Horizon Prospects

1)      Tenaciousness is a competency.  What are the behaviors that you have used (or developed) to keep up with the requirements of this course?  I know that it’ll take me extra time to do assignments, especially ones that involve interviews, so as soon as one assignment is turned in, the next Monday I immediately start writing questions to ask and contacting people to get an interview so I have a full five days to get the number of people I need. Also, I carve out time each week to watch the lectures as well as poring over my notes before each cupcake. 2)      Tenaciousness is also about attitude.  Talk about a moment or two when you felt like "giving up." What pulled you through? Do you feel like you've developed a tenacious attitude during the past two months? What experience or experiences most contributed to this? I truly didn’t think I’d be able to find a product or service I could expand into a full-scale busines...

In my Elevator Pitch, I said that I would market this product to managers of fast-food restaurants, however I wanted to explore another possible sector of my market: mothers with more than two children under the age of 13. In my interviews, all three mothers were very enthusiastic about my product, one even offering to test it if I ever made it. All three women were working in some capacity and did the majority of the cleaning for their household. To my surprise, when I asked them what they used to clean the most they all said the broom was their number one choice. I pressed one mother as to why this was and she in essence cited convenience of use. People were the first source of information that most of these women would turn to if they were trying to solve a problem. The general vibe I got from these mothers was that they would talked to a qualified individual first depending on the problem. Google would only come into the process if they wanted to fact-check someone or if there we...

1) You read about an entrepreneur: To Be Loved was not only about the rise of Motown, but also included Berry Gordy’s whole life, even the parts that didn’t seem to affect his business story, like when he lost his virginity. To be honest, I don’t really admire that about him: Gordy had many wives and was in his own way a player but never felt much remorse for the string of broken relationships he left behind. I do admire the fact he used all of the connections he could think of to make his numerous record labels successful. He was also able to delegate his responsibilities seamlessly, which is often a roadblock for independent, often stubborn leaders. I think the key here was that he valued Motown and the music he was writing, producing, and often marketing more than getting all the credit for everything in the end. Gordy definitely suffered adversity and failure. He ran out of money numerous times and had to humble himself to get money out of the family trust as well as co...

-Me: I’m very good at finding out what people want and identifying things that I also want to change and make better. I pride myself on coming up with creative solutions to problems as well as my general creative spirit. If I’m passionate about something, I will not stop until my goal is reached. My aspirations are to set the bar higher for cleanliness in restaurants and to let employees do their job better. I would network with the industrial equipment sellers to refine the need and see if I could get my product, once it’s in a physical form, into their catalogs. I’d hold demonstrations close to closing time so they can try out using it when they’re in a time crunch and spend a lot of my time pitching this to potential clients. -The Product: I’m offering cleaner floors with a better dustpan. Since there’s always a line of dirt left over when sweeping, this would take care of that. The skeleton of the design is a standing dustpan with a long handle and a compartment, but there a...