With no concrete ideas, Dane Cho walked into the first Entrepreneurs’ Bootcamp of the semester on Feb. 1 to learn and brainstorm ideas for this year’s 25th annual University of Hawai‘i Venture Competition.
“The end goal (of coming today) is to pitch an idea to my team for the UHVC,” said Cho, an entrepreneurship major at UH Mānoa.
This year’s competition is the biggest one yet, as the grand prize will be more than doubled. In previous years, the winners won $10,000, but the top team this year will win $25,000 to help turn their business ideas into reality.
The UHVC is a semester-long, experiential program that provides hands-on education, mentorship, and resources to UH students and faculty who seek to learn what it takes to be an entrepreneur and start a business venture.
The bootcamp was led by 2022 UHVC grand prize-winning team coach and UH lecturer, Jeff Hui, where he shared advice to students for free.
Hui emphasized the importance of talking to customers and said that it’s his number one advice for aspiring entrepreneurs.
“Talking to customers isn’t just how you develop a product, but also demonstrates that what you have is real,” Hui said. “Students usually have an idea, but if you can demonstrate that you built something and got feedback that’s tangible and real, that’s what really separates you.”
Not talking to customers is the most common mistake that he sees in students.
“They create something in their mind that’s interesting and what they do is focus on ‘this is a cool technology’ or ‘cool product,’ but they don’t ever talk to customers to see if they’ll want it,” he said.
Cho plans to use this strategy when it’s time to compete in the competition and also wants to learn from the mistakes of others.
“The first thing I’m going to do is ask customers and people for data and feedback, then relay it to my group,” Cho said. “Sometimes it’s less about you and shutting your mouth for a second and understanding the other person’s point of view.”
Despite the bootcamp being entrepreneurial themed, some of the students weren’t business majors. Hui expressed that there are many skills in business that translate to other careers or life in general.
“Customer discovery isn’t so different from regular life,” Hui said. “People typically apply for a job and prepare for the interview, but if you can talk to the people that work there before the interview, it helps a lot.”
Hui also highlighted the importance of accepting failure and how it can help people get better.
“Failure is good because it means you learn and it gives you opportunities and that’s the same thing with life,” Hui said.
At the end of the day, Hui wants to give back to students in hopes of helping them find better jobs and opportunities. Teaching a free bootcamp to students of all majors on a Saturday morning is a “passion project” for him.
“If or when a student comes up to me and says, ‘Hey, you changed my career or life,’ that’s payment for me,” Hui said.
