As I am developing this company and business idea with someone outside of the class, I have a great built-in reinforcement of concepts in explaining it to my colleague. From this week of class my summary of things that we need to talk about:
- company vs business vs products
- nature of the transaction
- legal structures
- growth & revenue drivers
- why are we doing this?
Other things that we need to talk about:
- norms and expectations (potentially friendship preserving!)
- network of stakeholders who were already interested in this project
This week my goals are to further flesh out "thick descriptions" in the Product/Service/Experience portfolio and establish communication, accountability and meeting norms. I feel like I have a good grasp of the "company vs business vs products" and the hows to get started. However the details about content are more my partner's contribution. So together we need to firmly establish our first target market and focus on the products that will appeal to them, while keeping an eye towards future growth.
Good job capturing the concepts explored this last week and weekend in class. Looks like you are progressing nicely through your plan.
ReplyDeleteOne of my take aways, during my after class meeting with prof Nelson and which I have posted in my latest blog, is that business plans are only assumptions which leaves room to formulate hypotheses from our research, although the logic must be able to stand on its own in these cases.
HI Emily - it strikes me as crucial that you and C be able to write up a one page detailed description of your product/service/ experience asap. It doesn't make sense to network with people until you have the content to WOW them. Do let me know when you have that -- I'm glad to take a look.
ReplyDeleteand again, partnership agreement! when you are sure you are moving forward with a business. But at least get it in the conversation, so it doesn't later make C feel that you believe the relationship untrustworthy. We just want partnership agreement to be "business as usual". (I hate to tell you how many great businesses I have seen fall apart because expectations and norms differ...)