As part of our MA degree requirements, Lauder students are required to form a team across language tracks and conduct research in different regions of the world. There are four of us in Lauder this year who were entrepreneurs before coming to Wharton, and we teamed up to further explore entrepreneurship in the developing world.
Will, an American in the Spanish track, is a former investment banker who moved to Mexico to open his own chain of ice cream stores. Stephan is a German, also in the Spanish track, who worked for McKinsey and Bain as a management consultant and also participated in several start-ups. Aymeric, a Belgian in the German track, was involved in several start-ups including a mid-sized pharmaceutical company in Europe. Last, and most certainly least, is me, the founder of PoolTables.com, the largest pool table retailer in the US.
Our mission was to further investigate an entrepreneurship school in the Philippines (The Academy for Creating Enterprise - ACE). A retired entrepreneur, named Steve Gibson, and his wife moved to the Philippines in 1999 to establish a non-profit school where they could train young, poor Filipinos on how to start and grow profitable businesses. They purchased a home large enough to house 25 students and they began teaching an intense eight week, in-residence program to young aspiring entrepreneurs. There were only two requirements: 1. They had to agree to pay a registration fee of about $20, which showed their commitment and sacrifice to become part of the program (all other costs for books, room, board, etc. are covered by ACE). 2. They had to be a returned missionary for the LDS church - as a devout Mormon, Steve had a strong belief that young people who had learned to work hard and serve others for two years (unpaid), were uniquely qualified and trained to become entrepreneurs.
As part of our visit to the Philippines, we were asked to teach the current batch of 25 students about entrepreneurship, our businesses and what had made us successful entrepreneurs.
Several groups at Wharton (Lauder Institute, Wharton Entrepreneurial Programs, and the Wharton Store) were kind enough to donate items to these students. Every student received a Wharton tote or backpack, a Wharton t-shirt, mugs, Wharton pens/pencils/pads, etc. The items might seem insignificant, but you should have seen the look on the faces of these students as they received the gifts. It was well work the extra space it took up in our luggage!
I was fortunate enough to be in Cebu during this batch's graduation, so I attended the ceremony. It was a unique and touching experience to see each of them graduate. Most traveled to Cebu from islands quite a distance away, so only a few had family there to support them at the graduation ceremony. Despite this, without fail, when an individual's name was called, the audience erupted and if there was nobody there to support a recent graduate, several other students would run up to accompany the graduate for some picture taking. Of all the traveling I've done, I have to say that the Filipinos are the happiest people I've ever seen. I asked a taxi driver during my trip why Filipinos are always so happy. His response: "We can't afford much, but we can always afford to smile!"
One of my favorite classes at Wharton was an entrepreneurship classes where we participated in an innovation tournament, which we decided to duplicate during our visit. We didn't have a lot of time, so we did a condensed version. A week before our visit, I emailed the students and asked them to each come up with ten new business ideas which they weren't to discuss with their classmates. Upon our arrival, we had the 25 students divided into five groups of five. Each person presented their five favorite business ideas to their small group, followed by silent voting by each individual on a scorecard. After each person had presented their five ideas, we compiled the scores and revealed the top two ideas in each group (ensuring that they were from two different individuals - not surprisingly, several group's top ideas were generated by the same individual).
So with the top two ideas coming from the five teams, we had ten ideas which were the best out of an original 250 ideas. Each candidate from the top ten ideas formed a team of two or three individuals which helped them further develop their idea and create a poster which summarized the idea visually. We then had each of the top ten ideas pitch to the entire class. Upon completion, we gave every person two stickers that they could place on their top two ideas. This then gave us a winner, two runners-up and some very excited winners!
In addition to visiting current students, we also visited with ACE alum throughout the Philippines. Stephan and I visited with a few alum in Manila. These alum were all neighbors ... one runs a t-shirt printing and design company, another started a successful tamarind candy company, and the one on the far left is a regional coordinator for ACE, who oversees alumni affairs and other ACE activities in the northern region of the country.
This entrepreneur and his wife run a 30+ store business called Cellular City where they sell refurbished cell phones and service. He is one of ACE's most successful entrepreneurs.
Many of ACE's alum return home and start small businesses which provide an income sufficient enough to sustain their families. This ACE alum and his wife run a small barbecue stand together which supports their small family and a few older relatives.
This ACE alum actually owns three small businesses in Manila.
We met with a handful of ACE alum on the small island of Bohol one afternoon. The one standing up in the green shirt was in the first batch of entrepreneurs to graduate from ACE. He started a very successful online real estate company in the Philippines while a student at ACE. He now has over 30 offices around the Philippines and targets mostly Filipinos who live/work abroad who want to own island properties back home.
One of the fun cultural things we experienced in the Philippines was the transportation. These Jeepneys rule the roads in Manila and throughout the Philippines. They are old Jeeps that were stretched and converted into mini-buses where you can easily climb in and out the doorless-back of the vehicle.
Another common form of transportation are the "tricycles" which are modified scooters. As you can see, they often fit quite a few people on one scooter. We had 8 people on this scooter (I somehow ended up fitting right behind Stephan, in the pink shirt).
Mangos ... need I say more?
We somehow fit in some scuba diving at the end of our trip. Life is rough!
No comments:
Post a Comment