Becoming A Successful Entrepreneur
Contributed by Soon Wan
(Region 1 GOLD Coordinator)

Do you have a business idea, and want to know how you can put your idea into the market and become a successful entrepreneur? On November 07^th, 2006, IEEE Boston GOLD (Graduates Of the Last Decade) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) IEEE Student Branch joint hosted a free seminar on business and entrepreneurship at the MIT Stata Center.  And, Professor Kevin Krauss got all the answers.

Professor Krauss currently serves as Professor and Director of Suffolk University’s Center for Entrepreneurial Studies. His current activities also include serving as advisor/board member and or CEO to a number of emerging technology companies including Dirt Glue Enterprises, Trilithon Technologies, Masterbond, SP and Advin Systems. At the seminar, he provided the Students and GOLD members the vision, knowledge and skills that they need to succeed in business. This was a great opportunity for the young professionals to come and learn more about business and entrepreneurship.

In the two hours session, Professor Krauss shared over thirty years of his experience on business and entrepreneurship with the audiences, and articulately spoke about how to setup a new business or company.  He used many of his life experience and real business cases to prove the facts and his points. He interacted with the audiences, and got them involved on a business negotiation.

“Part of entrepreneurship is to experience failure,” said Professor Krauss. In fact, seven is the average number of failures before a CEO succeed. He added that entrepreneurs understood two basic concepts: (1) Problems represent opportunities (2) High rate of failure is part of the learning experience and process. Unrelenting drive or obsession is the single most critical of an entrepreneur’s character.

The skill sets needed to be a successful entrepreneur are (1) Idea Creation (2) Business Skills and (3) Experiential or Emotion Skills. Ideas are everywhere: there is a problem, or a way to do something better, faster, or cheaper.  To develop your business skills, you can self learned, and acquired through building a team, or from undergraduate/graduate degree in Business.

Then, Professor Krauss taught the audiences how to raise money for their business. There are five main sources: (1) F&F: Friends and Family, (2) Angels, (3) Venture Capital, (4) Banks, and (5) Self-Funded. He explained the different between these sources, their advantages and disadvantages. 

Professor Krauss concluded the seminar by saying that Entrepreneurship is a state of mind that says, “I will make something happen.” Do it and make it happens, and do not just think about it.

The mission of IEEE Boston GOLD is to develop programs and foster relationships, to provide tangible value to members, to promote the GOLD program to students, and to recruit, develop, and nurture volunteers. Anyone interested in finding more information about IEEE Boston GOLD or this event, please visit http://www.ieee.org/go/bostongold or contact Boston GOLD Chair May Wan at maychee@ieee.org.