As it turns out, building a startup business from the ground up is actually very simple.

Step 1: build the entire startup.
Step 2: make money.

That’s all there is to it. You only need intense dedication, creativity, vision, motivation, discipline, tenacity, failure, and many more words that summarize similar things.

Over the course of this semester, our media entrepreneurship and innovation class has actually taught me a significant volume of knowledge that I don’t believe I would have gained elsewhere or in such a short period of time. We covered large portions of the innovation and entrepreneurship process, focusing largely on the media market.

First of all, I think entrepreneurship is genuinely inspiring. Many of the people who I look up to are ones who’ve started and built their own companies of varying sizes and categories. While at first it seems simple – customers pay for a good or service – the reality is that the factors that need to be in place for everything to work smoothly add significant complication. Because of this, I think there’s a certain degree of idolization we have for people that build their own businesses. Beyond the standard title of “success” there’s an appeal of the self-reliance and robust lifestyles associated with the job.

With all that being said, I don’t think that at this stage of my life I’d want to start a business of my own. Part of that is because I don’t have a burning idea that I want to bring to fruition. But also part of that is because I don’t feel like this stage of life can support building a startup with school loans to pay off. We’ll just have to let time pass while keeping a keen eye out for opportunities, but for now I’m pretty excited about my post-college career.

Working on a startup team, however, could be far more realistic. Many factors would have to fall into place for me to take an opportunity like that, but I feel this class has actually prepared me to better recognize a good business plan from an employee standpoint. I could certainly see this happening, and is part of what this class has taught us – the mindset to bring innovation to whatever employment situation we find ourselves in.

Being able to innovate in whatever job we find ourselves is what will both improve our standing in the workplace and the development of the company. Further, this approach to improving whatever we do is beneficial to all aspects of life. Whether we suddenly discover a new way to organize the kitchen for better productivity or we develop a new strategy at work, the point is that the concepts learned in this class don’t limit themselves to homework of campus media innovation.

While we did talk about business pitches and other, more specialized goals, the overall thought processes we discussed in class can benefit anyone.