Last week I had my first session of the Merlin project, a four-month Entrepreneurship course taught by Columbia University professors. The program is organized by YNG+ a group affiliated with YPO (Young President’s Organization). Referred to as an “inaugural accelerator for innovators” the four-month course instructs about 25 Entrepreneurs and teaches us how to jumpstart our business. The class organization is as follows: 1.5 hours weekly session every Wednesday where Columbia Professors, Clifford Schorer and Murray Low video chats with all the members. We have weekly assignments ranging from case studies to personality tests. There are sometimes guess entrepreneurs in the lesson, last week we had Yael Alkalay from Red Flower (https://www.redflower.com/) a successful beauty wellness store selling aromatherapy bath and spa products.
The goal of the program is to immerse us in the entrepreneurial mindset while giving us “new” entrepreneurs guidance in the form of classes and a one-on-one relationship with a YPO Mentor. I met mine yesterday: Shayne Skaff a technology entrepreneur who sold his company MaintenanceNet to Cisco last year for over 100 Million dollars. We had an interesting discussion and planned to meet every week to discuss our lives and startups. I hope to learn a great deal from Shayne!
YNG+ers in the Merlin project have the opportunity to pitch their ideas at the YPO EDGE in Vancouver Canada, 1-3 March 2017 (http://www.ypo.org/exclusive-events/ypo-global-edge/). The conference has over 2,500 YPO business leaders and investors and past speakers include Richard Branson and Steve Wozniak (super cool!).
I’m excited about the Merlin project and what opportunities it will open up. I have the chance to learn from the best and interact with a group of entrepreneurs from all over the world (U.S, Latin America, Australia). Will update on the experience soon!