My Farewell Address to the Next Class

         I get one opportunity to share with you what I learned from this course. I learned a lot. I have always known that passion is an important part of being an entrepreneur. I have known that failure is a temporary thing and not a permanence, even though it feels that way at times. It’s easy to say, it’s much harder to go through.
There are few things in this life that require more attention than one’s family. I beg and plead for the sakes of our communities and the generations that follow you that you find out how to balance life and work. It is true that we must absolutely have money to fulfill our lives. Money is not an evil, it is a tool that perpetuates a quality of life. Wealth itself does not make someone happy; however, lack of wealth can cause unhappiness. Even then, one can be happy without wealth as long as their basic needs are met. Take time to learn about money and why it is important for your survival. Don’t put accumulation of wealth over the importance of your family. If you were to do this, at the end of your life, you could be extremely wealthy, but have no one to share it with. At that point, what was it worth. Make a balance.
Push through the hard times. Some of the most successful people that are household names got there because they pushed through the times that were most difficult in their lives. When we are challenged with an obstacle in life, it is crucial that we don’t give up on our most important goals. We may have to change the path on which we’re travelling, but the destination should be the same-to live with God again with our families. This also means that when fears come our way, we need to face them. We must see a fear as an unattended problem. This means we have to address the fear. Determine what the outcomes would be if each of our fears took place. You’re likely to find that facing the fears that haunt you will dispel them and leave a wide open road ahead. Then, when all is going crazy about you and you have your head on straight, and you’re working like a mad man, non-stop, don’t forget to take a break. Sharpen your saw, as Stephen Covey suggests. Keep your mind sharp by taking a break from any obstacle that comes your way and you’re likely to find a solution when you least expect it.
Set guidelines for your life. You will not be the master of your life until it is over, so just keep being the best you can be. Don’t let yourself fall into traps of unethical behavior, or even the appearance of it. Your financial freedom is worth the effort, but keep your integrity, for without integrity, again, no one will be there to celebrate with you when your funds have been counted.
In the end, your wealth will not go with you after you die. It will rot or burn a hole in someone else’s pocket, so cherish the moments you have with your family…and take the class—you’ll discover what kind of entrepreneur you are or want to be!

Growth and Entrepreneurial Evolution

Being an entrepreneur is not easy. An entrepreneur does need to understand most all of his or her business, at least to the point of how they want it run. Henry Ford is accredited for saying he doesn't have to be the smartest person in the room, he just needs to be able to hire them, or similar to that.


I think Haykin did a great job in evolving with his roles and with the industry. This is definitely a lesson we can take-that keeping an eye open to the movement within the industry can cause us to float with the successors rather than sink with the failures. For instance, those who fought the electric car in the early 2000's are now playing catch up because of the likes of Tesla. Blackberry failed to see the benefit of the iPhone UI. I think the banking industry better look to cryptocurrencies as the next wave of the future blaring at us in our eyes. It will be interesting to see what leaders are able to envision the future. Adaptability is crucial as an entrepreneur.

From this lesson, I found that as we adapt to our environments, we become increasingly valuable. If we find weaknesses within our own lives that we can't overcome easily, it is important that we find partners who can complement us. This will create the most interdependence and the sum of the two halves will be greater than the whole, so to speak.

Capitalism Has Made More People Rich Than Any Other System in the History of the World

It was nice having to listen to "Entrepreneurship and Consecration" this week. There were a couple quotes I had to write down. The first was, "God gives man the challenge of raw materials, not the ease of finished things." This quote reminds me that God trusts man to be able to create and innovate. He isn't going to give us ease and lawn chairs with cold drinks in our hands. In being an entrepreneur, it is our job to find something of value in the raw materials we've been given. If we can build upon something that is already created to make it better, we've added value to the world.

The next idea that stuck was that an entrepreneur can't be a person who only does what they're told to do. We need people who can solve problems. I feel like the schooling system as it stands now is a system to teach people to follow directions and work for someone else. One of the reasons I home school my children is so I can teach them how to be problem solvers. It's a mindset that needs to be broken in our schools, in my opinion.

When, "Earth hasn’t provided the answer, perhaps we should try heaven." Relating closely with the first quote I mentioned, when man has tried as hard as they could to fix the problems that face them and still hit a wall, it's time to ask God. It seems those are the best times to receive inspiration-when we're down to our last push.

Regarding the other readings, I found the reading on micro lending to be the most interesting. I had heard of micro lending years ago. The only reason I never got involved was because I need to increase the size of my golden goose before I can pass out her eggs, so to speak. I love the idea and to hear it again in this class is not only heartwarming, but a welcome reminder of what good we can do in this world for others around the world. It is truly a great way to “teach a man to fish.”

Additional questions:

Based on what you read in the first two pages (pages 3 and 4), why are virtue and integrity so vital to an economy?

The first pages of the reading has somewhat of a pessimistic feel to it. The reasons virtue and integrity are so important is that businesses use the savings of ‘everyday people’ to invest. When the leaders of the businesses lie, cheat, or steal in the name of capitalism, or because “it wasn’t against the rules,” they are stealing from people in general and everyone else suffers. It affects society as a whole.

According to Charles Handy, what is the “real justification” for the existence of businesses?

“It is to make a profit so that the business can do something more or better” (emphasis added).