Every successful company started with an idea.  Michael Burcham, CEO of the Entrepreneur Center and Professor at Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt’s Owen Graduate School of Management, shared at E|SPACES Cool Springs May 10th how to turn your ideas into reality.

1. Only Use a Legitimate Business Model

Investors want to know up front what business model you’re using and what other companies have succeeded using that model. Think outside the box of your industry and consider successful companies in entirely different industries than yours then figure out how to apply the principles of their model to your startup.

2. Save the Writing of Plans for Later

Eager to write your business plans?  First begin with your financial model.  How is your shiny object going to make money?  What problems are you solving for your customers?  List your assumptions and your facts – once you have 50-60% of the facts nailed down you’ve got a good financial model and are ready to move forward.

3. Frame Your Idea

What is going to drive your revenue?  Who is your customer? How are you going to get the product to your customers and keep your margin in check? How do you cause your customers to fall in love with your product?

4. Build Your Business Model from the Ground Up

Study your competition. Who are your competitors?  What models are they using?  What needs are they failing to meet?  What are the pain points of their customers?  Talk to your potential customers – find out what is actually important to them – usually this is different than you originally thought.  “The pain to switch to your solution has to easier than staying.”

5. Know Your Margin in the Industry

6. Stay Focused on Magnetic North

Know your customers and adjust your product to meet their changing needs and desires.  Maintain a competitive edge in your market.

The best entrepreneurs see ordinary problems, put together a tested business model, and execute it well.  Even a mediocre idea can turn into a profitable business if executed well. For more insights from Michael Burcham and more tips for how to turn your ideas into reality – visit The Entrepreneur Center in Nashville or attend some of their upcoming events.  For those of you with 10 ideas in your head, you may want to purchase The Idea Frame, an entrepreneur’s handbook by Michael Burcham and David Furse to help keep your ideas organized and ready to pitch.

Are you an entrepreneur in Nashville needing a place to meet with clients and colleagues, network, or just get some work done or a large company needing a place for creative off-site meetings? E|SPACES may be just the right place for you to turn your ideas into reality. Learn more about us and how you can join today.

As reported on VUCommodores.com, “In one season, Vanderbilt Head Coach James Franklin became the only first- year coach in school history to guide the Commodores to a bowl game, surpassed the total wins achieved by the program in each of its previous two seasons, and reeled in the best recruiting class in school history.

Through his successes, Franklin has sent a jolt of positive energy throughout Vanderbilt’s football program that has been buoyed by an infectious personality and unmatched passion for the Commodores.”

So what are the keys to turning around a struggling football program or an underperforming business? Join us as Coach Franklin reveals the secrets at E|SPACES Cool Springs on Thursday, May 17, at 7:30 AM for a networking breakfast, presentation and Q & A. RSVP Here.

Coach Franklin came to Vanderbilt after serving as the Offensive Coordinator at University of Maryland and Kansas State University, and an Assistant Coach with the Green Bay Packers, in addition to other coaching roles. He was a star quarterback at East Stroudsburg (Pa.) University and is married with two children.

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This event is sponsored by Synergy Systems. Based in Nashville, Tennessee, Synergy Systems, LLC is a leader in recruiting the most sought-after talent in today’s competitive hiring markets. With proven methods and experience for creating successful search strategies for our clients, our services include leading successful staffing campaigns for rapid growth start-ups and corporate relocation projects, to the strategic hiring of leadership executives for Fortune 500 companies. We’re Serious About Recruiting, and it shows.

David Owens, Professor of Management and Faculty Director, Executive Development Institute, Vanderbilt University

If your organization is good with “doing things like you have always done them,” and “marketing the products you have always marketed,” then you DO NOT want to hear David Owens discuss innovation. If you would like to be more innovative and there are a lot of good ideas floating around, but new ideas just never seem to go anywhere, join us for this exciting CEO Cafe at E|SPACES Belle Meade on Wednesday, May 16, at 7:30 AM for a networking breakfast, presentation and Q&A. RSVP Here

David Owens is trained as an engineer and has worked as an electrical engineer and design engineer as well as served as CEO of a consumer electronics company, Griffin Technology. Today, he works as a consultant, educator, and board member.

He is a professor at the Owen Graduate School of Management focusing on innovation, product development and organizational design, change and management. In addition to his work at Vanderbilt, where he has been a recipient of teaching awards, he has consulted with companies such as NASA, Nissan LEAF, and Cisco and has done product design work with companies including Apple Computer, Daimler Benz, and Dell Computer.

David holds three degrees from Stanford, including a Ph.D. in Management Science and Engineering. In November of last year, he published a book by the same title as this presentation.  Join E|SPACES in Belle Meade and The Bank of Nashville, sponsor of The CEO Cafe, on Wednesday morning, May 16, for David’s presentation and discussion of this very relevant topic.

Be sure to mark your calendar for our our lineup of speakers and events this month, including Michael Burcham, Coach James Franklin, and Arthur Laffer.

So you have a shining object that you think is the next big thing. No, you know it is the next big thing! What do you do with it — start a business of course.

Will it alter our view of the world? Check! Will it improve efficiency? Check! Will it improve the lives of people? Check! Will it open up vast new opportunities? Check! Will it make money? Uh, I hope so.

Join us at E|SPACES Cool Springs as Michael Burcham addresses this question on Thursday, May 10, at 4:30 pm for networking, food and drink and a presentation and Q & A with Michael. (RSVP here) There is probably no one in the country more qualified to help us answer the question, “Will your shining object make money?” than Michael Burcham.

Michael is President and CEO of the Entrepreneur Center, Nashville’s nationally recognized center for supporting entrepreneurs and startup businesses. He recently led the launch of Startup Tennessee as the second state to join Startup America, and in March Michael was honored at the White House as a “Champion of Change.”

Michael approaches the topic with a strong theoretical knowledge, holding a Ph.D. in Healthcare Administration from the Medical University of South Carolina, and he teaches healthcare innovation and strategy at the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University. Perhaps even more important, he is grounded in practical knowledge having been an entrepreneur and company founder and president of two companies. He knows firsthand the emotions that only an entrepreneur can know behind the phrase “making payroll.” And he knows the “business models” that lead to “making money.”

Join the E|SPACES community in Cool Springs and our sponsor for this program, W Squared, for Michael’s presentation on Thursday, May 10, with a mixer starting at 4:30 pm.

And if you need help launching and making money with your shining object, W Squared may be just the resource for you.

About W Squared - 

W Squared’s outsourced solutions including technology managed services, healthcare information technology, finance and accounting, and human resources and payroll solutions remove scale as an obstacle for clients. Integrated as a comprehensive suite, the solutions provide a complete corporate back office; selected individually each solution provides resolutions to barriers inhibiting growth. A step beyond business process outsourcing (BPO), W Squared provides not only process expertise, but also business expertise creating a Business Process Partner (BPP) relationship. W Squared allows its clients to focus on their core competencies.

If you came to the Health Starts at Work with Whole Foods event at E|SPACES in Cool Springs last night you were asking for the Thai wrap recipe because you couldn’t believe healthy food could taste so good.  For those of you who couldn’t make it to the event last night, you missed some tasty dishes.  I have listed the Double Green Smoothie recipe and done my best to list the ingredients for those excellent Thai Wraps below for you to try at home.  Special thanks to Whole Foods Market, Hot Yoga Plus, Avalon Effect Light Therapy, and The YMCA for joining us to inspire healthy living and for Brentwood Homepage who covered the event in a recent article ”Maintaining Health at Work is Possible.”

Thai Rice Wraps

Ingredients:

• Rice paper rounds
• Rice noodles
• Baked Thai-style tofu
• Chopped lettuce
• Chopped cucumber
• Chopped avocado
• Chopped fresh cilantro
• Thinly sliced carrots
• Crushed red pepper flakes to taste
• 365 Organic Peanut Sauce for dipping

Optional Extras:

Cook and drain the rice noodles and chop all the veggies, then dip the rice paper rounds in hot water and lay out on clean surface. Fill wraps with all the above listed ingredients and roll up then slice in half.  Dip in the Thai peanut sauce or your favorite Thai dipping sauce and enjoy!  Or go to Whole Foods Market and purchase these wraps at their prepared foods counter.

Double Green Smoothie

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups unsweetened non-dairy beverage, such as almond, rice, or soy
• 2 dried apricots or 4 pitted dates
• 1 banana
• 1 cup chopped kale leaves
• 1 cup spinach leaves
• 1/2 cup fresh or frozen berries

Combine all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.

Find more inspiring healthy recipes on the Whole Foods website – and be sure to come to future E|SPACES events.  Follow us on facebook or twitter to stay connected to our team and get the latest news.