Small Business Labs

University of Miami's Innovative Launch Pad Entrepreneurship Program

In 2008 the University of Miami started a student entrepreneurship program called Launch Pad.  Unlike most academic entrepreneurship programs, it's not a major or set of courses.  Instead, it's mostly an individual study program using outside advisers to teach aspiring student entrepreneurs what they need to know about starting a business. 

Miami's Launch Pad is housed in their career center and positions entrepreneurship as an alternative to a traditional job.  It is available to all Miami students.  Miami also has a traditional entrepreneurship major and set of courses in their undergraduate business school. 

Since the program started, University of Miami students and recent grads have launched 45 companies.  This level of success led to the Blackstone Charitable Foundation committing to spend $50 million over the next 5 years setting up Launch Pads at other schools, starting with Wayne State and Walsh College. 

Inc. Magazine has a nice Launch Pad summary and Business Week also covers it in an article on youth unemployment. 

Based on our work with entrepreneurs, we're strong supporters of entrepreneurial education and training.  Miami's approach is an exciting innovation in this field. 

Teen Necessity Entrepreneurs

The New York Times article Teenagers are Building Their Own Job Engine talks about teens starting their own businesses because of a lack of jobs. 

According to the article, teen unemployment is at 22.7% and the economic downturn is leading older workers to take jobs that teens would normally get.  This is resulting in teens becoming necessity entrepreneurs - starting businesses because there are not other options.

Gen Y continues to appear to be a very entrepreneurial generation. 

Gen Y - Natural Freelancers

Ypulse, a website/blog focused on youth marketing, has an interesting post on Gen Y's view of freelancing. 

Written by a seriously over achieving Gen Y college student, the article highlights reasons why "freelancing seems to be a natural thing for Gen Y."  Key quote:

"After making it through the incredibly competitive college admissions processes and completing four years of college, today's college graduates are a highly capable bunch. However, after emerging from the less structured campus life where their achievements were mostly fueled by self-motivation, an increasing number of young people are balking at the idea of getting a traditional job with a supervisor and an office hierarchy."

Is Gen Y Too Soft For Entrepreneurship?

The recent Forbes article Entrepreneurship (or lack thereof) in Millenials questions whether or not Gen Y (called millenials in this article) is tough enough to make it as entrepreneurs.  Key quote:

"The oft raised question - and it is a big one for the U.S. - is whether millennials (also known as "The Everybody Gets a Trophy" generation) have been so coddled, so inoculated against insults and injury, that they are now too, well, soft to achieve entrepreneurial success."

We, of course, strongly disagree.  Our research - and the research of others - points to Gen Y being a very entrepreneurial generation.

I'm also curious who is raising this "oft raised question?"  We do a pretty good job of keeping up with the work being done looking at small business, entrepreneurship and Gen Y.  The vast majority of this work is positive about Gen Y's entrepreneurial aptitude.

The author does end on a pro-Gen Y note. 

Gen Y's View of Top Green Brands

Outlaw Consulting has released a list of top 100 green brands based on a survey of their Gen Y trendsetter panel.  The top 10 are Whole Foods, Trader Joes, Toyota, Honda, Google, Aveda, Zipcar, American Apparel, Ikea and 7th Generation. 

As an article in Sustainable Life Media points out, the list favors companies that use minimalist design techniques and/or do a good job of marketing sustainability.  It is both interesting and disappointing that a number of the companies on the list do not show up on lists produced by groups with deeper knowledge of sustainable business practices.  Key quote on this from the article:

"Our trendsetters are very hip and aware, but they are far from experts," explains Barbara Bylenga, founder and chief strategist. "Our aim was to discover which companies are going beyond the niche market of hard-core 'greenies' and winning over the more broadly influential members of this generation."

With sustainability becoming more important to consumers, it is worth better understanding what is driving green influencers.   The Sustainable Life Media article also points out a study on this topic called Greenfluencers by communications firm Porter-Novelli that more broadly covers this topic. 

Employees Want to Work on Their Terms

Interesting report by Deloitte called Competing for Talent.   The study suggests that companies need to change the nature of work to continue to attract and retain high value employees.  Key quote:

"For today’s workers, hefty compensation packages and fancy retirement plans just aren’t as appealing as they used to be. What they really want – more than anything else – is to control when, where, and how they work. They’re happy to work hard, but want to do it on their terms.

And by the way, we’re not just talking about "Gen Yer’s", also known as, "Millenials." As it turns out, recent retirees who are re-entering the workforce want many of the same things as their younger counterparts. So do "Gen X’ers," although most are too afraid to ask."

In our research on very small (5 employees or less) and personal businesses (one person businesses), work flexibility, work/life balance and values are consistently mentioned as key reasons for starting small businesses.  Competing for Talent looks at this issue from the point of view of larger organizations, but reaches the same conclusion as our research - people want more work flexibility and  want to work on their terms.

EDN has a related article on this study that discusses Gen Y in more depth.   

Gen Y Social Entrepreneurs Get Some Positive Press

The New York Times has an interesting op-ed piece on Gen Y social entrepreneurs called "The Age of Ambition."  Key quote:

"Today the most remarkable young people are the social entrepreneurs, those who see a problem in society and roll up their sleeves to address it in new ways. Bill Drayton, the chief executive of an organization called Ashoka that supports social entrepreneurs, likes to say that such people neither hand out fish nor teach people to fish; their aim is to revolutionize the fishing industry."

One of the reasons I really like this pro-Gen Y article is that Gen Y has been getting a lot of bad - and I think very unfair - press.  There have been multiple articles in the popular accusing Gen Y of being narcisstic, shallow and and unable to fit into the work world.  Several articles call Gen Y the Entitlement Generation. 

We spend a lot of our research time with Gen Y and young adults, and because they are very entrepreneurial we post on them often.  What I posted on Gen Y last year still holds for me:

"I've had the opportunity to participate in a fair amount of research on Gen Y and young adults over the years.  I've also worked with quite a few young enterpreneurs and young adults in Silicon Valley.  Based on both my research and work experiences, I think the Entitlement Generation is a generation of enormous talent.  They are smart, aggressive, innovative and make things happen.  I wish I entered the workforce with their skills and abilities.  Yes they have big expectations - and yes they can be difficult to deal with - but they also have what it takes to deliver."

It's nice to see this generation starting to get credit for their efforts. 

 

NY Times on Career Status and Entrepreneurship

The Fashion and Style section of the NY Times has an article on the declining prestige of doctors and lawyers called "The Falling Down Professions".  Key quote on this decline comes from Richard Florida, the author of the book The Rise of the Creative Class:

"This decline, Mr. Florida argued, is rooted in a broader shift in definitions of success, essentially, a realignment of the pillars. Especially among young people, professional status is now inextricably linked to ideas of flexibility and creativity, concepts alien to seemingly everyone but art students even a generation ago."

The article suggests that entrepreneurship and finance are careers that are growing in prestige.  Key quote on college students and careers:

"Students are focusing now on starring in their own creations, their own start-up businesses, said Trudy Steinfeld, the executive director of the Wasserman Center for Career Development at New York University.

“There’s a sexiness to starting something cool,” she said. “Now we have people trying to start a Facebook or a MySpace. You might be working like a maniac, but it’s going to pay off in status. You’re going to be famous, providing something people are going to know and use all over the world.”

More evidence that Belmont University Entrepreneurship Professor Jeff Cornwall is right when he calls Gen Y the greatest entrepreneurial generation ever.

Body Art in the Workplace

Fun article in the Christian Science Monitor on tattoos and the workplace.  Key quote on the growth of body art, piercings and tatoos:

"More than one-third of Americans between the ages of 18 and 25 have tattoos, and 40 percent of those between 26 and 40, according to a Pew Research study. For those over age 40, the number drops to 10 percent. In all, an estimated 30 million to 40 million people have tattoos."

The article discusses how businesses are being forced to be more accepting of body art mostly because younger workers increasingly have body art:

"As more young employees – both women and men – opt for ink and piercings, they face decisions about how much decorated skin to bare or not to bare. In the process, they are also quietly forcing their employers to accept them."

Body art is mainstream and will remain so for many years to come.  Businesses need to undertand this and accept it.

Shifting Career Blog on Attracting Gen Y Workers

Excellent post called "What the Gen Y Workers Want" at the NY Times shifting careers blog.  The post is written by the authors of the book Recruit or Die: How Any Business Can Beat the Big Guys in the War for Young Talent.  The post focuses on what small businesses can do to improve their ability to attract Gen Y workers.  Key quote on Gen Y:

"These kids have ambition and aspiration coming out of their ears. They want to be leaders when they grow up. They want to change the world."