Unlocking the Power of ChatGPT and AI in Testing - A Real-World Look, present...
How Entreprenuers Think V2
1. Matthew Waymire CPA MatthewWaymire@hotmail.com 702-279-0831 How Entrepreneurs Think
2. Background Emerging Service Section of Deloitte CFO/Controller Start ups Reboots Turnarounds Own Practice General contracting, casino theatre, entertainment, wireless cable, television, radio, fine art management, commuter air carriers, tour operations, aviation repair, advertising agencies, manufacturing, waste management, stock brokerage, mortgage banking, real estate development, law practices, property management, retail. Business Broker Top 25 out of 1300 two years running
3. What do they have in common? No formal business plans Little to no college A heavy predisposition towards doing/building rather than planning Observant A little more persistent than average Not afraid to solve problems
4. How do these people think? Pin maker – Just do it Net $700 k per year – year after year Worked 15 hours a week 1 semester college Virtual Office – Just keep pushing on the idea Bought a local franchise – found a unique extension Was netting about $30 k and growing at 18% per month when sold – after a year in business Building Contractor – Just handle it now and Just be observant Nets $500 k plus now in Las Vegas
5. Schedule July 13th, 2011 "Thinking like an Entrepreneur“ Exploit the Do/Learn/Adjust/Do Loop July 27, 2011 "Creativity Strategies of Entrepreneurs“ More ideas = more creativity August 10, 2011 "Problems Solving Strategies" Similar to low information – high time pressure strategies of firemen, neo-natal intensive care nurses , tank commanders in battle August 24, 2011 "5 Entrepreneurial Traits“ Listening and observing among the most important September 7, 2011 "Action Strategies of an Entrepreneur“ Solutions are often revealed by taking the next step September 21, 2011 "Closing & Failure strategies of an Entrepreneur“ Two essential abilities – persuasion and persistence/reevaluation
6. Takeaways Employ the Do/Learn/Adjust/Do cycle Rapid Prototyping Rapid iteration Experimental method Information by doing/building Observe and act on anomalies
7. Process Normally Taught to Entrepreneur Students Generate Idea Do market research Do feasibility study Create financial projection Finance Prototype Go to market
8. Alternative Method 1 Sara Sarasvathy – Darden Graduate School of Business – University of Virginia – Effectual Reasoning Actions and interactions drive the process Do the doable continuously Take inventory of your skills and resources and make use of them Be ready to pivot when new opportunities arise Risk management not elimination Keep failures small and early Use failures to inform your next action Risk small – what you can afford to lose Don’t fear the future Chances you are already pretty good at solving problems Look for significant issues and tackle them early
9. Build – measure – learn loop Lean Start Up – Rapid Prototyping taught at Stanford Technical Ventures Program Get through the following loop as quickly as possible Take an idea Build it Measure the users response Learn from it Modify the idea
10. Marshmallow Exercise Tom Wujec: Build a tower, build a team http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0_yKBitO8M <http://blogs.forbes.com/nathanfurr/2011/04/27/why-kindergartners-make-better-entrepreneurs-than-mbas-and-how-to-fix-it/> 20 sticks of spaghetti, one yard of tape, one yard of string, and one marshmallow. They then have 15 minutes to build the largest free standing tower with the one requirement that the marshmallow has to be at the top of the tower.
11. Who does well? Architects/engineers Kindergarteners CEOs Lawyers Recent MBA students
12. What can I do? Look for things in your business that don’t make sense. Ask: who would pay for a solution to this anomaly. Think of something you are putting off. Attend to it early in such a way that you get feed back from the end user.
13. Entrepreneurial traps Too Much Overconfidence Hinders One's Ability to Learn Build It and They Will Come: Not Necessarily! Solely Processing Information That Supports One's Position
Editor's Notes
Wasn’t till I was a business broker when I really learned about the entreprenueral mindset.Start up TV 39
Patton vs. Montgomery WWIIBut they think about their businesses a lot Run mental scenarios of tough situations all of the timeBut have directionsAct on opportunities/anomoliesNo set goals for their businessesPick out anomaliesReally observe client reactions
Executive suitesWhy did I want to know this is learnable I want to be able to build companies like they do I want to build My training tends to make me too rigid and rule boundSo as I would make mini discoveries I would share them with john
Mitch Kapor Lotus NathanFurr BYUunemployed at the time, spent an immense amount of time hanging around customers in retail computer stores. He heard the customers talk about how they used computers and their frustration with the existing spreadsheet solutions–they just wanted software that was easier to use and more powerful. He also picked up the vibe around the emergent PC as a potential exciting new technology. Lastly, he brought a new perspective to the problem, recognizing that there might be a way to use the unique capabilities of a PC to improve existing spreadsheets. When Lotus conducted a demo of their product concept at Comdex, they landed $1M in orders in a single day for a product that wasn’t even built yet.Engineering design student Why might not he have engaged?Looking at the 7 step process what jumps out at you Time consuming Expensive Leads to procrastination No to little feedback from actual users/paying customersWhy is this taught
Interviewed 30 founders of companies – most serial entreprenuars – gave set of start up problems and had them reason aloud 200m to 6.5 billionLess than 1% are funded through VC. As many non VC go public as private. True” or Knightian uncertainty – Distribution does not exist and/or is unknowable: Each draw brings forth a different item, not limited to balls – in other words, we just simply do not know and cannot estimate what the urn contains. It is here that we need a non-predictive technique to make decisions. Effectuation suggests that one solution to this problem lies in understanding that this distribution is created through human action; hence, harnessing human action through a process of persuasion[1] is likely to prove more useful than predicting it.
the Marshmallow Challenge: students are given 20 sticks of spaghetti, one yard of tape, one yard of string, and one marshmallow. They then have 15 minutes to build the largest free standing tower with the one requirement that the marshmallow has to be at the top of the tower. Every year I see roughly the same pattern: students break into groups and begin feverishly debating approaches before settling on a single plan to build the Eiffel Tower of marshmallows. Then the teams quickly specialize, with a few team members assembling tape and spaghetti trusses while others prepare the yard of string and marshmallow. As we near the 15 minute mark most teams beg for more time and after a few deadline extensions I finally call “time’s up” and the magic begins: fully half of the towers usually crash immediately in a broken mass of dry pasta. The other half teeter but eventually stabilize, much to the relief of the teams, and we measure the towers to determine the “winner.” That’s usually when I tell the class that despite their best efforts they are among the worst performers.Iterative process
MBAs actually perform the worst on average in building marshmallow towers. Engineers perform moderately well (thank goodness), but which group performs the best? Kindergartners! But why? The reason is quite simple: MBAs want to plan their way to an optimal outcome and then execute on the plan. Furthermore, adding incentives, like prizes or cash only makes the problem worse—planning goes up and average tower height goes down. In contrast, kindergartners do something much different. Instead of wasting time trying to establish who is in charge or make a plan, they simply experiment over and over until they find a model that works.
MBAs actually perform the worst on average in building marshmallow towers. Engineers perform moderately well (thank goodness), but which group performs the best? Kindergartners! But why? The reason is quite simple: MBAs want to plan their way to an optimal outcome and then execute on the plan. Furthermore, adding incentives, like prizes or cash only makes the problem worse—planning goes up and average tower height goes down. In contrast, kindergartners do something much different. Instead of wasting time trying to establish who is in charge or make a plan, they simply experiment over and over until they find a model that works.
The comedianswhats uWhat's with the cab drivers and B.O.? Just how long are these shifts? It's like they just get in the cab and drive 'til they are dead. Then they always have that cherry popit on the dashboard. Like that's suppose to be some kind of an improvement. Now you've got the cherry flavored B.O. I can't even imagine fruit going that long without a shower.p with?
