20A

20A- Growing Your Social Capital

Entrepreneurs can reap profound benefits from their social capital. If you know how social capital works, then you can build it!

This is a 'networking' experience -- but unlike other 'networking' opportunities you may have had in the past, I'm going to set very clear parameters on this experience. This will help you focus your efforts on achieving exactly what you need for this experience; moreover, you can set parameters on any future networking experience, to get the most out of it.

Here's what I want you to do for this exercise: establish contact with three new people, who will be valuable to helping you pursue your business idea. But I have some additional parameters:


Domain Expert:
My business plan is to open a sports facility to minority students to help them receive the development and guidance that they need to get working or to college. I ended up talking to an advisor that specialized in Sports Management. He helps people fulfill and seek the job opportunities that they want in terms of sports while also picking their brain about what they want to get out of a job. I was able to pick his brain and find out how hard it is to actually receive grants for a business like this. I was able to understand and realize that I will always need to be out looking for additional funding while not being able to be a part of the daily operations of the business like I want to. I found out about this person when I was asking him about future career opportunities and he began to ask me what my passion was. I definitely was able to use this opportunity to meet and get a deeper glimpse of the industry and how hard it is to enter and stay actively engaged.

Expert on my market:
The person that I had an opportunity to talk with actually owns a facility that is similar to the one that I want. This individual is my best friend’s dad and he actually runs a facility that mentors and teaches kids through basketball how to become a man. He also has future ideas of opening up an academy under the same name of this facility to help to teach and build the professional skills of his players. I have always had an open line of communication with Chris because he has always been around me since I was in the 3rd grade. He has always been here for my friends and has always showed interest in helping out in anyway possible. I was able to be able to pick his brain on the potential downsides and challenges that he has faced with growing a facility and program like the one that he currently has. 

Supplier:
I do not have many supplies when it comes to my industry. The only supplier I can think of that would be able to identify the need for these students are parents and schools. I decided to get the best of both worlds by interviewing and a school teacher from a low-income school where the minority population is actually the majority. My mom used to work in the school system so I was able to reach out to the lines of communication that she currently has to see how they feel about my idea. I was able to confirm that these students would need to have some help with financial aid to be able to subsidize the cost of attending this facility. I was also able to understand that I need to have public figures that will allow me to promote my product to increase the attendance of my facility. This interview went well and I was also able to get a supporter onboard. She told me to let her know when this idea was put into action and she would love to help me to enhance the brand of my company.


Finally: Reflect. This experience requires you to do a little 'targeted networking.' How will this experience shape how you participate in any future networking events? Did this experience differ from your networking experiences in the past? How?

I have always had an ability to be able to reach out to people. I think that it has enabled me to be remain calm and remain comfortable in future networking events. I was able to get an honest evaluation of the people who actually want to see me succeed.