30A: Final Reflection

Final Reflection:

1. When looking through my posts over the course of this semester, I can certainly pinpoint moments of both highs and lows. Some of my favorite assignments were from the tail end of this class, such as Creating my Secret Sauce and Creating a Customer Avatar. They really caused me to tap into what makes me an entrepreneur and an innovator over my competitors. Both with any highs, there will always be lows and for me those were the assignments from early on in the year. I despised having the list generic problems and rely on such an antiquated form of thinking things through in such a linear manner.
2. I don't think I'll remember anything I've done over the course of this semester even a month from now, but if I had to take a stab at what will probably remain the longest it would probably be the all of the Elevator Pitches. They were pretty unique and something most people (I would assume) weren't exactly trying to hone but nonetheless did over the course of the class. I think my most joyous assignment would actually be this one since it marks the final post, and it pleases me to begin a new chapter.
3. In actuality, I definitely identify opportunities far easier than most people would thanks to the mindset and thought processes I've learned through both watching lectures and repetitively posting on blogger. While I don't quite see myself as an entrepreneur I can assuredly conclude that my mindset has definitively moved in that direction.
4. The advice I could give to others who will follow along this entrepreneurial path is be open to the change of mindset from hearing Pryor talk about identifying opportunities on both a grand and local scale, it requires you to let go of what you've always heard big time speakers and billionaires say. Achieving success in this class comes from attentiveness to assignments and really analyzing what  traits serve a business best.

29A: Venture Concept No.2

2nd Venture Concept

My fully venture concept is centered upon the unmet needs of a rapidly aging population in Middle and Southeastern United States in the form of health-care predicated on the needs of deteriorating individuals. This opportunity was created in part to multiple factors, but primarily the failures of the American Healthcare system. American Healthcare has been constantly adjusted and redefined both legislatively and parochial to varying degrees to minimize spending and maximize coverage policies, but the actual affect of the current system does well to protect the general interests of middle class middle aged Americans but leaves gaps in the coverage of the senior citizens, resulting in ineffective recovery options for a demographic known to have the most tumultuous of health complications. Other such forces are the corporations that dedicate themselves to solving the problem but fail in their ability to provide the care necessary to ensure a healthy life and recovery period to both the customers and the family members of the cared, these companies like to prioritize the maximal profit margins by cutting costs on quality of life actives like meals and medications and labor costs by hiring individuals unqualified to be called a care-taker let alone a nurse; these factors culminate in a system that fails to meet the standards of conditions of the customer and chooses to neglectfully hire unequipped caretakers to continue to make maximize profits at the expense the customers health and the price point of the service. My market is defined within the demographic of Americans ranging in age from sixties all the way up to the late eighties, as these individuals are most likely to have an immediate family member or themselves be unequipped to provide the care necessary to continue an average day to day life. Geographically my market rests within the eastern seaboard as it is fairly common trend for Middle and Western America to live to a higher age without the need for a form of assisted living. A perspective customer of mine might seek to hire a live in nurse to assist with their health complications but such a measure is immeasurably expensive and tends to not be included in insurance, and the customers loyalty lies within what can provide them with the best care. Perhaps the best testament to my opportunity is the fact that it’s window of exploitation is endless, as it is a constant of life to grow older and in that fact lies the inevitability of disease and failing health, meaning my market never ceases to exist. The Innovation of my service lies in the ease of access/use for family members and the usage of qualified individuals to act as care-takers and nurses rather than hiring the cheapest labor possible to care for loved ones. The ease of access comes in the form of my automated payment system and navigable website both in beta testing as of this moment; the payment system is entirely automated and goes through the user’s registered email and of course is encrypted by hash-table prime number generated encoding, I intend to abuse my competitors lack of technological incorporation to care to my advantage and create a system that puts the user experience before operational performance, which creates a system that makes my companies billing easier and payment plans just as easy. My service functions on the basis of insurance coverage and tentative residence within the nursing home / care facility. Price point is dependent on supply, labor, and mortgage, but within the range of 1,000-1,750$ a month for recovery at the institution in exchange for peace of mind and unbeatable care. Now as to the reasons for why my venture product should work, the first being that the concept of nursing homes in general are a fresh concept, and as a result my current competitors happen to charge insane rates for a lackluster care facility, my price-point falls far short of theirs and my modernized payment plans are more than enough to have customers come to me over the competition. My main competitors are BrookDale, Helms Home, and other one-off elderly care facilities, but with confidence my staff and online services put  Pendleton Care a fair way ahead of them in scope. A definitive change I would make to this plan would be to outsource most of the care and patient needs to a nursing firm who could supply the labor necessary to work with and care for the patients.

• Feedback: Most of the changes I made were in part to whether or not selling the business so early on would be a good decision, so I decided to outsource the workforce to a nursing conglomerate rather than maintain the architecture myself, so leaving would be a bit easier now. Other ideas I noted that I could change would be to lean harder on newspaper advertising and pursue blogging to advertise my business.

28A: My Exit Strategy

My Exit Strategy

• The Plan:
• My current exit strategy to vacate my business is to sell over control of the company to either a different nursing home conglomerate to ensure employee's have a safety net underneath them, or possibly give my position in the company over to someone from within as a promotion, but also ensuring the responsibility to share holders isn't lost on them or my replacement.
• Reasoning:
• My current reasoning for either of my exit plans is simply that I have no personal passion for what it is that my business does; it merely exists as a result of a problem I identified and as a solution in a market where there is very few. By selling the company to another firm I can ensure that the business will continue to be operational in a similar capacity despite the inherent loss of my personal touches and new policy/ legality, but also to ensure that it has some kind of foreseeable future.
• Influence:
• My possible exit strategies have influenced quite a bit of how I conducted both my business and my opportunity. The goals and expectations I have for my life is not to be an operational manager/owner of a healthcare facility, but to work towards the conduits of life I have passion in, like engineering. Having a way to exit from this opportunity unscathed was a deciding factor in what I choose to do as well as how I would execute it.

27A: Reading Reflection No.3

The Final Read

• Theme:
• The general theme of the book is using the connected world we live in as to a business advantage by using elements of social media to broaden marketing opportunities and foster further connectivity with customers. Guy Kawaski makes an effort to emphasize elements of exploration, throughout the book Guy constantly mentions that social media is unquantifiable, what is effective one day may be mundane the next, so it is necessary to continue to experiment to find peak productivity.
• Learning:
• Guy's theme of exploration and blogging to better a business certainly connects with the courses material. Pryor taught his with the use of these blogs that social media and business can be on in the same, which Guy hammers home very well.
• Exercise:
• I would define an exercise centered on creating a Pinterest board that is occupied with content prior to public posting detailing business innovation mixed with social media suave.
• Aha Moment:
• I guess the aha moment for me would have been when Guy outright says the he doesn't fully understand the dynamics of social media himself, but that it serves to the advantage of you, the reader. It really sank in the way finicky nature of social media itself.

26A: Celebrating Failure

Celebrating my Failure:

• The Failure:
• Early on in this semester, a failure overtook my ability to control both my academics and my future. Every spring, UF Engineering holds C.D.W; or career development workshop where undergrad CS, CPE, and EE majors can go and attempt to sell yourselves and interview with big shot companies like Walmart, Ultimate Software, and even the likes of the NSA. So I went, and when it was my turn to sit down with a team-member of Ultimate Software and sell myself, I froze. I stammered, sweat, and stuttered through each and every question until I shook the recruiters hand and left. I prepared myself intensely for the questions and knowledge but putting it into practice was an entirely other story.
• The Wisdom:
• I guess what I took most from this experience was that preparation means nothing in place of resolve to meet every opportunity head on. I'd say that the biggest take-away from that experience was that I have to through away any self doubt I have when I tackle new ventures.
• The Reflection:
• I tend to handle failure by internalizing it, and molding how I feel about it into future scenarios similar to how I experienced the failure; essentially cataloging it into how I think and act later on. Thanks to this class however, I realize that failure is an inevitability, and that as a result I should be open to taking on more risks.

25A: What's Next?

No Seriously What's Next?

• Existing Market:
• My existing market coincides with the elderly population of the southeastern seaboard, and I see that the next step for my product is to begin advertising and release open beta access for possible customers.
• Interview 1:
•  "What I think is the next step for Pendleton Care is to do some customer outreach, and go into 55+ communities and talk a bit about yourselves and how it is you can alleviate the stress of day to day life with your services."
• Interview 2:
• "One thing that you could do is begin advertising in the papers! I think you would definitely see an interest bump once you get to where your customers are, which is the newspaper"
• Interview 3:
• "I think with your business model in mind, you could hold a press conference with Commissioner Dick and have him publicly back your healthcare".
• Summary: It should be clear from each of the interviews that the quality of the suggestions can very quite wildly. I feel as though my demographic has to be catered to very specifically or I run the risk of appearing as out of touch or unapproachable. However Interview 1's suggestion resonated with me quite well, and I think this is definitely something I can consider doing at a later date.
• New Market:
• I suppose to target a new market I might set my sights on the financially dispositioned. HealthCare for elderly and the poor go together quite nicely.
• Interview 1:
• "I think one thing you could do would be to host community wide events about what kind of affordability your program has for people in the community"
• Interview 2:
• "Something I could see you doing to show yourself a healthcare provider to the community at whole would be to make a wing in the facility dedicated to to walk-in 20$ copay type health issues, but that of course would require a doctor and many other factors."
• Summary: It is not as surface level as I once thought it would be to enter a new market based off of an already existing venture capitalist idea, and the modifications necessary to include a new share of a market would be a tremendous strain on what I would be able to do for my current clientel and market as a whole. The suggestions from Interview 2 however are definitely something to take into consideration.

24A: Venture Concept No.1

My Venture Concept: Pendleton Care

My fully venture concept is centered upon the unmet needs of a rapidly aging population in Middle and Southeastern United States in the form of health-care predicated on the needs of deteriorating individuals. This opportunity was created in part to multiple factors, but primarily the failures of the American Healthcare system. American Healthcare has been constantly adjusted and redefined both legislatively and parochial to varying degrees to minimize spending and maximize coverage policies, but the actual affect of the current system does well to protect the general interests of middle class middle aged Americans but leaves gaps in the coverage of the senior citizens, resulting in ineffective recovery options for a demographic known to have the most tumultuous of health complications. Other such forces are the corporations that dedicate themselves to solving the problem but fail in their ability to provide the care necessary to ensure a healthy life and recovery period to both the customers and the family members of the cared, these companies like to prioritize the maximal profit margins by cutting costs on quality of life actives like meals and medications and labor costs by hiring individuals unqualified to be called a care-taker let alone a nurse; these factors culminate in a system that fails to meet the standards of conditions of the customer and chooses to neglectfully hire unequipped caretakers to continue to make maximize profits at the expense the customers health and the price point of the service. My market is defined within the demographic of Americans ranging in age from sixties all the way up to the late eighties, as these individuals are most likely to have an immediate family member or themselves be unequipped to provide the care necessary to continue an average day to day life. Geographically my market rests within the eastern seaboard as it is fairly common trend for Middle and Western America to live to a higher age without the need for a form of assisted living. A perspective customer of mine might seek to hire a live in nurse to assist with their health complications but such a measure is immeasurably expensive and tends to not be included in insurance, and the customers loyalty lies within what can provide them with the best care. Perhaps the best testament to my opportunity is the fact that it’s window of exploitation is endless, as it is a constant of life to grow older and in that fact lies the inevitability of disease and failing health, meaning my market never ceases to exist. The Innovation of my service lies in the ease of access/use for family members and the usage of qualified individuals to act as care-takers and nurses rather than hiring the cheapest labor possible to care for loved ones. The ease of access comes in the form of my automated payment system and navigable website both in beta testing as of this moment; the payment system is entirely automated and goes through the user’s registered email and of course is encrypted by hash-table prime number generated encoding, I intend to abuse my competitors lack of technological incorporation to care to my advantage and create a system that puts the user experience before operational performance, which creates a system that makes my companies billing easier and payment plans just as easy. My service functions on the basis of insurance coverage and tentative residence within the nursing home / care facility. Price point is dependent on supply, labor, and mortgage, but within the range of 1,000-1,750$ a month for recovery at the institution in exchange for peace of mind and unbeatable care. Now as to the reasons for why my venture product should work, the first being that the concept of nursing homes in general are a fresh concept, and as a result my current competitors happen to charge insane rates for a lackluster care facility, my price-point falls far short of theirs and my modernized payment plans are more than enough to have customers come to me over the competition. My main competitors are BrookDale, Helms Home, and other one-off elderly care facilities, but with confidence my staff and online services put  Pendleton Care a fair way ahead of them in scope. 

In general, the most defining characteristics that can be indicative of success would be location, price-point, and customer experience; as any care facility would have. The next in line for my venture is to begin looking for perspective locations to place my very first business / facility, and to begin the screening process for qualified nurses, and as for me, my next steps within the process of my business is to see just how far I can reshape the process of care and recovery for the elderly, sell the business off should it find success and begin the work of opening my own one-stop-shop technology store, like a Best Buy of sorts and see if the market can handle just one more competitor.

23A: My Venture's Unfair Advantage

My Specialties:

• My Resources:
• Employability: This resource is valuable in that my service is uniquely employable in that sense that I would be a sole provider of the for elders, and it would be very difficult to imitate on the basis on the quality of care a nurse could provide.
• Political Connections: Luckily enough, I happen to have pull with multiple South Florida City Council members, meaning I could have the backing of multiple cities and their millions worth of capital and investments should I call upon it, and this is no easy feat to imitate.
• Care Plans: On the subject of health, none are quite as aware of finite qualities that can remedy a life on the brink. The staff of my business are perfectly trained in the areas necessary to have the highest quality treatment for patients, which is not so easily imitated.
• Supplier Connection: My business acquaintance from my prior post Mr. Sukar is more than capable of being able to assist in the supplies necessary to start a home up at an extended discount, such pull is highly unique and differentiates my profit markups.
• Real-Estate: A necessity of this business plan is to have a facility in a great spot, and a close family friend of ours happens to specialize in Real-Estate for large business centered on location, but this resource isn't all that uncommon in actuality.
• Automated Payment: An invaluable asset to saving money and ensuring timely payment is an automated system to distribute bills to customers and insurance companies and this is a system I already have in beta testing. This is a not so easily imitable skill.
• Website: An easily navigable site that is consistently updated with personal information of customers and company happenings is a necessity in this industry, and as such I've secured my own privated address for the company. This is unfortunately a not so original resource.
• Rural Marketing: While not all that original, I do have the resources to produce paper advertisements for my company to highlight its appeals, but such a skill has no edge over competitors.
• Established Clientele: While not a skill in the traditional sense, having a prepared set of customers is very important for building up to a successful business, which I am privy to back home.
• Financial Backing: In terms of financial capital, the comapny will be starting off of the savings account of a maturing stock of Coca-Cola for the past 10 years, which a certainly solid plane to begin work from, but the resource of money is not so unique from my competitors.
• Conclusions: I feel as though my most important resource is my political connectios in the form of the South Florida City and Town Planning Council. The members supporters are within my prime market for my services and their backing would ensure an amazing reputation and possibly a strong entry into market versus all of my other resources.

22A: Elevator Pitch No. 3

Elevator Pitch #3

2.)

• Some prior feedback of mine involved speaking less on where the ideas for the company came from and more on what it is that my service does.

3.)

• Based on feedback alone I managed to speak more on the service itself rather than it's inception and one thing to note was how much more natural the pitch felt to give, but the presentation still wasn't entirely memorized and the quality might seem lesser due to the casual dress but I felt that the pitch did improve overall.

21A: Reading Reflection No.2

An Analysis of The Wright Brothers

1.)

• The general theme of the book was the Wright Brother's emerging sense of market diversity and ingenuity. The theme of the book plays out from the drive that Wilbur Wright experiences after his injury at university, causing both him and his brother to develop a drive to  compete in the business world; first with a bike store, and second with their aviation.

2.)

• The book resonated with the values learned from ENT3003 by suggesting that innovation can come from a lack of something, and that often times the necessities of life can become the driving force in entrepreneurship.

3.)

• An exercise I would design would be to create plans for a personal workshop in which the person would have to outline the faculties of their business and what might make their talents more sought out than their competitors.

4.)

• The most surprising thing I managed to pick up from this literature was that many people might well have lost the drive necessary to work towards a better life from an injury like Wilbur's, but he managed to perceiver and create an innovation so great his name will always be tied to aviation all because of his entrepreneurial hustle and brilliance. 

20A: Growing Social Capital

Growing Social Capital:

1. The Experts

• Mr. Ahbinaav Faruk: Mr. Faruk is customer representative at Uniform Advantage, the worlds largest supplier of nursing supplies. I've identified Mr. Faruk is the supply expert within my field as a result of the backbone of my business being in healthcare. Mr. Faruk and I got into contact with each other when my Mother and I met up with Vanilla Ice at Chili's in late 2013 and Mr. Faruk was with him. I got in contact him for the purpose of this assignment and asked what our business had to offer with each other, and to no surprise Uniform has a partnership program to pair with start up nursing business in exchange for a monthly payment plan after 2 years. Mr. Faruk represents an opportunity to lift this idea off the ground; Uniform has helped shape the nursing industry so there stands to be no reason to not be capable for doing the same for me.
• Ms. Jessica Ness: Ms.Ness is the head nurse at the BrookDale assisted living facilities in Boynton Beach. Ms.Ness is who I would consider a dominant expert in my industry. I know Ms.Ness from the time she temporarily took care of my grandmother at BrookDale assisted living. Ms.Ness's knowledge base is without a doubt an invaluable insight into what can cause success and failure in this industry, and what she offers is the way to properly manager a nursing business for maximum efficiency.
• Mr. Siward Amando: Mr. Amando is a condominium salesman in Boynton Beach who happens to be an expert at targeting my very own same market with properties rather than a service. Mr. Amando is who I would consider a market expert. Mr. Amando is a family friend of ours and sells condo's all along the beach to roughly the same demographics my business tends to target. During our discussions we reached a point at which Mr. Amando was able to provide me with key insight on what allures and frightens his customer base which is roughly similar to mine. Mr. Faruk can allow me to exploit what might make customers more likely to buy onto my service and and share markets between real estate and nursing.
• Reflection: In reality this was my first time really socially networking. This experience will definitely aid me at future meetings among others in my industry and allow me to understand how business can be included in social events, but this experience honestly wasn't too far from how I pictured networking worked originally.

19A: Idea Napkin No. 2

Idea Napkin Reflection II

• You:
• I define myself as a person who sticks rigidly to the fundamentals of patience and hard work. I attribute very success I've had to either having the patience to gain the necessary insight or perceiver through failure until I found success; in  an almost a symbiotic nature. My aspirations are rudimentary at best: Be the best engineer I can be. At the core of what that means to me is be capable of constructing solutions to modern problems, which tie in directly with my plans for a nursing business, because who better to engineer solutions for the ones who's health we cherish the most.
• Customer Offerings:
• The unmet needs of a person whom's body and mind fail them is the adequate care and affordable price point with it. These dilapidated individuals require care outside of the scope that a family could give, which is why I offer a service that could guarantee both by my commercialized nursing institution.
• Demographics:
• The primary/tertiary customer of choice for my business would of course likely be the son or daughter of an elderly person. The typical client would have very little funds of their own for which to pay for my services but the soon-to-be patient of course has 3 sources of primary income being retirement, medicare and medicaid, meaning that my customers are the guardians and the reimbursement comes from the patient themselves in most scenarios.
• Care and Competencies:
• Care quality is the antithesis of my product. Nursing homes are infamous for inadequate care and staffers that are either unwilling or incapable of meeting the needs of the residents/patients. My business hires only qualified nurses who specialize in elderly care, and value the health of a patient more than some 9-5 worker with no medical background in most other places. With care quality assured and the ease of mind of helping a loved one without the burden of fully caring for them yourself is at the core of what value my business has.

• The business opportunity itself mimics aspects of childhood; the model of this business is foundational, but what it supports is very coherent. So long as the startup process goes smoothly in acquiring real-estate and placing ourself in a competitive sphere where the demographics line up, the service itself will succeed. Each aspect of the business is dependent on another, so it is very much so foundational and linked into each other, but to pick a weak link would likely be the ability to hire nursing candidates of such qualifications at the pay-rate necessary and make substantial profit.

18A: Create a Customer Avatar

Details:

• The customers age is within the range of 55-75, and should be evident based on the lack of hair and 20-20 vision.
• A prospective customer might have hobbies such as gardening, sewing, biking, and mainly anything that could be associated with a slow paced sedentary lifestyle.
• A customers car could range from a 90s Buick to a luxury car like a mercedes depending on their finances.
• Usually a customers source of news is a combination of TV and newspaper.
• Every single customer is guaranteed to have a child by this walk of life.

Similarities:

• I think what my customer and I have in common is attention to detail and a taste for good service, the elderly notice quality and lack of proper customer service; as do I thanks to a sharp upbringing.

17A: Elevator Pitch 2

2nd Elevator Pitch:

Reflection: The majority of the feedback I received was to correct my posture, and to have more business casual attire on when presenting. I attempted to correct both here. Some silly feedback I got was that my presenting area was dull, and to that I say I can't paint my walls its in the contract my dude.

16A: What's your Secret Sauce?

Don't get Lost in the Sauce?

• Confidence
• When it comes to getting things done, I always have the will to make it happen, even at the expense of my overall wellbeing; I get that bread.
• Teamplayer
• Labor allocation is exactly what happens in the professional landscape, and as a result being a team player is whats necessary to get things done, and luckily I have that in spades.
• Creativity
• Thinking outside the box is exactly the business minded nature an entrepreneur is and I have a good grasp of it.
• Innovation
• I've taken Catalyst and Creativity in Context, so I feel like this checks out the street cred of Innovation.
• Resolve
• Who takes failure lightly? Not this guy. I'm always determined to meet my own incredulous standards.
• Interview 1:
• "I think you're an intelligent person driven by an ambition to make money" -Friend 1
• Interview 2:
• "What makes Kenneth unique is his drive to avoid failure" - Friend 2
• Interview 3:
• "Kenneth's ability to make decisions that account for everybody makes him unique" - Friend 3
• Interview 4:
• "I consider Kenneth's biggest strength to be his tenacity" -Friend 4
• Interview 5:
• "After having known this kid for this long, i'm sure his greatest asset is his confidence." -Friend 5.
• Conclusions:
• I feel my friends accurately assessed my skills and were fair in what they called my best strengths. It was definitely a reflective experience to hear through the mouths what they thought to be my best gifts are. Looking back I really shouldn't value my creativity as much as I do if I were to go by my friend's assessments.

15A: Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 2

Evaluating Buyer Behavior:

Interview 1

• What drew you to seeking out an elderly care provider?
• "Well it really was a result of my mothers second fall. Around October 2014 she had just gotten out of the hospital after suffering a nasty fall down some stairs, bu my dad was managing to keep good enough care for both her and himself, but after a repeat incident at the tail end of 2018, it was evident she needed more than what my father could provide her."
• What Alternatives do you think exist for such institutions?
• "Personally the best alternative is just to not grow old haha! But in reality the alternatives include moving in with relatives and in-house nursing, which place a huge burden on the family both mentally and economically. I normally would just buy my plan at my healthcare provider, but he feeling is usually glum."

Interview 2

• What drew you to seeking out an elderly care provider?
• "I had initially considered the possibility of finding one of these places in the event my mom ever required the need for one of those, or for myself because you never are fully in control of your aging. My mother's memory has been worsening, and as of late is affecting her ability to live a healthy lifestyle.
• What alternatives do you think exist for such institutions, and what is the buyer experience like?
• "To summarize it: bleak. It feels so melancholy having to seek out a care provider for a person you love, especially when it's so painfully obvious many of these places look at patients as paychecks. Purchasing of course takes place in office, and it is a great peace of mind to know what I did makes sure my mother can live safer and healthier, despite the cost.

Interview 3

• What drew you to seeking out an elderly care provider?
• "With my father living in the inner-city all on his own, despite his resolve and strong will, his arthritis really impedes his ability to do much of anything for himself other than drive and get in/ out of bed. After so many weekends of spending the day helping my dad do day to day tasks is when I finally realized I had to take steps to find the right care.
• What alternatives do you think exist for such institutions, and what is the buyer experience like?
• "In terms of alternatives, I don't think many exist outside of integrating the afflicted person into your own home and life, or hiring a private nurse to account for their care; both of which are an insane burden to bare. And like mindedly the buyer experience for getting a plan for a loved one really takes that burden off your shoulders.
• Conclusions: I think it's safe to say the demographic pattern for my business follows a customer that isn't in the market to spend upwards of 20% of their living wage on a sustainable solution and that product within a specific price range with stellar customer service has a high chance of customer satisfaction and economic growth.

14A: Halfway Reflection

Reflection:

• One of the many adjustments I made to better suit the parameters of this class was to tune my internal clock to the Friday/ Monday schedule that this course has its assignments due on. It really helps to pace yourself to this same sort of tune so the weekly basis of this class doesn't overload you. Another behavior would probably be digging deep into your acquaintances to make sure the interviews you provide for this class meet the level of quality expected from an eager entrepreneur.
• In terms of tenacity, it was surely at its weakest when during week 4. Week 4 was the culmination of multiple classes projects and 2 exams in my hardest classes, and of course that coincided with 7 and 8A, when I needed to procure interviews to properly assess the chances of success my opportunity might have, and as such my will to perceiver was at its lowest. I pulled through of course since I really don't want to fail myself in the long run of my education, but I guess the last 2 months have been the most eager I've ever been.
• In terms of giving tips to incoming students ventures into ENT3003, I would say one of the first is to make absolutely sure you're comfortable with the 4 assignment weekly work schedule and the second might be to make sure you have plenty of creativity for the questions you'll have to ask others for the interviews you'll be conducting to aid your business hypothesis later on in the class.

The Entrepreneur god himself

13A: Reading Reflection No. 1

Book Review 📖

1. What really surprised me the most about the book was how committed the protagonist was to becoming an entrepreneur and how he learned so much from his experiences throughout the book. I admired the entrepreneurs innovated attitude the most I could really feel his thought process out. I disliked how detached the entrepreneur became from non-entrepreneurial ideals later on in the book. At first it seemed as though the entrepreneur failed to capture his market, but in general it was a success since he kept working at it.
2. The entrepreneur was competent at many things, some of those things he really honed over the course of the book. His competencies were his speaking skills and his ideation.
3. One of the more confusing parts of the book was how bad the author was at conveying the sense of urgency that an entrepreneur goes through when tailoring their product to an adapting marketplace, just a bad author in general.
4. I'd ask the entrepreneur if they liked being an entrepreneur and if they could do something better with their life why would the be an engineer.
5. His opinion was centered around a can do attitude and the falls in line with mine too; he's like the little engine that could my dog.

12A: Figuring out Buyer Behavior No. 1

Buyer Behavior:

• Pick a Segment: My Market Segment I intend to isolate is a demographic of middle class Americans between the age of 55-70, and their need for care opportunities for their aging parents.

• Interview, Need Summaries and Information Searches: 
• Interview 1: My first of the series of interviews was with a Gainesville local woman who fits right into my segment. Her need summary was exactly what'd i'd expect for a prototypical customer. Her need comes from her mother being in her late 80s and beginning to falter due to old age, and the where aspect is finding care facility that's right for her due to the fact she has alzheimer's. Her information searches consisted of googling for "nursing homes" and asking fellow co-workers if they have a similar situation to hers and where she might be able to turn to.
• Interview 2: This interview was conducted right outside of a Super Target with a 63 year old man named John. John's need summary also fits right inside of the definition I have laid out for my business opportunity. His father is beginning to have issues caring for his wife, as she has suffered 2 falls within the past 1 and both requiring surgery. The care she needs can't be supplied by his father so John needs an outlet to solve this problem. His information searches just devolve to using newspapers and inquiring where he might be able to find a care facility that he can afford.
• Interview 3: The final interview happened right at an Ocala gas station with a woman who also fit quite well into my demographic. She explained her need summary from the standpoint that she needs to find a place that's capable of caring for her aging mother due to her mother beginning to have mental issues and along with it consequences of an earlier hip replacement a few years prior. Her information searches tend to fall around using facebook as research outlet to poll for where she might be able to send her mother to live a quality life on the budget of a school teacher.

• Conclusions: From my interviews, I've realized that as long as I can reach out to my intended segment in the business market, I stand a fair chance of making a profitable business so long as the under the hood costs can be managed in a way to make the cost to customers manageable with middle class income and insurance. The need awareness can be categorized into simply needing a care facility that does 2 things: Cares for their loved one properly, and is affordable on a paycheck to paycheck basis. 

11A: Idea Napkin No.1

Idea Napkin:

• You: I am an aspiring computer scientist that is deeply rooted in the sentiments that resolve leads to innovation, and innovation can lead to success. My skills are concentrated in things like programming, hardware, and ideation; and ideation is one of my strong sides. Should my business opportunity become fully fleshed out, I would sell it off to somebody else and collect royalty checks for the rest of my life.

• What am I offering to customers?: I offer the most valued thing in such a complex age, peace of mind. I offer care that is second to none, from a business that puts your loved ones ahead of an insane profit margin. A system that cares for the elderly that once cared for you; that is what I am offering at a price-point that can managed for a middle class in todays time.

• Who's being offered it?: The customers are being offered this, but primarily the customers family. Odds are if someone needs this service they're either physically disabled or mentally disheveled, and it falls upon the family to take up my service.

• Why do they care?: They care because it's a loved one. You'd want to the best you could for your mother or father / grandad and grandma, so you come to a business like mine to see to it they live life with a higher quality getting what they need at a price that doesn't bankrupt.

• What are my core competencies?: What sets my idea apart from others is a staff that is licensed to care for the elderly and who's skills are specified into maintaining the quality of life that the patients are used to, something nowhere else can say.

• Evaluation: When it comes to all of these answers, I find that there is a cohesion of some sort. The customers will readily see the competencies I display and find that the care offered will always edge out any other care facility, and at an affordable price-point to. Altogether I think that the only outlier might be my own experiences and skillsets being so separate from my business opportunity, but there is no reason why I couldn't translate such proficiency into my business.

10A: Elevator Pitch 1

9A: Testing the Hypothesis Part 2

Testing the Hypothesis Part 2

Going on with my hypothesis from part 1, I went ahead and surveyed the opinions of five different people, with the interviews down below.

Interview 1: Publix Deli Woman (40-50s)

Does this solution present a fix you need?

• "While the problem is certainly there, my mom and dad are still going strong living on their own and don't really have a need for a nursing home even if it could correct the well known problems associated with them, and even then I really feel like once they get up in their age that they could just move in with me."

Interview 2: Car-Salesman (50-60s)

Does this solution present a fix you need?

• "Despite my parents being in there late 70s nursing homes are an extreme for us, and the services offered by the program you're presenting have to come with a price-point that just isn't all the do-able on decent salary, and it seems to be such a selective problem on the assumption my parents wouldn't be able to care for themselves sometime soon."

Interview 3: UF Professor (60-70)

Does this solution present a fix you need?

• "The need for your problem doesn't really present itself until the later walks of life,  and fortunately my mother is still doing quite well working from her home and in good health meaning such a service is a moot point to me."

Interview 4:  Neighbor (50-60s)

Does this solution present a fix you need?

• "My father and mother are actually living with me and my family for the time being. They eventually found themselves needing more and more help with day to day activities and moved in with us to be closer to the grandkids and simultaneously help us while we can help them. So I don't think what you're offering is a fit for me personally."

Interview 5: Football Coach (50-60)

Does this solution present a fix you need?

• "Currently my mom and dad are living fine on their own in Tallahassee so I can definitely conclude that I am not in need of the service despite the fact that my age and work puts me in your demographic."

Inside the boundary	Outside the boundary
Who is In: Middle aged people with dependent parents.	Who is Not: Middle aged people with independent parents.
What the Need Is: An outlet to help them with care.	What the Need Is Not: Care facilities for those who can care for themselves.
Why the Need Exists: Elderly being unable to take care of themselves.	Alternative Explanations: Home-care being present and parents that don't suffer from disabilities.

8A: Solving the Problem

Charting to a Solution

• The Opportunity
• This opportunity as I had discussed back in my 7A post is about capitalizing in the health care market, in which I talked about senior assisted living and nursing homes providing inadequate services for their patients and to go along with that sub-par service an expensive price point for that care. There's an opportunity to reform this broken system and reap untold profits due to the lack of competition compared to virtually any other industry.

• The Solution
• As I had also discussed back in my 7A post, there truly isn't an easy or spontaneous solution to this problem / opportunity. Nonetheless the solution to this problem is to increase the quality of care while simultaneously reforming the pricing of assisted living. The way I think of accomplishing this is to created a standardized nursing school or course for the explicit purpose of training people to help the elderly that introduce workshops that prepare nurses for the problems they'll encounter while assisting seniors with either unsound mind or body. This means that the elderly in the care of homes are better cared for, and thus the quality of life adjustments could be used to justify a high price point, but not one that current for-profit run facilities use.

7A: Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

The Beginning Steps of a Hypothesis

The Opportunity: After a bit of thought, I realized that the best opportunities start to help a problem in the present and become a pillar for solutions in the future. To put my opportunity into a statement best: "Nursing homes and care-wards are unable to provide the adequate care necessitated by the physical and mental limitations of the elderly as a result of the insurance policies of corporate run hospice/nursing homes."

• The Who: Nursing homes and care-wards.
• The What: Ineffective care for aging Americans.
• The Why: Insurance policies of for profit nursing homes.

Testing the Hypothesis:

• The Who: By extension of the problem, the "who" also includes the elderly who need to be placed into assisted living. 
• The What: I would wager that any patient in a nursing home faces the issues of inadequate care at the hands of programs that can be provided by the home itself, or by the staff. 
• The Why: One of the many "whys" for the failures of nursing homes is their payment policies relating to an absurd monthly price-point for the purpose of covering all patients care plans, while in reality they take those insane profit margins and do the bare minimum under contract to keep their customers healthy. But this "why" isn't exclusive to the for profit insurance policies specific to elder care, but also the training provided to the nurses / staff being insufficient to help these patients when they might be under duress or suffering from something.

Interviews:

In each interview I read the opportunity statement off, and after giving opinions on it I ask numerous questions relating to the who, what and why.

•  Interview #1
• "I think it's a well thought out idea, especially when you consider the aging boomer population getting older and with the younger generations dealing with a market left in turmoil cheaper and better care for seniors is going to be a must. Your who definitely seems on the money but the why seems a bit shaky, as I think there might be larger problems that go into contributing to the what."
• Interview #2
• "Seems like a fairly generational problem, but there is room to make a business opportunity around a reform like this. I think the who should include more than just nursing homes, but also the patients affected, and on a side note I feel that there really is no easy solution to this."
• Interview #3
• "This seems like a very eery problem, as in one that is going to sneak up on a lot of people in the later walks of life. I can say for certain I want to be cared for better than what a lot of those elderly get at those homes. The Who and What seem pretty good, but the why could also be in part to the lack of competition major nursing home companies lack."
• Interview #4
• "The opportunity is there but I don't have much firsthand experience with it as my family never used one of these care services before. As for the who though, I think it's not as cut and dry as you make it out to be. I think the profit margins for a better care systems would be weaker depending on just how many elderly in the next generations need this service."
• Interview #5
• "Altogether seems like a venture that could yield quite well assuming the solution to each of your why's isn't as monumentally difficult as it looks to be on paper. Making a better care system seems like the solution to go for when you mentioned your What, but tackling it at such a broad scope seems pretty difficult to go on.

Reflection: I feel like after going through the interviews that the opportunity surely exists, but it would take quite a while to make a thorough solution and on top of that, it would seem extremely difficult to draft the resources to make one. All in all it definitely exists, but to make a full blown solution work well it seems a tad out of reach.

6A: Identifying Opportunities in Regulatory and Economic Trends

Four Opportunistic Trends:

• Trend One: Biometric Security
• My mind first jumped to this opportunity after reading it from this specific article. Modern technology continues to evolve and find ways to assist and in some cases invade day to day life. Which is why I believe there exists an economic opportunity to improve antiquated homeowner security measures. With biometric enhanced doors and security systems perturbing all standard means of breaking and entering, I believe the customer base would be upper middle class suburban families all the way to the higher economic sector of things like banks and firms. It would be difficult to develop a standard U.I and servicing price, but it is heavily exploitable as there exists no current market for it. I saw the idea for this opportunity since I've always been pretty into security systems and wanting to make a futuristic one.
• Trend Two: Biodegradable Straws
• This specific opportunity relates to both economic and regulatory changes, but I would argue more towards regulatory (Source here). With topics like global warming steadily rising in our society and talks of renewable energy being the way forward, many fast food companies and restaurants alike will have to comply with upcoming policies, and marketplaces more inclined to shop conscientiously with green companies. McDonalds is even moving away from plastic straws and onto paper straws shortly, which proves that this opportunity exists on a huge scale. This products primary customers would be dinners and people going out to eat, and with shareholder backing a full on production of paper straws would be very easy to accomplish. The reason I saw this opportunity is because of the devolving politics and the increasing pressure from top scientists warning of humanity's consumption, and plastic being the biggest contributor.
• Trend Three: Smart Glasses
• The economic opportunity I identified through here and brief look at the current generation smart devices. The technology is there to create smart devices in the form of TV's, Refrigerators, and even watches, so it's a natural extension to go to something like glasses.  The customer base would essentially mimic the current buyers of smart tech but for those with a need for glasses or hands of displays. The endeavor would definitely be difficult due to the ability to make the chips and a passable U.I , but it is doable with effort and backing. I saw this opportunity due to the equally cool but less tech heavy glasses like the SnapGlasses, and realizing the only thing necessary was innovating a unique processor for the features.
• Trend Four: Waste Vaporizer
• This regulatory opportunity definitely follows along with waste disposal regulation, and takes a spin on it with some innovation. The opportunity surely exists as detailed in this article, and talks about using plasma to vaporize trash and convert it into gas. The opportunity surely exists due to the fact that American landfills are as polarizing as they are full. Customers would be the solid waste authority and other government waste disposable agencies. The opportunity is unimaginably hard to realize due to the process being incomplete, but with proper research and implementation the profit margins would be inconceivably high. I realized this opportunity as early as when I went on a field trip to the dump and they spoke on the need for technology to assist with human waste.

5A: Identifying Local Opportunties

5 Local Opportunities

• "In High Demand- Florida Contractors Say They Anticipate a Shortage of Constructors"
• Link
• South Florida contractors are actually facing an employment shortage they've never anticipated. Wages are on the rise and profit margins are the highest they've ever been but 80% of most Florida contractors are facing employment shortages. This is being caused mostly by the decreasing lack of white collar workers emerging from more recent generations. The most affected party in this ordeal has to be the Association General Contractors; needing 1/3rd more of a work force for upcoming projects.
• "Arguments- for and against buying gold - The Savage Truth"
• Link
• The article details both the pros and cons of getting involved in the gold industry; including purchasing and selling gold. The current trend in the gold economy is at a low point for buying and selling, and investment through gold can't current collect interest either, but if you enter the industry you can take stock in the Gold Exchange Economy and diversify your earnings with bullion. This problem mostly affects the Gold Sellers / Buyers in America.
• "Language school closes Fla. branches - Hundreds of education visa holders stranded."
• Link
• One of the most prominent Florida companies known for providing educational opportunities in the form of english learning schools for immigrants with educational visas has closed up shop, causing the displacement of all of their students, leaving their citizenship and their wages up in the air. Pre-paid tuition isn't being refunded and teachers are missing out on their paychecks, but the truly afflicted party in this situation are the poor immigrants who may have their visas rescinded should no other institution accept them.
• "New developments designed to 'make a dent in the crisis' of affordable housing."
• Link
• Following the housing crisis of 2013 and 2015, many people are still hurting from the loss of their home's property values and like-wise many people still cannot afford to find a place to live in general. Luckily, the South Florida company Housing Trust is has 4 projects underway, and one recently completed in Broward County. The 55 year old and older 6 story development is some of the most affordable housing in the area and due to the utilities is touted as "recession-proof". The housing problem affect most every Floridian looking to find housing and companies like the Housing Trust are starting ti make a dent in the problem.
• "Florida leaders blast Airbnb over rental ban - Services withdrawn from Israeli settlers in West Bank"
• Link
• This business dealing with Airbnb has created a social media disaster. After Airbnb decided to withdraw listings in West Bank, a providence on the Israeli disputed territory, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and other Florida government employee's blasted the decisions as anti-semitic. The problem comes in the form of Airbnb seemingly never having done something so rash before, and disenfranchising jewish homeowners. The afflicted parties Airbnb and the Jewish community are at odds with each other over this, and I can see an opportunity for other home-based services to jump at the opportunity to overtake Airbnb over their costly decision.