Speaker - 5 Shadrach White

Now that the quarter is over, I can say without a doubt that Shadrach was on of my favorite speakers of the quarter. He is the founder of CloudPWR, his 4th company so far, and really took a calculated leap of faith in deciding the direction this company was going to go. The aspect I found most inspiring about his talk was the way he viewed people, both investors and employees. The way he described the importance of treating them like an investment, something you value and respect, was really contrary to the image that had been described to me until this point of investor/employee relationships. He described the way he would take the time to talk to them, completely absent of any demands or hidden agendas, updating them on progress and details of a project they hadn't even gotten involved in yet. It was such a personal approach to what really should be a more social experience to begin with. Some of the other things he said that I particularly enjoyed was the way he described developing as being "like art, sometimes you're inspired and sometimes you're not.". He showed his ability to think ahead when he decided to go against the herd and focus his business on government, as well as when he made it a point to differentiate himself from the marijuana industry. The fact that so many of our class questions focused on marijuana seemed to annoy him about as much as it did me, and i'm already a supporter. The question I asked him was what his exit strategy was, and the way he answered so sharp and direct that it was to sell at $100 million valuation really threw me off guard. His answer made me feel like I was asking something he'd covered a hundred times, and I couldn't help but clam up and feel as though I had asked the dumbest question in the room. But once he elaborated, I believe the way he answered was only intended to be clear and honest, and I don't think the irritability I felt was actually real. All in all I loved his talk, and I thought he did a great job being open and genuine about everything he told us. I'd recommend anybody hear him give a talk in the future.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Speaker 1 - Erik Hanberg

Our first quest speaker was Erik Hanberg, a published author and entrepreneur. There was a lot to like about Erik's story, most notably the way he clearly and intellectually walked through his experience transitioning from the mindset of an employee to an employer. I genuinely connected with the way he was explaining the early frustrations and curiosities of taking that risk to step out on your own and put your time and energy into starting a business for yourself. Some of the things I found surprising about what he was saying was how many ventures he was a part of simultaneously, and how many books he had already written. IT was eye-opening the way he walked through the differences in revenue production between audio books, paperbacks, etc. Erik's story about pretending to write a book in order to gauge the public interest was fascinating, and I think it's exactly that kind of creativity that would lead somebody down the entrepreneurial path. I had never really considered
Read more

Business Ideas

    My business idea is very simple, to build an entertainment app company that focuses primarily on mobile games. As a child I spent the majority of my time living in the middle of nowhere in Iowa with 2 of my brothers (out of 7 siblings total) and a father that worked from the time we got home from school to the time we were leaving for it. We had to find ways to entertain ourselves, and the way we did that most was by coming up with games to play. I was fortunate enough to have an older brother that was a talented artist and naturally creative person in general. We would hand draw our own cards, make up our own rules, and play the games we had created ourselves. These memories shaped who I am in an important way, and became a catalyst for business aspirations I have to this day.     My intentions are initially to develop a sort of flagship game using the skills I've learned in developing alongside my older brothers talents for design. Some of the things I consider important fo
Read more

Mission and Vision Statements

In class we had an exercise exploring the importance of providing mission statements, vision statements, and values for your business. Not only do they set a standard for the company as a whole to aspire to, but they outline a focus that every employee can take into consideration any time they make a decision affecting the company. When potential employees, investors, or customers want to know exactly what sort of company they might be dealing with, these statements provide a good idea of the sort of things we might consider of importance. It's difficult to come up with statements that are simple enough to comprehend, yet powerful enough to inspire, but we gave it a shot anyways. My business idea is of a Mobile Game App company, so my focus was on creativity. These are the rough drafts of what I would consider my business statements: Vision: Develop a brand immediately recognized by any gamer, by inspiring creativity and fascination from within our virtual universe. Mission: Re
Read more