Rejection Activity

Hello all,

This week's post will cover my thoughts on the rejection activity we did in the last class, and why I felt it was valuable. I've heard of similar trading activities being assigned by Haas classes, and I think that it teaches an important lesson to entrepreneurs.

I specifically had 2 major takeaways from the activity. 1 - It doesn't matter how much a product is worth, it matters how much the customer thinks it's worth. When we were trying to trade away the box, we had to convince people that it was worth more than the $0.50 "list price." That was the only way we were able to trade up for more expensive items, ultimately ending up with a $20 Arduino display. We used different pitches to convince people of the box's value - telling them they could use it to store stuff, putting a love note in it, etc. But the main point was, we were only successful because we were able to convince people to trade items worth more than $0.50 for a $0.50 box. 2 - You can't take rejections personally. This is one of the hardest things, in my opinion, because no one likes getting rejected. However, it's inevitable that life will be full of rejections - internships, college applications, investor pitches, relationships, etc. If the first rejection from an investor phases you, your company is never getting off the ground. In our process, we had 5 people willing to trade, and a far larger number who said no. It was important to keep trying, since ultimately we had success. Another reason why I said it's important not to take rejections personally, is, because, sometimes it did seem very personal. We noticed that people who seemed friendlier, and seemed to like us more, were more willing to make trades. That made me realize that, to some extent, business decisions can be influenced by personal feelings, which is why presentation and first opinions can often be so important. To that end, I feel that it's definitely important to be personable and likable as it will definitely help your chances as an entrepreneur, but it's also important to recognize that not all people will like you, and sometimes that may result in rejections.

That's all for this week. Looking forward to the next class!