Please follow the professor instructions and make sure that it is your own work and not copy and paste off of someone else w
Please follow the professor instructions and make sure that it is your own work and not copy and paste off of someone else work or article. Please read the study guide. Please watch out for spelling and grammar errors and please use the APA 7th edition format.
Book Reference: Neck, H. M., Neck, C. P., & Murray, E. L. (2021). Entrepreneurship: The practice and mindset (2nd ed). SAGE. https://online.vitalsource.com/#/books/9781544354644
For this assignment, read the case study on pages 27 and 28 of the eTextbook. Once you have read and reviewed the case scenario, respond to the following questions with thorough explanations and a well-supported ration
Compare the different types of entrepreneurship concerning the amount of risk associated with starting a technology services company. Think about the ramifications of starting a company, where the core product (technology) is changing at a rapid pace.
Describe Gyan’s business model. Why does this business model fit or not fit this organization? Apply one other business model to this case, and then explain whether you think your selected business model would contribute to the company’s success and growth or not.
Analyze the type of entrepreneurship Gyan exhibits. As you think about doing something entrepreneurial, what is your motivation for entering an entrepreneurial activity?
Your case study should be at least two pages in length. References should include your eTextbook and a minimum of one additional credible source. Adhere to APA Style when constructing this assignment, including in-text citations and references for all sources that are used. Please note that no abstract is needed.
BUS 8303, Entrepreneurship and Innovative Business Development 1
Course Learning Outcomes for Unit I Upon completion of this unit, students should be able to:
1. Compare the types of entrepreneurship. 1.1 Contrast different types of entrepreneurship related to a level of risk. 1.2 Analyze a type of entrepreneurship.
4. Examine business models.
4.1 Apply a business model. 4.2 Explain a company’s use of business models.
Course/Unit Learning Outcomes
Learning Activity
1.1 Chapter 1 Student Resource: Frugal Innovation Unit I Case Study
1.2, 4.1 Unit Lesson Chapter 1 Unit I Case Study
4.2
Unit Lesson Chapter 1 Student Resource: Challenges of a Family Business Unit I Case Study
Required Unit Resources Chapter 1: Practicing Entrepreneurship In order to access the following resource, click the link below. Navigate to the Video and Multimedia area in Student Resources for Chapter 1 of the eTextbook to view the items listed below.
• Challenges of a Family Business
• Frugal Innovation
Unit Lesson
Characteristics of an Entrepreneur How do you define an entrepreneur? Are you surprised to learn the truth about entrepreneurs rather than the myths that are falsely attributed to entrepreneurs? In the article by Goyette (2019), it is stated that more managers are building an entrepreneurial mindset in their employees with a growing preference to hire people who can contribute within an organization as an intrapreneur, a person who acts and thinks in an entrepreneurial manner. In this course, entrepreneurship is explained in depth to help you understand who entrepreneurs are, the characteristics of entrepreneurs, and why these characteristics support the success of the entrepreneurial venture. In later units, tools and resources will be presented as mechanisms to enhance your creativity and build your own entrepreneurial skills. Characteristics connected to entrepreneurship include creativity,
UNIT I STUDY GUIDE
Exploring Entrepreneurship
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resourcefulness, perseverance, passion, motivation, being future-oriented, optimism, an adventurous spirit, flexibility, ethical behavior, comfort with ambiguity and risk, emotional and social intelligence, and humility. Each of these characteristics associated with successful entrepreneurs comes from research on the qualities displayed by entrepreneurs through a variety of studies that attempted to find out why some people become entrepreneurs, while other people are content to work for others.
Entrepreneurship and Ethics A common theme within the field of entrepreneurship is the importance of being ethical and honest. Since there are many risks associated with the progression from identifying a problem, finding a solution, and building the venture, a variety of people are needed along this path. Entrepreneurs focus more on collaborating with others than on competing against other people or organizations. Within each of these relationships, each person is dependent on the other for building a successful venture. In these relationships, each person must speak the truth, even when the information is detrimental. The earlier any negative information is identified and communicated, the quicker the problem can be addressed. Building teams and networks is another important characteristic of entrepreneurs. An entrepreneurial team is a significant part of a venture’s success.
Some derailers result from childhood experiences where learned messages, such as a fear of failure, hold us back in life. Surprisingly, some people even have a fear of being successful, as the message heard in childhood could have been that the person was inadequate or incapable of being successful.
Social Entrepreneurship
In fitting with this emphasis on ethical behavior, a subdivision within the field of entrepreneurship is about creating non-profit ventures and for-profit ventures that solve a societal need. Social entrepreneurs identify challenges faced by social and environmental problems, such as how to add more protein to a population’s diet in a tropical climate. One solution to this problem could be the creation of shitake mushroom farming to add a new source of protein into the local populations’ diet. Another idea is farming oyster mushrooms to teach people how to earn extra income by selling their mushrooms. Once you start developing your
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entrepreneurial mindset, you will start to notice more examples of social entrepreneurship and the creation of new products to solve unique challenges.
Intrapreneurship In this course, preconditioned restrictive messages about entrepreneurship will be diminished as your knowledge of the field of entrepreneurship is expanded and as you learn how to develop your entrepreneurial skills to become alert in continuously viewing the world through a lens that notices all of the possibilities for creating new ventures to solve problems. Not only is the topic of entrepreneurship relevant to the idea of starting a venture, it’s also relevant from the perspective of intrapreneurship, the focus on creating new products within an organization. An example is 3M, which was originally named Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company. It has a history of success, failure, success, innovation, and perseverance (3M, n.d.). In addition to its history of innovation and perseverance, 3M has a focus on collaboration and trust, essential components that propelled 3M into the Fortune 500 list with over 60,000 products and a presence in over 70 countries. One-third of those products were invented within the last 5 years (3M, n.d.). To support intrapreneurship, 3M is known for encouraging employees to spend 15% of their time working on new ideas. Even ideas that do not result in success count as work toward new inventions (Goetz, 2011). 3M’s mission includes the importance of protecting employees and the environment, creating products with a high value to the customer, incubating and protecting disruptive technologies and processes, and developing and engaging employees (3M, n.d.). This type of supportive environment is intentionally designed to encourage entrepreneurial activities that are, in the case of working within an established corporation, examples of intrapreneurship.
Business Models and Entrepreneurship Along with growing entrepreneurial behaviors through intrapreneurship, other forms of entrepreneurship can occur through understanding business models. Business models describe the method for providing a value that results in revenue. Some organizations like YouTube avoided creating a traditional business model around selling a service. Instead, YouTube was created with the intent of harvesting, or selling the company. Their innovative business model was designed to grow the volume of video data, rather than create a business model based on revenue related to uploading video. Another innovative type of business model includes subscription services, the idea of the customer purchasing a regular predetermined quantity of a product over a set timeline, a growing trend in start-up companies. The topic of business models and entrepreneurial venture success has not been studied extensively. An article by McDonald and Eisenhardt (2020) explores how business models position the new venture for success in noting the value in adjusting traditional business models to align with the value proposition. The example from this article points to the difference between Blockbuster and Netflix. Blockbuster’s business model was time-locked; whereas, Netflix’s business model offered ease of use and flexibility while simultaneously tracking individuals’ streaming history and preferences. These key alterations to the business model used by Blockbuster differentiated Netflix as an entertainment provider that offered key values to their users. The openness to reconsidering the business model from a creative value-added perspective locked Blockbuster out of the video rental industry. Even redefining how the industry is described provides new insights into defining the business model. The redefined industry move from video rental to entertainment provider has reshaped this industry with Netflix advancing to creating their content, solidifying their business model even further to block out competing players. The topic of business models and revenue models is covered later in the course in more depth.
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Manager vs. Entrepreneur There is a difference between being a manager and being an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurial ventures are not small versions of large corporations. There is a difference between following a method rather than a process. Entrepreneurs focus on taking action, experimenting, and seeking out the best business model that fits their venture and target market. There is even the idea of failing until success is reached. Failure is an opportunity to learn, rather than accepting a result without considering the various components or variables that were part of the action or experiment.
Behaviors of Entrepreneurs Keep in mind the importance of enjoying this course as part of the entrepreneurial behaviors of playfulness and experimentation. During this course, take time to apply the topics covered in the chapter readings. For example, Table 1.7 in Chapter 1 of the eTextbook shows how to use deliberate practice, which is a concept similar to practicing mindfulness. Consider practicing these activities at least once a day. Being deliberate, being consciously aware, and being in the moment are activities that you could build into your life. The benefit is improved perception, memory, intuition, and metacognition (Neck et al., 2021). These are documented behaviors of entrepreneurs proven to be effective and worth your time in practicing the activities and tools covered throughout this course.
Interactive Activity In each unit, you will find an interactive knowledge check activity, where you follow Claire’s story and help her develop a business idea. This is a nongraded activity.
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In order to check your understanding of concepts from this unit, complete the Unit I Knowledge Check activity. Unit I Knowledge Check PDF version of the Unit I Knowledge Check Note: Be sure to maximize your internet browser so that you can view each individual lesson on a full screen, ensuring that all content is made visible.
Conclusion
In today’s world of uncertainty, stepping out of traditional career paths and stepping into the world of entrepreneurship can provide greater control over your life. Although this sounds contradictory given the unknowns in starting a new venture where even the industry might not have existed before the startup opened, the average employment time within one company has now dropped to 3.2 years for employees between the ages of 25 and 34 (Doyle, 2019). As an entrepreneur, your efforts are directly related to advancing the development of your venture. Growing your idea into a successful venture is a rewarding manifestation of your dream, your idea.
References Doyle, A. (2019, November 8). How long should an employee stay at a job? The Balance Careers.
https://www.thebalancecareers.com/how-long-should-an-employee-stay-at-a-job-2059796 Goetz, K. (2011, February 1). How 3M gave everyone days off and created an innovation dynamo. Fast
Company. https://www.fastcompany.com/1663137/how-3m-gave-everyone-days-off-and-created-an- innovation-dynamo
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Goyette, K. (2019). 5 things leaders do that stifle innovation. Harvard Business Review. https://libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?dire ct=true&db=bsu&AN=139155074&site=eds-live&scope=site
McDonald, R. M., & Eisenhardt, K. M. (2020). Parallel play: Startups, nascent markets, and effective
business- model design. Administrative Science Quarterly, 65(2), 483–523. https://doi- org.libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/10.1177/0001839219852349
Neck, H. M., Neck, C. P., & Murray, E. L. (2021). Entrepreneurship: The practice and mindset. SAGE. 3M. (n.d.). The history of 3M: From humble beginnings to Fortune 500.
https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/company-us/about-3m/history/
Learning Activities (Nongraded) Nongraded Learning Activities are provided to aid students in their course of study. You do not have to submit them. If you have questions, contact your instructor for further guidance and information. In order to access the following resource, click the link below. Utilize the following Chapter 1 Flashcards to review terminology from the eTextbook.
- Course Learning Outcomes for Unit I
- Required Unit Resources
- Unit Lesson
- Characteristics of an Entrepreneur
- Entrepreneurship and Ethics
- Social Entrepreneurship
- Intrapreneurship
- Business Models and Entrepreneurship
- Manager vs. Entrepreneur
- Behaviors of Entrepreneurs
- Interactive Activity
- Conclusion
- References
- Learning Activities (Nongraded)
,
Key Terms
· Benefit corporation (or B Corp) 12
· Corporate entrepreneurship (or intrapreneurship) 10
· Deliberate practice 22
· Entrepreneurs inside 10
· Entrepreneurship 3
· Family enterprise 13
· Franchise 11
· Inbound marketing 28
· Outbound marketing 28
· Royalties 11
· Serial entrepreneurs (or habitual entrepreneurs) 13
· Startup 6
Case Study Saurbh Gupta, founder, Gyan-I Inc.
Before you start your entrepreneurship journey, make sure you validate your reason and motivation for doing so. If you are convinced that you are doing this for the right reasons, whatever it may be, you shall be able to take on whatever comes your way.
—Saurabh Gupta, founder of Gyan-I Inc.
The name of Saurabh Gupta’s company, Gyan-I, means “knowledgeable one” in Hindi. Having always wanted to be his own boss, Saurabh’s entrepreneurship journey began when he came across an opportunity while working for a very large charitable foundation called Daniels Fund. Daniels Fund is headquartered in Denver, Colorado, and is dedicated to providing grants, scholarship programs, and ethics education in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming. As vice president of IT, Saurabh oversaw the end-to-end management of the organization’s entire IT infrastructure. This included vendor negotiations, department budgeting, project planning, and execution. Daniels Fund manages assets of more than 1 billion dollars, but Saurabh realized that smaller, less wealthy nonprofit organizations faced similar IT issues and technological challenges. He identified a real unmet need: IT services for nonprofit organizations that did not have the infrastructure or money to support a full-time IT staff. Saurabh felt that meeting this need would fit perfectly with his skillset and experience and would be a good way to finally fulfill his dream of becoming an entrepreneur.
Though he toyed with the idea of starting Gyan-I Inc. for years, he could only take the leap after he received his U.S. green card in 2011. The CEO of Daniels Fund was supportive of Saurabh’s decision to start his own company and was also his first customer! His former CEO continues to be his mentor and a pillar of support today.
Gyan-I Inc. provides technology consulting and managed IT services primarily for nonprofit and small- business organizations. As Saurabh explains it,
For an organization with 10 to 100 people, it doesn’t really make sense to hire a techie. What we do is that we run the basics around the network, website, online infrastructure, and even consult companies to give them new ideas and improve overall operations using IT. Most of the work is remote and our clients sometimes like us to operate out of their offices. While the five-member team usually works out of Denver, people are all over the country. Recently, however, we have pivoted the business to focus on cybersecurity, and all the services I just mentioned are offered only to legacy clients.
Over the past 2 years, with the increasing number of cyber incidents, crime, and malware, cybersecurity in business infrastructure has gained significant importance.
The hacking of the 2016 U.S. elections was a watershed moment for us. While cybersecurity is a space that I personally really enjoyed, it is also a space that is gaining significant importance and is here to stay. The IT infrastructure around the world is changing with more offerings coming on the cloud, increasing exposure to the Internet, making cybersecurity even more necessary and relevant. We saw this as an opportunity to evaluate the strength of our team and internal resources, focus our offerings towards cybersecurity and move up the pecking order in our niche market segment.
Gyan-I Inc. now offers three services that help small businesses manage their cyber risk. First, they do an initial risk assessment and give a report on the risk businesses are likely to face and consult on how to overcome the risk. Second, they extend offerings by hand-holding the company and providing the necessary support to protect the companies from risk, analyze their security, and train employees on an ongoing basis. The third service is related to fast responses to cyber breaches. The response to these higher-margin services, Saurabh says, has been “good.”
In 2011, when Saurabh started, he was alone and “bootstrapped” the business. Bootstrapping is entrepreneurship lingo for starting a business with very limited resources without outside investment. Saurabh believes his bootstrapping approach helped him start small but grow with intention. As people joined the team, the company began to grow organically and slowly, not to mention being profitable from Day 1. Bootstrapping the company presented Saurabh with its own sets of constraints. He felt that it would not be possible to deliver the services to his clients at a low cost and on time if he developed his own resources (IT infrastructure). Instead, he adopted existing software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions that were not only tried and tested but also readily available (e.g., SaaS for payroll, project management software). Using these existing solutions allowed him to bundle and customize his offerings to address the specific needs of his customers, improving customer satisfaction.
Bootstrapping also meant that other overhead costs had to be minimized. His first office was in a co-op workspace in Denver. “Everything is an operational expense when you’re bootstrapped,” he quipped. The business developed organically and mostly through word of mouth. Because most of the leads resulted from inbound marketing , their sales cycles were extremely short, so they could contact the customer, pitch the product, and close the sale in less than one day. This enabled them to grow 30% every year. Gyan-I Inc. currently has 45 to 50 customers, and they have expanded their marketing efforts to include outbound marketing . They have recently hired a marketing professional to help grow the company base and brand.
Inbound marketing: bringing potential customers to your business by creating online content that addresses their needs, in order to build trust and brand awareness.
Outbound marketing: promoting your product or service through traditional activities such as advertising, trade shows, and cold calling.
Not everything was smooth sailing for Saurabh. He recalls an early misstep in the business around 2013, when he decided to focus on developing a SaaS product called Applyd ( http://applyd.co/ ) from scratch. He noticed many of his nonprofit clients followed a paper-based approach to file requests for scholarships. He thought it was possible to streamline this process electronically, reducing the time spent on redundant activities for these 500 potential clients. Building a product from scratch was different from what Gyan-I had done so far. Saurabh, however, felt that he understood the problem and that the product he would build would be adopted by potential users almost immediately. He decided to dive in with both feet, allocated a budget, and spent a lot of time building and working on the concept. His budget was running out and he was spending more than he wanted to on building the product. He was able to scrape through and finished the software in 2014, but the product did not achieve expected sales. It reached only 2–3% of the addressable market. The clients simply didn’t use it. He quickly realized that his clients were not early adopters and couldn’t see the value in automation. Saurabh stopped pursuing Applyd in 2015.
Saurabh realized that the company successfully worked as an outsourced model. His customers needed IT support and not new IT products. Gyan-I worked because it had internal resources—knowledgeable people who offered quality service and attention. Clients knew their IT was in good, capable hands. Today Saurabh is confident that his boutique business has a sustainable model that is scalable. The small staff size of the company also positions it well to provide high-quality services.
When a client approaches us, the team is able to be nimble and efficient. We are able to fine-tune our offerings in real-time based on the feedback and requirements of the client. Some clients are hard pressed for time and want work to be completed within the week, while some don’t mind spreading it over a few months. We are able to manage those expectations, a big advantage in this space.
Added to this is the awareness that Gyan-I Inc. has of the events affecting its industry, especially those related to cybersecurity. This nimble attitude has allowed it to pivot effectively and leverage and build on the existing strengths of the team.
Saurabh’s journey as an entrepreneur has not been without a struggle. He says that starting and running a company has been a spiritual and philosophical journey for him. It has not only helped him become more observant and disciplined in his personal life, but he has also developed a sense of self-awareness—something that he is very thankful for. Although he’s not able to spend as much time with his family as he would like, he has been able to strike a meaningful balance between family life and work life. The technology industry is constantly evolving, and Saurabh points out that he is always concerned about the company’s ability to remain relevant to customer needs and wants as the managed IT services industry is experiencing a tectonic shift toward cloud-based computing and consumption. This means that he is continuously learning in order to stay ahead of the game.
Critical Thinking Questions
1. How risky is it to start a technology services company today when technology is changing at such a rapid pace?
2. The Entrepreneurship Method is about taking action and trying new things. Do you see evidence of the Method during the creation of Gyan-I?
3. As you think about doing something entrepreneurial, today or someday, what is your motivation for doing so?
Source: Saurabh Gupta (interview with Babson MBA graduate assistant Gaurav Khemka, September 09, 2018.)
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