Crowdfunding Next - And the enthusiasm Wanes

Well, the students appear to have everything under control. However, they seem to have taken me out of the loop. I called a meeting for anyone who wanted to attend an informal session and no one showed.  All I pretty much see are the results, yet, the results are good, better than good actually. I will take this non-attendance as a good sign that they are progressing.  It will be bad if this means that they are losing interest.

The teams have been doing an excellent job with their presentations to the class and I was extremely impressed with the concept test that was developed during class.  I asked students to come prepared on how to conduct a concept test.  They were peer graded on this so many came with a good understanding. We broke into teams by question types. At the end of class the questions were collected and one of the project manager put together the final test with me.  We got 180 responses (mostly students friends and family and my grad students) which allowed me to do some segmentation.

The marketing team presented the results of the concept test, including some perceptual maps.  They did a nice job overall.

The finance team presented the next week and this may be why we are losing momentum.  This team determined that there is not a valid revenue model for the product.  Great insights!! But this means that the teams have started to lose interest because there is no money to be made!  How do I regenerate enthusiasm for the project? Ownership of the product after the class is over is another problem that needs to be figured out. Some students suggest giving each student a 'share' of the company.  These shares can then be bought and sold, but that does not bring in seed funding for the project.  Is this what needs to happen to get them motivated again??

I like the lesson of the ebbs and flows of energy in a start-up that we are experiencing as a class.  I wonder if the students are getting this as a lesson.  Maybe I can have Drew or Christian talk about this.

My concerns are on the success of (1) the indiegogo campaign.  This needs to be good to generate funds to move forward.  This may also generate energy again if we are successful; (2) finding a developer that can write the app for the students.  We need a prototype to take out to get additional funding.  Students seem to be lagging here.  I need to get them to 'network' to find the right person.  Again, lack of motivation? or lack of knowing what to do next?

Because the indiegogo campaign is so crucial, the Funding team asked the class to collectively come together to help with the campaign.  It took a while and some reminders that this is class participation before we got full cooperation.  Again, another sign that students are losing momentum.

Having project managers is one of my best decisions.  These three students are crucial for making things happen.  Here is the minutes from my last meeting with them:

We will be switching to a kickstarter, because if we do not raise enough money we will not be able to complete the project and would not collect the money anyways.

-As to ownership, we will equate $250 with a purchase of one share within the company. There will be the option of half-shares for $125.

-As we launch the Kick campaign, we will express to the class that if everyone involved could come up with 10 friends who give $10, we will be well on our way to our goal. We want to make sure the class knows that even though they are skeptical we actually can achieve a successful fundraiser!

-If the Kick campaign is not successful we will continue working on the project, but it will be as a hypothetical launch.

-Keary is now in charge of the Design and Global teams

-Grant is now in charge of the funding, finance and legal teams

-Danny is now in charge of the marketing and distribution teams

-Danny will e-mail Dan Gregory, head of idea for Northeastern to inquire about ways to get money from outside of the kickstarter.

-Professor Garcia will e-mail Professor Kaeli about people willing to code a Facebook web app.

-The three project managers will work together with the relevant teams to find a developer and get a quote ASAP. We want to have this done by Monday/Tuesday.

-The class format will be changed in the future. Mondays will be lectures and assignments for the first 80 minutes with 20 minutes for group work at the conclusion. Wednesdays will be a quiz or an assignment or attendance for 15 minutes at the beginning of class. Then the project managers will address the class for 5 minutes so that we will all be on the same page in terms of project progression, deliverables, and group work for class time.

-When we reach a point where brainstorming is needed we will create a poll everywhere so that everyone in the class can submit their suggestions. We can then choose off of the list which items will be important to address and carry the discussion from there.

  

The brainstorming day went well, I think.  I don't know what the students think though.  Should I start taking surveys at the end of every class?? Which reminds me that I need to do a pre-survey about self-directed learning.  I will need to get that done today.

Last week's brainstorming class used Leidtka's book.  The prior week, students did an out-of-class ethnographic study so they came to class having experienced at least one customer's journey for a problem.  We then formalized that journey by using Leidtka's journey map exercise of mapping out highs & lows.  We then used that map to brainstorm the idea further.  Students finalized their product idea and then walked around and looked at each others posters (flip chart paper).  They were then asked to do one more revision based on comments they had received.  Three teams had the exact same idea, so two merged together. Then the next exercise was Leidtka's mind mapping. Without talking, students were to leave a post-it-note on a poster about something they liked or disliked about the idea.  The take home assignment was that students were to put together 1 ppt of the idea to present in the next class (5 min max) and also complete Leidtka's napkin pitch exercise.  This is turned in as a homework assignment.

General observations:
1. Some of my international 'A' students struggle with the concept of self-directed learning.  They are the ones that continually do not follow directions.  Maybe there is a language barrier here.
2.  The ideas generated by the students are very similar to past classes, so perhaps the type of ideation exercise doesn't really matter.
3. Overall, I get positive feedback almost every class.
4.  Check points, such as quizzes, seem to be essential to make sure that the students actually learn the material that they are suppose to be learning.  Having a book (even if it is mine), certainly helps with the self-learning process.  I'm not sure I would do it without a book.

This weekend, I attended the InnovWeekend, which was a start-up weekend of the Entrepreneurship club. Students had 48 hours to put a product together.  Many of the students, particularly engineers, had an idea/product they had been already working on.  It seems as if these students did not win the competition.  I will have to verify that.  I think the reason is that the ideas are very different than the business school's ideas and the judges tend to be from the business school.  Also the engineers did not do a great job of presenting their ideas.  The idea presentation is extremely important for entrepreneurs.  I must remember to show shark tank to my students today.

Final thoughts:  The organic nature of this class keeps me interested.  I'm hoping its not too organic for the students!

Turning education on its head

I have decided to teach my new products class as self-directed learning.  What this means I am not exactly sure.  However, I have given it the definition to mean that students are required to learn the material outside the classroom and we conduct the homeworks in class.  The first day of class I started off with asking students what is it they wanted to learn.  Many answered some of the standard answers.  I also asked what they wanted to do for the course project.  One response was to launch a new product/service.  I queried the class using Polleverywhere which allows students to respond anonymously.  3/4 of the student thought it was a great idea and 1/4 were not sure.  I have the sense that students don't actually like the uncertainty of the project as it will be very fluid.  We will come up with the product idea during class, we will decide how to develop it in class and then decide how to launch it.  One student suggested a Kickstarter campaign, which I think is a fabulous idea.  So we will be going through each step of the new product process during class.  Wow!  A new one for me.  I'll use this blog to give updates on how the class is progressing.

Boston Marathon Bombers

April 20. 2013. On Monday in Amsterdam, two men planted a bomb at the Boston Marathon.  I was traveling in Europe at the time and could only observe what everyone back at home was experiencing through the eyes (biased??) of the internet.  I probably felt more disturbed than those in the thick of it because I could not be home with my loved ones.  I awoke in Milan on Friday morning to see that the two men had gone on a crime rampage and the entire city of Boston had gone into a 'shut-down' mode.  There were no buses, no trains, no subway.  Boston turned into an unprecedented ghost town while two brothers originating from Chechnya, which even I didn't know was near Russia, terrorized Cambridge and Watertown. I checked the web at least three times an hour to see if any more carnage had ensued.  A few hours into the crisis, Northeastern went into lock down mode so that all classes were canceled, including finals, and the university was officially closed.  Businesses across the city were asked to keep closed for the day.  I can't even imagine an entire city being shut down. 

When the youngest of the brothers was caught (the older died before being captured), the city erupted into a spontaneous party.  I'm sure it was even more exciting than when the Red Sox won the world series or when Obama won the election the first time, both events that I was in town to experience.  Here is a picture of a party near Northeastern.

One thing I to say is that I don't understand these type of people who feel that violence, particularly to innocent bystanders, is the way to convey a message.  Much to Boston's credit, fear has never been an option in which to hide from.  The city was created based on the fearlessness of a few men who stood up against a monarchy who didn't care about the individual.  So it will take much more than two cowards to topple over this town.  Instead, I know that the people of Boston will be stronger and will look out for each other even more than before this violence.  So maybe it is not good to call this event senseless, because it has awakened our senses on how important our friends and family really are to us and how we can be united as a community.  B Strong Everyone, not just Boston!