight, and now I have two bars and 23 screws holding my spine in place. My doctor told me not to go to school in the fall because my recovery was looking at about 4-5months. Well I didn’t listen, I said I would be ok and I started fall classes like everyone else. That semester was one of the hardest times I’ve ever been through, with school and medical complications (ill save you the details again) I failed Far1 for a second time, so that didn’t help and my graduation year has been pushed back for about a year. I did take FAR1 for a 3^rd time, and if you were wondering I did pass. Weirdly enough being an accountant is my dream and I haven’t given up on it.

Right now this is all in the past for me, and I have honestly learned a lot from this and all my failures. I’m a strong believer that things happen for a reason, but I have God and my family and friends to thank for everything I have accomplished since then. Failure is hard and I would honestly try to avoid it at all cost, but sometimes it’s just unavoidable. But it’s important to embrace your failures and learned from them. Cause I could have switched majors easy when I failed my class for a second time, and it honestly took a lot for me to sit through the same class for a third time. If anything I’m glad this class is encouraging us to share our failure story, because you are honestly not alone. 

My Exit Strategy

Background: My entrepreneurial concept was building underground parking garages. My vision was constructing these garages for interested parties. Hence my company would just be a contractor/builder so our revenue stream will come from business entities hiring us to build them an underground garage. My main goal was to fix the parking problem here at U.F but eventually my company could expand to even more populated areas. Especially populated areas which are still under infrastructural development. Places like India or China, where there population is abnormally huge, we could find a way to fit all these people but underground.

 I think my exit strategy will definitely be staying in the business until I retire. Throughout all the assignments that was just my underline thought. I never once thought of selling it of or giving it to my future children.

2.     I picked this strategy just because it has been installed in my culture and the way I was raised in general. It might not always be a good thing, but I was thought to always stick to my main goal and never doubt myself, especially in hard times. I could see this by the way my parents have handled there 27 year marriage, my dad’s 25 years of service ect. Also my parents have kind of installed in me this idea of when you start something also ways finish it, and finish strong.

3.     My exit strategy has definitely influence the other decisions I have made. Back to my first point, throughout the assignments, especially the ones requiring me to look into the future and into possible markets, all my plans where long term plans. I even talked about expanding my venture into foreign markets, like India who have very high populations and poor infrastructure. Such expansion would take time and a lot of money.  

Reading reflection

This chapter is all about preference in my opinion. It has some really good advice but not everyone is the same. Strategic planning is something that I would personally recommend but not everyone good that happens, has to be planned. A lot of people who run into new venture ideas just run into them and take the opportunity they aren’t necessarily looking for it. like the chapter mentioned and I really agree with is the fact that everything here has one common element, its that it’s an extension of the entrepreneurship vision. Research suggest that small business that use strategic planning are better off, but honestly strategic planning in my opinion is not a by the book thing. Someone out of the business college here has a lot of knowledge and there are going to apply it in the real world, doesn’t have to be labeled a plan. What I don’t agree with is the fact that they say entrepreneurs have to concentrate on 3 things. Increasing perception, institutionalizing the venture goals, and desire to be innovative. Yes all these things are important but almost all start us won’t have the capital to fund this and other things take more importance at times. All in all this chapter has a lot of great advice and if I could ask the author anything is about personal experience. he write all this stuff and all these things you should know, well I want to know if he has implemented any of it in real life. 

Whats Next

Existing market:

Step1:

My entrepreneurial concept was building underground parking garages. My vision was constructing these garages for interested parties. Hence my company would just be a contractor/builder so our revenue stream will come from business entities hiring us to build them an underground garage. The next thing I believe my customers are going to want is cheaper prices. Right now constructing such a product would be very costly. I think the next ting will just be finding ways to minimize cost and be more efficient in order to cut cost. I also think that our nest thing is expansion. Originally my idea was just a means of fixing the parking problem at U.F but there are many places in the U.S that suffer from dense populations and in turn horrible parking.

Step2:

After describing my idea with potential customers I asked them the following questions.

I asked customers what should we be doing that we aren’t doing?

Do you think customers in other populated locations might what more parking garages as well?

Step3:

I think our future path looks as follows. We would run a lot of test and gather a lot of data and finally build one garage. After that garage we would see how it goes, how it’s holding up and see if it’s as popular as I expect it to be. Then over time my company could find cheaper but still good quality materials, maybe over time we could have perfected the way we construct the garages to be as efficient as possible and things of that sort.

For my kind of business I have two possible ideas the “next” thing could be as a mentioned before. For started is we find a way to build underground parking garages here in Gainesville, we could move out of state and start constructing underground ground garages in other parts of the country. In order to do that we would have to research other potential candidate cities, study  their local laws and regulations, test their land and just over all have a lot of hard evidence that this will be beneficial before even building anything.

New Market:

Step1:

My radically different market that eventually I would plan on targeting would be some international countries. We would be able to build them in even more populated areas. Especially populated areas which are still under infrastructural development. Places like India or China, where there population is abnormally huge, we could find a way to fit all these people but underground. These undeveloped nations will eventually catch up with the rest of the wealthy nations but something that these wealthy nations don’t have any experience on is how to govern and manage so many people. China and India together hold about half of the world’s population. And although the U.S is big land wise, out population can just not compare. Infrastructure is a major key in order to be and to reach developed nation “status”. But how are these so populated countries going to do that? Well I think my underground parking garage idea can help not just in that regard but it could foster other ideas on how to spread different kinds of infrastructure underground.

Step2:

Let’s take India for example. My idea can create value for their society in many different ways. For starters it can help them be and keep organized. India has really bad traffic/traffic rules. There has crazy of number of cars and about 4 lanes drawn on the ground but the people make about 6 lanes because they don’t follow the lines on the grounds. Not to mention pedestrians cross the street and cars don’t stop, cars just move around them. And rarely do individuals actually pay attention and listen to traffic lights. My underground parking garages can help with bringing some discipline to Indian streets. Although it wouldn’t fix the problem it would be a start.

Step3:

I found some potential customers and I asked them the following questions.

What do you think about my idea?

What kinds of adaptations to the product/service mix do they think you should make to be successful in this new market, like India or China?

Step4:

I definitely still think this market is as, or I would even say, more attractive than my existing market. India is still very underdeveloped and it’s going to see massive growth in the next couple of years. There whole country is massively populated they are my perfect targeted customer. My assumptions where correct I expected them to question whether it was ok with the government, if it was expensive and stuff like that.