NVP Day 1

An introduction before the ranting and other nonsense begins. This is, for the next few days, more than just my personally neglected blog. I have a university course called New Venture Planning, which I have to do, and for which the lecturer requires we keep a blog. I do think that it will be possible for me to get into the habit of regular blogging about the goings on of my university career through this, I just have to hope my lecturer wont judge me too harshly for some of the other weird stuff that winds up in my blog posts. So without further ado, here it is, the NVP log, of me.

We have been instructed to keep a blog for this course. Great, I agree, the most learning is done in the time spent contemplating the material. Unfortunately for the lecturer this is also a time when it becomes possible for me to air my feelings about the course. Under some circumstances a blog I kept of a course would be quite fun, in this case it may simply serve as a ranting spot while I analyse my own feelings about certain business concepts which are being taught. That is not to say that all my feelings about the course are negative, but rather that my instincts are not business oriented, and I struggle to put money before social betterment. Perhaps that makes me a socialist, but then that is who I am, and how I work.

The way in which our groups were assigned I found to be fairly interesting. It leaves us with quite a nice spread of interests and areas in which we are “experts”. I would say that there are some groups who will perform to a higher standard than others, but that is due to the socialisation of the group members, and how well they interact. I feel that in some ways I will pull my group back, because I struggle to see how it is possible to make a money focussed educational product. I suppose though that to think about it rather as an educational product than a thing to make education more accessible to people would aid in that process. There are a number of odd educational toys and things that are simply making money out of parents who wish to give their children a head start.

This is a much nicer way of thinking about it actually I think. To create a product which also happens to be educational which will make money is much easier than to create a product which will revolutionise the education system and make me money as well. I don't have any ideas yet, but I'm sure they will come to me over time thinking about this.

It is now time to think about what I learned today, if anything. Well, obviously I learned something. It is very rare that I sit through three or so hours of lectures or discussions without learning anything. One thing I learned is that I struggle to pay full attention to these lectures because they are outside my are of interest. I find it would be really easy to sit and draw pictures all through these lectures. Obviously if I actually want to do well I need to pay attention, but I struggle, I am a theorist. I do aspire to becoming an entrepreneur. I do not feel that it is meaningful for me to sit through a bunch of lectures telling me how hard entrepreneurship is, but I should do it anyway.

Okay, thing I learned today. 0.5% of business ventures presented to venture capitalists are funded. That is 2 in 2000. I am in a class of forty something all being told we could be entrepreneurs. I feel like we are all being set up for failure. Oh wait, of course we are, entrepreneurs love to fail! Failure means we are trying things. A good entrepreneur has lost millions in other people's money. It is these people who make me think I will never invest my money unless I know for sure that it is safe, i.e. I will quite happily make use of a good savings account, but don't ask me to be part of any of this stupid risky stuff. I want to be a teacher, not a risk taking venture capitalist.

Perhaps my rant is compounded by the other things which are being stupid at UCT, but I was hoping I wasn't going to find that this course was mandatory for me, so, you know, I'm a little disappointed right now.

Of course the reader of this blog now has no idea what to think of me, except that I waffle and I am either really brave, or really stupid, or both, because I have said that the course for which this blog is mandatory is boring and not what I actually want to be doing with my time.