Lessons from the Beer industry

Today we had a guest lecture Rob Heyns the founder of The League of Beers and a former Genesis student. I find meeting former genesis students very interesting, the question I always ask is what are they doing now? The interesting thing is that their directions are so divers. I would like to share a few lessons that Rob Heyns shared with us today.

Lesson 1

Be creative and persistent however willing to develop your idea. This was a great reminder of a lesson from a previous Genesis lecture about the lean start-up, testing your idea and allowing for iterations and/or pivots. When I look at our product this year I see that we practically applied this lesson in the design of our product as we went from prototype to prototype changing aspects here and there and even half way through sales deciding to sew our coat pockets closed. We were always looking to improve. A lesson I will definitely take into the future.

Lesson 2

“If plan “A” didn’t work, the alphabet has 26 more letters. Stay Cool” J this puts a smile on my face. You see it is very easy to get demotivated when your idea is shot down or it does not work out. In as much as we must be persistent in pursuing our ideas, realising that it’s time to let go and there are possibilities other than your current idea is comforting as well as motivating.

Lesson 3

“Traction”

I have heard this word being used by entrepreneurs before and in presentations. Businesses are only really viable if they can prove that they have traction i.e. sales…revenue…brining in the moola. Looking at our business, it has traction and we are making sales and I definitely think it could do so much more in the future.

So thank-you Rob Heyns…Stay Cool