Stage 1 focused on understanding your motivations for pursuing entrepreneurship. It also introduced you to the concept of an “entrepreneurial journey”, as well as to the importance of early planning for your venture.

Now that you have a deeper understanding of entrepreneurship beyond the Oxford Dictionary definition, this stage will introduce key entrepreneurial concepts and tools as you continue on the entrepreneurial journey. In other words, if Stage 1 had a heavy focus on the idea, Stage 2 is all about execution.

Michael Dell, Founder of Dell Technologies, once said “Ideas are a commodity. The execution of them is not.” Without a solid plan and foundation, your idea will fail. This stage will introduce important topics in entrepreneurship such as validation, customer profiles, customer interviews, pitch decks and the “Business Model Canvas”.

As with Stage 1, please recognize that everyone will experience these concepts differently. Contrary to Stage 1, however, these differences will stem from your unique idea, sector, or customer. Certain customers are harder to reach, some sectors are much more competitive, and many ideas don’t make it past validation. No matter the challenges you face throughout this stage, remember that ups and downs are part of the entrepreneurial journey.

Objectives

By the end of this stage, you will be able to:

• Understand the importance of validation in the entrepreneurial journey
• Evaluate whether your business idea is worth pursuing
• Create a Business Model Canvas

Activity

Before starting this stage, Pause and think about the following questions:

• What is your business idea?
• Who are your competitors?
• Why do you think your idea is better than the existing solutions?

Required Reading List

(in order of appearance)

Module 2.1

Woods, Dan, “What Does The Word Startup Mean in 2018?” Forbes Magazine, November 30, 2018.