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Launching iSPIRT pre-entrepreneur Program

The clichéd but very apt picture provides the context for this program.

Pre-Entre-programThe media shrill is at peak right now about entrepreneurship and many are jumping headlong into it armed with in depth technology, product management and sales skills. While there is considerable information available on the tangible skills, one of the key skills is self-management and ability to deal with incredible amount of uncertainty, indecisiveness, FOMO, self doubt and various other critical but often ignored aspects. Most are also not exposed to this intensity in their normal corporate existence.

Few folks in iSPIRT have been dwelling on this and with a happy coincidence of many events have come up with a program to address this need. We’re piloting an iSPIRT pre-entrepreneurial program to sketch a path for builders/makers who want to startup, including resources, exercises, and activities that strengthens them for their entrepreneurial marathon. Bringing in the principles of effectuation, developed through observing 45 expert entrepreneurs who have at least 15 years of entrepreneurship. Effectuation puts the entrepreneur as the agent of change, owner of their destiny, and helps them create the future rather than predict it.

The program itself will be a journey through market and personal challenges that a founder must go through when they do a startup. Those going through this program will get tips from experienced entrepreneurs in the Indian ecosystem, frameworks to develop their own products/startups, and a support system through the entrepreneurial journey.

The program will include effectual entrepreneurship and skill-building. This will be a 10 weekend workshop, with 90 minutes per week. The workshop is tentatively scheduled for mid April.

If you know someone who

  1. wants to startup soon
  2. wants to learn the challenges and difficulties of doing a startup
  3. wants a peer group that can help them through the journey
  4. is open to learning about and changing themselves
  5. And wants to co-create this program with iSPIRT,

Please nominate yourselves (or them) here

 

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Your working space inside another startup in Silicon Valley. #AtithiValley

A few decades back, when the technology boom in India was starting and our now ubiquitous technical talent was finding its footing, there remained a huge gulf between the India & the US in terms of exposure and application of new technologies. Which is why a lot of pioneers and early tech visionaries, wanting to be in on the action, decided to take the trip to the Valley itself.

That was a difficult time, as networks weren’t well established, access to companies and face-time with people was limited.

Now isn’t like then.

The rise of the Indian contingent in the Valley has meant that it is far more easier to travel to the US, and perhaps even start operating from there. Moreover, hungry and promising startups can travel to the Valley when they want to, absorb the culture, ask the questions they want answers for, network for funding and come back to get stuff done. This has been happening increasingly in the last few years and slowly positive results are coming out of it. Hobnobbing with product guys, resonating ideas with consumers, strategies for go-to-market, sales execution from professional who have done it many times over, accelerates the time to market.

We at iSPIRT have been thinking about this for some time now; the Valley has a lot to offer to the Indian ecosystem, and we need to use all that it has to offer.

iSPIRT is pleased to announce the Atithi Valley program, a first-of-its-kind initiative that will enable Indian startups to travel to the Valley and call another company’s space as your office for 2-3 months, using their facilities, bumping into creationists and maybe getting mentored. 10 companies have signed up for the program and we have access to around 20+ spaces in Silicon Valley, from San Francisco to San Jose.

If you are a startup and are planning to travel to the Valley in the next few months, please sign up using this form and get one of the iSPIRT Founder Product Circle donors or Fellows to recommend you. We will help you find a space in the Valley, opening up a new vista of knowledge and opportunity.