Jerry
New Contributor
A little about me. I'm in my mid 20s but got a break with my first job due to some connections. I also interned with a huge company in high school doing some really cool stuff. For my first (and last now that I think about it) job I worked in a corporate environment for over 8 years while trying to figure out what I wanted to do. When I started I was pretty much a gopher running paperwork around and making coffee at a small company. By the time I resigned, I'd worked my way up to office manager, the company had been acquired by a huge corporation and I was reporting directly to a senior VP of the company/president of two subsidiaries (while making more than my friends who already had a degree). My replacement had an MBA, which was also awesome for my ego. It was a small office so I got a variety of experience including accounting, human resources, bids/contracts, etc. almost everything that came through the office crossed my desk at some point, first all the simple stuff and then higher level as I moved up, SOX compliance sort of stuff and that level. I was taking a college class here and there along the way and eventually I realized all the college majors I was considering were only a step to someday starting a business in that field so I figured, screw it, I'll just major in that. I figured if all I wanted to do was work for myself then employ-ability was overrated.
I've also got some cool personal experiences as well. I've traveled to 25 countries on 5 continents (the other 2 are on my list), been skydiving, bungee jumping, other cool shit I can't think of at the moment… Currently I'm working on 3 projects, 2 are with partners and 1 is a solo effort. All are low cost so I'm/we're just bootstrapping them and they are all still in their infancy (not here to sell and not here to pitch). They all have some potential but I'm really doing them more for the learning experience. I've got a friend who thinks I'm crazy cause he has "seen good companies fail" but I figure if I fail and loose a couple of grand, the learning experience will be worth it. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if one of them paid off enough to covered my investments with some spending money left over to play with... If it doesn't kill me I'll pick up the pieces and start again and I'm betting someday I hit one out of the park. I'm also writing a book. I don't think that will make me much money but it is one of the few things left on my original "bucket list" and a trip to antartica doesn't fit the money/time budget at the moment.
I'm also a senior at the University of Oklahoma and an officer in the entrepreneurship club (possibly more on that later after I hear back from an admin). Doing some big things there, on the waiting list to hear Warren Buffett speak, might be getting a congresswoman who is running for governor to come talk about how she plans to help start-ups, etc. (I hope that doesn't count as political, not intending to start a discussion on politics) and we have done some cool stuff in the past. It is really such a young program that the students can contribute to it and it is developing around us. Case studies instead of dull textbooks, a department head and professors who are excited about making something where nothing existed before and are always e-mailing out information they ran across in a trade journal and willing to responding to input. Some of us are kicking around the idea of starting a (really tiny, hundreds not millions) VC fund locally just to get the experience, maybe some social entrepreneurship. All of the ideas and passion floating around are really exciting. I'm not the only one in the program already working on getting a venture up and running; I know one guy who already has a successful business paying his tuition.
Jerry
I've also got some cool personal experiences as well. I've traveled to 25 countries on 5 continents (the other 2 are on my list), been skydiving, bungee jumping, other cool shit I can't think of at the moment… Currently I'm working on 3 projects, 2 are with partners and 1 is a solo effort. All are low cost so I'm/we're just bootstrapping them and they are all still in their infancy (not here to sell and not here to pitch). They all have some potential but I'm really doing them more for the learning experience. I've got a friend who thinks I'm crazy cause he has "seen good companies fail" but I figure if I fail and loose a couple of grand, the learning experience will be worth it. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if one of them paid off enough to covered my investments with some spending money left over to play with... If it doesn't kill me I'll pick up the pieces and start again and I'm betting someday I hit one out of the park. I'm also writing a book. I don't think that will make me much money but it is one of the few things left on my original "bucket list" and a trip to antartica doesn't fit the money/time budget at the moment.
I'm also a senior at the University of Oklahoma and an officer in the entrepreneurship club (possibly more on that later after I hear back from an admin). Doing some big things there, on the waiting list to hear Warren Buffett speak, might be getting a congresswoman who is running for governor to come talk about how she plans to help start-ups, etc. (I hope that doesn't count as political, not intending to start a discussion on politics) and we have done some cool stuff in the past. It is really such a young program that the students can contribute to it and it is developing around us. Case studies instead of dull textbooks, a department head and professors who are excited about making something where nothing existed before and are always e-mailing out information they ran across in a trade journal and willing to responding to input. Some of us are kicking around the idea of starting a (really tiny, hundreds not millions) VC fund locally just to get the experience, maybe some social entrepreneurship. All of the ideas and passion floating around are really exciting. I'm not the only one in the program already working on getting a venture up and running; I know one guy who already has a successful business paying his tuition.
Jerry
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