Did you hear the LAUNCH of National Entrepreneurship Week 2011 by Cathy Ashmore at the “Future of Entrepreneurship Education Summit” in Orlando, Friday, February 18? Thanks to the leadership of Michael Simmons of Extreme Entrepreneurship there was an all-day focus on THE FUTURE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION with 130 specially invited national leaders to discuss this critical issue. You could have heard it streaming live…and hopefully the videos will be available soon.

In the meantime here are some of the key issues addressed by some of the speakers:

 Cathy Ashmore thanked everyone who has joined with the Consortium for the past 30 years to fight for the opportunities for youth and adults to learn about entrepreneurship…. providing a clearinghouse for developing entrepreneurial skills and motivation to be self-reliant through these educational experiences. Simmons got the attention of the audience by introducing Dr. Ashmore as the “GRANDMOTHER” of entrepreneurship education.

 Michael Holthouse of Lemonade Day responded to the call for Social Entrepreneurship to “save the world” by suggesting that American entrepreneurs have been doing this for decades in creating advanced technologies that improve the lives of everyone worldwide.

 Deborah Hoover, of the Burton D Morgan Foundation, said they were carrying on the dedication of their founder, an entrepreneur who believed that entrepreneurship education was essential. She announced that schools in NE Ohio would be celebrating National Entrepreneurship Week with planning for their own young entrepreneurs to have Lemonade Day. Holthouse calls this the “Pee Wee League” of lifelong entrepreneurship education ! He is proud of their goals for lemonade stand founders to divide their profits…to Save Some, to Invest Some, and to Give Some Back to good causes.

 John Box, Senior Education VP for JA Worldwide, said their organization has been encouraging thousands of young entrepreneurs worldwide for decades. He introduced the newly created Teacher Training model, “A ROADMAP FOR ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION” that the Youth Entrepreneurship Alliance is releasing as a unique template for preparing teachers at all levels of education with “real world” experience.

 Cathy Ashmore asked how many know about SBA’s data saying that 81% of the 31,000,000 businesses in the US have only one employee….the entrepreneur. She suggested that entrepreneurship education might have encouraged those 25,400,000 lone entrepreneurs, and that by doubling that number in each of the next five years we would wipe out the current unemployment problem forever !

 Fiona Macaulay, of Making Cents, said there is not just one type of entrepreneurship program….that many strategies are important because the goals for different student groups are so diverse.

 It was exciting to hear from so many young adult entrepreneurs like Ryan Allis (iContact), Scott Gerber (Gerber Enterprises) Travis Kiefer (Gumball Capital), Chris McCann (Startup Digest), and Caryn Shick (Incuba8), who are joining us in focusing on entrepreneurship education.

 Even the White House was represented by Doug Rand, Office of Science and Technology Policy, that launched the Startup America Initiative this year to increase the success of high growth businesses. He reported that net job creation comes from young companies with 20 employees or less that need access to capital, removal of regulatory barriers, and mentors to improve their success rate.

 Cathy Ashmore urged all who agree that entrepreneurship education can lead to opportunities for everyone ….to join the Consortium for the next 30 years . . . to bring a helping hand to youth and adults who wish to be self-sufficient job creators worldwide.

Congratulations to STEVE MARIOTTI, founder of NFTE, and Ken Yancey, Jr., CEO of SCORE who received LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS.

By Michael Simmons and Malla Haridat

Seven top youngentrepreneurs and leaders in the entrepreneurship education movement shared their thoughts during a panel at the Future of Entrepreneurship Education Summit (February 18) at theUniversity of Central Florida. The summit, created byExtreme Entrepreneurship Education (also led by young entrepreneurs), gathered over 130 top entrepreneurship education leaders from government, foundations, organizations, media, and corporations to talk about the future of the field.

Their panel was moderated by Donna Fenn, author of UpStarts!, and included:

• Ryan Allis of iContact (earned over $40 million in 2010). Ryan built the firm from its start in July 2003 to its current size of 240 employees and 67,000.

• Scott Gerber of the Young Entrepreneur Council. Scott is a serial entrepreneur and Scott is the most-syndicated young entrepreneurship columnist in the world.

• Trevor Owens of the Lean Startup Machine (LSM). LSM teaches entrepreneurs how to rapidly improve their businesses through a customer feedback process called customer development.

• Chris McCann of Startup Digest. Startup Digest publishes a weekly email newsletter of the best events in 57 cities and 6 Universities to over 100,000 subscribers.

• Caryn Shick of Incuba8. Incuba8 is a series of initiatives that inspire and generate entrepreneurial activity that cultivate cultures of action, fully vetted ideas and make concepts a reality.

• Travis Kiefer of Gumball Capital. Gumball is a social enterprise that has challenged over 3,000 students at 25 schools to raise maximum revenue and awareness on poverty alleviation using only $27 and 27 gumballs.
• Ankur Jain of the Kairos Society. Kairos is a student run, not for profit foundation created to tap the power of the brightest undergraduate entrepreneurs to develop business innovations with global impact.

Watch the Full Panel

To watch the full, 1-hour panel, visit the following links:

• Part 1 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wa3VIbHYdIg
• Part 2 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8O9dx98j5yc
• Part 3 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyI5KeaispI
• Part 4 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBaJEvofzzY

Visions for the Field

Starting with the end in mind, below are the participants’ personal visions for the field of entrepreneurship education:

• Entrepreneurship education and financial literacy should be required for all high schools.
• There should be viable opportunities as entrepreneurs should be given to those who are not college bound.
• There should be less business plan competitions and more events where youth can test their ideas.
• The overall density of entrepreneurs should increase so entrepreneurs don’t feel alone.
• Students should have their context shifted so they realize they can create businesses that solve big social problems.

Highlights

How do we get there? Below are highlights on strategies panelists provided for aspiring entrepreneurs and those supporting aspiring entrepreneurs:

• Reaching the first 100k is the hardest.  But once you reach this level, it becomes easier to scale.  You’ll need to spend three to four years to reach the $1 million revenue and ten years to reach the $100 million mark.

• It’s important to create business models that aren’t based solely on raising money.  Instead, create a solid product or service and generate sales.  The pay-off should not be the goal of venture capital but rather the creation of a solid business model.

• It’s not about the best idea but the EXECUTION of the idea.  Know the landscape of your industry and your company and know how to play the game of business.

• It’s important to learn how to sell.  You don’t need a product but you will need to have masterful sales skills. Get started selling before you focus on building.

Written by Michael Simmons and Malla Haridat. Michael Simmons is the co-founder of the Future of Entrepreneurship Education Summit and Extreme Entrepreneurship Education. Malla Haridat is the founder of New Designs for Life and a blogger at 9to5entrepreneur.com.

By Jennings Moss

Spend a few days in the company of entrepreneurs, or devote a solid 12 hours to listening to educators and self-made businesspeople talk about ways to encourage entrepreneurship, and you’ll come away with a few conclusions. That’s what happened to me last week after spending three days in Orlando: the first two spent at a retreat for young entrepreneurs and the third at a summit exploring the future of entrepreneurship education.

Rather than write a lengthy tome on any single topic discussed last week, I’m opting for a different approach (an impending flight back to New York and a looming deadline might have something to do with this). And since this is 2011, I offer not 10 but 11 lessons about the state of entrepreneurship today.

1. The biggest single takeaway from Friday’s marathon summit—organized by the Extreme Entrepreneurship Tour and held at the University of Central Florida—is that educators at big and small institutions across the country say their schools are finally tailoring programs to teach about entrepreneurship. That’s definitely a solid development, since business programs traditionally deal with economic theory, supply and demand, and big finance. But just saying your university is adding entrepreneurship courses to a curriculum isn’t enough. Schools need to ensure they’re not just teaching the theory of entrepreneurship, but that they’re developing programs that actually let students create and develop new companies. Plus, they need to recognize that it’s not just business students who can benefit from these courses: would-be engineers, artists, doctors, journalists, and many more would be eager to create their own companies.

2. Following President Barack Obama’s launch of the Startup America program to encourage and support entrepreneurs, the administration sent representatives to Orlando to send the message “we’re here to help.” No one in the audience was critical of this effort. Far from it. The general consensus was it was about time Washington went beyond outreach to corporations and traditional small businesses. But this doesn’t mean the entrepreneurs were pro-government. One very successful creator of a multimillion-dollar company had a wild idea: eliminate as many government functions as possible and turn those tasks over to entrepreneurs.

3. Beyond what the feds and universities are doing, new resources for entrepreneurs are being created seemingly every day. There are intense and exclusive programs like Y Combinator and 500 Startups that will offer guidance, training, and funding for select companies in exchange for equity in companies. There are branded programs by American Express, Bank of America, Cisco Systems, and more to aid entrepreneurs. And there are incubators cropping up all over the country to lend a hand. To find these, you need to do two things: Be creative in looking for them (use online searches with various key words), and don’t get discouraged if you get turned down.

4. The high-tech startups get all the glory, but they only account for a minimal number of startups. Scott Gerber, the founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council who has a few businesses in the works, emphasizes this point and says 99 percent of all startup efforts are inherently non-tech. The YEC’s membership is filled with this type of business owner; people like Adam Witty, who founded and leads the Advantage Media Group, a company rooted in one of the oldest pursuits: publishing. Witty’s company mixes the old, putting out books and magazines, with the new through ebooks and multimedia production. Gerber, who briefed the summit on results of a survey of young entrepreneurs, also made clear to include more traditional small-business enterprises like dry cleaners in his call for more entrepreneurship.

5. When someone talks about being a “social entrepreneur,” he’s not talking about running another network like Facebook or LinkedIn. He’s referring to creating a company that either has a noble purpose or takes a creative approach to funding charitable operations. Robert Nicholson is an example of the first. The Ohio native is co-owner and operator of two companies that aid developmentally disabled adults. His companies are all about improving his communities. Ryan Allis is an example of the second. The founder of iContact, an email marketing company for small businesses, Allis mandates that 1 percent of his company’s payroll, 1 percent of equity, 1 percent of product, and 1 percent of employee time goes to supporting nonprofit organizations in North Carolina, where iContact is based.

6. In the example above, notice I used the pronoun “he.” That wasn’t on accident. Men significantly outnumber women in the entrepreneurial ranks, a fact that’s not lost on either gender. During a session Friday on young entrepreneurs, only one of the seven business owners on stage was a woman. Caryn Shick, president and CEO of Opportunity Analysts, suggested one reason for this dearth of women creating their own businesses might have something to do with an aversion to risk, a desire to be more practical or safe with career choices.
7. Don’t just look down the street, across town, or into a neighboring state for fresh leads or the talent to operate your business. Go global. This is a favorite topic for Portfolio.com, and it deserves repeating here. Online employment sites like ODesk can help you find contractors in other parts of the world who may be more cost effective. British Airways is in the second year of its Face-to-Face program to give U.S. entrepreneurs foreign trips to help them grow their business. And groups like the Entrepreneurs’ Organization have programs dedicated to small-scale globalization. The world is getting smaller all the time. And that’s a great thing.

8. My reporter friends may hate me for saying this, but say it I will: Entrepreneurs ask better questions than journalists. During the two days I spent with the two dozen entrepreneurs under the age of 30, I felt like I was the one holding a press conference. They asked question after question about who I was, what my profession was all about, where I saw opportunities, and who my most meaningful interviews were. They peppered each other with similar questions and went deeper to ask probing financial questions without fear of offending anyone. To be an entrepreneur, you have to be all the things journalists should be: inquisitive, curious, and determined to get answers. To be a successful entrepreneur, you have to make sure you listen to the answers and take appropriate action.

9. Even if you ask the right questions and get good answers, you might feel a bit overwhelmed by it all and may be in need of some motivation. Here’s one way to get it: Talk to a young entrepreneur. Their energy and drive is simply intoxicating. A prime example is Arel Moodie, one of the partners in the Extreme Entrepreneurship Tour, a company whose primary purpose is sending successful business owners in their 20s to college campuses around the country. Moodie served as master-of-ceremonies for Friday’s summit, getting the audience to high-five each other in crazy ways, and peppering his remarks with multiple uses of the word awesome. Moodie’s spirit is infectious, and an entrepreneur of any age would gain a boost by being around him.

10. Entrepreneurship breeds more entrepreneurs. Sure, it’s great that the nation’s universities are developing more programs for those who want to create startups. And it’s a welcome sign that Washington is waking up to the power of the entrepreneur. But perhaps the best proponent for taking the plunge is to see your classmate, neighbor, or sibling be successful with a startup. If jumping in all the way is too much of a perceived gamble, try developing a smaller-scale, new company as a sideline to your 9-to-5 job. This trend even has its own, somewhat awkward name: sidepreneurship.

11. All of this leads to one final observation. And there’s nothing special or unique or new to this one. Nike had it right with its corporate slogan. Stop thinking about potentially starting your own business and just do it. It won’t be easy, it won’t be instantly successful, and it won’t come without a healthy amount of mistakes and failure. But it will be all yours—and it could just be the best thing you’ve ever done.

Come hear an array of incredible “Ideas Worth Spreading” at TEDxMidland at the Midland Center for the Arts. Registration is at 8am.  Sessions run 8:45am – 4:30pm.

Thirteen ground-breaking visionaries, innovators, entrepreneurs and doers will gather to inspire, educate and create the opportunity for personal and professional reflection for the attendees.

TED (short for Technology, Entertainment and Design) is the foundation for the most revolutionary presentations in the world. TEDx events are independently and locally organized, and have become a global phenomenon – stretching from California to London to Dubai to South Korea, and everywhere in between.

Tickets are $40 and can be purchased at the Midland Center for the Arts Box Office:

ONLINE: http://www.mcfta.org/
BY PHONE: 989-631-8250 or 800-523-7649
IN PERSON: Midland Center for the Arts, 1801 W. St. Andrews Rd., Midland

Speakers include:

* Ron Clark – Disney’s 2000 American Teacher of the Year, founder of the Ron Clark Academy, and the inspiration behind the film “The Ron Clark Story,” starring Matthew Perry.

* Dr. Marc Hardy – Author, actor, dramatist, speaker. Topic: “Sharing Fire: Using the Power of Personal Encouragement Philanthropy.” Director of Non-profit Executive Education at Notre Dame.

* Reed Shick– “Dreams of Technology: Problem-Solving through Sleep”
Former ICM for Core R&D at Dow Chemical. Founder of Intensify Solar. Inventor on 25 patents, some inspired through his dreams.

* Julie Maloney “Letting Go of Perfect.” Current Fortune 100 coach and kindle author of “The Blue Jean Manifesto”

* Andy Bacigalupo – “Chef Move to Schools” – Faculty at the Bay Arenac Career Center Culinary Program. Featured on the Dr. Oz show on healthy dieting and recognized program by the First Lady for his work fighting child obesity.

* Chip Reeves – “Learning through Serving” – Director of Discovery and Insight at Dow Corning’s Business and Technology Incubator.

* Dr. Karla Witzke- “Robotics in Medicine: Advancing Patient Care” – Urologist using the da Vinci Di Surgical System at MidMichigan Health.

* Dr. Ed Shaffer-“ Teaching Old Dogs New Tricks: Inventing in a Mature Industry” – Founder of Advanced Battery Concepts of inventor of revloutionary GreenSeal Technology that doubles the capacity and quadruples the life of lead-acid batteries.

* Ken Kousky- “Can Machines Teach People.” – CEO of the MidMichigan Innovation Center.

* Joe Wilkinson – “The Journey from Quiet Desperation to Joy and Beyond…” – Guide on the “Road to Nowhere” Tour

* Jeff Phillips- “Cartooning in the Classroom” – Professor at Northwood Unversity

* Rachel Rotay – A nine-year-old “coloratura soprano” singing sensation.

* John St. Augustine- Emcee – Award-winning radio host and author. Also was instrumental in launching the radio network “Oprah & Friends” and was the executive producer for the Dr. Oz Show

FACEBOOK EVENT

It’s time for our annual EntreMeetup Lake Party and Potluck!

When: 6pm

Where: Dr. Shicks’ House, 2470 E. NewCastle. Ln. Midland, MI 48640

There will be a meet and greet time, followed by food and fellowship by (and in) the water. Don’t forget to bring a swimsuit.

To RSVP and learn what you can bring contact Caryn Shick, cshick<at>opportunityanalysts​.com.

August 16th EntreMeetup’s Facebook Event

Facebook Event

Connecting creative entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses! Come meet people with ideas, who are making their ideas happen. This month we will be talking about…

LEAN STARTUP PRINCIPLES (Part I)- Getting your product to market sooner faster by identifying your minimum viable product (MVP) and testing it with your customer base to understand what your product should include to create the most value and build demand for when you launch.

A TAXONOMY OF REVENUE MODELS- We will be exploring Michael Rappa’s business models on the web. This is one of the most complete taxonomy of ways businesses make money that I (Caryn) have come across and can be applied to internet and non-web based businesses alike. To prepare to talk about how we can apply this to our own businesses check out http://digitalenterprise.org/models/models.html.

THE SOAPBOX/ SHOW’N TELL (Free Forum)- Have you been learning something while developing your business? Have you stumbled upon some great resources. This is your chance to share with our growing entrepreneurial community.

Please bring a dish to pass of $5-10 to contribute toward food.

May 19, 2011 3 p.m.- 9 p.m.

Heading for the Big Leagues celebrates entrepreneurship in the mid-Michigan region and gives attendees an opportunity to network and see firsthand some of the innovative products and services being developed in the region.

For the third annual event, the concourse at Dow Diamond will be transformed to a technology and innovation showcase, providing exhibitors the opportunity to display and demonstrate their innovative products to potential investors as well as key business, community and political leaders.

Special recognition will be provided to entrepreneurs and businesses that have cultivated mid Michigan’s entrepreneurial environment, including established and emerging companies that are critical to growing Michigan’s economy.

Register Now

Please join us for the VIP program starting at 3:30 PM ($100) or at 6 PM for the general public ($10.)

The Michigan Lean Startup Conference

featuring Eric Ries of The Lean Startup

Thursday, May 19th, 8:00 to 5:00

Eberhard Center at GVSU. Grand Rapids, MI

For information and registeration visit leanstartupmi.com

The Lean Startup movement is taking hold in companies both new and established to help entrepreneurs and managers do one important thing: make better, faster business decisions. By testing assumptions earlier, faster, and with more rigor, you can improve your success rate. Bringing principles from lean manufacturing and agile development to the process of innovation, the Lean Startup helps companies succeed in a business landscape riddled with risk.

The Lean Startup Conference is an event designed to unite those interested in what it takes to succeed in building a lean startup. The day long event will give startups, aspiring entrepreneurs, technology professionals, investors, educators and entrepreneurial stakeholders the opportunity to hear insights from national leaders in the lean startup movement and learn what it takes to build a lean startup.

Speakers

Eric Ries- Startup Lessons Learned

Patrick Vlaskovits & Brant Cooper- The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development

Dan Martell- Strategies for Fast Growth Entrepreneneurs

Rob Walling- Lessons Learned Moving From Developer to Entrepreneur

William Pietri- Agile Focus

Jeffrey Schox- Schox Patent Group

Michael Godwin & Jason Townsend- Resonate Venture Partners

Gagan Palrecha- Chirply

Zach Steindler- Olark.com

Jeff Epstein- Zferral

Dug Song- Duo Security

Additional speakers to be announced

“The Lean Startup is a disciplined approach to building companies that matter. It’s designed to dramatically reduce the risk associated with bringing a new product to market by building the company from the ground up for rapid iteration and learning. It requires dramatically less capital than older models, and can find profitability sooner. Most importantly, it breaks down the artificial dichotomy between pursuing the company’s vision and creating profitable value. Instead, it harnesses the power of the market in support of the company’s long-term mission”. Eric Ries, creator of the Lean Startup Methodology

Statewide Resources

Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC)

DTE Energy Economic Development

Michigan Counties/Cities : US Census Bureau

Mid- Michigan

Bay Future

Midland Tomorrow

Saginaw Future, Inc.

Economic Development Alliance of St. Clair County

Southeast Michigan

Livingston County Economic Dev Council

Westland Economic Development Corporation

Lapeer Development Corporation

Detroit Economic Growth Corporation

Novi Economic Development Corporation

Tuscola County Economic Development Corporation

Sterling Heights Economic Development Corporation

Monroe County Industrial Development Corporation

Genesee Regional Chamber of Commerce

Livonia Economic Development Partnership

Clinton County Economic Alliance

Eastpointe Economic Development Office

Sanilac County Economic Development Corporation

City of Fraser

Northern Michigan

Lake Superior Community Partnership

Northern Lakes Economic Alliance

Schoolcraft County EDC

Mecosta County Development Corporation

Middle Michigan Development Corporation

Traverse City Chamber of Commerce

Newaygo County Economic Development Corporation

Otsego Community Connection

Gaylord-Otsego County Economic Development Corporation

Dickinson Area Partnership

Evart Economic Development Corporation

Manistee County Economic Development Corporation

Ontonagon County Economic Development Corporation

Southwestern Michigan

Van Buren County Economic Development

Grand Haven Chamber of Commerce

Battle Creek Unlimited

Tri County Regional Planning Commission

Mason County Growth Alliance

Berrien County Economic Development

Hillsdale County Industrial Development

Northside Business Association of Kalamazoo

Grand Rapids Economic Development

America Electric Power Economic Development

Branch County

Southwestern Michigan Economic Growth Alliance

Cornerstone Alliance

Southwest Michigan First (Kalamazoo)

Muskegon Area First

Marshall Economic Development

Sturgis Economic Dev Corp

Ionia County Economic Alliance

St. Joseph County Economic Development

Kalamazoo Economic Development

City of Plainwell

Are we missing a resource? E-mail us and let us know.

2nd Tuesday Every Month, 7-10pm
2470 E. NewCastle Ln., Midland, MI

EntreMeetup’s Objective: Connecting Creative Entrepreneurs Together to Launch & Grow Startups!

Feb. Startup Presentations

1) Ingenuitas -Nate Oostendorp (Co-founder of Slashdot.org)

Hear seasoned entrepreneur Nate talk about his startup to unleash open source in manufacturing through creating an Industrial Controls open source platform.

His background includes:

SlashDot Co-Founder
Tech-news Hub with 10M readers/month

SourceForge Architect,Product Manager
Hosting for 2M+ OSS Devs, 42m visitors/month

Magna-Donnelly Industrial Programmer
3yr on production systems in data, vision, robotics

EntreMeetup Format:

* Business card table
* Quick 20 second intros for first time attendees
* Birds of a feather- learn about other attendees interests, skill sets, and new opportunities
* Three or four presentations from recent startups (7 min presentation, 3 min Q&A)
* Quick elevator pitches, announcements, and life changing books nominations

Please email me if:

1. You are interested in presenting your company, idea, or social venture at a future meetup
2. You want to submit an announcement before the meetup
3. You are traveling from out of town

Please spread the word about the group and invite any of your friends who care about changing the world and are interested in entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship, public policy, politics, investing, healthcare, education, law, poverty, marketing, or technology. All are welcome!