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CIBC Presents Entrepreneurship 101: Shooting for gold

By Tony Redpath @ MaRS
October 20, 2008
 
CIBC Presents Entrepreneurship 101

Entrepreneur Sean O’Dea wowed a packed house at last Wednesday’s Entrepreneurship 101 lecture with a dynamic talk about his experiences with launching The Second Cup, ProShred and other new businesses.

He emphasized the importance of having a clear vision behind a new venture — something that can link employees, investors, customers in getting the big picture. The first Second Cup outlet was never intended to be the only one — the vision was always that there would be a chain of stores. The first ProShred mobile shredding truck was aways intended to simply be the first of a fleet. We Canadians are often accused of going for the bronze — Sean always was shooting for gold — and succeeded.

What do we need to do to create a culture of big visions? Do we need to create a better environment where big dreams can get financed? Do we need to mentor our entrepreneurs more to urge them forward? Or do we need to encourage our entrepreneurs to go big or go home? Your thoughts?

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  • Daniel Armstrong

    I feel the single best resource MaRS has to offer is mentoring and peer support. Big and compelling ideas get the financing they deserve. Drawing on the wealth of experience and wisdom gained by those who have “been there, done that” boosts the chances those ideas will ever be *heard* in the first place.

    We need to encourage a culture that not only believes in going big but going *long*… as in, world-changing requires players who are in it for the duration, failure is part of the process and must be engineered to be as graceful and short and as inexpensive as possible. Sean O’Dea perfectly illustrated the differences between vision vs strategy last week during his talk. Great stuff!

  • Fred Reader

    Sean O’Dea’s talk was excellent. It was great to hear his “war stories” about coffee and shredding. But the important thing I got from the talk was to focus on the vision I want for my business in the future and to make all my decisions with that vision in mind. As a consequence, I have decided to drop two of the three things I have been working on because, while the are great ideas, they really don’t support my vision.

  • http://ryanaroundtheworld.blogspot.com/ Ryan Coelho

    I think it’s largely about helping Big Dreams realize their potential reality. I feel a lot of times as we think about entrepreneurship we’re scared off by the size of the dream, rather than the possibilities the dream has to offer. nnI love how Sean talked about the importance of a clear vision. I think what I got out of it is a vision is your dream’s “reality check” … it makes you think about your dream as less of a dream and more of a reality that isn’t quite here yet!

  • http://ryanaroundtheworld.blogspot.com/ Ryan C

    I think it's largely about helping Big Dreams realize their potential reality. I feel a lot of times as we think about entrepreneurship we're scared off by the size of the dream, rather than the possibilities the dream has to offer. I love how Sean talked about the importance of a clear vision. I think what I got out of it is a vision is your dream's “reality check” … it makes you think about your dream as less of a dream and more of a reality that isn't quite here yet!

  • Anonymous

    I took this with me from this lecture: “It takes 10 years to become an overnight success” and “pay attention to the customer, to stay ahead of the change”.

  • halayc

    I took this with me from this lecture: “It takes 10 years to become an overnight success” and “pay attention to the customer, to stay ahead of the change”.

Tony Redpath @ MaRS

Tony Redpath @ MaRS

As the VP of Partner Programs at MaRS, Tony ensures that our external and internal programs work together. Tony also advises entrepreneurs and high growth companies, particularly in environmental, advanced materials and manufacturing markets, with a special emphasis on mentoring and development of entrepreneurs.

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