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Exploring Entrepreneurial Traits and Design Thinking

Throughout the process of completing my assignment as well as the entire semester, I have been lucky enough to be exposed to a variety of readings/modules which have allowed me to complete not only this specific part of my assignment but the entirety of the course to this date. These modules have bettered my understanding of entrepreneurial traits, skills and processes, which I can ultimately take into my everyday life after my university degree is complete. In this review, I will be outlining my journey of completing the assignment whilst also highlighting the different primer readings and videos that influenced the way I created my assignment topic. In Week 3 of the subject, students were given the opportunity to read and watch "IBM and design thinking) 3.2 Primer. This module included a Ted talk and highlighted the founder of Airbnb Joe Gebbia's journey from having a crazy life experience to starting his own business. The story is inspiring and shines light on the different ways of thinking that exist amongst entrepreneurs in today's society. Furthermore, Gebbia's ability to explore the possibilities of his abstract idea whilst also supporting and assisting in solving an already existing issue inspired me to think outside the box and to have the best interests of those involved within my assignment topic at the forefront of my entrepreneurial idea. Whilst my assignment topic won't lead to the next Airbnb, it will provide young upcoming athletes in the NRL with a new, exciting and increased opportunity to become a professional within the league whilst also meeting the needs of the products consumers (the fans) by making the game more exciting through its new draft system. Without watching Gebbia's Ted talk, I believe that I would have solely focused on the profits side of being an entrepreneur, however after watching his speech, I now understand that the ability to understand and address society's issues through my creation is just as an important skill and trait to have then the ability to generate profits. What differed my experience as well as my process of completing this assignment from traditional approaches towards entrepreneurial thinking is the implementation of design thinking. In week 2, one of the first modules we looked at was "what is design thinking" which ultimately described the process of utilising different entrepreneurial thinking in order to complete one idea. A described in the primer readings, "design thinking is a means of going on an expedition without a map without knowing the destination with the confidence that you will end up somewhere great". Design thinking includes 5 main steps: Learning from people, finding patterns, design principle, making things tangible and iterate relentlessly. By implementing these 5 key steps into my own entrepreneurial idea, I was able to discover new possibilities with my idea and it ultimately allowed me to think of my solution. Instead of focusing on the end goal or place, I instead turned my attention towards the issue at hand which was the decreasing number of