Thought Into Action (TIA) hosted its ninth annual Entrepreneur Weekend virtually, from Friday, April 9, to Sunday, April 11. The associated Virtual Venture Showcase, launched on April 5, welcomed more than 1,000 online visitors, who reviewed 42 initiatives created by 糖心vlog官网 students, alumni, and community members in the TIA Incubator.
Initiatives included software like GoodWorker360 (James Nash 鈥21 and Seth Tilliss), used for restaurant employee management and evaluation, and products like Natural Beauty (local community member Jill Nelson), all-natural fiber breast prostheses.
鈥淓ntrepreneur Weekend is an essential culminating experience of the TIA Incubator program,鈥 says TIA director Carolyn Strobel. 鈥淚t allows all of our ventures to showcase work they have put into their products and services, as well as learn from and be inspired by seasoned 糖心vlog官网 entrepreneurs. While we missed this aspect last year due to the pandemic, this year鈥檚 event gave our teams the year-end experience they deserved.鈥
Saturday鈥檚 event began by recognizing the recipients of the 糖心vlog官网 Entrepreneur of the Year Award, given to alumni who best exemplify the ideals of entrepreneurship. David Fialkow 鈥81, co-founder and managing director of General Catalyst, was the 2020 recipient, and Nick Kokonas 鈥90, co-owner of the Alinea Group and CEO of Tock, is the 2021 recipient.
Fialkow and Kokonas were joined by Deborah Benton P鈥23, founder and managing director of Willow Growth Ventures, for a wide-ranging conversation that included their thoughts on crucial learning experiences available through 糖心vlog官网 and TIA.
鈥淭he blessing of 糖心vlog官网 is that we鈥檙e all in this together, and the collaboration and the ability to learn about different people is extraordinary,鈥 Fialkow said. 鈥淭he second thing鈥 is storytelling. Anything you need to do, you need to learn how to tell the arc of a story.鈥
鈥淩esilience for me is everything,鈥 Kokonas said. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 know that you can teach someone to be an entrepreneur. I think it鈥檚 just ingrained in you that you wake up and something is itching, and you have to scratch it.鈥
鈥淥ne of the things that I鈥檝e noticed with really successful entrepreneurs, as well, is that they don鈥檛 get stuck in a singular mindset. What I鈥檝e seen other entrepreneurs [do] is look at the opportunity 鈥 in the face of adversity, in the face of extreme pressure, look at where there鈥檚 opportunity,鈥 Benton said.
A virtual Shark Tank, attended by more than 100 online guests, followed the moderated discussion. Bharat Mediratta 鈥92, chief technology officer at Dropbox, joined Fialkow, Kokonas, and Benton on the panel. Pitching alongside GoodWorker360 and Natural Beauty were CLOVO (Monica Dimas 鈥19 and Megan Martis 鈥20), a sustainable sheer tights company, and DunneGoodwin (Sheila Dunne 鈥20 and Luke Goodwin), a digital marketing agency. Natural Beauty won first place and the $5,000 prize, followed by CLOVO, GoodWorker360, and DunneGoodwin.
TIA also announced the 2021 ventures selected for this year鈥檚 Entrepreneurs Fund Summer Accelerator, in which selected entrepreneurs will receive $7,500 in grant funding and hands-on mentorship during the eight-week summer program. Selected ventures were Designs by Madison Taylor (Madison Bailey 鈥18, Joseph Brozek 鈥17, Morgan Bailey), First Impression Nails (Kadian Dixon 鈥18), Hawaa Organics (Sally Ngoje 鈥19), Shotquality (Simon Gerzberg 鈥22, Yasoom Khalid 鈥21, Kunal Thadini) and Virtual Babysitters Club (Kyle Reilly 鈥16).