Module 1 - Assignment 3: Where do good ideas come from?

There are many myths and false beliefs that people have about entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs. One such myth is that ideas suddenly come upon a person ("an aha moment"). The fact is that good ideas take time to form. Students often struggle to think of themselves as an entrepreneur, because they do not feel they have the inspiration to come up with clever ideas, and that entrepreneurs are different, or that they cannot be an entrepreneur because they do not like risk. The fact is that everybody is born with some entrepreneurial DNA.

For example, think back in time to when you were a child. Back then you were far more able to think creatively and with great imagination. As people age, society directs them toward more specific and defined goals that squeezes the entrepreneurial mindset out of a person. Research shows that children in elementary school are far more entrepreneurial in their thinking when compared with high school students or adults. Survival is based on entrepreneurs developing solutions to problems. Everything you see, touch, and use each day was created by an entrepreneur. The question you should ask yourself, and what this course will hopefully motivate you to do, is to realize that entrepreneurship at its core is a way of thinking, a mindset that can help you in life regardless of the path you take. Entrepreneurship can be taught because we all have within us an entrepreneurial spirit to innovate and survive. Studying entrepreneurship unlocks that natural behavior that is dormant within so many of us. 

You will learn in this course that the key to being successful in life and most certainly successful as an entrepreneur is the ability to stop talking about your ideas, and start taking action on them. In this assignment, you will learn a little bit about what an entrepreneur is and where their ideas come from.

Assignment: Watch both videos below (total watch time 16:25), and then complete Part I and II of this assignment described below, after the videos.

Where do good ideas come from? (4:05)

How to Develop a Business Idea? (12:20)

Assignment task

Use this worksheet Download Use this worksheet

Part 1: Create a catalog of your means.. what you have, what you know, and who you know, and then generate a Word Cloud Links to an external site. . There is also a link to generate a word cloud in the worksheet..

Part 2: In the worksheet list at least five problems in the world or better yet in your own life that you believe need to be solved, and list your ideas for solving those problems. Do not let money, time, resources etc. constrain your creative thinking. The ideas you share do not have to be well developed or money making ideas, simply ideas for solving each problem.

When you are done with the two parts above, upload the worksheet to this canvas assignment.