| Idea Contests: Beneficial to Students and a Nation? - Or Exploitation of Entrepreneurial Ideas? |
| 20 April 2008 |
Recently, the Turkish Daily News had a very generous front page article, ("Young Turks' career question: Why?") concerning Unilever's IdeaTrophy Contest. A business strategy contest for university students throughout Turkey, IdeaTrophy provides a competitive platform for students to form teams, culminate ideas, and present to Unilever executives. Winners of the yearly contest are rewarded with small cash prizes (and potential for employment). While I agree that the contest provides a good framework for teamwork, business planning education, presentation skills and valuable experience working with a multinational corporation, I will stop short at saying it promotes and improves innovation and entrepreneurship for Turkey.
This is the problem I have with these "idea" contests. For these large MNC's, they are quite simply building a marketing focus group for free, and a permission-based recruiting network. By asking for ideas (bordering on exploitation of rather entrepreneurial ideas that are not their own), the MLC focuses on the best of the best, refines them, and "rewards" (disguises) it with a contest prize incentive. Whether the student winners are hired is immaterial, the objective of garnering valuable market data on Turkey's youth, the largest demographic in Turkey, has been achieved. I find it interesting that last year's contest was on product development, as they received hundreds of brainstormed ideas for free. Having completed that production of an abundant array of Lipton Tea products (Long Tail?), this years contest decided to focus on customer attraction and retention. Hmm.. how interesting. (Back in the day, people used to actually work for a living)
Cem Tarık Yüksel, Unilever's veteran human resources manager, (interestingly enough) was quoted as saying,
"the first question youth ask themselves is whether they were doing a meaningful job or a “brand-name” job. “In the past, ‘brand-name jobs,' such as being the so-and-so manager of company X, used to be in high demand. But now they look at whether that job has a meaning,” he said. He added that people were not satisfied with “brand-name” jobs that did not provide them with real responsibilities."
The competitors have to pass various elimination processes, just as in pitching an idea to the board of a multi-national company. “The first one is at the idea level. The goal here is to promote innovative thinking. The roughly 50 teams that make it through the first elimination are asked to prepare their business plans,” said Yüksel. The second elimination yields 20 teams and these make a presentation to a board made up of the manager of the related brand and human resources group. Ten teams are chosen as finalists and are then invited to a three-day camp, where they receive training on their subject. The last day of the camp is “the big day,” when teams make a presentation to members of Unilever Turkey's board of directors."
Ironically, later in the article, interviews are made with previous winners of the contest who just so happen to work for Unilever, as they fit so nicely into their "brand name" jobs. Here's what they had to say the contest did for them.
Mehmet Çelikol is a member of the team that won the IdeaTrophy prize in 2005. “I was studying computer engineering in Bosporus University, but I had decided to go into marketing,” said Çelikol, who currently works as a products manager assistant for Dove Hair at Unilever Turkey. “So this was important for me. It was a turning point in my career,” he said.
Mirella Kasuto is another IdeaTrophy winner who has joined the ranks of Unilever Turkey. She was a member of the winning team in 2001, the first year the competition was held. She believes that the competition had positive results and was influential in her decision to apply for a position with Unilever. “The competition taught not only me, but the whole team quite a lot. It allowed us to have a real business life experience as students. It was also an opportunity for us to get to know Unilever better,” she wrote in an e-mail interview from a business trip abroad as customer marketing manager in charge of the Lipton and Amaze brands at Unilever.
How many entrepreneurs wake up one day and say, "I want to be the product manager for Dove Shampoo!" Do I dare say this is the reply to your primary school teacher's question, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" I think not.
So who are the real winners here? Does Turkey, as a nation, increase its wealth? Have we increased the entrepreneurial spirit and spurred innovation? Some may argue that the valuable job experience, which so few young educated Turks have, is of the upmost value. Others might argue that young Turks are able to sample new products first-hand. And this is an incentive to compete?
OK, OK, I'll get off the rant. But regardless, if you are a student with minimum ideals, prospects, dreams and/or ability to take risks, than these contests are an excellent opportunity to flaunt what you think you got. Take the 50 year job, get the gold watch and parachute. For other contests, you should also check out TRUST International Management Game by Danone, or Loreal's E-Strat Challenge just to name a few. Don't get me wrong, these contests are a great experience for students, but the hidden benefits for the company are greater.
That said, how many university students do you know that opted for an internship vs. a summer in Bodrum? The point is that it takes all kinds. Everyone is different. However, if you think you are an entrepreneur and your ideas will set you above the rest, then don't waste your time. Wait for the next business plan contest, and pitch your idea to real VCs. You may die broke, but atleast you weren't a numbered cog.
Labels: Business Plan Contests, Idea Contests
|
|
|
|
|
| Turkish Mobile Applications Provider Pozitron Wins Harvard Business School's Global Business Plan Competition! |
| 10 February 2008 |
 It seems my friends at Pozitron, who I posted about in June 2007, have won the HBS Global Business Plan Competition. The news has been posted courtesy of Dan Primack of PEHub, who judged at the event. Pozitron (www.pozitron.com), a mobile and alternative communications solution provider based in Turkey, won the Global Business Plan Contest sponsored by the Harvard Business School’s Entrepreneurship Club on January 27. It was the first contest of its kind that brought together a panel of judges from the venture capital and technology sectors including IDG Ventures Boston, HarbourVest, and Thomas Financial.
 Pozitron is an R&D focused enterprise communications solution company taking tremendous strides in innovation and development in the mobile industry. It develops new technologies which makes wireless experiences more enjoyable and powerful. Founded in 2000, Pozitron provides professional service and solutions to meet the demands of its customers. Pozitron is the fastest executed principal partner of SUN Microsystems in the world. (There are only 8 principal partners in 96 countries). Pozitron created the first mobile banking application for Turkey’s largest bank, Türkiye İş Bankası. Everyday, over 100,000 users enjoy Pozitron’s mobile applications and more than 250,000 people communicate through Pozitron’s solutions.
Pozitron’s business plan, focused on its integrated mobile banking product, was chosen among a dozen of companies to represent Turkey. It then competed against several top firms representing Armenia, Colombia, Germany, Lithuania, and Mexico at the Global Business Plan Contest and secured first place after two rounds of deliberations.
"Mobile banking solutions are essential in our increasingly globalized world," says Pozitron CEO Fatih İşbecer. "As many people are starting businesses or doing trade, communications is an essential part to help them grow. We’re deeply honored that Harvard Business School chose our firm among a stellar group as having enormous potential."
Pozitron, last year, won its place as an "Endeavor Entrepreneur", and since then has been able to secure Iş Bank as a customer in building and implementing its Java-based mobile-banking application. "This is the hallmark of high-impact entrepreneurship," said Linda Rottenberg, Endeavor Co-founder & CEO, "We’re proud to have Pozitron among an innovative group of Endeavor Entrepreneurs who are creating new breakthroughs that are improving their communities."
For an entrepreneur to score such a major client before venture funding and providing necessary revenue, it clearly gave them a leg-up in the business plan competition. They are currently negotiating with other banks, and, as can be seen from the PEHub post, will most likely role it out with other international banks.
Another noteworthy point regarding this feat is that Pozitron was able to make use of 4 intership students from the G-Lab Program of MIT Sloan School of Management. These 4 students helped Pozitron toward their Latin American expansion strategy. For all you entrepreneurs out there, this is a great program, one that you should really check out.
Congratulations go to Fatih and Firat İşbecer!
 Technorati Tags: Endeavor, Pozitron, Entrepreneur Awards, entrepreneurship, Business Plan Contests, Harvard Business School, G-Lab, MIT SloanLabels: Business Plan Contests, Business Planning, Endeavor, Entrepreneurship, Harvard Business School, MIT Sloan, Pozitron
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Publisher: Jon H. Black
