Week 13 Reading Reflection

What I found surprising and interesting, was how entrepreneurs must be objective to avoid emotional bias. I like this, but it surprised me. As a journalist, my job is to be objective. It was surprising to realize entrepreneurs need to be, as well. You would think that entrepreneurs would need to be passionate and head-over-heels for their product, but this is not the case. It’s a nice surprise.

Something that confused me was the discounted earnings method, which the author writes ca help determine a firm’s true value. Just because, a method like this seems completely dependent on the future, and in the end, is only a hypothesis. It also looks at the estimated cash flow, which I feel like can be very dependent on a lot of things.

If I could ask the author two questions, I would ask: what is a reasonable life expectancy of a business? And how dependable is the discounted earnings method?

I wouldn’t argue against the points of the author in Ch. 14. The information is thoroughly backed up through numbers and examples. 

Celebrating Failure

I have failed so many times this semester, my hands are sweating as I type this, recalling all the times my face reddens in embarrassment from an error. When I fail, I never let myself live it down. For instance, I misspelled a student’s last name in the paper. Oh yes, I was one letter off, but it changed my entire life. Not only did I lie in bed and contemplate my career in journalism, I cried a bit. A fact error, can in some cases, be life ruining, especially if it morphs the entire meaning of a story or fact. That was probably the worst one. 

What I learned was, I have to be so careful when it comes to spelling names. I misspelled the student’s last name because I did a phone interview off of my friend’s phone. I was also exhausted, and it was near deadline. I learned that I have to TRIPLE check. That means finding the student in the UF Directory (and making sure they exist), and even checking Facebook to see if there’s a profile that matches a person.

I think failure sucks. Truly and honestly, it makes life a lot harder when you have a big red X that follows you wherever you go. But if you keep that big red X in check, if you keep it close and keep it as a reminder, you can make sure it’s only one. Once I got over the initial embarrassment, I contacted the student and apologized. It helped, a bit. But my pride was still wounded. And to ensure I don’t fail like that again, I’ve learned to find ways to fact check myself. This class has helped me put failure in a different perspective. In class, when coming up with a business product, I’ve learned that failure is the criticism and feedback that helps you create a better product.