Session 10 Review

The seminar today discussed about Business Planning. At the end of the seminar a short time was also taken to talk about story telling.

During the part about business planning we discussed about how different small businesses like limited liability partnerships (LLP) could be run. Firstly, let me tell you something about small businesses. A small business is one which is independently owned and operated by the owners. In such businesses the control over decisions and operations are done by the owners. Business equity is not publicly traded and business financing is personally guaranteed by the owners. Such types of businesses usually have less than twenty employees. Another condition is if the employee count is below ten, it is termed a micro business.

We also spoke about LLP's which was a very new idea to me. I have been totally unaware of such a possibility in business and such ideas obviously encourage people to go into business wihtout having to worry so much about the cost of failure. Such a type of business hsd elements of both a partnership as well as a corporation. What happens is in a LLP all partners have a form of limited liability which is very similar to that of shareholders in a corporation. All this tends to make LLP's more suitable for businesses where each investor would like to take an active role. (Source: Wikipedia)

We then went about discussing how to actually get banks and potential investors to loan money and invest in your idea. This is the part where the business plan is key. What I found really interested is the part where after going through the financial data investors tend to look at the management team. I actually believe a good team could really be the key into getting a an investor to invest in a business. Most of the times market research and a lot of homework on the product and market will enable us to give a good financial production. This is probably the reason behind people also chasing their idea. But the difference is really in how well people can execute that business idea. All this is down to the team, how qualified and skilled the people are, past achievements in different fields, and in the end the working chemistry between each member of the team. A team full of superstars that cannot get along with one another and are not coherent is never a good team. All this actually reminds of a seminar we had a while back on the power of thinking in a group and individually. I can really relate that seminar to this now.

Next we also had a brief overview as to why businesses fail. I thought incompetence to handle it and inexperience were definitely up there and I was right about that. I believe if the management is competent and with a bit of experience funds can always be generated. Ofcourse there are certain circumstances where this does not occur and the business falls due to lack of funds. Another thing that struck me was also the passion to work for your business. A human mind is such that a lack of interest in anything will always result in that person not wanting to do it. So all in all we went throught the lifecycles of small businesses and I must say it was interesting. Though, I do no I probably will never start my own business, I think it is not about lack of passion and interest for me, but rather in my personality which is more likened to enjoying work in a large multi-national corporation.

Towards the end of the seminar we went through something called storytelling. I am quite sure I do not need to talk about what it is since we have all been told stories and have also told them and will them at many points in time. But what was important from this part of the seminar was the effect a good story teller might have. I believe a good leader is someone who can actually literally tell real or even ficticious stories to motivate, inspire and lead his team. Story telling is also a wonderful way of communicating with different types of people.

I believe story telling is an art and not something that can really be learned that easily. It is the ability to do it better that actually defines and separates out the outstanding individual with leadership and better potential from the rest. Story telling to me is all about creativity.

This was a different type of seminar where Prof Gilbert had a lot more to say than the class but there was still some participation for us. The main reason behind it was actually to get us to realise your reports are due in a week or so and how to go about doing it.