23A - Unfair Advantage

1.    Life Experience - I have been through a lot of the experiences that young people sometimes find daunting. 

·     Valuable : this is valuable because it is what the idea is based on. 

·     Rare : Not rare at all. I don’t think I know everything, and there are people that are much, much smarter than me. 

·     Inimitable: Life experience is something that everyone possesses. 

·     Non-substitutable: There is no substitute for going through an experience. 

2.    Social Capital - Age: I’m not that far from the “no experience” age, and can remember feeling the way many young people do. 

·     This will be valuable in relating to others. 

·     This isn’t rare. 

·     It is possible for others to relate to this, so it isn’t rare. 

·     It is substitutable. Age is not proprietary. 

3.    Social Capital - Making Mistakes: I have made a lot of the mistakes I want to help others not make.

·     Making these mistakes is valuable to learning how to do things correctly and make more sound choices. 

·     Mistakes aren’t rare. 

·     Mistakes are imitable, but why would you imitate mistakes?

·     Mistakes are unavoidable, but not necessarily non-substitutable. 

4.    Work Ethic – Working construction at an early age taught me to work hard and show up every day, and work through roadblocks. 

·     Extremely valuable when trying to get a product off the ground. 

·     While good work ethic is not rare, sometimes it can fluctuate. 

·     A great thing to imitate.

·      I don’t think there is a substitute for doing the hard work. 

5.    Good Karma – Helping people make better decisions is something that is good across the board. Difficult to find a negative thing about helping people.

·     Valuable from a self-worth standpoint. Helping others can make one feel good. 

·     Not rare. 

·     Inimitability would be a plus. 

·     Not necessarily substitutable. 

6.    Tech Savvy – Starting a database-based app comes with its own challenges. I have been tasked in the past with creating and maintaining databases at work.

·     Extremely valuable to know how these systems work. 

·     Not necessarily rare, there are more and more people learning every year. 

·     Very imitable, as there are much more tech savvy people than me. 

·     Substitutable by specific company’s IT support. 

7.    Ease of access to information – Utilizing technology already out there makes it simpler to get information to the masses.

·     Valuable because it is how we would get the information out. 

·     Not rare because many people have smart devices.

·     Inimitability not a factor here, again it’s a good thing to imitate. 

·     No need to substitute. 

8.    Financial Capital – Sound choices up to this point have afforded me the ability to be taken seriously at financial institutions.

·     Very valuable to get any venture off the ground.

·     Not rare to have good financial backing. 

·     Easily imitated. 

·     You would not be able to substitute this. Every business needs money. 

9.    People resources – The “adults” around me are great resources. What I lack in any category, they usually have the answer.

·     This is valuable across the board to have a good support network. 

·     Not rare as a lot of people have great support systems. 

·      I think this is another good thing to imitate. 

·     Having trusted resources for situations that come up isn’t something that you would want to substitute out. 

10.  Ability to work anywhere – Adulting advice is something that isn’t limited to a specific area. 

·     Valuable because the information can be applied across the board. 

·      I think that this is something that is rare. A lot of people are pigeon-holed to specific locations. 

·     This is not easily imitated but possible. 

·     NO substitute for having a presense that isn’t tied to a geographic location. 

I think by far the best resource for my venture would have to be a tie between life experience and tech savvy. I can’t help others without going through similar stuff, and being tech savvy is paramount to gathering the information and getting it out to the customer base.