PSYC 494: Entrepreneurship in Psychology
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The criteria for Entrepreneurship was fulfilled by the course PSYC 494, Entrepreneurship in psychology. The main focus of this class was the acquisition of adequate knowledge for the completion of a full business proposal by the end of the semester. The opportunity presented lead to integration of disciplinary theory and knowledge through developing a profit/nonprofit program, product, business, or other initiative. The proposal was meant to enhance personal and professional development; it was divided into seven parts that were assigned throughout the semester.
I chose to write a business plan that proposed a potential Clinical Psychology practice in Fort Worth, Texas. Much of the research that I had to conduct had to deal with prior market analysis, industry description and outlook, deciding who my target market would consist of, size of my target market, market share, data analysis to create potential pricing and gross market targets, description of the business cycle, and much more that can be seen within the embedded PDF file that is located under this paragraph. Through the development of my proposal, I worked closely with the assistance of the Small Business Administration (SBA) and their bountiful information. This assistance became necessary as I started identifying potential ethical, political, professional, and social issues involved in entrepreneurial initiatives. By the end of the project, I felt a sense of accomplishment and as though the hands-on work experience helped to strengthen my professional work habits and skills. The assignment and course provided me with the ability to reflect deeply on the entrepreneurship experience and the effort it takes to initiate starting a business.
Business Proposal
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FULL-BUSINESS-PLANOver the course of several weeks, I completed various parts of a complete business proposal. The requirements were 15 pages excluding cover page, contents pages, and reference pages however; I went beyond this with a total of 26 pages of relative content expanded from my review of current literature. I thoroughly enjoyed creating this proposal and as a result I have a bettered my skills in development of business plans, assesses effectiveness of innovations, being able to demonstrate my abilities of integrating newly acquired professional and interdisciplinary knowledge to produce programs and initiatives. Although my feelings have changed about the pursuit of clinical psychology, I still feel a deep satisfaction of this work product and hope to be able expand on this information in the future should I decide to open a business within I/O.
Current Development
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I am very appreciative of this course and the development that has come about because of it. Although not refined, I now possess a basic understanding of applications of business development through contacting potential clients, making sales presentations, and writing proposals: Working within sales and marketing: And obtaining and processing information to present to others. This course has also helped to enhance my abilities of time management (through the completion of various parts of the proposal), critical thinking (how I was going to run my potential business and the limitations that may come with it), information organization, reading and writing comprehension (taking information from resources and legibly relaying the information), and interpretation of the meaning of the information collected so that different populations of audiences may understand.
Future Applications
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With the enrichment of the skills listed above, I am to assume that these would help propel me through my professional career as an I/O psychologist working within a newly developed or already thriving work environment. The retained knowledge of what goes into building a business and the skills necessary to make it work will prove pivotal in efforts to be hired by a variety of companies in all stages of development. I will be able to assess the work environment in many contexts, analyze the appropriate data, and strongly relay the information to employers regarding their employees physical, mental, educational, and overall satisfaction. This information will also prove useful should I be asked to facilitate a more integrative work environment.