Throughout the second half of Comm 101, it was imminent that two main ideas that were constantly emphasized were business ethics and entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is an interesting topic as it broadly covers an amalgamation of personal interests and business skills. From class, we have heard from Janice Cheam’s Energyaware, Tom Dobrzanski‘s Vertical Studios and band The Zolas, and the Urthecast space camera among businesses such as Lululemon that were all started due to self-interests and market opportunities.
As I continue on with my journey through Sauder, I believe that there will eventually be more and more stories of young undergraduate entrepreneurs, such as Brian Wong’s Kiip. I have enjoyed hearing these personal testimonies from individuals and I believe that for myself, I took from this experience the message to continue with my passions, to take advantage of my opportunities, and apply business knowledge.
One significant aspect of entrepreneurship that is seemingly overshadowed by the success and innovation of entrepreneurs is the amount of sweat equity and time they put into the research and development stages in the process of founding and starting up their company. For many of these ventures, start up costs are also a great issue.