camp diary

TUESDAY 26.4.

On tuesday morning we learned about nature and identification of opportunities and managerial aspects of entrepreneurship. On afternoon sessions we learned about Contextual dynamics and search for entrepreneurial opportunities.

What I learned of this day, was that the subjects were familiar from earlier studies, but the atmosphere was much more motivating. Reasons for this were existence of experienced MBA students who were discussing about subjects and another one was that our professor Lambert had interresting way to teach. Third reason was that the classroom was built as a triangle, that allowed everyone to look other people’s eyes, and not backs.

WEDNESDAY 27.4.

On Wednesday we had lessons about business models. I realised the importance of business models, and that companies need to change it when going abroad. Good example is Wal-mart which is biggest hypermarket chain in US, but till now it has failed in Europe. Company’s need to think locally!

Wednesday afternoon we had a professor from Cambridge, Charles Hampden-Turner. He taught about paradox and dilemma. What left in my mind, was that every succesful team has to have different members – team doesn’t work if there’s only leaders or only thinkers. What impressed me, was Charles’s story of good leader. He told an example about japanese man, who wanted something and he worked for it every day and didn’t loose his will even there came many missfortunes. When the man succeeded finally to do what he wanted, he saw it and was killed right after that. The lesson was that good leader never looses hope and faith and humbleness.

THURSDAY 28.4.

Thurday morning we had also Charles Hampden-Turner who gave us three real life succes stories: Richard Branson(British), Anita Roddick (Italian immigrant) and Gordon Edge (Cambridge).

Branson, funder of Virgin is person, who has understood the importance of people.

“Employees come first, customers come second, owners come last, not in importance but in TIME”

Thursday afternoon we had another guest lecturer, Michael Rogosin. He mentioned key trends on innovations, which are:

- mass customization

- mass collaboration

- co-creation – prosumers

- open innovation

- permission marketing

- focus on new business models

- customer experience

FRIDAY 29.4.

On Friday morning we had Charles Lumbers who spoke about implementation dynamics and on afternoon we spoke about patents, trademarks and ipr. We had Rick De Zeeuw and Nadège Lumbers (Charles’ daughter). I found the lesson very interresting and all the hings were new for me.

SATURDAY 30.4.

Saturday was a huge day for us because we had an opportunity to present our business ideas for 3 business angels, who came to EDHEC only for us. I haven’t ever been as nervous, but it went quit well, and I’m glad I had such a great opportunity to improve presenting and investor pitching.

DAY 1 (26.04), START

Today we had our first session at EDHEC Business School. The reception was very kind, ‎and our professor Charles Lumbers seemed like a real professional and I was ‎immediately convinced that we were in good hands.‎

On the first session we went through how to create new market space, how to make a ‎good business plan and strategic pricing. I think the lesson was very inspiring and I got ‎much about it reflecting on our business plan.‎

The most useful tool presented on the lesson was the Buyer Utility Map, which clearly ‎shows on a simple map what the buyers are assuming to get from you.‎



The main idea of making successful business is to make yourself sustainable ‎competitive advantage.‎

DAY 2 (27.04), BUSINESS MODELS

Today we had the morning session with Charles Lumbers and the session was about ‎business models and how to use them effectively. A company’s business model is the ‎story of the company. It can been said that the business model is the core business ‎which you make money with.‎
Other key words of the day:‎

‎-‎ Single / multiple streams (one / many products or services you receive your ‎revenue from)‎
‎-‎ Loss leader (you attract people to your store with cheap products to get people to ‎buy your other, more expensive products)‎

In the afternoon we had a guest lecturer from University of Cambridge, Charles Hamp-‎den-Turner. The professor told us about dilemmas, paradoxes and strategy. I think the ‎strategy part of the presentation was very good, because Michael Porters theories pre-‎sented with help of examples is always interesting.‎

Ps. Growth must be financed!‎

DAY 3 (28.04), DIVERSITY & ENTREPRENEURSHIP

In the morning we had the same lecturer as yesterday, Charles H-T. He told us three ‎really interesting examples of successful entrepreneurs: Richard Branson, Anita ‎Roddick and Gordon Edge.‎

Richard Branson is the founder of Virgin Company. Richard has got incredible skills to ‎run companies successfully. Charles came up four points that account for Branson’s ‎success:‎

‎-‎ Always keep your sense of humor
‎-‎ Position yourself as an underdog
‎-‎ Success lies in the primary group “small is beautiful” as is the human FAMILY
‎-‎ Employees come first, customers come second, owners come last, not in ‎importance but in TIME.‎

In the afternoon we had another guest lecturer, Michael Rogosin who told us about dis-‎ruptive innovation. Disruptive innovation means a low-end product that is so ‎innovative that it changes the way to behave on the market. Other key words of the ‎session were: revolutionary innovation, sustaining innovation, mass customization, ‎mass collaboration, open innovation and customer experience.‎

DAY 4 (29.04), THE LAST DAY OF MY STAY, PATENTS

On the morning session Charles Lumbers did tell us about some more business models ‎and about different attributes of entrepreneurs. We went through business models ‎like: open business model (make money by collaborating with people) and free as a ‎business model (the product itself is free, but you earn money with for example ‎marketing, example Metro).‎

Main attributes for an entrepreneur:‎
‎1)‎ Be specific
‎2)‎ Keep It Simple
‎3)‎ Copy Somebody (you can copy a business model which is stated profitable)‎

In the afternoon we had some lectures about patents and trademarks, which I think ‎was really interesting, although the examples were not that suitable for Finnish ‎entrepreneurs. After the break we had a round table discussion about patents, and ‎there came up interesting questions about technical solutions and how to protect ‎them.‎

The most interesting question was about trademarks regarding to Internet pages. If a ‎company has trademark registered to its Internet page (for example ABC) but it ‎doesn’t operate or offer customer service in your country you’re free to register the ‎same trademark in your own country.‎

SUMMARY

As I think of the whole 4/5 day camp we spent in Nice, I’m very happy to tell you that ‎the camp was a real success. Personally I’ve learned a lot of theories associating with ‎entrepreneurship, but the best part of the camp was the mentoring part. It ‎encouraged a lot towards entrepreneurship and while thinking of my own business plan ‎I think this was a necessary course for me to attend. I’m very happy about I attended ‎this course and that I was so lucky to get selected to it.‎

Thank you for arranging this wonderful camp and hopefully it will be arranged in the ‎future too!‎



By Heikki Hämäläinen

A mind-opening experience in Nice...

Early wake-ups after fun night in the city center of Nice, looong lunch breaks under the Sun of Nice (by the sea!), wine moments ;-) and interesting discussions with experienced MBA students, the great knowledge and experience of lecturers - one week in Nice offered all this and a lot more! I can warmly recommend EDHEC and this camp to everyone who want to expand their backpack of great experiences! :-)

‎
INTRODUCTION

The reason of this trip was to develop our business idea and deep our entrepreneur ‎knowledge. We arrived to Nicé one day earlier because we wanted to get to know Nice ‎and Monaco. Both cities are very beautiful places. In two days we walked maybe 30 ‎kilometers but it was really nice to see beautiful beach and fancy cars in Monaco. But ‎as I said the main idea was to study and think the business idea further.‎

‎DAY ONE

I was little bit nervous on the first day because I did not have the preliminary material. First day's program included ‎pricing, how to create business plan. The fact that mister Charles Lumber lectures us was pretty much ‎already learned fact so those business terms and things just remind to my head and I ‎started to connect them to our business plan. If you really want to know the most ‎important thing in the lecture, it was CFIMITYM. Cash Flow Is More Important Thing ‎Than Your Mother. ‎

‎DAY TWO

I discovered that yesterday´s lecture was really hard because I was really tired. ‎Tuesdays evening went on doing business plan and I ‎was really tired. The second day's schedule was also busy. ‎

Afternoons lecture were really interesting. Charles Lumbers told us about business models and ‎strategy things. I learned that strategy decisions are very important because they rolls ‎the business forward and hopefully in right direction. We deal in lecture few examples ‎of strategy decisions that big companies have done. Those examples were bad and ‎good decisions. Good decisions made money to the company and bad decisions were ‎disasters. ‎

In the evening Mr Charles Hamden-Turner from University of Cambridge lectured us ‎things like what kind of human types exist and how they effects when you create a ‎business plan.

DAY THREE

Day three was guest lecturer’s day. At first Charles Hamden-Turner told us stories of ‎Anita Roddick, Richard Branson and Gordon Edge. Charles told us stories of those three ‎successful business man and women. Those examples were really interesting and they ‎inspired really to create a really good business idea which flows us to success.‎

At afternoon Mr. Michael Rogosin lectured us about innovation. I believe that the meaning of this lecture was to ‎inspirited people to entrepreneurship. ‎

‎DAY FOUR

Charles Lumbers lectured us about dialogue between theory and practice. The most ‎important thing that I learned was to get known with a leaders guide map. The map ‎shows how you have to respond to your workplace in every situation. There are 4 ‎different situations in workplace and you have to deal them all. First category is ‎simple, second complicated, third complex and fourth is chaotic. If you are a manager ‎in your team you have to know what and how you have to do to make things better. ‎

Afternoons lecture went with patents and trademarks. I don´t remember the names of ‎afternoons visitors, but Charles Lumbers daughter was the other one and the other one ‎was a layer from Netherlands. They told us about those patents and trademarks and ‎then people were able to ask questions from them.

‎SUMMARY

The trip to Nicé was successful and a experience that I won´t forget. Lectures were ‎brilliant and my inspiration raised again to new level. It was really shame that we ‎thought that in Saturday there won’t be anything necessary. That’s why we booked ‎flight to morning because it was much cheaper. I want to thank you Anna for ‎successful trip and I hope that in future there will be also successful trips to Nicé.‎

By Olli