Today we had the opportunity to ask questions and learn more about media entrepreneur, Josh Hoffman. Josh was very engaging and I appreciate the time he took to speak to us students especially considering he is currently working in Tel Aviv Area, Israel which set his time to 2 a.m. in the morning.

Josh spoke about his venture to becoming the Head of Marketing and Operations at BlockGroup. He is also the founder of Epic Freelancing where freelancers can seek his help on achieving financial success, creative free and lifestyle design. He told us that one of the most important qualities an entrepreneur can have is time management. This stuck with me because I sometimes struggle with managing my time correctly. I keep myself very busy and often find myself working harder instead of smarter.

My question I asked Josh was what other trait or skill would he say is important when starting of a venture as an entrepreneur. He responded with saying that a key quality to have is confidence. He then elaborated that confidence is not to be confused with cockiness. It is important to put yourself out to the world of entrepreneurship confidently, but not to act like you have everything figured out. Learning is a part of the process and as long as you are passionate you can succeed.

Another point he touched upon that stood out to me was the idea that our attention is fragmented. He used the term “attention economy” and explained that as an entrepreneur you have to sometimes forget about people’s money and pay attention to the client.

For this blog post, I will be discussing my experience speaking and meeting with inewsource CEO and Founder, Lorie Hearn. Instead of giving away all the information that will be talked about in my paper about Lorie, I will go into the experience itself.

Meeting with Lorie Hearn gave me a whole new perspective on what it entails to build a company from the ground up. Lucky enough, our class has the opportunity to meet with her and ask her questions on Monday, March 25th. I believe everyone should have the chance to meet Lorie Hearn. She is one of the most inspiring women I have met. One thing I would like to point out before diving into my experience with Lorie is the fact that she is the first woman entrepreneur the class has the opportunity to meet and she is an amazing example of what it means to be a strong female CEO. 

Inewsource is located inside the KPBS building on the San Diego State University campus. The inside is very modern and exciting as a student seeking to be a part of that world. Inewsource has a section in the main newsroom and their own conference room. Lorie’s team consist of ten people varying from managers, editors, and reporters.

After our interview, Lorie gave me a tour of the entire KBPS building. I had the chance to see the radio rooms, the editing rooms, filming rooms, sound board rooms, TV editing rooms, and the major filming warehouse for various events. By far, seeing where KPBS films their nighttime special with the real deal cameras and set up was a highlight of this tour. For me, that was showing what I can work towards in the future.

You can tell by the way Lorie explains things and shows the space she works in that she is passionate about what she is doing. I think that this passion is the reason for her success. She mentioned in our chat that she never once thought about giving up. Even when inewsource was close to broke, she never considered pulling out or dropping off as an option.

All in all, we need more people like Lorie Hearn in the world.

 

Attending the Hackathon as San Diego State University was a very interesting and inspiring experience. The session I attended was on the first day and the first hours of the Hackathon. I got the chance to experience a lot of amazing guest speakers that had started their own businesses. All of the guest speakers were insightful and informational and having the guest speakers speak first gave a source of inspiration for the teams before they created their ideas.

My time at the Hackathon was spent listening to guest speakers, watching the groups form, listening to groups give their initial ideas, and speaking to groups about their challenges. Throughout this process, there were various entrepreneurial concepts and techniques used. One of the techniques that stood out to me overlapped with the chapter ‘Team’ in the Creative Confidence book. This chapter discusses creatively confident groups and specifically, a concept called karaoke confidence which deals with the openness and ways to engage a healthy flow of ideas in the workspace. At the hackathon, groups were formed by who was interested in a common ground. Groups were allowed to switch around from original groups to groups that interested the hackathon attendees. This created a rather hectic but open way for people to connect on ideas that inspired them. One of the ideas in karaoke confidence is building on the energy of others which I saw in the way groups teamed up.   

As previously mentioned, hackathon groups formed their ideas based on what they were interested in. The theme of this year’s hackathon was surrounded around sustainability so a lot of groups had interesting ideas. I spoke to a group of high school students attending the hackathon and their idea was to take the plastic-like beads in hand soup and incorporate coffee extract beads. The coffee extract is great for the skin and is also biodegradable, making it sustainable and helpful. Some challenges group faced immediately was creating full dynamic ideas. Groups had a lot of ideas and concepts but creating a refined idea was deemed difficult from my observations. I noticed that after groups heard some more guest speakers after lunch their ideas became more defined.

Some takeaways I took from this event was the idea that there are so many other moving parts about starting a business than the business model canvas. For example, in my opinion, the most engaging guest speaker was the woman from Soul Much. Soul Much is a brand that creates nutritious cookies from food waste creating a voice that is sustainable and geared toward not wasting food. Not only is this company extremely clever but the way the speaker delivered Soul Much starting out with a story and engaging me and making me feel involved in the brand was extremely clever. I heard a lot of guest speakers but because of the delivery of Soul Much that is the one I remember the most. I also learned that being cohesive in a group is crucial to creating the idea. I heard some groups throwing out many ideas which is an important task, as we have learned in class, but respecting the ideas of others is important to the relationship of the group.  

From the hours I observed this type of event is important to entrepreneurship by putting yourself in the setting of starting from the bottom and working up. Having the chance to start from scratch and have entrepreneurs assist you in that is something that will help students in the future. I really enjoyed the time I got to observe students in groups and I am inspired by their willingness to learn, give up their time, and dynamic ideas.

Picture 1: Soul Much guest speaker

Picture 2: Groups forming

Picture 3: Groups defining their ideas

On Monday, February 25, our class had the pleasure to pick the brain of David Brickley, CEO of STN Digital and fellow SDSU Alumni. Brickley started his career as a small business and eventually built his empire to over $3 million revenue this past year. Having a person so successful take time out of their day to speak to young students was a very inspiring experience.

I learned from him that what you want is not going to come to you by luck. You have to reach out and do the work yourself to get to where you want to be. I have recently felt like I am stuck in a spot in my career. I am a college ambassador for the movie production company Lionsgate for Allied Global Marketing. I have been working for Allied for over 2 years and have learned so many skills that I will carry with me throughout my professional life. Despite the opportunities Allied has brought me, I still do not feel like I’m where I want to be in my career. Being a second semester junior my future professional life is only just beginning but I think about it often. Since meeting and talking with Brickley I have been inspired to apply to internships for the summer at places I was too afraid to apply before. I got the inspiration and confidence from our call with Brickley and took the next step forward with my career. I also took his advice and emailed various companies hiring managers introducing myself and requesting time to learn from them. I have already gotten a response and this person has helped me immensely. I am looking forward to learning from our next guest speaker this upcoming Monday.

Diving deeper into the world of entrepreneurship in media has made me feel motivated and inspired. Discussing the readings of the Creative Confidence textbook has informed me about the many moving parts it takes to be successful in one’s business. A standout element to me is the idea that who you surround yourself with can make or break your business. It is not just about the main entrepreneur in the project; it is about everyone involved and the skills and thoughts they bring to the table. It is crucial to have trial and error and flow of brainstorming among a team to reach a goal.

Another element that stood out to me is the idea that success is measured by how many times you’ve failed. I always had the mindset of went you get bucked off get back on the horse and try again but looking at it from the standpoint of the number of times you do fall is how far you will reach success is reassuring. In this world of media, it is more likely to be told no a million times until someone says yes. The ability to handle the no’s and take it with stride determines the future success of an individual.

Welcome Professor SchmitzWeiss,

I am pleased to begin this journey into the world of Media Entrepreneurship. Since I was in middle school I knew I wanted to have a career in media and specifically in journalism. I am looking forward to learning more about what it means to be an entrepreneur.

Along with my interest in media and journalism, I am also interested in entering the field of entertainment. I believe this class will leave me with the necessary skills I can take into the future of the career I am hoping for. I currently work for Allied Global Marketing as an ambassador for Lionsgate. I promote movies that come out under Lionsgate that have a target audience of college kids. This industry has been an amazing starting point for my career and using this class and my skills from my job I feel like I will be prepared for the future.

 

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton