Any kid with start-up dreams has some great examples to look up to.
Nick D’Aloisio was 17 when he sold his news app Summly for US$30 million. Juliette Brindak was 16 when she launched Miss O & Friends. It’s now worth US$15 million. Cameron Johnson was 15 and earning US$400,000 each month with SurfingPrizes.com.
Now Collective Campus’ inaugural ‘business school for kids’ program, dubbed Lemonade Stand, is aiming to create more successful teenage entrepreneurs like these by empowering children to reach their full potential and take advantage of the unique opportunities that today’s business and digital landscape presents.
The program is set to take place during the school holiday season in January 2016.
What will this Lemonade Stand involve?
Lemonade Stand will take place over one week at Collective Campus in Melbourne’s CBD, with a two day course on the 11th and 12th and one day sessions on 13th, 14th and 15th.
The kids will learn business fundamentals – how to identify ideas, design value propositions, develop business models, build physical and digital prototypes, distribute their product, acquire customers, measure success and pitch their ideas to parents at the culmination of the program.
Part of the fun of this course is all about building prototypes to test customer appetite for a product quickly and cheaply, empowering students to take many small bets – a critical mindset to support innovation as they get older.
What kind of prototypes will they build? Minimum Viable Products (MVPs), websites, website landing pages, mobile app prototypes, PowerPoint prototypes, 3D printed prototypes as well as Lego, paper and cardboard prototypes.
Who are the people behind Lemonade Stand?
Collective Campus is an innovation hub co-founded by Steve Glaveski and Sean Qian and located in Melbourne’s CBD where start-ups, SMEs and large enterprise can learn, connect and innovate.
Born out of the Queens Collective tech start-up co-working space, which has been home to the likes of Uber, Zomato, Coinjar and General Assembly, Collective Campus runs classes, workshops and courses on emerging skillsets for individuals and companies across topics such as lean start-up, enterprise innovation, design thinking, customer experience design, web development, digital marketing and data science, amongst other areas.
In addition, the Campus runs countless meetups, panel events and open innovation sessions with a focus on enterprise innovation.
What inspired Collective Campus to start Lemonade Stand?
“December and January is a quiet time for most businesses as it coincides with summer and school holidays,” Steve told Anthill. “We’re big believers in modular education replacing traditional education for not only professionals but also high school and primary school students.
“Technology moves far quicker than our education system can respond and as such it is up to practical educators such as Collective Campus to plug the gap by offering modular education in emerging skill sets that are short, high impact, affordable and effective.
“Going forward we may no longer be asking our children ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ and may be asking them ‘What do you want to create?’ instead.
“Industries are being disrupted and once safe industries such as accounting for example, are no longer a sure thing what with automation, offshoring and independent startups such as Expert360 and Eden McCallum cutting out the firms altogether.
“Today’s youth will need thrive in an environment in which personal reinvention is critical as it is anticipated that Gen Y and Z will have up to seven careers and 15 jobs throughout their lifetime.
“In an age when it has never been easier to start a business, teaching our youth fundamental business skills is imperative to having them think differently and adopt a mindset of ‘what if’ as opposed to ‘what is’.
“While our new PM Malcolm Turnbull has called for a more ‘innovative, creative and agile Australia’, this won’t be possible without a fundamental shift in mindset across age groups, industries and corporate hierarchies.”
