Mission and Vision

Our mission statement is “We must make medicine streamlined for the common person”. I find that a simple, concise, clear mission statement is the best thing for my company. I could make a mission statement that is long and drawn out and outlines the companies’ mission point by point for the next few years, but I think that there is something powerful in making a mission statement that is not hard to remember and embodies the spirit of the company. The whole idea behind the company is to make things easy on people having to deal with medical issues, using technology. I believe this mission statement portrays the idea of the company, and it is inspiring to anyone that may doubt the direction of the company, and can keep the company focused on its base premise.

The vision statement of the company is “Bringing healthcare into the 21^st century”. I think this is a solid vision statement because even more than the mission statement of the company, it explains the basic premise of the company and the entire point of creating the company in the first place. That is what I envisioned for the company from its conception in my mind. Having this is a powerful tool to guide the company in the long term. Once this vision is complete, it will be simply updated to “Bringing healthcare into the 22^nd century.” This is a broad, overarching idea that will guide the company and is a strong tool for setting the culture of the company.

Company Name & Logo

The name of my company is MeDeliver. I figured that the name would convey what the values of the company are. The company delivers for medical practices by giving them tools to help ease transition of new patients. Coming up with the name was especially tricky, as I wanted med or medi to be a prefix for the name, but almost every single idea I came up with had already been taken by a company. This was very eye opening for me, as I had not previously thought of a company name before, but as you explore options, the first, second, third and twentieth ideas that pop into your head were already thought of by someone else who made a company with that name. It is almost to the point where the domain of valid business names is almost exclusively going to be made up words. For my company logo, I wanted to create something that is easy to recognize and scale up or down, but also is a unique representation of the company and what it does. To accomplish this, I decided that a cross would be a good starting point, as my company will be operating in the medical field, but I decided to add a dashed line box pattern to evoke thoughts of organization and efficiency, which my database company will certainly provide. In the end, my logo will be recognizable, and easy to scale up or down, yet unique enough to stand out to the casual observer. Below is a rough sketch of my design.

Guest Speaker: Brian Forth

Last week we had the good fortune to have Brian Forth, of SiteCrafting come to the class to talk to us. Brian is unique among the guest speakers we've had talk to us in that he has owned his company for 18 years. While the other guest speakers we've had talk to us show an 'entrepreneurial lifestyle' starting multiple companies and moving from place to place, Brian started a company and stuck with it, which brings a unique perspective that we had not heard so far.
Brian started his company when he was a teacher, as the internet was growing rapidly at that time, and parents of his students would ask him to code websites for them. Once the work got to be too time consuming for him to do after school, he decided to quit his teaching job and work as a freelance website contractor, which was the start of his company, SiteCrafting.
Site Crafting has been running now for 18 years, which is very impressive considering the shifting landscape of the internet and technology. In Brian's experience, the key to staying afloat as a technology company in times of turmoil is to be diversified in the industries you work with, as well as provide an excellent service and excellent support for the clients you have, so they can support your company. Brian showed us that customer service is an essential part of keeping a company running over a length of time.
Overall, Having Brian come talk to the class was a delight as it was a new perspective on entrepreneurship that we have not heard before.

Guest Speaker: Erik Hanberg

    Last week we had the pleasure of having a guest speaker Erik Hanberg come visit the class. Erik Hanberg is a local author and entrepreneur who has done many projects in his life. Among his accomplishments are working as the Director of the Grand Cinema at a young age, which inspired him to start the Horatio, a live theatre company. After that, he started self-publishing books, and works with his wife at Sidexside, a marketing consulting firm, as well as running and being elected to be on the parks board of Tacoma.
    He offered some advice to the class, in the form of the ideas, be a starter, and practice shipping. By be a starter, he meant in order to be successful, you must go for it. If you have a good idea, do it. By practice shipping, he meant practice finishing something. He said the best way to practice for the ups and downs of starting a business is to do something on your own, start to finish. Whether it is writing a book or learning something new or whatever, getting through the rough times gives you the experience and the motivation to get through the rough times starting a business.
    An interesting tidbit he shared with us was that there are two basic kinds of income. There is income that you get for doing labor, such as a job or a career, and there is income you get from making things, like writing a book. In the example of writing a book, there is a certain amount of time you have to work on it, but once you are finished, any sales of the book makes your time more and more valuable, as you are spending no more time on it, yet you are gaining rewards. Conversely, there is the labor income, which is simply paying you for your time. He made the point that even the highest paid lawyers are still essentially being paid for their time, whereas famous authors simply reap the rewards of their previous work.
    Having Erik speak to the class was an informative and interesting experience, in which I personally learned a lot about his perspective as an entrepreneur.

Guest Speaker: Derek Young

We had the good fortune to be able to have a guest speaker visit the class last week. Derek Young took time out of his schedule to come speak to the class about his life and the experiences he’s had as an entrepreneur, and for that we are grateful. Derek Young is an entrepreneur who has started many companies in the Tacoma area, including Tacoma Runners, Seasonal View, and Exit 133. He started making companies after he reached a stagnation point climbing the corporate ladder and felt the need to start something new. After ruminating on the decision he decided to quit his job and strike out in something new and started setting up companies. Fast forward a few years, and he does not regret his decision in the slightest.

               For Derek, starting companies seems to be almost second nature, as he is not risk-averse in the slightest. In his own words, he stated that he is the type of person who “jumps off of the cliff and then checks to see if he has a parachute.” His drive and determination, along with his ability to bring people together and get excited about an idea has proven to be a strong enough force to make companies successful.

               From his visit with us, I have taken away that passion and drive as well as keeping good friends who can do things that you are not able to do are very important parts of making a successful business. Having Derek come speak to us was a great opportunity, in which I personally learned a lot.

Business Ideas

Business Ideas:

1) A business that manufactures and sells a smart pill reminder/dispenser. Every day, people around the country have to take multiple pills at different times of the day with only the small writing on the pill bottle from the pharmacy to go on. As people get older especially, they get forgetful, and that can be dangerous if it is life-critical medication they need to take. My idea is to create a dispenser that can read a barcode generated by a pharmacy that contains how many pills to release and when to release them. The user simply scans the barcode and pours the pills into an empty slot in the dispenser. The dispenser would release the correct pill at whatever time of the day it’s needed, as well as remind the user to take it by playing a sound as well as lighting up as well as sending a notification to a smartphone.

2) A universal medical database. One of the most annoying things about medical records is that there are so many of them, and they come from different sources, and they are very important and useful to medical facilities and insurance companies. A business that creates a medical database that stores information about what surgeries you’ve had, what dental work you’ve had done, what shots you’ve had, what medications you’re allergic to, all of this is very important information, yet every time you go to a new hospital or clinic or anywhere else, you have to fill out all of the same questions over and over again. A database which stores all of the medical information about a person in a universal format would be hugely valuable.

3) A smart smoke detector with a clock incorporated in it so that it's "Change Me" beeps don't happen in the middle of the night, as well as being able to send a report of which alarm needs to have it's battery changed instead of having to hunt around the house for it.