The Vol Court Series wraps up with a great session led by John Jansheski who is the founder of DenTek, a company in Maryville, TN, that provides products for Oral Health Care.  John was employee number one and has grown the company to now where they have over 200 employees.

There were no PowerPoints; just life lessons from a man who had to figure it all out along the way.  The cool thing is that John touches on every other topic in the Vol Court Series and it all comes together in a real life case history.  Here are some of the topics John touched on as well as some great quotes:

• John shares the life changing event that perhaps was the birth of his entrepreneurial journey.
• He always had money because he started working at an early stage in life.
• He talks about how he got started with what led to founding DenTek.
• Ability: "Passion is the great equalizer."
• Personal Responsibility: "Most people don't own where they are in life."
• "We are all billionaire candidates."
• I have a very expensive education through many failures in business."
• "Business is mitigated chaos."
• John shares his views on equity capital as he bootstrapped his company
• Exiting: "I exited myself out of the president's seat."
• Company Culture
• Transitions to systems management
• Intellectual Property
• "Entrepreneurs would rather die than lose."

Enjoy the final installment of Vol Court:

Vol Court Session 8 - Vol Court Wrap Up with John Jansheski from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

 

 

In Session 7 - we move into the often obscure realm of Entrepreneurial Finance with a presentation by Chris Miller of Meritus Ventures.  Chris is an analyst with the venture fund and his job entails doing a lot of the ground work to evaluate deals and perform the due diligence required of any investment deal.  He has a unique perspective in that he knows, at a basic level, what will get the attention of the fund partners; what works and what does not.  When a partner sees a potential deal, Chris does the evaluation and provides the information used in the decision to fund an opportunity or not.  Finance is never an easy topic.  Chris provides a couple models that simplify the complexity so that the lay person (early entrepreneur) can begin to get their head around these concepts.

The presentation is laid out in three main topics:

• What is an entrepreneur?
• Why should I care about Finance?
• What should I know to be successful?

The presentation closes with a case study of two hypothetical entrepreneurs who choose different strategies to fund the growth of their companies.

There are some quotable moments as well:

Chris drew some similarities among the over 400 potential deals in their system.  He said in most of these deals, there's almost always a $2 Billion market, almost always no competition,  and most companies project a $200 million revenue in four years; leading to the amusing quote: "I'm not delusional, I'm an entrepreneur."

Another point made clear is that while banks require a rate of return in the range of 6.9%, VC's expect a huge 38% which is a reflection of the risk involved.

Here's the video:

Vol Court Session 7 - Finance as a Strategic Activity from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

 

 

In Session 6, we have Dan Ryan from The Human Capital Group.  Dan is presenting an often overlooked discipline in the creation of a startup company or any other endeavor.  Some of Dan's relevant quotes are:

"Networking is 24x7x365."

"Your best job may be the one you create and not the one for which you apply online."

"Who you know is often more important than what you know."

Dan touches on the importance of using social networking platforms today in addition to several traditional networking strategies.  Here is the general outline of the talk:

• Why is Networking Important?
• Reasons to Network
• Who should you network with?
• Networking Circles
• Networking Basics
  • "Never Eat Alone" by Keith Ferrazzi
  • Ask for Help
  • Ping constantly

Vol Court Session 6 - Networking Essentials from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

 

Session 5 of Vol Court brings to us Mr. John Morris of The Center for Entrepreneurial Growth.  The overall topic is Staffing the Startup and John borrows a theme from the landmark book, "Good To Great" by Jim Collins.  The main message is to focus on the roles necessary to create a successful venture rather than the individuals you may know.  Here's the outline for the talk:

• Why are YOU great?
• The Bus
• Getting the right people on the bus
• Where to go
• Who's driving the bus?

Here is Session 5:

Speaker Session 5 from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

 

In Session 4 of Vol Court, Lynn Youngs presents the best 1 - hour business plan course we've seen.  Here's the outline:

• What is the Business Plan?
• Why write a Business Plan?
• Challenges to the planning process
• Influences on the plan
• Form vs. content
• Investor turn-ons and turn-offs

Enjoy Session 4:

Vol Court Session 4 - What's Your Game Plan? from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

Vol Court continues in Session 4 with Lynn Youngs presenting "What's Your Game Plan" with an overview of creating a compelling business plan.

In Session 3 of Vol Court, the topic of the evening was Customer Value.  Shawn Carson led the discussion opening up with an example of how and how not to interview customers, learning from their experience to understand their "customer pain".

Key Points:

• Customer Value is the foundation of the company - Understanding what customers need and are willing to pay for is detrimental to a startup company.
• Customer Pain - defined as "A problem, need, or desire strong enough to motivate a change in behavior." The reason the word pain is used is because it highlights the customer's willingness to part with their money in order to enjoy the benefits of the product.
• Customer Value Hierarchy - A framework that traces product features to the benefits they deliver and then to the values that convince the customer to buy.  Buying decisions are EMOTIONAL!
• Value Proposition - They way you communicate the value customers derive when they experience your product.

Plus, there were free tee shirts involved.  Here's the video:

 

Vol COurt Sesson 3 - Customer Value from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

In Session 3, Shawn Carson discusses the concept of Customer Value and its impact on the business strategic planning process.

In Session 2, Mike Carroll of MK Technologies shares his experience with starting over 14 companies: what worked and what didn't.

Key Points:

• We are all already in business.  We bring in money, pay out money and we all have our Uncle as a partner
• Put yourself in a position to be around people who have great ideas
• Product ideas take time to develop.  Store good ideas away.
• Products that increase safety are worth considering.
• Most products are priced too low.
• Product developments ALWAYS cost much more and take more time than you think.
• Most products don't have time and cost factored into the price.

 

Vol Court Session 2 from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.

 

 

The University of Tennessee Reseach Foundation, in partnership with the College of Business Administration’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CEI), the Center for Entrepreneurial Growth (CEG) and OutOfTheGarage.com.  It is a series of nine seminars open to students and faculty at the University of Tennessee who are interested in start their own business.  All the presentations are captured in video and presented here.

The first session of the series is "Going Pro".  We have two entrepreneurs, Chuck Witkowski, CEO of Protein Discovery, and and Andrew Dougherty, CEO of Medinteract both sharing their experiences to date... a few war stories, things they would do differently and generally how great is is to work building your own dream company. 

Enjoy Session #1 of Vol Court!

Vol Court Session 1 from Shawn Carson on Vimeo.