26A

There have been numerous occasions during the semester when I have experienced failure. My largest of the bunch was over the past few weeks. At the beginning of May I took part in the startup weekend, an event where you network with strangers, form a team and spend a few dats creating the idea, excecution and pitch for a startup business. My team formed over that time, won, recieved prizes, business mentors, and a real shot at making this business idea successful and we blew it. Over the course of the past months our team has met regularly, failed to create a cohesive plan, lacked the skills to develop the idea further, and ultimately handed over all of our invested money, ideas and intellectual property to the one group member who is actually passionate about the idea.

I learn a lot from this experience. I learnt that people, not the idea, not the resources, are the most important factor playing in the success of a business. I also learnt that communication between those people is the one thing that can cause longevity.

Failure is definitely the best teacher. I think that trying something and failing is an even more enriching experience than success and really shapes people. I'm a pretty deep thinker so I think that, although feelings like embarassment and regret are felt initially, I truly attempt to put into context the real implications of my actions and build my character off of those things that I learn. I feel like in a business context, I'm definitely more prone to take risks after this class. Risk is less scary when you have context and that is what this course provided.