Final Reflection:
Capstone and Conclusions

“How can such activities relate to the class?” you may ask. But they all did come back to the core idea behind this class: to be a great entrepreneur requires more than a big idea. In class, we discussed five different heuristics in building a successful business: demonstrating problems or needs, significant demand, cost-effective access to demand, the "Why Now," and whom this innovation will impact. Each heuristic requires thorough research, analysis, trial and error, and learning—a way of thinking that combats a traditional image of innovation and entrepreneurship about a single person coming up with a brilliant idea out of nowhere and out of luck.  

  

Beyond these heuristics, I discovered perhaps the most critical centerpiece of creating successful innovation and entrepreneurship. It’s all about the people. People who work in entrepreneurial endeavors must be diverse and accepting towards healthy conflict points. The innovative product needs to change the behavior of the people, persuading them of how it is solving their problems, which is an incredibly challenging thing to do (perhaps the most difficult thing to do in creating a business).  

  

A significant moment that I realized this importance was during a series of group questioning assignments. Throughout three weeks as a designated group, a few classmates and I had to ask 10 questions every day to develop an entrepreneurial mindset. The questions should refer to three types of questions: “Why does this exist,” “How does this make money,” and “Why did I start using this thing.” For the second week, we were tasked to motivate the other class group to fulfill this daily exercise.   

  

At the beginning of this assignment, it was hard for me to remember and feel motivated to do this assignment. Although I didn't doubt the helpful effects of the first activity, I just couldn't find the mental capacity amidst a busy week. What really helped me were two things: getting to know my groupmates and designing a series of fun/creative activities with my groupmates within the second phase of the activity. First, talking, having fun, and building communicative and supportive relationships with my groupmates helped me feel motivated. I didn't want to drag down my teammates by not completing my responsibilities. This initial interaction set us up for innovative and collaborative approaches to motivating the other group successfully. We decided to do daily inspirational quotes with relevant questions to help the other group come up with more questions. We did a scoreboard every day to show who created the most number of questions. We liked and interacted with each block of questions people created to make sure they felt like they were heard and to encourage them to come up with more questions. In this process, my groupmates and I also felt motivated to come up with our own share of questions every day.  

  

This experience reflected several key lessons. First, changing someone’s behavior is difficult. Second, authentic interactions with people are important to building my internal motivation to change my behavior. Lastly, collaboration leads to innovative and effective ideas.  

  

Including the capstone, the innovation and entrepreneurship (I&E) program always provided me with some moments of fresh air in a research-focused, prestigious, academic institution. But beyond that “newness,” the program most definitely provided opportunities to make connections, apply my learnings, and create ideas and thoughts that I am passionate about.  

  

Namely, I&E was critical for me to position and brand myself in the field of international development: innovation for inclusion and sustainability. Everything has an “impact,” good or bad. But to have a positive social impact, innovation needs to be flexible, centering on inclusion and sustainability of the original socially oriented goal. It needs to be rooted in local customers (i.e. bottom-up, locally-led approach). This is the belief that I have formed through a combination of my I&E programs and other academic and professional endeavors.  

  

Although my time at Duke was short to pursue this belief, and this passion, I hope to center my journey beyond Duke around it. I look forward to seeking and supporting locally led, innovative solutions to achieve inclusive and sustainable development. I hope to empower these local innovators and entrepreneurs.