3 ms·

As a current college student, I'd recommend they try their hand at starting a student organization that does something entreprenurial (a microfinance organizati

by shaddi 17y ago

As a current college student, I'd recommend they try their hand at starting a student organization that does something entreprenurial (a microfinance organization, or a group providing tech services to the poor, for example). I suppose I don't have the experience to compare it to launching a startup, but from what I've understood about startups there are a lot of similarities: - You are the one in charge, you have to make stuff happen - You have to figure out where money is going to come from and how to make it last (if you don't have a legitimate budget sheet you're doing it wrong) - You have to think about recruitment and retention of members (hard when payment is not an option) - You have to manage and motivate people - You have to set goals, develop a vision, and convey that to your members - You have to find organizations who can help you, and learn how to form mutually beneficial partnerships - You face hard times and good times, but have to keep going regardless - You learn your strengths and weaknesses as a leader (good for knowing what to look for in a co-founder) - If you are really passionate about what you're doing, you'll learn what it's like to really devote yourself to an organization - Somewhat trivially, you'll need to learn how to handle lots of emails, personal contacts, and competing time commitments. The nice thing is that the cost of failure is pretty much 0 in a student organization. If it doesn't work, no one will really care that much. But if it does, you've made a mark on your university and probably learned a lot in the process.

atiw 17y ago
THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING. Saying that doing a student organisation is a nice thing because it's cost of failure is 0, is not a very good logic. In fact, it is the risk factor that mostly forces us to go above and beyond when everyone else is giving up. Persistence is the key, and a good way of achieving that could having limited high risk, so that you don't quit during tough times. Sooner or later, there comes a point, when you have to make a lot of tough decisions, which mostly comes down to giving up versus fighting and finding your way out somehow. Oh, and I totally agree that you probably should try and keep your actual money investment close to 0, and maximise your time investment. But, I also think you can build a business with minimum money involved, and by that I mean less than 500 bucks. I am assuming a tech startup, where the main investment required is your time and code, and you can at least get a "proof of concept" working...which can be used to raise money and/or make sure it is the right idea. Last, but not the least, if you know you are going to do a startup, or are at least curious if you can do it, you owe it to yourself to see it through. To go ahead and build it, or at least fail trying to build it. The biggest upside to this startegy is that you only "learn" doing a student organisation. Whereas you actually succeed building a startup. I don't intend to be rude, but this kind of sounds like you want to do a college degree right after high school, and you are confused, and you decide to go do a assosciate degree or something, to get the "feel" of a real college degree. I repeat. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING.
- shaddi 17y ago
  Right, they are not the same thing: they do share similarities, however. I must not have made my point clearly. My own experience has to do with starting a group that has a non-trivial operating budget (O(10k), decent for a student org), customers, technology that we developed for our projects, and funded by grants for which we are required to show demonstrable progress. There are a few groups like this at my university, so I figure it is a relatively common setup. We actually considered launching it as a for-profit business, but realized none of us had the time to get fully behind that. When I say cost of failure is 0, I mean to say you're not going to be out a substantial amount of your own investment if things go bad. And you are still working towards something you consider valuable (a degree) during the whole process, so it's not a total waste of time. But there are certainly social costs for just walking away from something you start, especially if you make a big deal out it to begin with. I understand what you're getting at -- they are not the same thing. But I do think that some of the leadership aspects are similar, insofar as starting any organization (student, startup, community, or otherwise) requires certain common skills. If you can't/don't want to drop your studies to go do your Startup, then this might be a means to exercise a similar skill (sub)set in the meantime.
  - noverloop 17y ago
    I have done something similar and I share your viewpoint, it is not a replacement for a real company in real economic circumstances but I did need to develop a lot of skills that I wouldn't have learned in classrooms. I'm still in college though so I can't tell you how beneficial these skills will be when I either startup or enter the workforce.

by shaddi 17y ago

atiw 17y ago

THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING. Saying that doing a student organisation is a nice thing because it's cost of failure is 0, is not a very good logic. In fact, it is the risk factor that mostly forces us to go above and beyond when everyone else is giving up. Persistence is the key, and a good way of achieving that could having limited high risk, so that you don't quit during tough times. Sooner or later, there comes a point, when you have to make a lot of tough decisions, which mostly comes down to giving up versus fighting and finding your way out somehow. Oh, and I totally agree that you probably should try and keep your actual money investment close to 0, and maximise your time investment. But, I also think you can build a business with minimum money involved, and by that I mean less than 500 bucks. I am assuming a tech startup, where the main investment required is your time and code, and you can at least get a "proof of concept" working...which can be used to raise money and/or make sure it is the right idea. Last, but not the least, if you know you are going to do a startup, or are at least curious if you can do it, you owe it to yourself to see it through. To go ahead and build it, or at least fail trying to build it. The biggest upside to this startegy is that you only "learn" doing a student organisation. Whereas you actually succeed building a startup. I don't intend to be rude, but this kind of sounds like you want to do a college degree right after high school, and you are confused, and you decide to go do a assosciate degree or something, to get the "feel" of a real college degree. I repeat. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING.

shaddi 17y ago
Right, they are not the same thing: they do share similarities, however. I must not have made my point clearly. My own experience has to do with starting a group that has a non-trivial operating budget (O(10k), decent for a student org), customers, technology that we developed for our projects, and funded by grants for which we are required to show demonstrable progress. There are a few groups like this at my university, so I figure it is a relatively common setup. We actually considered launching it as a for-profit business, but realized none of us had the time to get fully behind that. When I say cost of failure is 0, I mean to say you're not going to be out a substantial amount of your own investment if things go bad. And you are still working towards something you consider valuable (a degree) during the whole process, so it's not a total waste of time. But there are certainly social costs for just walking away from something you start, especially if you make a big deal out it to begin with. I understand what you're getting at -- they are not the same thing. But I do think that some of the leadership aspects are similar, insofar as starting any organization (student, startup, community, or otherwise) requires certain common skills. If you can't/don't want to drop your studies to go do your Startup, then this might be a means to exercise a similar skill (sub)set in the meantime.
- noverloop 17y ago
  I have done something similar and I share your viewpoint, it is not a replacement for a real company in real economic circumstances but I did need to develop a lot of skills that I wouldn't have learned in classrooms. I'm still in college though so I can't tell you how beneficial these skills will be when I either startup or enter the workforce.