Startup Weekend Oakland: The Richest Educational Experience. Ever.

I was there.  From 6pm on Friday, January 13, 2017 to 8pm on Sunday, January 15, 2017 at the Kapor Center for Social Impact in Oakland, CA I saw students stretch and accomplish things I did not think possible. 

  

I was leading a group of 19 students from Elon University as part of our Winter Term Course called Innovation in America.  The previous two years, I led similar groups and our main activities were engaging companies like Google, Apple, and Facebook and attending startup events.  

But this year was different.  Startup Weekend is a 50 hour event where a diverse group of ~100 programmers, designers, marketers, and other business professionals gather to tackle problems.  On Friday night, all participants are invited to take one minute to pitch an idea they would like to work on throughout the weekend.   Then participants vote on the best ideas and ~12 teams are formed to tackle the problem for the rest of the weekend.  Here's why 

• Physically Challenging - It’s really difficult to teach drive, passion, and grit.  But the high expectations of Startup Weekend helped students understand that it takes extreme amounts of energy and focus to tackle big problems.  Between Friday night and Sunday night some students slept only 10 hours and worked as a team for 30+ hours.  While I don’t recommend this sleep pattern, for this specific occasion it was inspiring to see teams laser focused on a goal.  I doubt any of the students had worked this many hours in a so short a time.
• Surrounded by Experts – All day on Saturday, top experts around Silicon Valley walked around the venue talking to teams about their projects.  Picture a Data Scientist from LinkedIn who had launched her own startup around calendaring helping a team on their project that ironically enough happened to be focused on calendar integration functionality with Artificial Intelligence. 
• Difficult Teammates – You’ve seen reality TV shows where participants are so stressed out and upset that they quit and walk away, never to return.  This happened at Startup Weekend and it’s a great experience for students to be in stressful situations.  Then there are those difficult teammates who don’t walk away but are disparaging to their teammates.  Another great opportunity for students to stand up for their ideas and be forced to articulate why they believe a certain action is needed. 
• Focus on Emerging Technologies – Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Artificial Intelligence were the focus and each team created a prototype using one of those technologies. 
  
• Expectation to Create - Teams were working against the clock.  They were expected to make a pitch to a panel of investors on Sunday at 5pm.  This meant some students quickly refined their prototyping skills in able to build a prototype to demo.
• Educational Content - I've been to other Startup Weekends and this particular one was better because the organizers brought in top experts in the fields of Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Artificial Intelligence.  Imagine taking a one hour class from a top Artificial Intelligence expert who did PostDoc work at Google.  All day on Saturday, participants could take a number of classes that would help them in their project.    

Students Should Create....Chatbots

When I brought home our Google Home Personal Assistant, I was pretty excited to see how our children used it.  I felt like we walked back in time as if we were a family who had just purchased a state of the art radio.

Perhaps you have visited a website lately and a chat window automatically popped up that said, "How can I help you?"  It's likely that the person behind that is not a person at all but a "chatbot."

Whether it be via messaging or voice recognition with Google Home, chatbots are changing the way we interact with the web, shop, listen to music, workout, acquire knowledge, etc.  Some even believe that chatbots will replace website because young people are so wired to text, snapchat, message, etc.

The beauty is that companies like Motion.ai have create web based tools that empower all of us to create web based chatbots with easy drag and drop menus.  There's a small learning curve but nothing students can't figure out in a hour or so.

Why should they build these?  Instead of Artificial Intelligence replacing their jobs, how about we empower students with the skills to build Artificial Intelligence?

All "Jean Valjeans" of the Triangle, Please Step Forward

This morning I was reading about a glorious time when an entire people were prosperous.  How we can begin to get to such a place here in the Triangle region of North Carolina?   It's a tall order, but why not shoot for it?

There was a similar people in the book Les Miserables.   How did they get to this point?  It was the work of one man, Jean Valjean.  It was said of him:

"He makes the entire region prosperous. There is no pocket so obscure that it didn’t have a little money in it. No dwelling so low that there wasn’t a little joy within it.

Father Madellan made his fortune but a singular thing and a simple man of business did not seem as though that was his chief care. He seemed to thinking much of others, and little of himself."

So who's willing?  Are you that Jean Valjean for the Triangle?  By the way, we can have more than one in our area.  No need to sign up.  Just get to work.

How to Get a Job: Attempt to Launch Something

Last week I was in my office when a gentleman whom I did not know appeared in my doorway.  He was not there to see me but was knocking on the door of my colleague who's office is across the hall.  I introduced myself and he turned out to be an Elon Alumni coming back to campus for Homecoming.  He works for marketing company, so I invited him to come chat with my Marketing class which was starting later that day.

One takeaway.  As Peter was interviewing for the position the interviewer said, "If you were going to launch a new product, what would it be?"  Peter responded, "Actually I'm working on building an app right now."  The interviewer was very impressed with that and eventually offered him a job. 

Fast forward.  That app idea didn't work out but going through that process shows companies that you are innovative and driven.  Now Peter is doing well at his company.

Pete Rose: A Model for Entrepreneurs

No, I'm not talking about gambling.

From http://reds.enquirer.com/

This is about his records as the all-time Major League leader in hits (4,256) and at-bats (14,053).  You see where this is going.  Mr. Rose stepped up the plate more than any other player. 

What does this mean for me and you?  If you are like me and slightly above average intelligence (though not from Lake Wobegon), then we have to win via hard work and persistence.  You, with your average batting average, have to step up the plate again and again.

Yes, there are outlier entrepreneurs who seem to step up and hit home runs every time they are at the plate.  Don't let that distort the reality that 99.9% of the entrepreneurs learn by striking out again and again.

I suggest that we all can follow Pete's example as a grinder who showed up more than everyone else.  

Any Major As Long As It's Computer Science

"Any color as long as it's black" was Henry Ford's strategy.  When the time is right to share career advice with my 3 children I will say, "Any major as long as it's computer science."  I won't push them, but will definitely show them the benefits.

Every field needs computer scientists.  You want to go into agriculture, health care, education, art, whatever, they all need  wizards with superpowers. Plus you don't have to program your whole life and the base knowledge will enable you to speak with the wizards.  If fact, I will outline benefits in double majoring in Computer Science and whatever interests them.    

I was recently chatting with the Dean at a highly ranked business school and he said, "If I hear someone say 'Do What You Love' one more time, I'm going to punch them."  Yes, you can enjoy your work.  But the career management process must be aligned with real world demand.

Majoring in computer science could be your path to solving the problems in the world that keep you up at night. 

The Odds Are Always in Our Favor

While I'm not a huge Hunger Games fan, I did see it twice at the theaters in less than a week.  Once with my Dad during our Thanksgiving trip and once on a romantic date with Angie to Southpoint.

"Control" is lesson we must learn as parents, people managers at work, and church leaders.  No one likes to be coersed and I continually learn this lesson as a father when I choose to physically pick up my kids and force them to brush their teeth or whatever task we need to do at the time.  It's a short term fix and taking time to teach them to fish is the better choice.  As Peeta said, "...our lives aren't just measured in years. The measure in our lives are the people we touch around us."     

Coersion is not the way of the Lord.  Obviously there's a stark contrast between President Snow in the Capital and the way our Our Father in Heaven operates.  Here on earth we have agency to choose and God's hand is continually "stretched out still" (Isaiah 9) when we need him.

With the help of heaven, the odds are always in our favor.