I haven’t thought about starting my own business before seriously, although when I think of a good invention I always joke about it and how I could start one or go on Dragons Den.
I have been told many times before and by many different lecturers that I will one day require business skills even if I don’t realise this now. They explained that it would probably be in the form of writing grants for research projects or grants for the funding of other random reasons that my employeers may need and ask me to do. Many of my lecturers have mentioned during lessons that they are busy writing grants so I can see that it is true, that if I wish to continue into the field of research zoology, then I will probably need to have a better knowledge of business.
Because of this, I was quite looking forward to the task.
The things of most use I learnt from this task were:
- How hard it is to strike up an initial business (whether new or pre exisiting) and having a good enough plan to get it up and going and actually feasible
- How hard it actually would be to think of something original so you can fill a unique niche
- How your idea for a business or product can actually be quite unpractical and ‘weak’ even though you think it sounds amazing at the beginning
- How you need to constantly have back up plans and other options for every idea you have at evey stage of the planning
- and lastly, how thoroughly you need to plan every stage in detail and keep track of figures because ultimatly its all about the money and you need to be thinking of this even before you begin planning
I found the task very informative but starting my business is still something I am not planning in the future and most likely will not.
Allthough I am glad I had chance to participate in this task, I would have liked 2 workshops. In addition to this one, I would have liked to have been given a typicall senario of a scientist asked to apply for research funding and how to go about this. This is because for me personally, I wish to go into research and so if I am ever going to need to have any involvement with anything money-related in my career than it will most likely be because I have to write a funding grant.
Maybe this is something you are taught in more detail if you do a higher degree such as an MSc? But that is what I also would have liked.
bsu0af 
It’s nice to see the things you learnt from the Dragon’s Den. I agree with you about the second session. Given the amount of times they’ve said we will have to use business plans in any line of work, it would be nice to be given some of these kinds of tasks. The Dragon’s Den was still all about setting up/developing a business. I guess we might have to do this as part of a company in future, but what other things might be involved? It would also have been helpful to be given more instruction on each section, don’t you think? We made up pretty much all our finance figures, but it might have been helpful to be told better ways to come up with projected profits, income, outgoings and other relevant financial calculations.
Also maybe a bit more instruction on the kinds of rules and regulations we might come across whilst applying for funding, or setting up environmental businesses. Things like public liability insurance, tax and health and safety standards were only briefly mentioned in the session, but it would be good to know more about these things.
Well done for stating how you think the session could have been improved, I’ve barely seen this on other blogs.
I agree, the task was very large in that sense. I did learn a lot of things I didn’t previously know and found it useful but the finer details were vague and especially when it came to finance. I know its probably meant to be more of an introduction just to get you thinking and familiar but I would have preferred to have focused on writing a grant, maybe spread over 2 workshops so I could really learn it in more depth. I think the Dragons Den does have a place in this module and there will be some who’d like to start a business, but for me, grant writing would be preferred.