Guest Speaker: Rob Coons

Mr. Rob Coons, who is the Co-founder & CEO of Scout Military Discounts, delivered a presentation about his life as an entrepreneur for our class. One of the very first things that Rob made is that: to be a successful entrepreneur, one needs to know how to play the home games—knowledge of self will take on further in their career. Learning that Rob was passionate about running businesses, I think that he really meant what he said: to really know what you are good and not good at, so that you can play the home field advantage and be successful by emphasizing on your specific skills. For me, Rob was the first guest speaker that really talked more in-depth about the obstacles that he had to face and overcome in order to be where he is now. He brought up the event where an investor pulled the plug right before their product was ready to go on the market. The lack of funding at the crucial moment was a heavy set back.  Although his current product is still in development, his company through all the struggles, is currently in a good place in terms of progress and preparation to launch and expand their business. Through all the ‘shady’ incidents that happened mentioned by Rob, one of the things that I got out of this presentation is that, business means business; you will almost always at least encounter people who find ways to get advantages over you unethically and that you should always be ready for those encounters and have a plan B in case partnerships/deals don’t go as planned.  Relating to our class, Rob’s slide on ways to generate revenues had me thinking by comparing what I’ve had in mind so far about ways to bringing revenue. I feel that my scope was still too small (inside the box) and that Rob’s presentation brought up a few suggestions that might be useful for my Business Plan.