Entrepreneurship

I found a problem that I think helps no one last year teaching entrepreneurship at NYU, also as a mentor. Nearly all the students I worked with were born outside the U.S. They picked my course, "Entrepreneurial Marketing and Sales" or picked me as a mentor largely because they liked entrepreneurship. Many wanted to become entrepreneurs. As much as they wanted to start businesses, many of our conversations had this phrase in them: ... but I have to get a job with a big company to sponsor my visa. Non-citizens who wanted to start companies either had to leave the country to start one or work at a big company to stay. Following on the success of the Women in Entrepreneurship panel I helped organize…

People often ask if graduate school was worth it. I've made it work for me. As someone who left his field of graduate study, I wrote the following on graduate school to someone asking if it will suck out your life power, you'll have no social life, no free time, low pay, a lot of stress etc. I got a PhD in physics at Columbia in 2000. I helped build an X-ray observational satellite (XMM-Newton). I left the field to start a company and I don't know anyone who enjoys life more than I do. People often ask if I use my physics education now. I don't solve hard problems, but having written and defended a thesis, I constantly use my ability to solve hard…

The other day I was invited to speak to a couple groups of high school students in a summer program at Columbia on entrepreneurship and leadership. The students inspired me then for the questions they asked. Their teacher asked them to comment on my talk after I left, which he sent to me, and their comments inspired me again. Many of the comments are insightful beyond what I would have expected from high school students. I find that inspiring because when others show me I can expect more from them, I can expect more from myself. I asked if I could share them here and he encouraged me to. In bold is the question the teacher asked. Everything after is from the students. Question: We…

One of my students jumped for joy last semester. She got a job offer during class---specifically, during a field trip. I consider the exercise an example of great teaching. Context I couldn't make the last class of the semester and wanted to make it up. An email from NYU inspired me. It was about a series of job fairs including one for start-ups. I had already planned a session on applying the course's skills to contexts other than basic marketing and sales---for example, to treat raising capital as marketing and selling shares in a company, to treat hiring as marketing and selling your company to potential hires, to treat making proposals as marketing and selling ideas to your boss. My idea My idea was to…

NYU-Poly collects student evaluations of courses and Professors. One of my students liked the class so much she sent me her evaluation to post independently and publicly. I feel honored and flattered. Professor Spodek's dynamic personality captured my attention from the start of  the first class in January 2014. I have an entrepreneurial mind and I still remember lessons from the first day applying, making me a better business thinker already. The course was Entrepreneurial Marketing and Sales, which he covered. It went above and beyond my expectations in refining my Marketing skills. We started by identifying unmet needs, coming up with solutions, and taking it to the next level in talking to people and developing the ideas. Through simple steps, I developed the idea…