20A - Growing your Social Capital

1) Who they are and what their background is.

The three people I talked to to grow my human capital are:

Rocky Shiffner (Pre-School Teacher)

Betty Joostema (Retired Nurse and Librarian) 

Pete Mozes (Traveling agent)

2) Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot. 3) A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

Rocky (Domain Expert): Rocky is actually a close friend of mine mom and she fits this aspect for me because she herself is a pre-school teacher and has a passion for making sure children are reading books at a young age. She told me she has a passion and want to write children books, which would be incorporated into my business as some book options to choose from. She has a good idea of the overall market of how books trade and sell. She came up for a baseball game and it was a perfect time to talk about this assignment.

Betty (Market Expert): Betty is actually my grandmother but she has a vast knowledge of the book market being she was a former librarian. She has an understanding of the book market and has research about what people want and the books people could care less for. Her and I came into contact after I gave her a phone call. 

Pete (Supplier Expert): Pete is one of my dad's best friends and I gave him a phone call to talk about what he does. Basically he travels around for his business to places across the nation and tries to make other companies/institutions buy his product. His products range from electronics to books and much more. He has an idea of how to persuade and talk businesses into accepting your product and wanting to make it one of their own which would be huge for my business.

4) The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? 

Rocky: Rocky told me the difficulties that include trying to mass produce and find someone interested in the product one is trying to sell. She told me sometimes its a dirty business and just because your idea seems like the best it sometimes will go unnoticed and she told me to never give up. She emphasizes this idea because Rocky herself has been trying for a few months now to have some books approved for publishing. Her ultimate goal is to get books into the market that can be used by many ages for enjoyment and knowledge.

Betty: We talked about the true difficulty of determine the types of genres and style of books that people nowadays tend to read or want to read. She told me how the trend has become more expansive as more and more people want to read such different subjects. But she ensured me one thing and that was as long as people are alive and breathing there will be people interested and wanting to read.

Pete: Pete and I actually talked for awhile a lot about life and then I basically ran through my elevator pitch with him. He told me it was a good start but needed much improvement. He told me I have a great tone but I lack in the ability of persuading others that my product far outweighs other competitors and it would be hard to get accepted if I cant overcome this.

All three listened to my business idea and helped me develop pointers and tips on what my strengths and weaknesses are and how I can try to improve them.

5) How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

Rocky: Rocky has experience in trying to sell to the market and with her and she knows how to produce books/ services. She has way more knowledge then I do with actually trying to enter the market and has many tips that would be beneficial to my service. 

Betty: Betty has such an array of knowledge as has been alive to witness all the trends that have shaped the the book market to what it is today. She has a good idea of what books are a "hot read" and which ones I shouldn't even worry to include within my business. She has a background knowledge of the subject to help my service progress to maximizing its opportunities. 

Pete: He would be a perfect addition in my network because he really would give insight for my service of being persuasive and showing that we are the best company for the service that is needed to be provided. He has extensive background history in selling to firms in my industry and has a great idea of the best ways of how to do that.

Finally: Reflect. 

This experience actually really will help me in numerous aspects of future networking events that come my way. I've learned from this that 1.) it is so beneficial to look for others for advice. You need a team in order to fulfill all the needs of a successful business and talking with everyone made me realize this. 2.) It will make me also always looks for outside the box solutions of how to differentiate myself from others and be a unique service. This experience differed a lot from other networking experiences i've had because I actually had to make initiative to go out and find very compatible sources that I could learn a lot from. I did research and much more to find suitable people.