Published in the Independence Daily Reporter, August 17, 2016

Many understand that Fab Lab ICC is available to community members, entrepreneurs and small business owners for a small annual membership fee.  Many understand that Fab Lab ICC is a place where things can be created and made for fun, learning or business purposes.  Here, we explore some of the ways the Fab Lab ICC experience impacts our local and area economy.  Some of these items are happening now, while some will happen as we continue to grow.

• We work toward a continuous flow of new business start-ups while existing entrepreneurs and small business owners learn that they can use the Lab to develop new products and services. This adds jobs as some grow to need help.  Every entrepreneur that becomes a start-up business is either a part-time or full time job created.
• We inspire an Entrepreneurial Mindset through everything we do, including the Mindset class and the initiation of the Youth Entrepreneur curriculum in area high schools. As this culture of Entrepreneurial Mindset develops, our communities become better at solving the problems facing rural communities in Southeast Kansas.
• We can facilitate the infusion of grant money for product development. Eight to ten federal agencies are mandated to promote small business development by dedicating 2% – 3% of their budgets to that end.  There is development assistance available for entrepreneurs and small businesses that have product ideas of interest to one or more of the agencies.  The funds can be substantial–$200K to $300K—and part of the funds go to the assisting research institution; i.e. Fab Lab ICC.
• We can help challenged individuals improve their quality of life. We discovered this by accident.  Some will become entrepreneurs, experiencing for the first time in their lives, the joy of providing a product or service in exchange for money.  We have one autistic young man on his way to opening a computer repair and networking business.  Government and foundation agencies around the U.S. are looking for quality of life solutions for these populations.  We are working with two local agencies to develop solutions through the Fab Lab experience.
• We connect our Fab Lab ICC members with agencies to provide business development assistance. Examples are the Innovative Business Resource Center, Northern Montgomery County E-Community, Montgomery County Action Counsel, Network Kansas and Kansas Small Business Development Center.
• We’re creating the work force training (we like to call it “Fab-Force”) that is required to thrive in the coming age of customized manufacturing made possible by automation, robotics and advanced electronics. We believe the training for the employees and contractors of the future should consist of an approach where participants receive an introduction to a variety of disciplines rather than the singular disciplinary approaches of the past.
• We strive to function as a type of advance manufacturing Lab where existing businesses can learn about new techniques in customization and automation.
• Fab Lab ICC does a share of the heavy lifting in making Independence Community College strong. A strong community college helps build a strong community.
• The Fab Lab culture has a positive effect on attracting youth to the area. That kind of Entrepreneurial-Fab Lab culture, based on technology and innovation never gets old or goes out of style.  Young people like that kind of environment and will be attracted to return to the area as the quality of “city life” continues to deteriorate.
• The Fab Lab and related culture become destinations that out of town visitors and guests want to come to see. We’ll continue to make headlines, host events and offer our assistance around the country to communities who are building their Fab Labs. That will attract people to come to Fab Lab ICC to see “what we’ve done with the place”.

Published in the Independence Daily Reporter, August 10, 2016

Conventional thinking is that people always want the lowest price no matter what, yet some of the most successful businesses I know don’t have the lowest prices for what they sell.  What do customers really want?

Businesses, large and small, all too often get caught up in a “race to the bottom” trying to drive their prices down to be lower than a.) The local competitor, b.) The box stores or c.) The Internet.  At the same time, they strive to offer the best in customer service.  The challenge is that it is nearly economically impossible to offer both, lowest price and best in service.  The skimpy profit margins of lowest prices simply won’t support the costs required to provide the best customer service.  There are a percentage of customers, probably somewhere between 20% and 40% that will always buy at the lowest price yet expect the best service.  They usually expect more than is reasonable for that lowest price and they can be most difficult.  I’ll call them the “B” customers.  Then there are the “A” customers, those of us that want a certain value included in the products and services we buy and we realize that usually means we won’t get that value by looking for the lowest price on earth.

Businesses should realize they’re not going to get 100% of the market anyway, so their efforts are better spent in attracting the “A” customers.  As an “A” customer myself, I think I can give a fairly accurate representation of what we want.  First and foremost, we want a solution to a problem.  Our problem might be that we want a great dining experience, that we need to find a gift for someone or that we need to fix or replace a broken something in our home or business.

We want to feel safe, welcome and comfortable while looking for a solution to whatever problem we’re trying to solve.  We want to be respected and we’d like the business—owner and/or employees—to be attentive to our needs and really try to understand and solve the problem we’re asking them about.  This includes being friendly with us no matter what kind of day it’s been.   If we need to “go” while we’re shopping, we don’t want the awkwardness of having to ask when we’ve seen the NO PUBLIC RESTROOM sign on the door.  We want to get what we’ve been promised and we love it when we get more than we’ve been promised.  We also love it when we receive ideas that lead to better solutions than we originally had in mind.  When we receive these things, we’ll gladly pay a bit extra for the goods and services we need.  We’ll drive past competitors that don’t give us these things.  When we can get these things locally, we’ll gladly shop at home.  It’s only when we can’t find these things locally that we’ll get them elsewhere.

Published in the Independence Daily Reporter, August 3, 2016

For the last 80 years or so, the hiring process in America has and continues to be very inefficient and not effective.  We require “applicants” to give us all kinds of information on a job application.  We accept bland cover letters and resumes (many trumped up with fluffy accomplishments).  We stack the cover letter and resumes up in a big pile and start to eliminate.  Even through all of that lengthy and time-consuming process, we still eliminate good candidates while bringing in bad ones.  Through this standard process, it’s only through random good fortune that we actually hire someone that has the attitude, character and skills to help us fulfill our mission in serving our customers and constituents.

I’ve had plenty of practice hiring the ineffective way.  From the time in the early 1980’s when I waded through 55 or so applications from teen agers wanting to work in my photography studio until today, our methods haven’t changed much and the “stack resume and eliminate” method hasn’t improved outcomes.  I listen to the radio ads promising hundreds of applicant resumes if you’ll pay their fee.  This will only provide a much higher stack to eliminate even more good candidates.

Over the years, I’ve also experimented.  I’ve hired by watching the way someone works at some other business and asking them to come and work for me.  I once hired a young man whose resume contained typos and misspellings (definitely against the recommendation of the HR director and even the CEO) because I thought he’d be dedicated and hard working.  I was right.  Overall my track record at hiring, using gut feeling, has been better than when I waded through the applications and resumes, eliminating without knowing the applicant.

A few years ago, after a lengthy discussion about this in one of my entrepreneurship classes, Terry Trout, owner of Ane Mae’s Coffee and Sandwich House in Independence threw out the traditional job application and replaced it instead with a sort of questionnaire.  Applicants expecting to find the same ineffective job application questions instead are invited to tell Terry about themselves and how they can help him and his staff members serve their customers better.  Those looking to fill their “quota” of job applications rarely complete the questionnaire.  Those that do answer see that Terry thinks differently and is willing to train someone in the aspects of his business after knowing they are in tune with helping him serve customers.

When we look for people to add to our businesses and organizations, if we will pay the same attention to character, entrepreneurial mindset, positive attitude and innovative thinking as we do to “qualifications” and other aspects of competency, we’ll get the consistency and quality we need to be more effective in fulfilling our collective missions.

Published in the Independence Daily Reporter, July 20, 2016

There are undoubtedly several high schools in Southeast Kansas using some kind of entrepreneurship curriculum.  The best programs concentrate as much or more on the way entrepreneurs solve problems than the technical aspects of running a business.  While we’re not familiar with all the various high school entrepreneurship programs, we are familiar with one of the best of the best.   Formerly known as Youth Entrepreneurs of Kansas, YE has now become just Youth Entrepreneurs.  Based in Wichita since 1991, YE has grown to provide curriculum and support for about 40 high schools in Kansas and another 16 in border states.  Currently launching the high school program in several markets across the Unites States, YE is poised for growth.

YE offers week-long entrepreneurship camps as an introduction to their program about helping high school students to learn about “business, markets, and solving problems for profit”.  We have the (day) camp available at Fab Lab ICC next week, Monday – Friday from 8:30am to 1:30pm.  We’re adding time in the Fab Lab at the beginning of each day.  The facilitators (one from Wichita and one—fresh out of YE facilitator training) will start the YE part of the program at 10:30 each day.  We’ll feed these students lunch for a camp fee of $39.  The registration link is posted on our Facebook page “Fab Lab ICC”.

The great thing is that we’re all involved in “business, markets and solving problems for profit” whether we work for someone else or we go out on our own.  The YE program is not just about business, but about the business of solving problems, whether in a professional or personal context.  Hence, it’s a very good way to introduce and develop life skills in our young people.  Some people would call it a curriculum to inspire the elusive “soft skills” we always complain to be lacking in our young people.

Until this fall, there were no high schools in Southeast Kansas offering YE.  All 40 active high school programs were in the other quadrants of Kansas.  This fall Independence, Field Kindley (Coffeyville), Elk Valley (Longton) and Fredonia high schools will initiate YE into their schedules as a regular elective course.  We are happy to have been of some assistance in the implementation of Independence and Field Kindley.  Elk Valley and Fredonia have come into the light on their own accord.

Two years ago, we hosted about 25 YE students from around the state on the ICC campus for a tour of Fab Lab ICC and some of our other innovative programs.  During the visit, we all noticed that these students were different than the average high school student.  Alert, positive, curious and self-confident is how most of us described them.  It was at that point that we stepped up our efforts to be a catalyst for initiating YE in our area high schools.  It is very satisfying to see us establish a foot-hold for YE in Southeast Kansas.