Humber’s 2014-2015 Applied Research & Innovation annual report

[Disclaimer: Herb Communications is a member of Humber College's HumberLaunch business incubator.]

Humber's 2014-2015 Applied Research & Innovation annual report is now online. Designed and developed by a team of Humber students, this year's report is in the form of a responsive website.

"HumberLaunch was founded in 2011, offering services to Humber students and alumni. In September 2014, HumberLaunch opened its doors to entrepreneurs from Etobicoke and surrounding areas, offering resources and membership to community businesses.

"Since then, HumberLaunch has engaged with over 30 community agencies, developing collaborations with the Lakeshore West Post, MicroSkills, the Queensway Employment & Social Services, Enterprise Toronto, and MaRS.

"HumberLaunch has also joined three community based networks: the ONE Network Partners in Peel, the Etobicoke Youth Network, and the Lakeshore Interagency Network.

"In its first year, the community outreach initiative has been a success. Nine community entrepreneurs have joined HumberLaunch to develop their innovative business ideas, and HumberLaunch has delivered quality events and workshops to the community, including a Startup Weekend with over 70 attendees, a Startup Skills Mixer, twelve information sessions, and several community tours of the Prototype Lab located at Humber’s North campus.

"Humber's New Venture Seed Fund provides up to $10,000 of start-up capital, on a competitive basis, to businesses founded by Humber students and alumni. Since 2010, the fund has provided support to over 33 new businesses to build on their innovative ideas."

Here's more details on its applied research and innovation.

From a personal viewpoint, it's been a great resource to be part of this organization.

John.

Making personal connections at the Small Business Forum 2015

Thanks to an invite from HumberLaunch, I helped out on their booth this morning at Enterprise Toronto's Small Business Forum 2015 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

It was an excellent networking opportunity, and I came away with some really good contacts and around five potential new client leads. Interest was very high in HumberLaunch's offerings so we were kept busy talking to a lot of people.

Other organizations represented included -- to name but a few -- GoDaddy, Google, Uber, Shopify, FreshBooks, Yellow Pages Group, Toronto Region Board of Trade and National Crowdfunding Association of Canada (never knew about the latter).

The one thing I took away from my interactions with the booth visitors is that people still want to make that personal connection, face to face, initially. After chatting and finding out we can potentially help each other, or just have something in common, the first thing I ask is if we can connect on LinkedIn. All agreed. (One even invited me on the spot!)

I'm one of those people who don't like to just send the default LinkedIn template message, it's so lazy and disrespectful. I usually ask in an e-mail conversation first, or follow up on Twitter to ask beforehand.

It's very east to connect these days with people you meet for a brief time, and then you are lost in a sea of business cards or follow-up sales pitches. Spending just five to 10 minutes getting to know their business, what they need and requesting the later invitation, pays dividends in my mind.

And I think that goes a long way these days.

John.

HumberLaunch Fall Series Workshop: Creative Idea Generation

You know those brainstorming meetings where you all sit around, throwing ideas out there, and no one really says what they want to because the boss is also there? Yeah, those ones.

Today's HumberLaunch Fall Series Workshop was run by Jennifer Morozowich, Principal of INideas, who walked us through how to dive deeper into the brainstorming process to really get at the solution to any problems a client may be having.

The workshop usually takes two days, but we ran through it in two hours ... so by Jennifer's admission it was an overview rather than a full-on intense study.

One of the aspects that came across in the session is not to shut people down, but be open to ideas. For example, when hearing someone's idea, it's better to lead with, "Yes, and ..." rather than the negative, "No, but ..."

We also looked at:

• Divergent Thinking -- Generating lots of ideas
• Convergent Thinking -- Evaluating ideas/options and making decisions

These two steps encourage people to come up with "off the wall" ideas to begin with, then examine those more closely to what are realistic and doable as it relates to helping a client solve their problem(s) or need(s).

Jennifer asked us to write down a problem anonymously, and she picked one for the group to examine. I was the lucky winner so had the good fortune of hearing my fellow attendees' thoughts and feedback on solutions to my small business needs.

I'm finding these HumberLaunch sessions extremely useful, from a knowledge standpoint and also networking opportunities with fellow entrepreneurs.

[As an aside, Jennifer is also starting up a cat cafe in Toronto!]

John.

HumberLaunch Summer Series Workshop: Pitching To Investors

This morning I attended the last of HumberLaunch's summer workshop series. [More are being planned for the fall season too.] The subject matter was Pitching To Investors, and the presenter was Kevin Smith, Chief Story Architect at The Story Architect.

Kevin walked us through the process of raising money for start-ups using his PACES system: Problem/Answer/Credibility/Evidence/Steps To Take Next. He estimated that in his career, he's been involved in around 10,000 pitches, so had gleaned the "good and the bad" way of raising money from investors.

You don't need a ton of money to get started. Kevin cited the example of Russ Montague, the Co-Founder of ShirtPunch who borrowed $2,000 from his dad to get the business started ... and now makes millions.

He referred to the early days of pitching, or "PowerPoint karaoke" as he called it. Nice phrase!

"You don't need money," he advised. "You need execution. Who's on the team is the most important question. The investor is not buying the idea -- they are buying you."

After an hour of great advice, the attendees divided up into groups of four and then had five minutes to make a pitch to the rest of the group. There were some innovative ideas.

I connected with someone too that has (what I think) is a brilliant idea, so -- true to the theme of the day -- have already pitched him on my services if he needs help launching it ...

John.

HumberLaunch Summer Series Workshop: Branding Your Business

That feeling when the alarm goes off at 6:00 a.m.! Luckily I'm an early bird so it was out of bed, a quick smoothie, shower and off to HumberLaunch's [breakfast] Summer Workshop Series (Herb Communications joined the business incubator a month or so ago).

Today's session was presented by Jacqueline Spicer, Founder of !nk Tank in Toronto. She talked about Branding Your Business.

Jacqueline shared some excellent insights and tips from her many years of experience helping brands of all shapes and sizes, from a variety of industries.

One comment she said that resonated with me [paraphrasing]: "You have a logo, website and are on social media, so you think you have a brand. No. You just have the tools, not the brand."

Yes! Been saying that for ages. It's just a tool, don't be nervous of it. A telephone, fax machine, e-mail that people use all the time = just tools. People are the brands.

"Know that brands are people too," she says. So we both agree on that.

There's a lot of, shall we say, "borrowing of ideas" from the Internet. Jacqueline mentioned that brands sometimes get stuck in their ways. As they say to her: "It's always been done that way and we don't want to break that mold because it's dangerous."

One point I disagreed on is that social media is not for everybody [please see Jacqueline's comments below for clarification on this point]. As I mention here, I believe it can be adapted to help most brands. There's the simple basics of monitoring your industry and competitors, to a full-on campaign of outreach and discussion with your customers.

She mentioned a quote from Simon Sinek, who I'm embarrassed to say is a new name to me: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." Now I plan to read more about Simon.

Lastly, we had to sum up our story in six words. Tricky ... but I think, "Twenty years of knowledge helping others" is close to what I'm striving for.

It's great to be part of a business incubator, get out for a while and listen/learn/chat with others in the same boat.

John.

[Updated with reference to Jacqueline's feedback below.]

Herb Communications is now a member of HumberLaunch

After a tip off from the Mississauga Business Enterprise Centre, that led me to Enterprise Toronto ... I discovered HumberLaunch, an incubator program of entrepreneurial innovation.

And I'm pleased to say that after applying and pitching to their selection panel a week ago, Herb Communications is now a member.

"HumberLaunch is the destination for entrepreneurial innovation. HumberLaunch's mission is to cultivate innovative ideas into successful business ventures while promoting economic development.  Entrepreneurs are provided with physical resources, business advice, knowledge, skills development, mentors and networking opportunities during their start-up phase."

HumberLaunch is the destination for entrepreneurial innovation. HumberLaunch's mission is to cultivate innovative ideas into successful business ventures while promoting economic development. Entrepreneurs are provided with physical resources, business advice, knowledge, skills development, mentors and networking opportunities during their start-up phase.

Linked to Humber College students and alumni, in September 2014 they opened up their free services to the wider community of entrepreneurs and small business start-ups.

I'm confident that the mentoring, events and networking opportunities offered via the incubator will be a great resource for Herb Communications and its clients.

You can never stop learning.

John.