5 Reasons Why Entrepreneurship Is Important at an Early Age

Here are five reasons why young people should become entrepreneurs.

Today’s world is evolving at a rapid pace, and advances in innovation are occurring in many fields. In this ever-changing climate, we must teach our children essential entrepreneurial or problem-solving abilities early in life to stay on track with their chosen job routes.

Entrepreneurship not only fosters clever mindsets but also enhances personal skills, inventiveness, and, of course, financial gain. Entrepreneurship education is gaining traction in schools as a means of influencing job prospects and economic growth. As a result, the development of an entrepreneurial attitude in children and adolescents has become critical and vital.

We live in a world where information and skills must be constantly updated. To deal with future issues, one must be able to modify the necessary skill sets to deal with the complexities and challenges of future workplaces. One must be well-equipped with the abilities necessary to manoeuvre through difficult scenarios.

These abilities are taught through entrepreneurial courses or entrepreneurial skills. It gives you the capacity to solve issues, think creatively, take chances, and propose innovative solutions.

We should teach our children entrepreneurial skills at an early age for the following reasons:

1. ENCOURAGE CREATIVITY

Creativity is crucial and engaged in many types of activities, including entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs need it to make business breakthroughs, increase business efficiency, and much more. Parents might use this opportunity to adopt entrepreneurial activities that will help their children’s inventiveness.

2. INTERPERSONAL SKILLS

Communication has always been one of the most crucial soft skills, and it is much more vital in today’s business environment. Your activities or connections with others are just as significant as having a degree. Instilling these talents in children at an early age will benefit them for the rest of their lives. As they develop in their business journey, children are forced to deal with various individuals. This connection and collaboration with people from a variety of backgrounds teach children vital interpersonal skills.

3. EDUCATING ABOUT FINANCIAL LITERACY

Children’s lives are already oriented towards money-based activities, particularly when it comes to going shopping with their parents. As parents, we must pay attention to this issue because it will influence our child’s future spending habits. One has no idea what one’s children could try to buy with their money. Is it for the better or for the worse? That is why one must plan ahead of time for one’s children’s financial education.

4. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF TIME MANAGEMENT

The success of an entrepreneur is dependent on meeting stringent deadlines and working on time. As a result, emphasising the value of time is critical. As parents, one may set small tasks for their children with time constraints and reward them for completing them on time.

5. THE VALUE OF PLAN B

Mentoring children through the ups and downs of life is an important element of their development. Whatever the scenario, one must support them through successes and failures, and provide them with a Plan B in case they fail.

Entrepreneurship is a way of life that we must instil in our children. An entrepreneurial mindset is not limited to a certain group of individuals; anybody with it may profit in some manner. Furthermore, the future workforce is a compelling incentive for us to begin preparing our children today. It is also one of the few topics that contribute to a student’s total growth, and the current generation requires it more than any prior generation. Whatever your children become, they will require entrepreneurial skills to succeed. So, give them a head start and teach them about it from an early age.

Courtesy of India Today, Education Desk

HBR: 5 Ways to Future-Proof Your Career in the Age of AI

In this HBR article from Dorie Clark and Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, we learn about five concepts for future-proofing your career. Each of the authors’ suggestions offers a quick and useful way to think about this new technology while also seamlessly aligning with entrepreneurial thinking. Connecting with real-world people to learn their needs, constantly learning, and being reliable are all keys to remaining impactful in the world of work

Since last fall, artificial intelligence — in particular ChatGPT and its recently unveiled successor, GPT-4 — has taken center stage in conversations about the future of business, work, and learning. ChatGPT became the fastest-growing consumer application in history — outpacing Instagram and even TikTok — and Google lost $100 billion in market cap after a botched AI product demonstration raised questions about its ability to compete.

The stakes are high, not just for companies, but also for individuals hoping to navigate potentially massive implications for their own careers. For years, pundits have assured us that the key to surviving AI disruption was leaning into creativity and other (theoretically) unique human skill sets. But the new wave of AI is rapidly demonstrating that it can do far more than crunch numbers and analyze data: It can also create professional-level art and design (see DALL-E and Midjourney, among others) and create articles and copywriting that could displace many journalists and marketers.

We believe it’s no longer useful to debate whether this tool is “smarter “or “better” than us. The tools are here, and they’re already being widely used. What matters to us — Tomas, the author of the new book I, Human: AI, Automation, and the Quest to Reclaim What Makes Us Unique, and Dorie, a consultant and keynote speaker on personal branding and career development — is how we can better ourselves by using them.

Of course, there are nearly infinite tactical applications for AI. For instance, we can speed up our productivity by using GPT-4 or other tools (such as Microsoft’s Bing, which now integrates GPT-4, or its recently launched Copilot for all things work) to assist with brainstorming, creating drafts of emails, or performing rapid and complex research.

But above and beyond specific use cases, we’re interested in exploring the question of whether there might still be strategies that professionals can deploy to generate unique value, even as AI begins to showcase its prodigious (and exponentially increasing) power. In other words, what can we do personally to stave off the displacement that may happen as a result of AI and future-proof ourselves in the age of intelligent machines? Here are five strategies we find especially critical.

Avoid predictability.

It’s important to remember that AI isn’t generating new insights; it’s a prediction engine that merely guesses the most likely next word. At the micro-level, it’s helpful: “thank” is indeed often followed by “you.” But at a macro level, its suggestions tend to homogenize, and they’re only as good as the wisdom of the crowds, which is often the exact opposite of wisdom. In the famous words of Oscar Wilde, who would probably not have been a heavy user of ChatGPT: “Everything popular is wrong.”

Hone the skills that machines strive to emulate.

There’s no question: GPT-4 has been trained to be respectful and polite (especially now that previous — ahem — vulnerabilities have come to light). Its responses display empathy (“I am sorry my answer upset you”), self-awareness (“I’m just an AI model and my answers are based on training data”), and even creativity (producing ingenious haikus about inequality, impersonating Elon Musk, and generating an infinite number of cheese jokes in multiple languages). But — to reiterate — those responses are based on text prediction, and AI is not capable of experiencing or displaying the human version of these soft skills. As Tomas has argued extensively, humans are wired to respond to genuine emotions — so actually knowing and caring about what others think and feel, truly understanding yourself, and being capable of creating something machines cannot is an essential strategy to set yourself apart in the age of AI.

5 Ways to Future-Proof Your Career in the Age of AI

The stakes are high, not just for companies, but also for individuals hoping to navigate potentially massive implications for their own careers. For years, pundits have assured us that the key to surviving AI disruption was leaning into creativity and other (theoretically) unique human skill sets. But the new wave of AI is rapidly demonstrating that it can do far more than crunch numbers and analyze data: It can also create professional-level art and design (see DALL-E and Midjourney, among others) and create articles and copywriting that could displace many journalists and marketers.

We believe it’s no longer useful to debate whether this tool is “smarter “or “better” than us. The tools are here, and they’re already being widely used. What matters to us — Tomas, the author of the new book I, Human: AI, Automation, and the Quest to Reclaim What Makes Us Unique, and Dorie, a consultant and keynote speaker on personal branding and career development — is how we can better ourselves by using them.

Of course, there are nearly infinite tactical applications for AI. For instance, we can speed up our productivity by using GPT-4 or other tools (such as Microsoft’s Bing, which now integrates GPT-4, or its recently launched Copilot for all things work) to assist with brainstorming, creating drafts of emails, or performing rapid and complex research.

But above and beyond specific use cases, we’re interested in exploring the question of whether there might still be strategies that professionals can deploy to generate unique value, even as AI begins to showcase its prodigious (and exponentially increasing) power. In other words, what can we do personally to stave off the displacement that may happen as a result of AI and future-proof ourselves in the age of intelligent machines? Here are five strategies we find especially critical.

Avoid predictability.

It’s important to remember that AI isn’t generating new insights; it’s a prediction engine that merely guesses the most likely next word. At the micro-level, it’s helpful: “thank” is indeed often followed by “you.” But at a macro level, its suggestions tend to homogenize, and they’re only as good as the wisdom of the crowds, which is often the exact opposite of wisdom. In the famous words of Oscar Wilde, who would probably not have been a heavy user of ChatGPT: “Everything popular is wrong.”

And yet, this aspect of generative AI can be a powerful tool if you use it right. For instance, if you want to understand how most people think or feel about something, including their prejudices and misconceptions, you can use GPT-4 to access this common knowledge — or ignorance. But if we simply deploy the tools without question, their algorithms and nudges may turn us into more predictable creatures who eventually all start to sound the same.

Consider that whenever we let Gmail autocomplete our searches or emails, we relinquish a bit of originality and uniqueness, turning AI’s prediction into a self-fulfilling prophecy that makes us more predictable. While GPT-4 is a powerful tool for ideation and initial drafts, if you want to stand out, you may be better served (in some cases) by doing the opposite of what it suggests, because you’ll be bucking conventional wisdom. Just as some corporations have recognized that boilerplate “corporate speak” turns off customers, we may discover the advantage of sounding like ourselves — and embracing our own personality, serendipity, and unpredictability — when everyone else is turning to AI.

Hone the skills that machines strive to emulate.

There’s no question: GPT-4 has been trained to be respectful and polite (especially now that previous — ahem — vulnerabilities have come to light). Its responses display empathy (“I am sorry my answer upset you”), self-awareness (“I’m just an AI model and my answers are based on training data”), and even creativity (producing ingenious haikus about inequality, impersonating Elon Musk, and generating an infinite number of cheese jokes in multiple languages). But — to reiterate — those responses are based on text prediction, and AI is not capable of experiencing or displaying the human version of these soft skills. As Tomas has argued extensively, humans are wired to respond to genuine emotions — so actually knowing and caring about what others think and feel, truly understanding yourself, and being capable of creating something machines cannot is an essential strategy to set yourself apart in the age of AI.

Double down on “the real world.”

GPT-4 — like AI in general — is confined to the digital world, inhabiting a virtual cage of 0s and 1s. Sadly, so are many human activities these days. But it’s essential to recognize that one thing AI can’t disrupt is our analog, in-person connections with others, so it’s important to carve out time and safeguard those. As Harvard Professor Arthur C. Brooks summarizes the research, “Technology that crowds out our real-life interaction with others will lower our well-being and thus must be managed with great care in our lives.” Artifacts of pre-pandemic life like having meals with colleagues, attending conferences, and initiating conversation with a stranger may seem less pressing now that we’ve gone so long without them. But they represent an opportunity to build connections and gain insights that simply aren’t possible through AI — and thus, they represent a unique competitive advantage we still possess.

Develop your personal brand.

AI tools have reached sufficient quality that they may well decimate the lower and middle ends of the market in many professions (for instance, copywriters and designers on freelance marketplaces, or those who work with cost-conscious customers eager to shake off expenses in favor of a free option). In some cases, AI may even match the quality with professionals at the highest echelons — but it’s almost certain those industry leaders won’t get displaced, and it’s because of the strength of their brands. Just as art-world buyers will pay exponentially more for a “real Rembrandt” rather than an equally beautiful painting by one of his lesser-known contemporaries, corporate leaders will likely continue to pay a premium to work with people viewed as the “top of their field” — partly as a statement of quality, and partly as a brand statement about whom they associate with and what they value. As one example, even the local tire shop or florist can use AI to create a logo. But only those with discernment and real money — so the thinking goes — can afford to use an elite group of agencies. The rise of AI doesn’t change the fact, crucially tied to human nature, that branding matters.

Cultivate expertise.

GPT-4 and other AI technologies are prodigious researchers that can summon a cavalcade of facts almost instantly. Unfortunately, some of those facts aren’t true — a form of the “hallucinations” that have, heretofore, plagued AI. (Indeed, one reader contacted Dorie asking where he could locate one of Dorie’s Harvard Business Review articles that ChatGPT had referenced. Unfortunately, this particular article didn’t exist.) Thus, while AI is an extraordinarily valuable tool, it can’t always be trusted to deliver accurate results — at least at this point. That’s why it’s so valuable to develop recognized expertise in your field. Even if AI performs “first draft” functions, it still has to be double-checked by a trusted and reliable source. If that’s you, you’ll continue to be sought out because you have the authority to vet AI’s responses.

Courtesy Harvard Business Review April 25,2023, Career Planning

How Should Entrepreneurs Use ChatGPT?

Whether or not entrepreneurs should use AI for their startup depends on the specific needs of the business. AI can be used to automate tasks, improve decision-making, and personalize customer experiences. Chat GPT and Google’s BARD AI that can generate text, translate languages, write different kinds of creative content, and answer your questions in an informative way.

Here are some of the benefits of using AI for a startup:

  • Automate tasks: AI can be used to automate tasks that are time-consuming or repetitive, such as customer service, data entry, and marketing. This can free up employees to focus on more strategic tasks.
  • Improve decision-making: AI can be used to analyze large amounts of data to identify trends and patterns that would be difficult to see with the naked eye. This information can be used to make better decisions about product development, marketing, and pricing.
  • Personalize customer experiences: AI can be used to personalize customer experiences by understanding their preferences and needs. This can be done through things like targeted marketing, personalized recommendations, and customized customer service.

However, there are also some challenges to using AI for a startup:

  • Cost: AI can be expensive to develop and implement.
  • Complexity: AI can be complex to use and manage.
  • Data requirements: AI requires large amounts of data to train and operate.

Overall, the decision of whether or not to use AI for a startup depends on the specific needs of the business. If the business can afford the cost and complexity of AI, and has access to the necessary data, then AI can be a valuable tool for improving efficiency, making better decisions, and personalizing customer experiences.

When a new technology breaks into the mainstream, it seems like a sudden and transformative shift. Naturally, a gold rush follows, as corporations, venture capitalists and enterprising entrepreneurs alike all scramble to invent the ideal use case, or at least the use case that can most quickly get to market and find traction.  You might remember that not too long ago, an iced tea company tried to create the ideal use case for blockchain.

The rush is on with natural language generation (NLG) and the recent commercialization breakthrough heralded with ChatGPT. Believe me, everyone I know is trying to figure out how to weave the NLG  into their own business model, including me.  As a writer, I’ve got a bone to pick with ChatGPT. As an entrepreneur, I hold a patent for the first commercial platform to use natural language generation in a corporate environment. So I’m forced to play both sides.

Back in 2010, sports data entrepreneurs, along with a handful of young developers, built a platform and an engine to create human-sounding content out of large sets of data, mostly sports data at that time. We didn’t call what we were doing NLG because we weren’t aware of the term yet. It hadn’t even been coined. We were just trying to do better sports data. We built a company around that platform called Automated Insights, which was acquired by private equity in 2015.

In the past algorithms analyzed the data and determined what could be said and when it should be said, paying special attention to patterns, deltas, trends, and milestones. In the closed universe of sports and eventually industries like finance, marketing and even healthcare, my algorithms could produce some pretty amazing and magical content. Thanks to Robbie and the coding team, we could spit out those articles at the rate of tens of  thousands per second, each one unique, each one reading like it was written by an industry professional.

¨Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.¨ Marie Curie

The advances in AI tools are awe-inspiring. And if you make money online (or want to) in any niche, you need a visible online presence, automation, and streamlining.  Naturally, only relying on AI tools will never do the trick. But not using them at all will leave you behind.  That is why I prepared seven new AI tools to help you make a profit online. So keep reading if you want to discover how AI can help you become unstoppable in your business.

TutorAI

Online education has become more reliable and effective than any college or MBA. And it doesn´t leave you with massive debts.

TutorAI is an innovative new AI tool that personalizes learning experiences for individuals based on their unique needs and learning styles. This means that you can learn anything you want, from basic math skills to advanced programming languages, in a way that is tailored specifically to your abilities and preferences. This can help anyone learn faster and focus on the chosen topics.

ReContent

Repurposing content can be time-consuming, but ReContent will help you to streamline it. With this new AI tool, you can generate Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram posts based on your existing content. This means you can easily share your content on multiple platforms without manually creating individual posts for each one.

The best part? ReContent’s AI-powered editor allows you to edit the generated posts further to ensure they fit your brand voice and messaging. This gives you complete control over how your content is presented on each platform.

ReContent is a valuable tool for anyone looking to repurpose their content more efficiently. Using AI-generated posts and an interactive editor can save time and ensure your content reaches a broader audience across various social media platforms.

Public Prompts

Public Prompts website provides general tools and knowledge that anyone can access. And if you need some extra help or guidance, our PublicPrompts Discord server is the perfect resource. Here, you can connect with other like-minded individuals and get help with anything related to Stable Diffusion, from running the AI locally to training models yourself.

The creator believes everyone should have access to the tools and knowledge they need to succeed, and he is committed to making that a reality through Public Prompts.

Fathom

Fathom is a podcast player offering various features to help users discover and enjoy podcasts. One of the most impressive features is its AI-powered search function, which allows users to search for specific topics or keywords within podcast episodes. This can be particularly helpful for finding detailed information or segments within longer episodes.

Fathom also offers transcripts, chapters, clipping, and highlights to enhance your listening experience. Transcripts make it easy to follow along with the conversation and can be especially useful if you prefer reading over listening. Chapters allow users to skip ahead or return to specific points within an episode while clipping and highlighting make it easy to save and share favorite moments.

Fathom is a great option if you are looking for a comprehensive podcast player with advanced features that make discovering and enjoying podcasts easier than ever before.

Fliki

Fliki is an innovative tool that turns text into videos with AI voices in just two minutes. With Fliki, you can easily create engaging and informative videos from your scripts or blog posts using realistic voices that sound like real people.

This is especially useful for businesses and individuals who want to create video content quickly and efficiently without spending hours recording their voiceovers. Fliki makes producing high-quality videos easy and more accessible.

tl;dv

If you’re tired of manually taking notes during meetings or struggling to remember important details from your calls with customers and prospects, tl;dv may be the solution you’ve been looking for. This AI meeting assistant records your calls and provides transcriptions and summaries of the key points discussed.

This can save you time and help ensure that important information is not missed or forgotten. With tl;dv, you can focus on actively participating in the conversation rather than worrying about taking notes or missing essential details. Plus, the platform integrates with popular video conferencing tools like Zoom and Google Meet, making it easy to use in your day-to-day work.

Thundercontent

Thundercontent is a new tool that utilizes artificial intelligence to help you overcome creative blocks and generate high-quality content in just minutes. Whether you need blog posts, product descriptions, or social media captions, Thundercontent can help.

With its advanced algorithms and machine learning capabilities, it can analyze your brand’s tone and style to ensure that the content it generates is unique, accurate, and on-brand. Best of all, Thundercontent allows you to focus on other essential aspects of your business while it takes care of your content creation process.

In conclusion, the rapid advancements in AI technology have revolutionized online money-making. While some may still be skeptical or confused about the potential of AI, Marie Curie’s words remind us that understanding and embracing new technologies is critical to overcoming fear and staying ahead.

This article explores seven unstoppable AI tools essential for monetizing the internet and achieving success in any niche. Let´s recap each of them:

  • TutorAI– learn anything
  • ReContent– repurpose content
  • Public Prompts– prompts library
  • Fathom– podcast player
  • Fliki– turn text into videos
  • td;lv– AI meeting assistant
  • Thundercontent– create any content using AI

In today’s digital age, establishing a solid online presence is crucial, and AI tools offer assistance. These tools maximize efficiency and focus on what truly matters: growing your business.

However, it’s important to note that relying solely on AI tools is not the ultimate solution. Combining human intelligence with AI capabilities creates a harmonious blend that harnesses the best of both worlds. By leveraging AI tools strategically, you can unlock new opportunities, outperform competitors, and create a sustainable monetization strategy.   AI can help find an idea for monetization. Here are some ways AI can help:

  • Analyze data: AI can analyze data to identify trends and patterns that can be used to develop new monetization strategies. For example, AI can be used to analyze customer data to identify which products or services are most popular, and then develop pricing strategies that target those customers.
  • Generate ideas: AI can also be used to generate new ideas for monetization. For example, AI can be used to brainstorm new ways to sell products or services, or to develop new ways to generate revenue from advertising.
  • Test ideas: AI can also be used to test new monetization ideas. For example, AI can be used to create a prototype of a new product or service, and then test it with a small group of customers to see how they react. This information can then be used to improve the product or service before it is launched to the wider market.

Overall, AI can be a valuable tool for businesses that are looking to find new ways to monetize their products or services. By analyzing data, generating ideas, and testing new ideas, AI can help businesses to identify the most effective monetization strategies for their specific needs.

Here are some examples of how AI is being used for monetization:

  • Netflix: Netflix uses AI to recommend movies and TV shows to its users. This helps Netflix to increase customer engagement and retention, which in turn leads to more revenue.
  • Spotify: Spotify uses AI to create personalized playlists for its users. This helps Spotify to keep users engaged and listening to music, which in turn leads to more revenue from advertising and subscriptions.
  • Amazon: Amazon uses AI to personalize product recommendations for its customers. This helps Amazon to increase customer sales and revenue.

Most marketing experts agree that creating engaging content is one of the best ways to build a following and attract customers. The challenge is that content creation takes a lot of time — in most industries, posting on social media or your blog several times per week is standard, and each piece of content generally takes anywhere from two to six hours. Unfortunately, this can pull an entrepreneur away from other critical activities involved in keeping their business operating.

ChatGPT can significantly reduce the amount of time that it takes for small business owners to generate the content they need, including articles, blog posts, video scripts and social media posts. One thing to note is that ChatGPT leverages the internet for information. You could run the risk of posting something too similar to another website, which can hurt your search engine rankings. It’s important to always add your own spin to the content. However, ChatGPT can significantly reduce the amount of time spent brainstorming ideas and creating drafts.

The future will bring many adaptions of the use of A. I.  Entrepreneurship educators have begun to use ChatGPT to help students formulate questions unique to particular end users, those targeted markets that would buy the product under development.  Chat might answer with a solution to a problem in everyday business that can lead to a breakthrough innovation.  So, we say “yes” A. I. has its place in entrepreneurship as a tool within the evidenced-based process that can make creation so dynamic.

Contributed by Builtin.com, Medium.com writers Joe Procopio and Jerry Keszka, the editor and Nicholas Leighton of Entrepreneur.com.

The Entrepreneurial Mindset Profile (EMP)

EMP is cutting-edge tool to assess your mindset, help unlock your entrepreneurial potential.

The Entrepreneurial Mindset Profile® (EMP) was developed by the Leadership Development Institute (LDI) at Eckerd College.  It is a  is a cutting-edge assessment tool that examines the skills and capabilities that are needed for this new way of operating. The EMP helps corporate leaders, students and entrepreneurs assess the degree to which they are utilizing an “entrepreneurial mindset” and provides resources to leverage that competitive edge.

Developed from extensive research into the traits, motivations and skills of entrepreneurs, the EMP is based not on theory or conjecture, but on hard data about the factors that actually distinguish entrepreneurs from non-entrepreneurs. The instrument shows solid evidence of reliability and validity.

In today’s complex business environment, organizations need to make profound shifts in order to stay competitive. Those who want to make a mark on the world need to ask themselves some tough questions.  Are you fully leveraging your unique strengths and talents in a way that enhances your chances for professional success?  What should you be doing to help your teams and organizations grow and stay ahead of the competition?Are you balancing risk and reward—and strategy and execution—in pursuit of high-potential opportunities?

Having this “entrepreneurial mindset” is essential to sustaining growth and innovation. The Entrepreneurial Mindset Profile® (EMP) is a cutting-edge assessment tool that examines the skills and capabilities that are needed for this new way of operating. The EMP helps corporate leaders, students and entrepreneurs assess the degree to which they are utilizing an “entrepreneurial mindset” and provides resources to leverage that competitive edge.

Girl Looking Up   

Developed from extensive research into the traits, motivations and skills of entrepreneurs, the EMP is based not on theory or conjecture, but on hard data about the factors that actually distinguish entrepreneurs from non-entrepreneurs. The instrument shows solid evidence of reliability and validity.  The personality characteristics and motivations that have been found to distinguish entrepreneurs from non-entrepreneurs.

The ability to generate multiple and novel ideas, and to find multiple approaches for achieving goal. A preference for tasks and situations with little formal structure.  An important question to ask of any assessment tool is the “So what?”  What do these results tell me? How should I interpret them? How can I benefit from this information?  Can I use this information to make me more effective?

Fortunately, with the EMP, these questions can be answered. When an individual or team takes the EMP, not only do they receive a thorough Feedback Report, but they also get a 67-page Development Guide containing the following sections – Interpretive material, suggestions for development, and recommended readings on each of the 14 scales; current books and websites on topics related to entrepreneurial mindset; effective action planning tips and, guidelines for continuous improvement.

woman development

This practical and user-friendly resource helps participants synthesize their results and generate a plan to leverage existing strengths and/or enhance skill sets.  If extended development is desired, personalized feedback sessions and ongoing coaching are available through the LDI.  One of its major uses is to pinpoint strengths and weaknesses in entrepreneurial profiles so that instructors and coaches can focus on areas of improvement or for emphasis.

Dr. Frank Hamilton, an Entrepreneurship professor at Eckerd College, employs the EMP in his classroom to cultivate student mindsets.  Here is an interview with Frank explaining the nuances: https://www.emindsetprofile.com/blog/2022/03/16/cultivating-an-entrepreneurial-mindset/.

For more information about this widely used tool, see https://www.emindsetprofile.com/about/.

Written by editor who is an Eckerd graduate and a certified EMP facilitator.

Special Small Business Seminar May 17th at State College of Florida

In the fairly new State College of Florida Bradenton Campus incubator, the 26 West Center, on Wed., May 17th at 4:30 PM a panel of experts will provide tips and answer questions for small business owners about growing their businesses.  For those not on the Florida Gulf Coast able to attend in-person, the event will be recorded and available on this blog as well as the training site, opportunityeri.com/resources afterwards.  Please feel free to attend in-person and, if not possible, schedule a viewing of the recording.  Those experts above, Dr. Bruce Teague, chair of the Florida Gulf Coast University entrepreneurship dept., Dr. Andy Gold, Vice-President of NACCE.com, the National Association for Community College  Entrepreneurship, RADM Paul Solh, CEO of the Florida High Tech Corridor, and Dennis Zink, former Chair of the award-winning Manasota SCORE chapter will provide recommendations and then answer all questions about specific situations among those in attendance.  As host, I will give a short overview of two small business growth methods…use of the BMC (business model canvas) Plus and the new Don Miller book, “How to Grow Your Small Business” airplane model.

The information is particularly useful to successful startups into their second stage growth.  How do they take their unique product or service and grow it by increasing sales or developing a new product -market fit related.  Such knowledge is in demand and the reason this seminar with its expert panel put together.  Don Miller is a best selling author whose earlier business books include “Business Made Simple” and “Building a Stored Brand”.  The concept of using the BMC together with a worksheet of individual component tasks listed by priority and deadline came out of the SCORE chapter in San Luis Obispo CA.

We appreciate corresponding organizations to this blog passing on the information about the in-person date and time as well as the two sites that will then have a link to the recording afterwards.  Editor.

Best Advice from CEEC Below.

There was electricity coming out of the California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference last week at the San Diego State University Lavin Center.  Many senior entrepreneurship faculty spoke an an array of topics, each special in their own way.  Your editor’s favorite was a Q and A session between retiring Alex DeNoble, Ph.D chair of the Aztec program and his long-time collaborator, Brian Dovey, a venture capitalist.

Left Brian Dovery, Alex DeNoble  

Brian Dovey is Co-Dean of the Kauffman Fellows Program and has been a Partner of Domain Associates since 1988. Since joining Domain, he has served as Chairman of Athena Neurosciences, Creative BioMolecules, and Univax Biologics and on the Board of Directors of some 30+ additional companies.  He served as Co-Dean of the Kauffman Fellows Program and has been a Partner of Domain Associates since 1988. Prior to Domain, Mr. Dovey spent six years at Rorer Group (now Sanofi Aventis as a result of subsequent mergers). As President of Rorer from 1986 to 1988, he was the primary architect of this Fortune 500 company’s strategic shift to pharmaceuticals that resulted in a doubling of annual sales to approximately $1 billion.

Mr. Dovey has served as both President and Chairman of the National Venture Capital Association. He is Chair of the Wistar Institute, a leader in preclinical bio-medical research in the non-profit sector. He is Trustee Emeritus of Germantown Academy and a former Trustee of the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing.

Having made his connection, we posed this question, “What is your advice for motivating students to desire a startup?  His answer is based on hundreds of startups and worth noting -“Don’t struggle waiting for the perfect idea. 5 guys is an “average” idea and Zappos a “bad” idea but we’ll executed. So go for it. Second don’t be afraid of failure.  VCs and most employers like to see some blooded people. A bad project doesn’t mean a bad person.”

5 AI Tools for Making $1,000 a Day

1. JasperAI

2.PictoryAI

3. Notion AI

4. Postwise.AI

5. Midjorney

Courtesy of Media Medium by Rohit Shinde, April 9, 2023

2023 California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference, San Diego

From San Diego State University April 20-22nd 120 entrepreneurship educators from many countries  came together at the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center on the campus of San Diego State University this week.  It was a special event in that Dr. Alex DeNoble, the chair of the department and founder of the CEEC, California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference, will retire this fall after forty years of entrepreneurship education leadership. Alex is a past President of both the USASBE, U. S. Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship and the ICSB, International Council for Small Business, major organizations.  Many of his senior colleagues were in attendance as a tribute to Alex and his many contributions, Drs. Michael Morris, Notre Dame University, Ted Zoller, North Carolina University, Ray Combs, Washington State University, Michael Grimshaw, Cal State Dominguez Hills, Wade Halvorson, Deakin University Australia, Jeff Hornsby, University of Missouri, Jill Kickul University of Southern California, Francisco Velez-Torres, CETYS University Mexico, Olusiji Lasekan, Universidad Catolica de Temuco, Chile, Hsing-Er Lin, Sun Yat-Den University,Taiwan, Julie Shields, CEO USASBE, Mike Still, Cal State San Bernardino, and David Taylor, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Following pre-conference visits to the Lavin and ZIP incubators on campus and a trip to Baja California for visits to agricultural entrepreneurs, well designed keynote addresses, social entrepreneurship, teaching cases, use of games and puzzles, motivating learners, use of IMPROV to improve classroom focus and participation, extension of community engagement, tactics in lean startup methodologies, female and youth entrepreneurship, high school and community college entrepreneurship, co-teaching lessons, San Diego urban poverty business initiative, and promotion of mindset for innovations and opportunity sessions provided diverse classes.  Selective content included IMPROV for breaking the ice, on the spot creative solutions, and fostering innovations. Your editor gave a talk on motivation in entrepreneurship education making the case the intrinsic, meaning  doing an activity for inherent satisfaction, leads to greater learning and student fulfillment.  It is human nature to desire autonomy and self-determination so that allowing students to determine their own path improves the quality of startup ventures.

The Lavin Center housed in the Engineering and Interdisciplinary building is two adjoining spaces, one the Lavin incubator with team work tables and classrooms while another side is the ZIP makers space with state-of-the-art printing, laser and creative equipment to produce prototypes from collaborative team designs.

New Trends in Entrepreneurship

 Entrepreneurs Increasingly Rely on No-Code Platforms

No-code (and its close cousin, low-code) refers to web and mobile development using a drag-and-drop interface.  Both approaches use much less technical knowledge than building via web programming languages and raw code.  Low-code enables anyone to build and create blogs, online marketplaces, and even fully fledged Software as a Service (SaaS) apps.  All without the need for a developer or designer.  As a result, entire industries are now accessible to “non-technical” entrepreneurs.  (Which is part of the reason Research and Markets estimates that the low-code industry could be worth $45.5 billion by 2025).  But even seasoned web developers often use no-code solutions (like Webflow) as a fast way to build apps quickly or to prototype business ideas.  As low-code entrepreneurial trend gains momentum, an entire ecosystem is springing up around it.

Email Marketing Makes a Comeback

Entrepreneurs are falling in love with email.  Why?  For starters you have full ownership over your mailing list subscribers.  Which is not true of Twitter, Instagram, Facebook…or any other social media platform.  Also, social media organic reach has. declined dramatically in recent years.

Organic Reach on Social Networks Have Decline in Recent Years

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) isn’t the holy grail of long-term, sustainable traffic it once was either.  The Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs) have become massively crowded by paid results and featured snippets.  Plus, email marketing has a track record of impressive ROIs.  The Data and Marketing Association reports that the ROI from email marketing can be as high as 42x the investment.  Most important emails get read which gives entrepreneurs the opportunity to teach, provide value and build trust.  They can then move into a soft sell when a subscribers ready.

ConvertKit is Email Marketing Software Aimed at Creators

Email marketing software like ConvertKit, designed to help creators keep in touch with their audiences, has exploded in recent years.  Another example of a fast-growing email marketing startup is Email Octopus. Like many growing email service provider startups, Email Octopus focuses more on simplicity vs. enterprise-level features (like marketing automation).

More Entrepreneurs Move Into loT

Fortune Business Insights estimates that the loT space will grow to a staggering $1.86 trillion by 2028.  In the early days of technology, loT projects were only taken on by big companies (like Amazon) that had the time and resources to build systems from the ground up.  Thanks to a new batch of loT startups, loT is now accessible to many small business owners.  For example, Blank is an loT development platform that allows anyone to easily create interfaces for controlling and monitoring your projects, like a smart houseplant watering system.

Blank runs thousand of internet-connected products, from home projects to massive enterprise venture products.  Pre-designed widgets get you up and running quickly with native iOS and Android apps.  These apps can then control electronics, monitor sensor data, get notifications, and so on, so that you can control hardware from anywhere.  From smart lamps to soil moisture monitors, the device possibilities are endless.  There are plenty of YouTube tutorials and Udemy courses out there for hungry makes and thinkers.

Micro-Influencers Grow in Importance

In the last decade Micro-Influencers searches have increased 1,800%.  They are the folks on Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok with a small, loyal following.  The exact metrics that define “micro-influencer” or “Nano influencer” vary.  But, they are usually people that have somewhere in the range of 1k-20k followers on a single platform.  This type of entrepreneurship is one the rise because the practice is now mainstream.  Paying influencers to promote or mention products has become a big part of most marketing department’d budgets including plenty of big brands.  This trend has gotten so expensive over the last year or so some estimates state that companies are now spending upwards of $10 billion per year on the influencer marketing campaigns.

Content Becomes Omnichannel

Statista estimates that people spend over 7 hours per day interacting with media and content.  The number of different ways in which people consume contents is still growing.  Content-focused apps like TikTok have taken off, where creators upload short 3-60 second videos (similar to Vine).  Even formats that have been around forever like podcasts are suddenly surging.  The best online entrepreneurs are adapting quickly to these alternative content formats.

Recording podcast episode videos is now a common practice.  Episodes can then be uploaded to YouTube along with mainstream podcasting platforms like Apple and Spotify.  These same podcasters then transcribe the show into text, to instantly produce a long-form blog article too.  Some even use clips from the podcast as “micro content” on sites like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Tools even automate this process.

Capital Flows Into Climate Tech Startups

According to a report by PwC, VC investment into climate tech startups is growing 5x faster than other investment categories.  Venture capital investments in the space went from $418 million in 2013 to $16.3 billion in 2019.  According to the report, that’s only scratching the surface of a multi-trillion-dollar opportunity.  Several large climate change investment funds have been introduced recently with the backing of major corporations. Amazon’s Climate Pledge is devoted to make Amazon net zero carbon by 2040.  One to the startups they backed, CarbonCure Technologies, has created a concrete-production process that sequesters carbon dioxide.

For its part, in January 2021 Microsoft pledged $1 billion over the next four years via its Climate Innovation Fund.  The company says will be carbon negative (including its supply chain) by 2030. Goggle plans to run 100% on carbon-free energy by 2020, and has launched multiple smaller funds to invest in climate tech startups.  At the same time Unilever has announced a $1 billion pound Climate & Nature Fund and aims to be net zero emissions by 2039.  Interesting climate tech startups include Climeworks, which uses powerful fans with special filtration system to remove carbon dioxide from the air.  The CO2 is then either recycled or sequestered to combat climate change.  Climeworks raised $110 million in 2020.

Microsoft’s Climate Innovation Fund announcement

Entrepreneurship in 2023 requires intense specialization to maintain competitive edge.  Both entrepreneurs and businesses are doubling down on what they’re best at to give themselves an advantage over the competition.  For example, more founders are starting to get help from virtual assistants to perform administrative and other tasks.  For example, direct-to-consumer e-commerce stores can now outsource product fulfillment entirely enabling e-commerce sites to focus on that what they’re good at -product development and marketing.

Some of these trends, like email making a comeback, may surprise a lot of people.  But, other trends listed her, like no-code and loT, are things that many businesses owners in the tech space are familiar with.  And with the pandemic behind us, we can look forward to more interesting in the business world in the coming years.