What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved the speaker we had come to class on Monday. As a psychology major, I really liked that the process he went through to discover the metaphor of the bees which to me compared to the business model canvas. He told us that he watched the bees as they behave in nature and then he applied that to how people in the business world behave. So awesome! I would have loved to start change leadership this week but it’s challenging to do tasks that require meetings nowadays.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture.
The speaker did a good job of opening more context to the common notion that there are bound to be unexpected things that will interfere or improve your progress through a venture. The weather metaphor was what did a good job of this for me. You never know what obstacles may come or go throughout this process. I have to take that into account when creating my venture this quarter.
What tools are you applying that you have learned from, or deepened understanding of this week?
I am trying to understand how a BMC works and how to apply it to multiple situations. This has been somewhat of a challenge for me in the past but now I recognize that it will be helpful for my personal organization. I want to be able to do this naturally and quickly.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
Once again, the main challenge I am facing is deciding if I want to be on the leadership or founder track. I plan to set up a meeting with one of the student leaders in our class to get some guidance.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
These first two weeks were, as always, spent on VP1. During this project, I loved the prompts. I think they were definitely appropriate for the current media and social issues. I think my team generated a solid idea for the prompt we picked which was the prompt for sustainability. I do wish that we would’ve been a more productive team. Taking online school and our skill sets being rather similar, I think this made this project rather hard for progress.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture.
Honestly, before this project, I hadn’t considered why test cards would be useful. My team did a really good job applying our test cards to producing a better project and business model. It helped us realize what customers we should target and what they want from our product. I’m going to use these for my E4 project this quarter to ensure that I am truly filling the gap.
What tools are you applying that you have learned from, or deepened understanding of this week?
This week I learned a lot from the younger E-levels. I hadn’t realized how much information had been lost over the summer and they brought a lot back to my attention. I think that using our community was probably the tool that deepened my understanding this week.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
I need to decide if I want to follow the leadership or founder track. After class on Monday, I think that I am more likely to go down the leadership path because I want to learn more about the styles Meg mentioned. That information feels like something I would use more in the future.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved being able to watch all the really great pitches this past week! I think the E1s did a fantastic job since everything is online. I do hope they were able to learn a lot and gain experience. We were spending this last week recovering from the craziness of planning the event. So, I barely focused on this class since I did have other work in my other classes that were more important. We did prepare for our pitch and I think we are all excited for this quarter to be done!
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
The only challenge I’m facing is finishing the business report! Otherwise, I am free as a bird. I think our teams next steps are just to finish the final parts of VP2 and then turn it in!!
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved our event! It really feels like our whole team of 11 people finally found a shared goal and that was to make sure the event was awesome! It went great. I’ll admit that day one was more popular but I went to nearly every talk and I learned so much. I think my favorite talk was by Arathi because she helped me to plan a lot of things regarding my passions. I am so happy that this event is now done.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture
I learned how important it is to plan every moment and every detail of an event. If Amelia had not made the event plan that was detailed by the minute we would not have been as successful. That showed me how much work goes into an event. You cannot do it alone. I don’t even want to think of how hard that would be.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
We are now facing the challenge of the pitch. We agreed not to do a practice pitch and I hope it works out for us. I am nervous for planning a pitch online. It seems very confusing and a huge amount of work. We already did so much work I hope we have it in us to pull it off.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved how easy going this past week was compared to the previous weeks. As a member of the outreach team, I feel like we had to grind really hard these past few weeks to ensure the timeslots were full. Now it’s all done! The event will be great and I am very excited to see what happens.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture
I didn’t really learn much from class this last week. I think a lot of my energy has been put into making sure this event is as good as it can be. It’s been really stressful and I personally am very ready for it to be over. I’m not sure I will ever plan another event in my life. It has been fun but not fun enough to want to do again.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
Next, we need to make the event a success. That means on Friday and Saturday we actually do this thing! Holy sh*t I can’t believe this is real. The challenge I am facing is on that Friday I have two exams and a research paper due so a majority of my next week will not be dedicated to this event like normal.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved the game night! It was seriously so much fun and I am really happy that I got to be a part of it. I think it was the most fun for me because I somehow won two of the rounds and I really never win games like the ones we played. Usually, no one can match my humour but this group of people liked my answers which made me feel good. In class, I really liked Dr. S’s workshop about coaching. I thought it was really valuable and it taught me skills I will definitely need in the future.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture
I learned more about how we are going to be dealing with zoom-bombers for our online event. This was a really long conversation that our whole team had to work through. It definitely brought me some awareness of the negative sides of using the internet for our event. I think the chance of someone negatively impacting our event will be very low but it is always possible so we will keep an eye out.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
The big challenge that I think we are facing is finalizing all the people who are presenting at the event. I am starting to get worried that not all the people I have asked to present will be ready. I also find it challenging to schedule all of the presentations and the inability to meet with anyone in person has become a very big hardship for me. Other then those few things I think the event will run smoothly and is going to be great!
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved how much work we got completed this past week! I really feel like this event is coming together and I am getting less worried about it every day. Schantell and I have been working really hard to make sure we are contacting as many great people as we can be, Tori and Evarosa are doing the same! I am honestly very excited to see how it all goes. I think I am most excited to get people from around the globe to participate, Dr.S will be sending us the contact information of people all over the world! I think that will really make this event shine.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture
I am learning a lot about using my networks. Until now, I didn’t realize how many people I have in my life who are entrepreneurs or who simply have awesome skills that I can help broadcast in this event. For example, I have a family friend in Indiana who owns a furniture restoration company and he is going to do a talk about how he got his business up and running for so many years. I also know people who are dance teachers and professional chefs. I think this will be a great event.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
Right now my challenges are minimal. If I was to list any it would be making sure everyone on each team is getting the same information. This has become a huge puzzle and very confusing. Outreach is doing the most right now and I think we have a huge weight on our shoulders. That’s okay though! Everyone is understanding and is here to help us.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved it when our E3 group met with Seraphima this last week (in class for half an hour). She has so much enthusiasm for our progress and the fact that she thinks we will make an awesome event this quarter makes me feel much more confident! She shared a lot of information with us. The one that stuck with me the most was sending people invitations to our event directly. This will make them feel included and important. I wish that our team would have been able to get more survey results. So far we have 79 but I had a personal goal to get it to 100 at least. I tried to ask our team to send it to at least three people per day but I don’t think that will happen. Hopefully, by the end of this quarter, we get more results.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture
Something I learned this week was how to write an engaging email directed towards potential speakers for our event. My team (the outreach team) decided it would be a really good idea to create a general outline for what to send to the potential speakers. It includes information about what type of event we want to host, what the basic outline of the event will be, the topics we want to talk about, a link to the website for our event, etc… I think it turned out great and will be helpful in making sure everyone gets the same information.
What tools are you applying that you have learned from, or deepened understanding of this week?
This week I have been applying a lot of group focused conversation tactics to our team meetings. Honestly, it’s not been going great but I think soon enough we will get into a grove. I think this deepened my understanding of group dynamics especially for planning an event. I think having smaller teams for particular topics is important.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
I’m not facing a lot of challenges. Mainly, I need to find people to speak at our event and I am nervous because the speakers are the substance of this event. That’s a lot of pressure. If we don’t find people to participate then the whole event could fail. I think I am just nervous about it right now but in the next few weeks, I think it will all come together.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
Something I loved this week was watching everyone pitch! It was a very relaxed day for me because all of my work was done behind the scenes. Everyone did a fantastic job and I’m really proud of all the E&I students for adjusting to the online platform. It has been challenging but, in my opinion, very fun! I wish that I could have met with the teams that Jake and I were coaching at least once more. It was a great time working with them. It’s sad that it has to come to an end.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture.
This week I learned how to interview with the “9 whys” strategy. I think this will be really beneficial for VP2 because our groups are going to need to think OUT OF THE BOX. So, with the application of this interview style, I think we can achieve a deeper understanding of what our target market will be hoping for in an online event
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
My biggest challenge right now is wrapping my brain around the concept of an online event. I have fears that we won’t be able to make anything successful happen. However, we are a group of really smart and creative people. I’m sure something will spark an idea and everything will fall into place. We will need to do a lot of ideation for this project.
What did you love this week? What would you have loved to have achieved this week?
I loved learning how to use zoom as a tool for our class! Normally our in-person classes are loud and tend to be a little crazy but now that we are able to mute everyone except for those teaching I find this to be a much more efficient learning environment. I really like the breakout rooms because we are forced to talk to people we may not know and its only those in our group so there are fewer distractions.
I honestly achieved everything I was hoping to finish this week. I started and nearly finished my website, chatted with both teams that Jake and I are coaching, and have organized all my work in all three of my classes.
Applying the content from this week’s learnings, connect your understanding with something that’s relevant to your venture.
I currently don’t have a venture but I am coaching students (which I’ve never done before). Something I learned about coaching is that it’s not the same as consulting. When consulting, you tend to give advice and input. When coaching, it’s important to ask open-ended questions about a topic. If you do this then the students are able to come up with their own ideas and expand upon their own knowledge. When questions arise or advice is wanted the students will ask.
What tools are you applying that you have learned from, or deepened understanding of this week?
I have been learning how to use the Word Press program. It was a HUGE challenge for me when I started using it but after clarification, I have become rather successful. I think this website will be a really useful tool in this class and in my future. I hope to use it after graduating from Western.
What challenges are you facing? What’s Next?
I am facing some communication challenges. Online can be strange but students in my age range generally should know how to communicate online, so, I find it very frustrating when groups don’t reply. I know we all have heavy workloads but we are under quarantine which means we all have plenty of time on our hands. I hope that throughout this quarter the communication gap will shrink.
