April 24, 2025 • 36 mins
Georgetown University is redefining entrepreneurial education by building a mission-driven ecosystem where innovation thrives.
In this episode, our host, James Mackey, and Ben Zimmerman, Managing Director of Georgetown Entrepreneurship, share Georgetown’s unique approach to fostering an environment that helps startups succeed. From student programs to alumni support through the Venture Lab, the initiative offers mentorship, funding, and real-world experience at every stage.
Discover how Georgetown is cultivating entrepreneurship for the common good—one venture at a time.
Thank you to our sponsor, SecureVision, for making this show possible!
Our host James Mackey
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm your host, james Mackey.
Welcome to the BreakthroughHiring Show.
Today I have the ManagingDirector of Georgetown
Entrepreneurship, ben Zimmerman,on the show.
Ben, thanks for joining us.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
That's awesome to be here, really great to know James
and to have brought him intoour ecosystem.
We're really blessed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Yeah, well, really excited to do this episode.
I know we've been planning onit for a few months now, so I'm
glad we're finally able to hitrecord and make it happen.
Before we jump into what you'redoing at Georgetown
Entrepreneurship, we'd love tolearn a little bit more about
your background.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Sure, yeah, my background is varied in some
sense, but I think that the mainthread that my background has
had through gosh 20 plus yearsis through education.
I started off as a teacher.
I was trained as a middleschool humanities teacher,
worked my way through tobecoming more of an
(00:50):
administrator.
That was.
My goal in life was to be aschool principal and didn't end
up quite going in that directionbut ended up more in the higher
ed space because I got a littleburnt out as a teacher in a
classroom setting with youngerstudents.
So I was like I want to stay ineducation, found my way to
Georgetown and was going to usethat opportunity to take some
(01:11):
courses, figure out the nextpath and basically had a side
hustle myself as a tutor, builta little tutoring company it was
just me grew that to a pointwhere it was hey, it's time to
either hire some more people tohelp grow it or essentially quit
(01:32):
something else in my life.
So my wife was pregnant at thetime.
I had the day job at Georgetownworking in a learning and
assessment role and I was aboutto start an MBA program.
On top of this side hustlebusiness I had tutoring families
around the greater District ofColumbia area, so you could
probably take a guess on whichones of those I should not say
(01:53):
get rid of.
I elected to let my littletutoring business fizzle.
Basically, clients I had.
I said my goal in that job wasto tutor my way out of a job.
It was to say, I'm going tohelp students that have
executive functioningdeficiencies keep themselves
organized and, once I set upthose structures, send them on
(02:13):
their way, set the systems upfor the families.
And so, once those students wereall set, I focused in on the
MBA and then actually, Isimultaneously found the
Georgetown EntrepreneurshipInitiative and my esteemed
colleague, boss Jeffrey, took meunder his wings hey, I need
help.
Basically organized hisfinances and started with that,
(02:37):
and then we came into somefunding right about that same
time this is like circa 2018.
And the funding was to gotowards one of our main pillars
now, which is around venturedevelopment engagement, to start
our venture lab.
So I built that and over thecourse of about a year from the
(02:58):
ground up, we had, at one point,40 plus ventures in there doing
all sorts of things, but allGeorgetown alumni so happy to
talk more about that.
But that's how I came to be andbeen able to grow a lot of the
various things we do atGeorgetown Entrepreneurship and
work with just fantastic,inspiring people like James
(03:20):
Mackey.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Yeah, I appreciate you say that.
So the entrepreneurship programwas founded, you said in 2018?
.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
No, jeff Reed started it around 2010.
Okay, 2010.
Yeah, but I started with theprogram in about 2018.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, Nice, okay, gotcha, and I know the program's
grown considerably over thattime.
I think what I'd love to beable to share with our audience
is about what you're currentlyoffering to primarily just
students, I think.
Start there and then, if wehave time, to get into also what
you're offering to alumni,that'd be pretty cool too.
But do you want to give us ahigh level over there?
And then I'm sure I'll havefollow-up questions to ask you.
(03:58):
Surely.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
We do a lot.
Our motto in the office, so tospeak, is we do a lot with a
little.
It's a lean startup approach.
We practice what we preach andwe're really proud of that, to
the point where we won an awardthrough the Global Consortium of
Entrepreneurship Centers lastfall for being the best
entrepreneurship center one ofon the globe for 2020, I guess
(04:21):
that's 2024.
So part of that was tobroadcast what we do.
We have three pillars studentformation, venture development
and engagement and thoughtleadership.
That's how we bucket all thestuff we do and I'm not trying
to gloat, it's just one of thosethings that we try to see what
(04:41):
the problem is, so to speak, atthe university and how we can
help solve it from anentrepreneurial mindset.
And ultimately, those threepillars.
The goal is to inculcate thepeople in our ecosystem with an
entrepreneurial mindset, notnecessarily just start
businesses, not to makebillion-dollar acquisitions, ipo
(05:02):
, spacs, nothing like that.
It's all about in each personto do that, and that's a really
grounded way to think through itfrom a Jesuit perspective,
which is the main function tenetof Georgetown University over
other institutions.
So we're really happy with that.
So I can dive into each ofthose pillars.
I can pause there if you hadany follow-up questions before I
(05:24):
dive into the Pillars.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Yeah, no, that was very helpful and clear.
So yeah, let's dive into it,sure.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
So start with student formation by all means is our
largest population that we serve.
Last year alone we served over3,000 unique students.
From our calculations, in thevarious things that we do
there's a minor.
You can minor inentrepreneurship if you're a
business school student.
We aspire to broaden that tothe entire university in the
(05:53):
near future.
There are disparate coursesthat have entrepreneurship
threads in them that we considerpart of our academics and those
are open across campus to allstudents in many senses.
But the majority of thestudents that we are serving do
come from the School of Business.
But our tagline is GeorgetownEntrepreneurship serving all of
(06:16):
Georgetown University from theMcDonough School of Business.
The other key components of theacademic side of student
formation center around the waystudents interact in a club
sense right.
So there are student clubs.
The main ones that we workclosely with are the Georgetown
Entrepreneurship Club,Georgetown Ventures, which
(06:36):
largely circles around being anaccelerator, a peer-to-peer
accelerator, at the institution.
So they're recruiting studentcompanies and it's that kind of
different side of interacting.
We help advise them using ourentrepreneurs and residents.
We can talk about more of thatlater.
And then there are other groupsthat we work a little bit more
loosely with, but those are themain student clubs.
(06:58):
We have a big academic sidearound the Georgetown Startup
Interns Program.
One of our adjunct entrepreneurresidents teaches a
three-credit course, so studentscan.
It's a triad you can take thecourse for three credits, you
get help being placed in astartup internship and you can
be assigned a leadership coach.
(07:19):
So that's a growing programthat a lot of students take
advantage of, because everyonewants to be an intern somewhere
while you're a student.
It's a great opportunity.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
That's actually my software company, june actually
in the fall semester as agraduate student on the computer
science program that'sinterning for us and we're
actually onboarding.
We actually had such a goodexperience with him that it
looks like he's going to try tocontinue the internship and do
it again, so he might becontinuing and then we are
onboarding, hopefully.
(07:48):
Actually we're going to bemaking an offer later today for
another intern to start on forthe spring semester.
Amazing, I got to get back toMike later, but yeah, it's a
great program and we've just thestudents that are part of the
program.
They're just so incrediblybright right.
Yeah, it's been great.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Yeah, it's been great .
Yeah, there's something specialabout Georgetown students that
I just can't.
It's infectious, and I say thatas having been one myself, but
by no means I.
The ones I work with are justlike so impressive all the time
and they get stuff done and theydo it well and they do it with
pride.
And I think, above all,georgetown entrepreneurship are
really about entrepreneurshipfor the common good and I think
(08:27):
that kind of echoes through allthe programming we do.
So I was at so where was I?
Georgetown startup interns wedo have a global component of
that too, which, in essence,it's that triad I spoke of
trying to help firms abroadattract Georgetown students,
usually during the summer months.
(08:48):
We're focused on the summermonths and we've toyed with a
few different ideas, but MexicoCity is really where we focused
the past few years.
Next year we aim to focus alittle bit broader and the goal
there is really just we helpcreate a marketplace.
You have a startup you're inTel Aviv great, we'll market
that to our students and we helpthat partnership happen.
(09:09):
Just like James had mentioned,secure Vision was utilizing it.
Another big program that's beenaround for 10 plus years is the
Summer Launch Incubator.
That is what you think of inthe startup world, like Y
Combinator, but a very juniorversion of that.
But the startup excuse me, thesummer launch incubator.
(09:31):
We have a thought leader.
We have an entrepreneur inresidence.
Amy Millman currently runs that.
She's been running that for thepast two years.
Previous to that, she ran aincubator called Springboard
Enterprises I think they calledit, but Springboard.
It was a women-only,healthcare-focused tech
incubator.
So she is just an unbelievableresource to be running this and
(09:58):
essentially what we do.
We're going to spice it up alittle bit this summer, make
things a little more exclusive.
Spice it up a little bit thissummer, make things a little
more exclusive.
Goal is to pick five venturescurrent students or recent grads
come May and surround them withmentors, surround them with
resources and really curate aprocess for those five ventures
(10:19):
to help them launch to themarketplace or grow if they're
already in there.
We've traditionally done morecompanies, but the goal is to
kind of zero in on a few, just afew companies.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
So are you so?
Are you investing in thesecompanies as well, or is it
primarily advisement?
Speaker 2 (10:37):
We are not investing in them any more than, obviously
, time, intellect insights.
But they do earn.
Traditionally they've earned$2,000 stipend.
We're going to up that ante toabout 5,000 this summer, but
really we want students tocommit right and 2,000 is just,
it's not a lot of money.
(10:57):
But but no, we do not invest.
There are no programs currentlythat we do invest in.
Right now it's all non-dilutiveUse, as you wish.
The only exception would be wedo have in our I can talk more
about this later.
On the venture development sideof things is the Georgetown
Entrepreneurship Alliance, whichwe work close partnership with.
(11:18):
Our advancement office has thegeorgetown angel investment
network which, as it sounds, isa network of georgetown brethren
that are investing as angels ingeorgetown companies.
So that's nice right now.
The main place, that and theonly place where we are
(11:41):
investing in companies is that?
Speaker 1 (11:43):
is that a program that, like any angel investor,
can join?
It's not Okay.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Yeah, you do have to be an accredited investor, but
you have to be an alum ofGeorgetown.
So it's that loyalty componentof investing that sometimes can
be elusive in other ventureinstruments.
So that's the deal there.
We don't benefit monetarily.
(12:11):
Georgetown Entrepreneurshipdoes not.
That's strictly on the angels.
But it is a construct that hasgrown under our kind of umbrella
.
That's true.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
Uh, so you have this incubator, right.
But then you also have theVenture Lab, which is, you said,
this was like the program wejust mentioned.
It's over the summer, lot ofgreat stuff, as I outlined,
majority of what we do.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
There are a few other student formation things I can
talk about later.
But the alumni side was like wedo a few things for alumni and
majority of Georgetown brethrenare alumni, right, and it was
like what can we do for them?
We said let's start by creatinga space.
One of our advisory groupmembers had mentioned that
(13:10):
another one of his alma matershad a lab type structure where
alumni of the institution couldsay, hey, this is lonely, hey, I
need more resources, all thethings that entrepreneurs go
through and they created aco-working space.
Essentially this is in New YorkCity, which brought together X
(13:30):
amount of ventures a year.
They all sat together on aregular cadence and worked
together Water cooler stuff, Ithink.
Water cooler interactions.
They would have lunch andlearns, they would have talent
brought in to them, and it wasto create an ecosystem in a very
small sense in one city, andours is in Washington DC.
(13:53):
We've had that since 2018.
It's in a WeWork, so we do havethe turnkey readiness of a
WeWork, versus doing it oncampus, which is always fun, but
you're beholden to hey, we needto use your space type stuff.
Where this is our own thing, itdoes mean we do have to fund it
and that is funded incombination with another program
(14:16):
we have, which James isinvolved in, called Bark Tank.
The Leonsis family funds theVenture Lab, and we've had that
blessing and I was just runningsome statistics there.
Hundreds of millions of dollarshave been raised by these
companies.
Right, there's some big hittersin there, but it's been a big
success and I think the realityis that the attrition and
(14:39):
failure rate of startups writlarge is 90% or so.
Right, we've seen a far betteroutcome.
There are companies that don'tmake it for sure from the
Venture Lab, but that communityhas helped considerably bring
those numbers closer to like 30,40%.
So, anyhow, still room forimprovement, but a really great
(14:59):
resource for any Georgetownalumni of any program at any
point in time that is in theDistrict of Columbia looking for
low-cost office space but, moreimportantly, a community to
help them grow.
Definitely.
So, yeah, I'll talk a little bitmore about venture development
now that we talked about theVenture Lab, the Summer Launch
(15:20):
Incubator.
The Summer Launch Incubator inparticular is a bridge between
student formation and venturedevelopment because we're
focusing on students for summerlaunch incubator, but it's
strictly hey, we're helping youbuild a business, build a
venture, just like the venturelab is.
And the venture lab, again, isonly for alumni, and there are
times where we bring the summerlaunch incubator, for example,
(15:43):
to the lab, the physical space,in the summer to have those
collisions between currententrepreneurs and aspiring
entrepreneurs.
So that's one kind of beautifulway to see those two things
match each other.
We have received another verygenerous gift from the Leonsis
(16:14):
family for $5 million last yearthat basically will fund that
lab for the next few years, aswell as the Bark Tank, pitch
competition and one way to keepall this together and basically
prophesize all the things we do,we've created something called
the Startup Ambassadors and amajor component that bridges
student formation and venturedevelopment is mentorship at
Georgetown.
So the Startup Ambassadors arevery new.
(16:37):
Right now.
We've hired part-time a few MBAstudents, so they're students
that are currently studying.
They've worked somewhere intheir life before getting their
master's degree, and that's notalways common, right?
There are a lot of master'sprograms that will accept
students right out of college.
So these are students that haveeither been in a startup setup,
(16:58):
created a company of their own,or very interested in it, but
they've also worked, so theyhave that street credibility, so
to speak, to help mentor, to acertain extent, other students
and alumni.
The main function of this, thestartup ambassador, is to really
know all of what we do and helpguide students to the next
(17:19):
thing, not say, hey, this iswhat you got to do with your,
your P and L and here's how youattract customers.
Some of that happens, but it'sreally guess what?
I know the perfect person foryou, jimbo, that I'm talking to,
you should go talk toEntrepreneur-in-Residence X, and
that's a good segue to talkabout again.
(17:42):
This bridge between studentformation and venture
development is we have anEntrepreneur-in and we have an
experts on call program, theentrepreneurs in residence.
Right now we're, I think, at 35, they're from various walks of
life.
We try to keep a very diversecore of these mentors.
You can find them all on ourwebsite and any Georgetown
(18:05):
student or alum can reach out toone of these EIRs at any time
and say, hey, I'd like to have acoffee or I'd like to chat on
the computer or chat on thephone, so on and so forth.
The entrepreneurs and residents,for the most part, are close to
campus.
In DC, that's the residencepart.
Things have changed a littlebit with respect to being close
(18:28):
because of the pandemic right,we've all got more virtual.
So there's something a littlebit similar to that, because the
experts on call program, bynature, was they're not close to
campus, they're global, butthey have an expertise that we
haven't been able to matchelsewhere.
And those experts on call wehave actually zeroed in on it
(18:50):
being alum focused.
So if you want to be an experton call, we basically are
requiring at this point that youare an alum but that you have
an expertise.
And again, students, alumni,can reach out anytime to these
individuals for insights, career, business life, you name it.
I'll pause there, james.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
So the entrepreneurship and
entrepreneurs in residence andexperts on call.
The main difference is location, essentially just experts on
call, just like national orinternational, versus folks that
are in DC.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yeah, there is a larger.
There is a form, formality tothis.
Again, we're all about buildingcommunity and all the things we
do.
It's not just like one-offprogram there.
It's all about we have a coregroup.
How can we keep them cogent andknow all the things we do, get
them to events?
The entrepreneurs and residentshave a larger commitment.
(19:43):
They're on papers committing tofive to eight hours of their
month Experts on call.
It's less of a commitment.
It's more.
I think it's about four hour orfour interactions.
We say Some get way morebusiness than others, depends on
the trends in the businessworld, but it's just a far less
commitment is the reality,gotcha, yeah, and I wanted to
also make sure we have time totalk about Bark Tank.
(20:11):
This is a program.
You know that the goal is tobring some exclusivity to pitch
competitions.
We do several pitch competitionsthroughout a given academic
year at various levels, and thisone is designed to get the best
and the brightest and aspiringstudent built companies in front
of a highly trained set ofjudges.
And, moreover, the process forthe Bark Tank starts months
(20:32):
before the pitch competition,where there's a nomination
process.
You have to be nominated bysomeone that we will actually
vet, you have to have referencesand then you have the chance to
apply.
We will actually vet, you haveto have references and then you
have the chance to apply.
From those applications, you goin front of a panel of faculty
staff and entrepreneurs andresidents to determine who the
(20:53):
top eight teams are and, fromthat point forward, the top
eight teams are paired with,basically, pitch coaches,
because the timeframe is notnecessarily to accelerate or
totally hone in on the businessmodel.
It's more about let's put yourbest foot forward, given where
you're at right now, and that istypically a four to six week
(21:17):
process of coaching, and Jameshas been doing that, and I don't
know if you want to share itall about your experience, but
that might be fun.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Yeah, it's been.
It's been a lot of fun.
So each of the eightentrepreneurs or eight startups,
we could have more than onefounder.
They essentially have a coupleof months to prepare their pitch
and they're both teamed with.
Every group founder group isteamed with two coaches and
essentially we've, with my team,we've just essentially gone
through optimizing the pitch,getting it down to a tight three
(21:46):
minutes, dialing in on oneclear value proposition,
simplifying the pitch, making itimpactful, trying to show a
clear how the money's going toimpact the business and I think
it's.
It is incredibly valuable forthe entrepreneurs to be able to
leverage the mentor's experienceand then, of course, in my case
, I'm pulling in my network aswell to give our entrepreneur
(22:07):
even more of an advantage.
So what's really cool aboutwhat I've seen over the past
couple of months is I feel likethis has already been incredibly
valuable for the student thatwe're coaching.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Absolutely yeah, and I was just pulling some data
together and we'll share thisout at Actual Bark Tank, this
out at actual bark tank.
Not that these are the only.
Let me just pull this togetherhere.
Not that these are the onlyitems for reporting.
Just give me a second here,sorry yeah, go for it, yeah the
typical things, these vanitymetrics out in in the world of
(22:37):
the startup world, of jobscreated, funds raised, so on and
so forth.
So last last I checked and diddiligence on it the funds that
were distributed through theBark Tank Pitch Competition.
It's $100K or so a year.
They've given away they beingthe Leonsis family $975,000 in
(22:57):
prizes over the course of eightyears.
66 ventures have receivedfunding for that and to date
we've calculated about 1,100jobs created and $412 million
raised.
Pretty cool stats that we'rereally proud of.
(23:20):
But again, I think it's moreabout the lives impacted, the
entrepreneurs being impacted asstudents of the business world,
and it's all about community.
It's about building rapportwith the mentors, with staff,
with faculty, with students andwith the broader ecosystem.
So it's all the things we doare all about that.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Definitely.
I was a judge on a pitchcompetition a couple of years
ago, I think, for Mercore, isthat right?
Yeah, mercore, mercore, andthey recently raised, I think,
like a 30 million series B right.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
They did.
They're doing quite well.
They're in a similar space as,I think, securevision as far as
using AI and helping people findjobs in the tech world.
Yes, but they're doing quitewell.
He actually dropped out.
Brandon Foody dropped out ofGeorgetown to fully pursue his
business and we would never say,hey, drop out, it's time.
(24:16):
But that's one instance wherethings were moving so fast and
he had figured out the formula,so to speak, and it would have
been a hindrance to time wise tostay in school and hopefully he
comes back one day, finisheshis degree and all that jazz.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
But yeah, he's been doing quite well yeah, so
there's some really big successstories in there absolutely,
yeah, absolutely very cool soyou had mentioned, there's
several pitch competitionsthroughout the year.
There's the rocket pitch oneand then you have Bark Tank.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Are there any others?
Yeah yeah, pitch competition.
So we are in the venturedevelopment world.
That's a very major componentof that is venture development
would be behind what we do withpitch competitions, and right
now we are actually developing anew series called just a pitch
series, where we're actuallygoing to go straight to the
source.
So we typically we broadcasthey, apply here to pitch on this
(25:13):
date.
We've got some applications inadvance, and so on and so forth,
and then we find judges andthen people come, there's a
keynote and that's a formula forour pitch competition.
We are going to try somethingnew, largely going from the
ground up, with the studentclubs I mentioned earlier.
They are saying, hey, why don'twe go to like midnight mug?
Why don't we go to the makerspace on campus?
(25:37):
Why don't we go where there area lot, there's a ton of energy
of just students gathering, andwe'll basically do like a pop-up
pitch competition.
They'll be a little yeah,there'll be more advertising
than just that, but it's let'sjust bring our presence there
and the goal is it's more thananything is marketing yeah, for
(25:57):
sure, getting our yeah, gettingourselves out there.
So the goal is to do more ofthat like we initially called it
, micro pitch series, but it'llinevitably be titled something
even fancier.
But this semester we're goingto do three to four of those and
it's lean.
We'll probably have some foodthere, we'll probably market
swag and stuff like that, butthe goal is to bring that ground
(26:19):
up energy to our, our ecosystem.
That I wouldn't say it's waning, but it's definitely something
that it's always a struggle toget a message across campus
because there's so much going onin every nook and cranny and
new programs, new master'sdegrees, new institutes.
The good old guerrillamarketing tends to work best.
(26:41):
Put flyers out and actuallyphysically being in a dorm,
physically being in a coffeeshop that's really where the
trend's going as far as pitchcompetitions shops that's really
where the trend's going as faras pitch competitions.
But as far as venturedevelopment scope, its early
stage is RocketPitch or thesepitch series that we speak of.
You're then in our sphere,summer Launch, incubator, a lot
(27:02):
of those companies from thoseearly stages.
Hey, you're really a masterfulcompany, masterful pitching
there.
Let's hone that business idea,even better, incububate that
idea.
Oftentimes those companies outof the incubator are the bark
tank finalists as well.
So you can see that pattern andI think the trend with the
venture development side ofGeorgetown is to curate more of
(27:25):
a process.
Behind you enter our spherehere, ben Zimmerman, the student
pitching this idea we're goingto actually follow you and track
you and help you, not just doone-off programming, because
that's really the way we are now.
We strive to bring morecontinuity to following a
(27:47):
venture through a process.
Not everyone will get to BarkTank, but we want to make sure
that everyone that wants to havethe time of day of our mentors,
of our ecosystem, that we'reable to better attract them.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
Yeah, yeah and that makes I love it.
I think it's really impactful.
And just being part of BarkTank to me it's the.
This is the event I've had themost fun actually taking part of
here at Georgetown.
Again, I actually doing thementoring with Kevin over at
Serenity Lawn Care.
He's really doing quite a goodjob making the adjustments week
(28:22):
over week.
But on the pitch.
But what's interesting is, aswe're going through the pitch,
there's also hey, this isn'tnecessarily directly related to
your pitch, but also really weshould be dialing into here.
You should consider this.
Or hey, this is something thatyou need to think about for your
business, or shifting thebusiness model a little bit, or
whatever it might be, or just somuch comes up.
Right, while we're refining thepitch, where it's like there's
(28:44):
also all of these takeaways ofwhat you can do to improve your
business.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (28:52):
So I think that's really been.
The interesting part is when Istarted working with Kevin a
couple months back.
That's okay, we're just we'regoing to focus on refining a
pitch, but in doing so, we'vebeen doing a lot of work on the
business.
There's been a lot of thingsthat we're going to be able to
implement right To to help himaccelerate growth and really
make it a huge success.
(29:13):
Right, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Yeah, and I'm sure you'll.
You've formed a partnership,and not a formal partnership,
but a friendship that you'llhopefully continue beyond Bark
Tank too.
That's great.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Yeah, yeah, whatever he needs, it's always exciting
to and fun to work withentrepreneurs, folks that are
willing to put in the blood,sweat and tears to make it
happen, to make the commitment,and it's just.
There's an energy in thoseearly days of starting a company
.
Oh yeah, it's contagious.
It's a lot of fun to be around.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
I'm glad you're able to rekindle that in your own,
your nature good naturedness.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
Yeah, it's always good to stay around it.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
But is there anything else?
We got a few minutes here.
Is there anything else that youwanted to share with the
audience?
Yeah, I've said a lot.
I think again it's.
We can water down what we do tothose three pillars of student
formation, venture developmentand thought leadership.
You know I didn't really chimein on the thought leadership
side as much.
It doesn't mean it's notimportant, but I think the
reality of thought leadership isputting our word out there to
the world, and that is donethrough various channels.
(30:16):
I think the main way we do thethought leadership side of
things is through these newopportunities to engage existing
constructs and to be the personthat convenes the people.
Some examples of that arelargely this is done through
Jeff Reed.
We have a JesuitEntrepreneurship Alliance he's
(30:37):
helped form, in concert withsome of his other contemporaries
that are entrepreneurshipcenter directors.
So, as you can imagine, schoolsthat identify as Jesuit.
We're like hey, there's acommonality in the Jesuit
tradition of entrepreneurship isa thread actually in that
Religion.
Aside, it's like all theseJesuits through thousands of
(30:58):
years have always beenentrepreneurial and the
institutions are glomming ontothat.
As we know, things are verycompetitive, but Jeff convened
those people.
We are a thought leader in theJesuit institution side of that.
So I think that's pretty cool.
More to come on that.
Other main components of thethings that are in the works
thought leadership, wise, theventure and the capital love the
(31:21):
terminology, the focus there.
This grew out of students.
So connection between studentformation and thought leadership
.
Students said, oh my God, we'reso interested in venture
development, writ large.
There's a venture fellowsprogram that we have.
They said we got to do morethan that.
We need to bring together allthe people that have this policy
(31:44):
slant, defense, slant, whathave you?
The big names are coming to DCnow H2Q, andreessen, horowitz,
they're all bringing offices toDC because they know stuff's
going to happen there and ishappening.
Two more things and then I'llbe quiet.
Jeff Reed has done a great jobof convening innovation leaders
(32:06):
from the District of Columbia.
So you think your Nestle's,your Booz Allen's, the various
entities that are corporations,marriott, that have an
innovation, a CIO, so to speak.
He's convened some of theseCIOs to say, hey, cool, you guys
are doing your own thing atthat nook.
Why don't we share resources?
Why don't we share ideas?
(32:27):
Because we're all trying towork together and Jeff's theme
is that it's common good,entrepreneurship, like everybody
needs to make a living, butlike we're all working towards
helping the world, and it justseems like a perfect marriage of
that.
So he's brought those folkstogether, I think on three
different instances, and we lookto continue that series.
And then the last but not least,I would say, around thought
(32:49):
leadership.
A major breakthrough one is.
And then the last but not least, I would say, around thought
leadership, a major breakthroughone is more the incubators, as
it were, around town, thedistrict, sorry, union kitchens,
right, the Jose Andres thoughtleaders, the people in the Think
Food group, all those peopledoing work with the startups,
whereas those innovation hubslike the Marriott's, they're
doing it on a corporate level.
(33:09):
These are the more organic.
Hey go finding startups, havingthem convene in different ups
and crannies around town.
This one I'm not justifying forthe sake of a podcast, but I
think that's one like Jeff.
This thought leadership onewould be a great, I think,
podcast.
For Jeff probably to do is talkmore about all those things.
But that's it in a nutshell.
(33:30):
I've definitely left out a fewprograms, but it's a mouthful.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yeah, it's definitely a good high level and we could
always jump back on for anotherepisode if there's more to
always more to cover.
But, ben, thank you so much forjoining us today.
It's a lot of fun getting toknow you and the
entrepreneurship program andwhat you guys are building, and
I'm very excited to be part ofit.
So thanks for letting me dothat.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
But yeah, make sure to come back on sometime soon
and update us Absolutely, alwayshere to help, absolutely In the
future.
Take it easy.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Take care and for everybody tuning in.
Thank you so much for joiningus and we'll talk to you soon.
Hi, I'm your host, james Mackey.
Welcome to the BreakthroughHiring Show.
Today I have the ManagingDirector of Georgetown
Entrepreneurship, ben Zimmerman,on the show.
Ben, thanks for joining us.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
That's awesome to be here, really great to know James
and to have brought him intoour ecosystem.
We're really blessed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Yeah, well, really excited to do this episode.
I know we've been planning onit for a few months now, so I'm
glad we're finally able to hitrecord and make it happen.
Before we jump into what you'redoing at Georgetown
Entrepreneurship, we'd love tolearn a little bit more about
your background.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Sure, yeah, my background is varied in some
sense, but I think that the mainthread that my background has
had through gosh 20 plus yearsis through education.
I started off as a teacher.
I was trained as a middleschool humanities teacher,
worked my way through tobecoming more of an
(00:50):
administrator.
That was.
My goal in life was to be aschool principal and didn't end
up quite going in that directionbut ended up more in the higher
ed space because I got a littleburnt out as a teacher in a
classroom setting with youngerstudents.
So I was like I want to stay ineducation, found my way to
Georgetown and was going to usethat opportunity to take some
(01:11):
courses, figure out the nextpath and basically had a side
hustle myself as a tutor, builta little tutoring company it was
just me grew that to a pointwhere it was hey, it's time to
either hire some more people tohelp grow it or essentially quit
(01:32):
something else in my life.
So my wife was pregnant at thetime.
I had the day job at Georgetownworking in a learning and
assessment role and I was aboutto start an MBA program.
On top of this side hustlebusiness I had tutoring families
around the greater District ofColumbia area, so you could
probably take a guess on whichones of those I should not say
(01:53):
get rid of.
I elected to let my littletutoring business fizzle.
Basically, clients I had.
I said my goal in that job wasto tutor my way out of a job.
It was to say, I'm going tohelp students that have
executive functioningdeficiencies keep themselves
organized and, once I set upthose structures, send them on
(02:13):
their way, set the systems upfor the families.
And so, once those students wereall set, I focused in on the
MBA and then actually, Isimultaneously found the
Georgetown EntrepreneurshipInitiative and my esteemed
colleague, boss Jeffrey, took meunder his wings hey, I need
help.
Basically organized hisfinances and started with that,
(02:37):
and then we came into somefunding right about that same
time this is like circa 2018.
And the funding was to gotowards one of our main pillars
now, which is around venturedevelopment engagement, to start
our venture lab.
So I built that and over thecourse of about a year from the
(02:58):
ground up, we had, at one point,40 plus ventures in there doing
all sorts of things, but allGeorgetown alumni so happy to
talk more about that.
But that's how I came to be andbeen able to grow a lot of the
various things we do atGeorgetown Entrepreneurship and
work with just fantastic,inspiring people like James
(03:20):
Mackey.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Yeah, I appreciate you say that.
So the entrepreneurship programwas founded, you said in 2018?
.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
No, jeff Reed started it around 2010.
Okay, 2010.
Yeah, but I started with theprogram in about 2018.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, Nice, okay, gotcha, and I know the program's
grown considerably over thattime.
I think what I'd love to beable to share with our audience
is about what you're currentlyoffering to primarily just
students, I think.
Start there and then, if wehave time, to get into also what
you're offering to alumni,that'd be pretty cool too.
But do you want to give us ahigh level over there?
And then I'm sure I'll havefollow-up questions to ask you.
(03:58):
Surely.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
We do a lot.
Our motto in the office, so tospeak, is we do a lot with a
little.
It's a lean startup approach.
We practice what we preach andwe're really proud of that, to
the point where we won an awardthrough the Global Consortium of
Entrepreneurship Centers lastfall for being the best
entrepreneurship center one ofon the globe for 2020, I guess
(04:21):
that's 2024.
So part of that was tobroadcast what we do.
We have three pillars studentformation, venture development
and engagement and thoughtleadership.
That's how we bucket all thestuff we do and I'm not trying
to gloat, it's just one of thosethings that we try to see what
(04:41):
the problem is, so to speak, atthe university and how we can
help solve it from anentrepreneurial mindset.
And ultimately, those threepillars.
The goal is to inculcate thepeople in our ecosystem with an
entrepreneurial mindset, notnecessarily just start
businesses, not to makebillion-dollar acquisitions, ipo
(05:02):
, spacs, nothing like that.
It's all about in each personto do that, and that's a really
grounded way to think through itfrom a Jesuit perspective,
which is the main function tenetof Georgetown University over
other institutions.
So we're really happy with that.
So I can dive into each ofthose pillars.
I can pause there if you hadany follow-up questions before I
(05:24):
dive into the Pillars.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Yeah, no, that was very helpful and clear.
So yeah, let's dive into it,sure.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
So start with student formation by all means is our
largest population that we serve.
Last year alone we served over3,000 unique students.
From our calculations, in thevarious things that we do
there's a minor.
You can minor inentrepreneurship if you're a
business school student.
We aspire to broaden that tothe entire university in the
(05:53):
near future.
There are disparate coursesthat have entrepreneurship
threads in them that we considerpart of our academics and those
are open across campus to allstudents in many senses.
But the majority of thestudents that we are serving do
come from the School of Business.
But our tagline is GeorgetownEntrepreneurship serving all of
(06:16):
Georgetown University from theMcDonough School of Business.
The other key components of theacademic side of student
formation center around the waystudents interact in a club
sense right.
So there are student clubs.
The main ones that we workclosely with are the Georgetown
Entrepreneurship Club,Georgetown Ventures, which
(06:36):
largely circles around being anaccelerator, a peer-to-peer
accelerator, at the institution.
So they're recruiting studentcompanies and it's that kind of
different side of interacting.
We help advise them using ourentrepreneurs and residents.
We can talk about more of thatlater.
And then there are other groupsthat we work a little bit more
loosely with, but those are themain student clubs.
(06:58):
We have a big academic sidearound the Georgetown Startup
Interns Program.
One of our adjunct entrepreneurresidents teaches a
three-credit course, so studentscan.
It's a triad you can take thecourse for three credits, you
get help being placed in astartup internship and you can
be assigned a leadership coach.
(07:19):
So that's a growing programthat a lot of students take
advantage of, because everyonewants to be an intern somewhere
while you're a student.
It's a great opportunity.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
That's actually my software company, june actually
in the fall semester as agraduate student on the computer
science program that'sinterning for us and we're
actually onboarding.
We actually had such a goodexperience with him that it
looks like he's going to try tocontinue the internship and do
it again, so he might becontinuing and then we are
onboarding, hopefully.
(07:48):
Actually we're going to bemaking an offer later today for
another intern to start on forthe spring semester.
Amazing, I got to get back toMike later, but yeah, it's a
great program and we've just thestudents that are part of the
program.
They're just so incrediblybright right.
Yeah, it's been great.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Yeah, it's been great .
Yeah, there's something specialabout Georgetown students that
I just can't.
It's infectious, and I say thatas having been one myself, but
by no means I.
The ones I work with are justlike so impressive all the time
and they get stuff done and theydo it well and they do it with
pride.
And I think, above all,georgetown entrepreneurship are
really about entrepreneurshipfor the common good and I think
(08:27):
that kind of echoes through allthe programming we do.
So I was at so where was I?
Georgetown startup interns wedo have a global component of
that too, which, in essence,it's that triad I spoke of
trying to help firms abroadattract Georgetown students,
usually during the summer months.
(08:48):
We're focused on the summermonths and we've toyed with a
few different ideas, but MexicoCity is really where we focused
the past few years.
Next year we aim to focus alittle bit broader and the goal
there is really just we helpcreate a marketplace.
You have a startup you're inTel Aviv great, we'll market
that to our students and we helpthat partnership happen.
(09:09):
Just like James had mentioned,secure Vision was utilizing it.
Another big program that's beenaround for 10 plus years is the
Summer Launch Incubator.
That is what you think of inthe startup world, like Y
Combinator, but a very juniorversion of that.
But the startup excuse me, thesummer launch incubator.
(09:31):
We have a thought leader.
We have an entrepreneur inresidence.
Amy Millman currently runs that.
She's been running that for thepast two years.
Previous to that, she ran aincubator called Springboard
Enterprises I think they calledit, but Springboard.
It was a women-only,healthcare-focused tech
incubator.
So she is just an unbelievableresource to be running this and
(09:58):
essentially what we do.
We're going to spice it up alittle bit this summer, make
things a little more exclusive.
Spice it up a little bit thissummer, make things a little
more exclusive.
Goal is to pick five venturescurrent students or recent grads
come May and surround them withmentors, surround them with
resources and really curate aprocess for those five ventures
(10:19):
to help them launch to themarketplace or grow if they're
already in there.
We've traditionally done morecompanies, but the goal is to
kind of zero in on a few, just afew companies.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
So are you so?
Are you investing in thesecompanies as well, or is it
primarily advisement?
Speaker 2 (10:37):
We are not investing in them any more than, obviously
, time, intellect insights.
But they do earn.
Traditionally they've earned$2,000 stipend.
We're going to up that ante toabout 5,000 this summer, but
really we want students tocommit right and 2,000 is just,
it's not a lot of money.
(10:57):
But but no, we do not invest.
There are no programs currentlythat we do invest in.
Right now it's all non-dilutiveUse, as you wish.
The only exception would be wedo have in our I can talk more
about this later.
On the venture development sideof things is the Georgetown
Entrepreneurship Alliance, whichwe work close partnership with.
(11:18):
Our advancement office has thegeorgetown angel investment
network which, as it sounds, isa network of georgetown brethren
that are investing as angels ingeorgetown companies.
So that's nice right now.
The main place, that and theonly place where we are
(11:41):
investing in companies is that?
Speaker 1 (11:43):
is that a program that, like any angel investor,
can join?
It's not Okay.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Yeah, you do have to be an accredited investor, but
you have to be an alum ofGeorgetown.
So it's that loyalty componentof investing that sometimes can
be elusive in other ventureinstruments.
So that's the deal there.
We don't benefit monetarily.
(12:11):
Georgetown Entrepreneurshipdoes not.
That's strictly on the angels.
But it is a construct that hasgrown under our kind of umbrella
.
That's true.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
Uh, so you have this incubator, right.
But then you also have theVenture Lab, which is, you said,
this was like the program wejust mentioned.
It's over the summer, lot ofgreat stuff, as I outlined,
majority of what we do.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
There are a few other student formation things I can
talk about later.
But the alumni side was like wedo a few things for alumni and
majority of Georgetown brethrenare alumni, right, and it was
like what can we do for them?
We said let's start by creatinga space.
One of our advisory groupmembers had mentioned that
(13:10):
another one of his alma matershad a lab type structure where
alumni of the institution couldsay, hey, this is lonely, hey, I
need more resources, all thethings that entrepreneurs go
through and they created aco-working space.
Essentially this is in New YorkCity, which brought together X
(13:30):
amount of ventures a year.
They all sat together on aregular cadence and worked
together Water cooler stuff, Ithink.
Water cooler interactions.
They would have lunch andlearns, they would have talent
brought in to them, and it wasto create an ecosystem in a very
small sense in one city, andours is in Washington DC.
(13:53):
We've had that since 2018.
It's in a WeWork, so we do havethe turnkey readiness of a
WeWork, versus doing it oncampus, which is always fun, but
you're beholden to hey, we needto use your space type stuff.
Where this is our own thing, itdoes mean we do have to fund it
and that is funded incombination with another program
(14:16):
we have, which James isinvolved in, called Bark Tank.
The Leonsis family funds theVenture Lab, and we've had that
blessing and I was just runningsome statistics there.
Hundreds of millions of dollarshave been raised by these
companies.
Right, there's some big hittersin there, but it's been a big
success and I think the realityis that the attrition and
(14:39):
failure rate of startups writlarge is 90% or so.
Right, we've seen a far betteroutcome.
There are companies that don'tmake it for sure from the
Venture Lab, but that communityhas helped considerably bring
those numbers closer to like 30,40%.
So, anyhow, still room forimprovement, but a really great
(14:59):
resource for any Georgetownalumni of any program at any
point in time that is in theDistrict of Columbia looking for
low-cost office space but, moreimportantly, a community to
help them grow.
Definitely.
So, yeah, I'll talk a little bitmore about venture development
now that we talked about theVenture Lab, the Summer Launch
(15:20):
Incubator.
The Summer Launch Incubator inparticular is a bridge between
student formation and venturedevelopment because we're
focusing on students for summerlaunch incubator, but it's
strictly hey, we're helping youbuild a business, build a
venture, just like the venturelab is.
And the venture lab, again, isonly for alumni, and there are
times where we bring the summerlaunch incubator, for example,
(15:43):
to the lab, the physical space,in the summer to have those
collisions between currententrepreneurs and aspiring
entrepreneurs.
So that's one kind of beautifulway to see those two things
match each other.
We have received another verygenerous gift from the Leonsis
(16:14):
family for $5 million last yearthat basically will fund that
lab for the next few years, aswell as the Bark Tank, pitch
competition and one way to keepall this together and basically
prophesize all the things we do,we've created something called
the Startup Ambassadors and amajor component that bridges
student formation and venturedevelopment is mentorship at
Georgetown.
So the Startup Ambassadors arevery new.
(16:37):
Right now.
We've hired part-time a few MBAstudents, so they're students
that are currently studying.
They've worked somewhere intheir life before getting their
master's degree, and that's notalways common, right?
There are a lot of master'sprograms that will accept
students right out of college.
So these are students that haveeither been in a startup setup,
(16:58):
created a company of their own,or very interested in it, but
they've also worked, so theyhave that street credibility, so
to speak, to help mentor, to acertain extent, other students
and alumni.
The main function of this, thestartup ambassador, is to really
know all of what we do and helpguide students to the next
(17:19):
thing, not say, hey, this iswhat you got to do with your,
your P and L and here's how youattract customers.
Some of that happens, but it'sreally guess what?
I know the perfect person foryou, jimbo, that I'm talking to,
you should go talk toEntrepreneur-in-Residence X, and
that's a good segue to talkabout again.
(17:42):
This bridge between studentformation and venture
development is we have anEntrepreneur-in and we have an
experts on call program, theentrepreneurs in residence.
Right now we're, I think, at 35, they're from various walks of
life.
We try to keep a very diversecore of these mentors.
You can find them all on ourwebsite and any Georgetown
(18:05):
student or alum can reach out toone of these EIRs at any time
and say, hey, I'd like to have acoffee or I'd like to chat on
the computer or chat on thephone, so on and so forth.
The entrepreneurs and residents,for the most part, are close to
campus.
In DC, that's the residencepart.
Things have changed a littlebit with respect to being close
(18:28):
because of the pandemic right,we've all got more virtual.
So there's something a littlebit similar to that, because the
experts on call program, bynature, was they're not close to
campus, they're global, butthey have an expertise that we
haven't been able to matchelsewhere.
And those experts on call wehave actually zeroed in on it
(18:50):
being alum focused.
So if you want to be an experton call, we basically are
requiring at this point that youare an alum but that you have
an expertise.
And again, students, alumni,can reach out anytime to these
individuals for insights, career, business life, you name it.
I'll pause there, james.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
So the entrepreneurship and
entrepreneurs in residence andexperts on call.
The main difference is location, essentially just experts on
call, just like national orinternational, versus folks that
are in DC.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yeah, there is a larger.
There is a form, formality tothis.
Again, we're all about buildingcommunity and all the things we
do.
It's not just like one-offprogram there.
It's all about we have a coregroup.
How can we keep them cogent andknow all the things we do, get
them to events?
The entrepreneurs and residentshave a larger commitment.
(19:43):
They're on papers committing tofive to eight hours of their
month Experts on call.
It's less of a commitment.
It's more.
I think it's about four hour orfour interactions.
We say Some get way morebusiness than others, depends on
the trends in the businessworld, but it's just a far less
commitment is the reality,gotcha, yeah, and I wanted to
also make sure we have time totalk about Bark Tank.
(20:11):
This is a program.
You know that the goal is tobring some exclusivity to pitch
competitions.
We do several pitch competitionsthroughout a given academic
year at various levels, and thisone is designed to get the best
and the brightest and aspiringstudent built companies in front
of a highly trained set ofjudges.
And, moreover, the process forthe Bark Tank starts months
(20:32):
before the pitch competition,where there's a nomination
process.
You have to be nominated bysomeone that we will actually
vet, you have to have referencesand then you have the chance to
apply.
We will actually vet, you haveto have references and then you
have the chance to apply.
From those applications, you goin front of a panel of faculty
staff and entrepreneurs andresidents to determine who the
(20:53):
top eight teams are and, fromthat point forward, the top
eight teams are paired with,basically, pitch coaches,
because the timeframe is notnecessarily to accelerate or
totally hone in on the businessmodel.
It's more about let's put yourbest foot forward, given where
you're at right now, and that istypically a four to six week
(21:17):
process of coaching, and Jameshas been doing that, and I don't
know if you want to share itall about your experience, but
that might be fun.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Yeah, it's been.
It's been a lot of fun.
So each of the eightentrepreneurs or eight startups,
we could have more than onefounder.
They essentially have a coupleof months to prepare their pitch
and they're both teamed with.
Every group founder group isteamed with two coaches and
essentially we've, with my team,we've just essentially gone
through optimizing the pitch,getting it down to a tight three
(21:46):
minutes, dialing in on oneclear value proposition,
simplifying the pitch, making itimpactful, trying to show a
clear how the money's going toimpact the business and I think
it's.
It is incredibly valuable forthe entrepreneurs to be able to
leverage the mentor's experienceand then, of course, in my case
, I'm pulling in my network aswell to give our entrepreneur
(22:07):
even more of an advantage.
So what's really cool aboutwhat I've seen over the past
couple of months is I feel likethis has already been incredibly
valuable for the student thatwe're coaching.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Absolutely yeah, and I was just pulling some data
together and we'll share thisout at Actual Bark Tank, this
out at actual bark tank.
Not that these are the only.
Let me just pull this togetherhere.
Not that these are the onlyitems for reporting.
Just give me a second here,sorry yeah, go for it, yeah the
typical things, these vanitymetrics out in in the world of
(22:37):
the startup world, of jobscreated, funds raised, so on and
so forth.
So last last I checked and diddiligence on it the funds that
were distributed through theBark Tank Pitch Competition.
It's $100K or so a year.
They've given away they beingthe Leonsis family $975,000 in
(22:57):
prizes over the course of eightyears.
66 ventures have receivedfunding for that and to date
we've calculated about 1,100jobs created and $412 million
raised.
Pretty cool stats that we'rereally proud of.
(23:20):
But again, I think it's moreabout the lives impacted, the
entrepreneurs being impacted asstudents of the business world,
and it's all about community.
It's about building rapportwith the mentors, with staff,
with faculty, with students andwith the broader ecosystem.
So it's all the things we doare all about that.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Definitely.
I was a judge on a pitchcompetition a couple of years
ago, I think, for Mercore, isthat right?
Yeah, mercore, mercore, andthey recently raised, I think,
like a 30 million series B right.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
They did.
They're doing quite well.
They're in a similar space as,I think, securevision as far as
using AI and helping people findjobs in the tech world.
Yes, but they're doing quitewell.
He actually dropped out.
Brandon Foody dropped out ofGeorgetown to fully pursue his
business and we would never say,hey, drop out, it's time.
(24:16):
But that's one instance wherethings were moving so fast and
he had figured out the formula,so to speak, and it would have
been a hindrance to time wise tostay in school and hopefully he
comes back one day, finisheshis degree and all that jazz.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
But yeah, he's been doing quite well yeah, so
there's some really big successstories in there absolutely,
yeah, absolutely very cool soyou had mentioned, there's
several pitch competitionsthroughout the year.
There's the rocket pitch oneand then you have Bark Tank.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Are there any others?
Yeah yeah, pitch competition.
So we are in the venturedevelopment world.
That's a very major componentof that is venture development
would be behind what we do withpitch competitions, and right
now we are actually developing anew series called just a pitch
series, where we're actuallygoing to go straight to the
source.
So we typically we broadcasthey, apply here to pitch on this
(25:13):
date.
We've got some applications inadvance, and so on and so forth,
and then we find judges andthen people come, there's a
keynote and that's a formula forour pitch competition.
We are going to try somethingnew, largely going from the
ground up, with the studentclubs I mentioned earlier.
They are saying, hey, why don'twe go to like midnight mug?
Why don't we go to the makerspace on campus?
(25:37):
Why don't we go where there area lot, there's a ton of energy
of just students gathering, andwe'll basically do like a pop-up
pitch competition.
They'll be a little yeah,there'll be more advertising
than just that, but it's let'sjust bring our presence there
and the goal is it's more thananything is marketing yeah, for
(25:57):
sure, getting our yeah, gettingourselves out there.
So the goal is to do more ofthat like we initially called it
, micro pitch series, but it'llinevitably be titled something
even fancier.
But this semester we're goingto do three to four of those and
it's lean.
We'll probably have some foodthere, we'll probably market
swag and stuff like that, butthe goal is to bring that ground
(26:19):
up energy to our, our ecosystem.
That I wouldn't say it's waning, but it's definitely something
that it's always a struggle toget a message across campus
because there's so much going onin every nook and cranny and
new programs, new master'sdegrees, new institutes.
The good old guerrillamarketing tends to work best.
(26:41):
Put flyers out and actuallyphysically being in a dorm,
physically being in a coffeeshop that's really where the
trend's going as far as pitchcompetitions shops that's really
where the trend's going as faras pitch competitions.
But as far as venturedevelopment scope, its early
stage is RocketPitch or thesepitch series that we speak of.
You're then in our sphere,summer Launch, incubator, a lot
(27:02):
of those companies from thoseearly stages.
Hey, you're really a masterfulcompany, masterful pitching
there.
Let's hone that business idea,even better, incububate that
idea.
Oftentimes those companies outof the incubator are the bark
tank finalists as well.
So you can see that pattern andI think the trend with the
venture development side ofGeorgetown is to curate more of
(27:25):
a process.
Behind you enter our spherehere, ben Zimmerman, the student
pitching this idea we're goingto actually follow you and track
you and help you, not just doone-off programming, because
that's really the way we are now.
We strive to bring morecontinuity to following a
(27:47):
venture through a process.
Not everyone will get to BarkTank, but we want to make sure
that everyone that wants to havethe time of day of our mentors,
of our ecosystem, that we'reable to better attract them.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
Yeah, yeah and that makes I love it.
I think it's really impactful.
And just being part of BarkTank to me it's the.
This is the event I've had themost fun actually taking part of
here at Georgetown.
Again, I actually doing thementoring with Kevin over at
Serenity Lawn Care.
He's really doing quite a goodjob making the adjustments week
(28:22):
over week.
But on the pitch.
But what's interesting is, aswe're going through the pitch,
there's also hey, this isn'tnecessarily directly related to
your pitch, but also really weshould be dialing into here.
You should consider this.
Or hey, this is something thatyou need to think about for your
business, or shifting thebusiness model a little bit, or
whatever it might be, or just somuch comes up.
Right, while we're refining thepitch, where it's like there's
(28:44):
also all of these takeaways ofwhat you can do to improve your
business.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (28:52):
So I think that's really been.
The interesting part is when Istarted working with Kevin a
couple months back.
That's okay, we're just we'regoing to focus on refining a
pitch, but in doing so, we'vebeen doing a lot of work on the
business.
There's been a lot of thingsthat we're going to be able to
implement right To to help himaccelerate growth and really
make it a huge success.
(29:13):
Right, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Yeah, and I'm sure you'll.
You've formed a partnership,and not a formal partnership,
but a friendship that you'llhopefully continue beyond Bark
Tank too.
That's great.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Yeah, yeah, whatever he needs, it's always exciting
to and fun to work withentrepreneurs, folks that are
willing to put in the blood,sweat and tears to make it
happen, to make the commitment,and it's just.
There's an energy in thoseearly days of starting a company
.
Oh yeah, it's contagious.
It's a lot of fun to be around.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
I'm glad you're able to rekindle that in your own,
your nature good naturedness.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
Yeah, it's always good to stay around it.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
But is there anything else?
We got a few minutes here.
Is there anything else that youwanted to share with the
audience?
Yeah, I've said a lot.
I think again it's.
We can water down what we do tothose three pillars of student
formation, venture developmentand thought leadership.
You know I didn't really chimein on the thought leadership
side as much.
It doesn't mean it's notimportant, but I think the
reality of thought leadership isputting our word out there to
the world, and that is donethrough various channels.
(30:16):
I think the main way we do thethought leadership side of
things is through these newopportunities to engage existing
constructs and to be the personthat convenes the people.
Some examples of that arelargely this is done through
Jeff Reed.
We have a JesuitEntrepreneurship Alliance he's
(30:37):
helped form, in concert withsome of his other contemporaries
that are entrepreneurshipcenter directors.
So, as you can imagine, schoolsthat identify as Jesuit.
We're like hey, there's acommonality in the Jesuit
tradition of entrepreneurship isa thread actually in that
Religion.
Aside, it's like all theseJesuits through thousands of
(30:58):
years have always beenentrepreneurial and the
institutions are glomming ontothat.
As we know, things are verycompetitive, but Jeff convened
those people.
We are a thought leader in theJesuit institution side of that.
So I think that's pretty cool.
More to come on that.
Other main components of thethings that are in the works
thought leadership, wise, theventure and the capital love the
(31:21):
terminology, the focus there.
This grew out of students.
So connection between studentformation and thought leadership
.
Students said, oh my God, we'reso interested in venture
development, writ large.
There's a venture fellowsprogram that we have.
They said we got to do morethan that.
We need to bring together allthe people that have this policy
(31:44):
slant, defense, slant, whathave you?
The big names are coming to DCnow H2Q, andreessen, horowitz,
they're all bringing offices toDC because they know stuff's
going to happen there and ishappening.
Two more things and then I'llbe quiet.
Jeff Reed has done a great jobof convening innovation leaders
(32:06):
from the District of Columbia.
So you think your Nestle's,your Booz Allen's, the various
entities that are corporations,marriott, that have an
innovation, a CIO, so to speak.
He's convened some of theseCIOs to say, hey, cool, you guys
are doing your own thing atthat nook.
Why don't we share resources?
Why don't we share ideas?
(32:27):
Because we're all trying towork together and Jeff's theme
is that it's common good,entrepreneurship, like everybody
needs to make a living, butlike we're all working towards
helping the world, and it justseems like a perfect marriage of
that.
So he's brought those folkstogether, I think on three
different instances, and we lookto continue that series.
And then the last but not least,I would say, around thought
(32:49):
leadership.
A major breakthrough one is.
And then the last but not least, I would say, around thought
leadership, a major breakthroughone is more the incubators, as
it were, around town, thedistrict, sorry, union kitchens,
right, the Jose Andres thoughtleaders, the people in the Think
Food group, all those peopledoing work with the startups,
whereas those innovation hubslike the Marriott's, they're
doing it on a corporate level.
(33:09):
These are the more organic.
Hey go finding startups, havingthem convene in different ups
and crannies around town.
This one I'm not justifying forthe sake of a podcast, but I
think that's one like Jeff.
This thought leadership onewould be a great, I think,
podcast.
For Jeff probably to do is talkmore about all those things.
But that's it in a nutshell.
(33:30):
I've definitely left out a fewprograms, but it's a mouthful.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yeah, it's definitely a good high level and we could
always jump back on for anotherepisode if there's more to
always more to cover.
But, ben, thank you so much forjoining us today.
It's a lot of fun getting toknow you and the
entrepreneurship program andwhat you guys are building, and
I'm very excited to be part ofit.
So thanks for letting me dothat.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
But yeah, make sure to come back on sometime soon
and update us Absolutely, alwayshere to help, absolutely In the
future.
Take it easy.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Take care and for everybody tuning in.
Thank you so much for joiningus and we'll talk to you soon.
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