19A Napkin2

1.) I'm a very quick and skilled learner and I love to fix problems. My experiences in working in the customer service industry have taught me how to not stress out when things get busy and to manage my time wisely. Taking things as they come and prioritizing your duties is the best way to handle stress in the restaurant industry.
Being a quick learner, problem solver, and having the ability to not stress is vital to managing and running a restaurant. New problems arrive on a daily basis in restaurants and it's important to be able to solve them efficiently as they come. Being a quick learner will also come in handy because as a manager, you need to know the ins and outs of everything in the restaurant so the quicker I can learn the various process, the better and quicker I can train my employees.

2.) I'm offering my customers healthy fast food at a cheap price. It will be as healthy, if not healthier than if they were to cook at home. I differ from Chipotle and Bolay in that my restaurant will have a drive through and a wider variety of foods to choose from at a cheaper price.

3.) Most of my customers will consist of college students and full time workers in Gainesville who want to improve their diets. The main factors these groups have in common is that they want to improve/maintain their healthful nutrition and they don't have a lot of time in their busy schedules. They range in the ages from early 20's to mid 30's and probably don't have a whole lot of time to cook/go out and eat. The drive through aspect will cater to this need and I will also sell other products such as water bottles and reusable straws with our logo on it in order to advertise and increase revenues.

4.)As I previously said, my target market wants to improve what they put into their bodies without breaking the bank. They also want it in a timely manner which is why having a drive through window is so crucial to this business model. Providing them with healthy food at the same speed at a McDonald's rate is sufficient reason for consumers to spend their money in my establishment.

5.) My current competitors are Chipotle, Bolay, and Vale and they have two things in common: they’re expensive and they don’t offer a drive-thru service. My restaurant will be the cheapest, healthiest, and most efficient fast food restaurant in Gainesville. None of my competitors offer a drive through which I think is a key component to speedy service.

I see these elements to all fit together very well. They are like pieces of a puzzle that will create a successful restaurant when put together. I think my skills mixed with the want for healthy food and the need for speed will create a successful business for the residents of Gainesville.

A lot of my prior feedback was focused on the fact that my drive through sets me aside from my competitors so I really capitalized on that aspect in this assignment. I also focused on how my three main skills that will assist me in having a successful business rather than also discussing parts of my past that don't contribute to the business as much.

Elevator pitch 2

I felt that my previous feedback was all valid and I tried to incorporate it the best I could. I did this by trying to add a little more emotion as well as talking a little more about how I will keep my costs down and the specific foods I will try provide.

https://youtu.be/0k-b8oHXoC8

Assignment 18 Create a customer Avatar

My prototypical customer is a woman in her early to mid 20's who attends UF and must put the gym in her daily routine. She loves the outdoors and goes to Lake Wauburg at least once a week, either alone or with friends. She really cares about the environment and takes a reusable water bottle everywhere she goes. She drives a white, 2017 Honda Civic that her parent's got for her as a birthday gift and takes extremely good care of it even though it's pretty messy on the inside. She doesn't watch a lot of TV but every now and again she puts on The Office or How I Met Your Mother when she has some free time. She loves hanging out with her friends but values her studies much higher, you can often find her studying and various coffee houses or at the library studying. She has no affiliation with political parties and doesn't really keep up with the news. She's a Christian girl who attends one of the student ministries on campus and tries to make it church when she can. Her parents are together and loves them to death but they live two hours away so she doesn't get to see them all the time. She also has a 17 year old brother and a yellow lab back home. She loves to cook with fresh veggies and meats but doesn't always have the time due to her busy schedule. Her favorite movies are The Little Mermaid and Step-Brothers and can watch them almost any time. Her music taste has a very broad spectrum, going anywhere from Taylor Swift to Lil Wayne depending on her mood. She normally wears running shorts and T-shirts but on occasion you can catch her in casual business attire. Her favorite restaurants are China Wok, Chipotle, Chuy's, and Bahama Breeze and tries to eat at at least one of them once a week.

My prototypical customer and I love the outdoors, cooking, and studying in coffee shops. We both value our friends and family very highly and always wish we could be closer to them. It would be ideal for me to work the gym into my every day life but so far I have been slacking in that area. I don't really find any of these common interests to be significant except for the fact that we both love the outdoors. People who love the outdoors tend to care about their diets which would be good for my business. This assignment did help me come up with a few other ideas for my business such as selling products like water bottles and reusable straws with the logo on it.

Assignment 16

A.)
1.) Determination: I'm very determined to accomplish any task given to me, big or small. I don't think I've ever seen anyone put so much hard work into such arbitrary and irrelevant (or relevant and necessary) tasks.

2.) Quick Learner: I find myself to be an incredibly fast learner with almost anything I do, especially new jobs. In newest job, I only needed three days of training whereas everyone else generally gets five. I think I learn so fast because of my motivation and drive to be the best I can be.

3.) Caring: I think I care about people (whether I know them or not) probably a little too much. I go to great lengths to cheer someone up or make their day even if I've only known them for 5 minutes. I see it as a plus because it will come in handy when it comes to customer service.

4.) Correcting Processes: I'm good at finding flaws in existing processes and making changes to make them more efficient. I have saved my bosses and coworkers a lot of time by making their duties faster and efficient.

5.) Quick Witted: I'm good at coming up with snappy comebacks very quickly. I feel like it's a skill that not many people have and I'm proud of it, it's usually pretty funny.

B.)
https://soundcloud.com/user-248961874/jordan
This interview was with my roommate Jordan and he mostly talked about how much of a people person I am.
https://soundcloud.com/user-248961874/rob
This interview was with my boss and he discussed my great work ethic and my ability to train new hires.
https://soundcloud.com/user-248961874/tristan
This interview is with one of my best friends and he talked about how he thinks I'm really good with staying motivated and determined.
https://youtu.be/wVhLjHMpjpM
This interview is with my best friend and he just talked about how good of a friend and person he thinks I am overall.


C.) For the most part, I think my self-analysis lines up with the interviews from my friends/associates. I know Josh and I both stated that I really care about the people around me but I don't really think I'm as much of a people person as everyone else thinks I am. I can be when I want to be, but for the most part I only find myself talking to the people I already know. None of them mentioned my skill for correcting processes but I think that's because none of my friends really get to see me work. Other than that, I think they are all pretty spot on with how they perceive me.

Assignment 15

Conducting these interviews have shown me that I am on the right track but may still be lacking in terms of competitive advantage.

My first interview was with a girl in her early-mid 20's that I met at the gym. She is always trying to improve herself and her diet. She told me that quality is a big factor for her when purchasing her food along with making sure it's healthy and tries to buy local/organic products when she can. Cooking is big for her so most of the food she buys is at the grocery store but when she goes out, it's normally Bolay as long as the line isn't too long. Since she normally goes to the same few restaurants, she's generally satisfied with her purchases and bases it off of the comparison between quality and price.

My second interview was with a mother of two who is working hard to balance her life and maintain a healthy diet. She said she enjoys Chipotle and Bolay but her kids don't so it's hard for all of them to agree on dinner. It's also a struggle for her because she doesn't always have time to wait in the lines which are always out the door around the time she picks the kids up from school, it's just not convenient for her. When I asked if she had considered the online ordering she told me that they don't always get to her order right away because they're so busy so it's like taking a gamble. She's usually dissatisfied by the time she gets her food from these places because it wasn't worth the effort of getting her kids out of the car, waiting in line, having to get the kids to agree on something to eat, and then having to make another stop for them. She said "Lately it's so annoying that I don't even go anymore, I just get something that everyone will enjoy even if it's not the best thing I could be putting in my body.

My final interview was with a 20 year old college boy who is all about keeping up with his fitness. He said he's been trying to meal prep but has grown tired of the process. Ideally he would like to get his food from Whole Foods, but it's way to expensive. He likes Chipotle and Bolay but Bolay is a little pricey and you can only eat so much of something before you get tired and have to move on. He wishes there were more options in Gainesville. Lately he's been less and less satisfied with his purchases just because he's tired of eating the same things. He usually evaluates his purchases by considering his food ans asking himself if it was worth the price.

From these interviews, I've gathered that this segment values quality, price, and convenience when it comes to choosing their food. They go for things that are healthy for them (since this segment is based on improving eating habits) and choose what they do by a mix of price and quality. It seems the only competitive advantage this business would have is potential price and convenience but I'm not sure if it would be enough to win these customers over. 

Assignment 14

1.) The man behaviors I've developed in this course is time management and organization. This is the first semester I'm taking classes 100% online and it takes a lot of motivation and ability to manage your time wisely to succeed online. I have to basically plan my entire week around school if I want to succeed in this class. I also learned to sync my phones calendar with the canvas calendar so I never miss a due date. This has helped me tremendously with staying organized and not missing due dates.
2.) When I have felt like giving up, I remember where I want to be in the long term and what it's going to take to get there. It's important to maintain good grades so I can do the things I want such as study abroad or get an internship that may lead to my dream job. I also consider my family. Since I am the first one of us to attend college, it puts a lot of weight on my shoulders. I think about how proud they are of me and how much I would let down the family if I didn't succeed. This has definitely been my most tenacious semester and I've never tried harder for A's. I felt that way at the beginning of the semester and it seemed to have faded until I got my wisdom teeth removed. That put me out of commission for about a week and my grades started to fall fast. I had to work extra hard to get caught up but it motivated me to not let that happen again.
3.) Tip 1: Stay Organized.
Maintain a planner and keep track of your notes. This allows less room for falling behind and there's no better way to stay on track than to keep a planner. It's virtually impossible to miss an assignment if you keep your planner updated and check it at least 1-2 times a day.

Tip 2: Manage your time wisely.
Stay on top of your work and try to complete your assignments 2 days before your deadlines. This will keep you from falling behind and/or missing assignments. Make sure your keeping up with your readings and lectures.

Tip 3: Keep a picture/list of things that motivate you near where you study.
Keeping your biggest motivations close won't allow you to forget why you're in the class and why you need to maintain good grades. Practicing this will allow you to develop a more tenacious attitude and eventually these factors of motivation will be on your mind 24/7, making it hard to let you consider failure as an option.

This is a photo of four of my best friends and I at our high school graduation. I keep it as my phone background for a constant reminder to stay motivated so we can all graduate college together someday.

13A - Reading Reflection no.1

1.) For this assignment, I chose to read Steve Jobs' biography. The most surprising aspect of his life as well as what I admire most is the fact that he dropped out of college and became as successful as he did. His parents, both biological and adoptive, did a lot so he could go to college so it really had to take some guts to drop out. The fact that he had enough faith in himself to succeed without a degree is astonishing to me. I know plenty of people who have dropped out of college, not done much with their lives, and regretted it. I find the least admiring aspect of his life was how arrogant and assertive he was. This book gave me the feeling that Jobs was quite full of himself, especially the excerpt where Isaacson discusses Steve's job at Atari and his body odor that made the CEO force him to work the night shift is icing on the cake. Many of his coworkers at Atari also didn't like collaborating with him because he was arrogant which isn't very respectable. Even if he was a smart man, he could have been coy about it. He did experience a bit of adversity with the launch of the first Mac. There was a loss in sales but Jobs came back with an impressive marketing campaign that boosted the popularity of the company and increased sales.
2.) A main core competency that I noticed with Steve Jobs was his ability to be creative and think outside the box. For example, it's astonishing that he was able to come up with a marketing strategy that resurrected the plummeting sales. He was also a perfectionist and paid extreme attention to detail which is another pattern that was prevalent in this reading. I believe this was a big portion if what made his products so successful even if his tendency to be anal with details potentially sprouted from his hallucinogenic drug use.
3.)My main confusion lied in Jobs' family background. I'm a little confused as to why his parents gave him up, why they didn't really stay in touch, and why his parents were able to keep his sister and not him. I don't think it was a mistake by any means, he obviously did phenomenal without them but the whole concept leaves my mind wondering. Although his grandfather kept his biological parents apart, I think he still could have been kept.
4.)If I could ask Steve Jobs two questions, they would be: 1. Do you have any regrets regarding how you ran your company and treated your employees?   2. What are your decision making styles/methods? I chose the first question because he didn't have the best reputation and I'm curios as to whether or not he knows how arrogant and rude he was. I'd like to know if he would change how he treated his colleagues if he could go back or if he wouldn't change a thing. I feel effective communication is important to being a successful manager but it didn't seem to matter in his case. The second question is substantial because decision making is a very important part of being successful in just about every situation. His methods to making the right decisions had to have some sort of science to them. Jobs wasn't correct all the time but his decisions seem to have done him more harm than good and I think it would be crucial to understanding how one would achieve his level of success.
5.)Steve put hard work at one of the highest of priorities, only second to perfection. Working hard was one of his core values and he fired anyone who fell short of his standard. I agree that hard work is important but by no means think that someone should be fired for displaying the slightest bit of slack. Hard work is crucial to success, but no one needs to be pushed to the point of 90 hour weeks.

Assignment 12

1) Pick a segment. For this assignment, I chose to focus on people who want to improve/maintain a healthy diet.

2) Interviews.

My three interviewee's were a friend I made at the gym, a customer in Chipotle, and a coworker who has talked about eating better often. All three are college students who try to eat as healthy as they can.

What I learned.

It seems the need to eat healthier becomes most prevalent when people are hungry. My interviewees agreed that they find themselves most hungry at work, class, the gym, or on their way home from those places which puts us usually around 12-1 p.m. and 4-6 p.m. People usually start considering their meal options when they start to get hungry. They often ask themselves if they want to cook or go out and make further decisions from there. My friend at the gym says when she's in a hurry she'll just grab a smoothie from Smoothie King and call it dinner and neither of us thought this was a great option. Another thing I learned is that the need for a drive-thru window may not be as prevalent as I thought. They said they didn't rally care if there was a window at Chipotle/Bolay because they can order online and have it ready by the time they get there.

Conclusion.

This segment definitely sees a need to have a way to eat healthier when they don't want to cook, but it seems their prime reason for wanting this restaurant is to add variety to the already existing market of healthy restaurants. They don't really see an issue with the lack of drive-thru windows nor an issue with Chipotle's prices (with exception to the guac cost).

Assignment 11

1) I'm Kristen Fogel, I transferred into UFs business administration program from UCF and I hope to eventually attain my masters in information systems. I have a knack for problem solving and correcting inefficient/illogical procedures. Anytime someone presents me with a problem, I’m drawn to fixing it, no matter what it is. In my work as a to-go waitress, I often find myself doing things that aren’t even part of my job, I just like to fix problems. One day, I would like to be the manager/administrator of a database and fix everything that might go wrong.

If I were to start my business, it would play a major role in my life because restaurants are a lot of work to run and maintain. In the beginning, I don’t think I would get much sleep nor have time for a social life which isn’t ideal for me. I would stick with it until the end because I’m always determined to finish what I start and I think the idea has potential but I don’t realistically think it would work out.

2) I’m offering a fast and efficient way for people to eat healthy meals without hurting their wallets. By creating a healthy fast food restaurant, people no longer need to worry about what they’re putting into their bodies when they’re on a time crunch. The idea is to create deals with suppliers as well maintain a produce garden in order to cut costs which will allow the prices of the food to not be as high as competitors. I want this to be a place where people can eat good, healthy food when they don’t have time to cook for themselves.

3) My current target market consists of college students (age 18-25) in Gainesville that want to improve/maintain their diets but don’t have the time to cook. These students are often busy but also trying to work on bettering their health. The business structure will be marketed towards those who don’t have the time or want to cook but still want to eat healthy. I’ve noticed that many of the customers in places like Chipotle and Bolay, my prospective competitors, are often coming from the gym which I could also include in my target market by offering products like protein smoothies or water bottles with our logo on them.  

4)Often times, customers in Bolay and Chipotle look like they just came from the gym which means two things: they’re probably trying to improve themselves and they’re either too tired or don’t have time to cook. College students are also busy and don’t favor going into restaurants so this restaurant will have a drive-thru window as well as the option to go in and sit. Customers will also find value in this because people are always looking for ways to save money and for once, eating healthy isn’t breaking the bank.

5) My current competitors are Chipotle, Bolay, and Vale and they have two things in common: they’re expensive and they don’t offer a drive-thru service. My restaurant will be the cheapest, healthiest, and most efficient fast food restaurant by offering exceptional services without charging a fortune. 

I think these elements fit together well, they call coincide. I think my experience/skills would make me an excellent restaurant manager. The pieces of the puzzle fit, but I’m not sure that it will be enough for me to gain a competitive advantage. Although it is an ideal business plan, I don’t know how possible it will be for me to keep things cheap. The more I do research on it, the less motivated I am to continue with this business. It’s a good thought and it might thrive for a short time but keeping prices lower than competitors might be my downfall.