I was extremely skeptical of this course, as there was no information about the course or about Dr. Kane at UGA. I needed to take an MIS elective, and this was the only one that would fit into my schedule so I decided to give it a go. Fast forward a couple months later, I was even more skeptical after we had the first session. I had no idea what the class structure was going to look like or what the class entailed. However I am so glad that I did take this course, and couldn’t have made a better choice. This class opened my mind to so much more that is out there in the business world, that I did not even know is possible. I’ve heard terms such as venture capital and had no idea what that was or to even think that I could be one of those people potentially. I feel like this class broke down a lot of walls and gave us a better understanding of what’s out there besides consulting, development, and project management. Dr. Kane’s connections and Boston side really gave me a new outlook on what all else is out there.
Guest Speakers
Having guest speakers was one of the best parts of my MIS experience. There is really nothing like hearing from people who were once in your shoes, and seeing all the different places you can end up from there. Personally I knew nothing about consulting even until I attended meetings from companies, and that was the best way for me to learn about what I can do. I enjoyed many guest presentations, especially my own in conjunction with Andy Echeverria. Andy Ruben was an amazing person to talk to, and being able to meet with him was a priceless experience as he is a wealth of knowledge and a great person. I also enjoyed hearing from others such as Rich Nanda, Kelsey Bishop, and Mark Mahoney. Kelsey was especially cool as she explained her method of developing a new product by pushing out a link to emails, just to see how many people would potentially be interested in using her product. She had not even built anything yet but used it to see if there was something to be had there. It was also great to hear from the guys from New Age Capital. Their energy and outlook on things was very energizing.
Entrepreneurship
From VC to startups, I had virtually zero knowledge on the industries. I am now confident to say that I can tell someone what these things are, and be able to ask people from these industries about it. I have realized that you should know a little about every business industry, in order to be able to make connection in the real world. It is important to stay open minded and want to learn about others, or you can easily stay in a closed cocoon. This is how I feel I would have been if I did not take this course, and it is great to know I can do so many other things as long as I make great connections and stay curious. I do plan to one day become an entrepreneur, I don’t know in what shape or form that will be, but this class definitely helped me get an idea of what that looks like. I’ve also learned that it is not something you can always plan, you just have to stay open to the opportunities as they come to you.
Twitter was also a fun part of this class. It was refreshing to do this in a course, as I could’ve never really seen this being used. I am an avid twitter user, usually checking twitter once every hour throughout the day, but just consume content and don’t really post myself. This was a little difficult for me at first since I had to actively look for things to post about, but I got into the grove of it pretty quickly. I found it nice to see what classmates are interested in, though it was a lot of AI related tweets as that’s the way this semester went. Towards the end of the semester I did find myself having trouble finding topics to tweet about, as I was simply sick of the AI concentrated news. It was cool that we did however learn about other emerging technologies such as blockchain and crypto currencies, as this did give me things to tweet and blog about.
All in all, this was one of my favorite and most impactful classes that I have taken. This class is extremely beneficial to my career development, over anything. In my opinion learning about entrepreneurship and emerging technologies space is extremely vital, as we will be dealing with a lot of these things and people throughout or career in business. Thank you, Dr. Kane, for giving us your years of experience and knowledge, and preparing us for our features in the real world.
Hi Aly! This was such a good reflection. I felt the same way about this course at first, and to hear that you were initially skeptical but ended up really enjoying the course and finding it to be super impactful was refreshing. I totally get what you mean about Twitter being a fun part of the course too, it’s always cool to see what your classmates are interested in. I enjoyed this class a ton as well!
Hi Aly! I thought your final post was great and I could relate to you on several levels. I didn’t know to much about VC before taking this class. I learned a lot about digital innovation and companies from Kane’s lectures and the guest speakers we got to meet.
Hi Aly, you did a great job of summarizing the course in your post. At first, I was thinking about not taking this course as well due to it being a 3-hour course. I am very glad I decided to stay in this class because it turned out being one of the most (if not the most) interesting class I took at UGA. I agree that Twitter was a great part of the class as it allowed us to communicate and discuss topics more outside of class.
Hi Aly! I completely relate to your experience of being skeptical at first but ultimately finding the course to be incredibly valuable. Like you, I also found the guest speakers to be a highlight of the class, and I learned so much from their experiences and insights. I also agree that staying open-minded and continuously learning about different industries is crucial for success in the business world.
Hello Aly! I was also worried that there was not much information about the course, but I am glad I chose to take the class. I also learned a lot about VCs or startups after this class, but now being able to talk about these things will be beneficial. You are right that we must stay open to different opportunities because we do not know how things will pan out. Before this class, I had never used Twitter to learn about technology, so it was fun to see all the cool tweets that were made, and overall, it was a great way to improve our knowledge.
Good wrap up! Thanks for sticking up for Twitter, as it’s clearly one of the more divided aspects of the class! Look forward to discussing more today
Hey Aly! Great summary! I also did not know much about the industries brought into this class, especially VC. I enjoyed learning more about how the industry works in addition to seeing how various executives’ “day in the life” differs from company to company.
Great post aly, feel like I agree with a lot of what youve said. I also enjoyed the twitter aspect of this class because it was so different than what we were used to in traditional classes.