This deck is a part of an eight-day introductory course that I originally designed for the residents of Inle Lake (Nyang Shwe), Myanmar during my volunteer work with Partnership for Change org. This is a basic introductory course for those who wish to start a businesses but aren't sure where to begin or what would be an effective way to run and operate a company geared for Western customers. This deck is free for anyone to modify and use, but please keep in mind that I do not own copyrights for most of the images on those slides (with some exceptions).

1. Market & environment health.
No matter how well your business is doing, its success depends on how favourable and sustainable
are your market and environment conditions are. And since you are building the business for the
benefit of your customers and your own well-being it makes sense to make positive contributions.

2. Mini-assignment.
❶ Throughout this lecture, think
of at least one question to ask
me at the end of this class.

3. Review.

4. ❶ What is the
competition?
❷ What is the demand?
❸ What are the costs?
❹ What is the ROI?

5. What tools can you use to
research your decisions?

6. What is
diversification?

8. Experiments.
• Try your ideas on small scale
before going big.
• Learn from those test runs
whether it is a good idea.
• Not the same as market
research, your own opinion or
prediction about what would
happen. Experiments are
actually you conducting the
business on a small scale.

9. Things you can measure:
• Income.
• Costs.
• Amount of work required.

10. Collect & synthesize.
• Collect a good sample of
feedback (at least 10 people).
• Sort your feedback based on
opinions and suggestions.
• Think how it could apply to
your business.

11. Applying feedback.
Evaluate each customer
complaint, praise or suggesting:
• Is it feasible to make the
changes?
• Does it align with your
business objectives?
• Learn about your
business from the
customers’ perspective.

12. Empathy exercises.
• Create a customer story for
your business or product.
• Be your own customer. If you
hate your product, your
customer probably does too.

13. Kinds of information.
• Data about the market:
competition, demand.
• Operational data: costs,
potential revenues, ROI.
• Customer data: feedback,
average & ideal customer
traits.

14. Google Sheets.
Have you downloaded Google Sheets? Did you start tracking your data? Don’t
forget to add more data every day. Any questions or problems with Google
Sheets?

15. Collaboration.
• A team of like-minded small
businesses have a potential to
change attitudes and even laws.
• Together, small businesses might
negotiate better prices from the
suppliers.
• When businesses get together
they can have a larger buying
power to advertise, thus bringing
more customers to their sector.
• It’s very common for businesses
to partner with governments to
mutually benefit each other.

16. Disruption.
• Disruption means finding new ways of
conducting a business.
• This method can “disrupt” or “break”
the existing market or industry. The
“old” way of doing things is no longer
good enough.
• Companies who can achieve this often
become very prosperous very quickly.
• Alternatively, those companies benefit
or change the marketplace and are
often good for the customer.
• Most often “disruption” is referred to in
online business but there are
examples in the real-world as well.

17. The list.
• Research.
• Diversify.
• Manage feedback.
• Apply empathy.
• Track everything.
• Collaborate.
• Disrupt*.
*Depends on your business objectives.

18. Market & environment health.
Where would you like to live and operate your business?

19. Why do business
neglect environment?

20. • Short-term thinking, false assumptions of infinity of
resources.
• Lack of resources to change operating methods.

21. Short-term thinking.
• Full effects are hard to see unless
they are calculated over time.
• We live on a vast planet where
resources might seem abundant
(they aren’t).
• Our actions might seem
insignificant, but they make a
lasting impact over time, together
with other offending patrons.
• Example: Nyang Shwe township
might be wasting over 120,000
tons of clean water every year
due to dripping taps.

22. How much water are
you loosing at home?
http://water.usgs.gov/edu/activity-drip.html
“convert gallons to liters"

23. What is it doing to
local businesses?

24. Resources.
• Calculating the amount of
resources required to make a
change is hard. How much is
acceptable to spend to benefit
sustainability?
• Consider the water tap
example. How much would it
cost to replace the tap vs.
what is the price of water lost?
How much time would equal
to the price of a tap? What if
the price of water keeps
rising?

25. Financial and
obligatory
pressures.
We all tend to think that we
are better than “that guy”
but when it comes to
actions required for
personal and business
survival we are often forced
to act in a way we thought
we wouldn’t.

26. Greed.
Is a natural human tendency. It is the drive to turn a successful business into an
even more successful one. It’s not a bad word or bad quality, it is who we are
(like many other animals).

27. Unhealthy market.
• Monopolies prevent choice for
customers and other businesses
from operating.
• Lack of business diversity drives
competition up and opportunity
down.
• Lack of or declining:
• Resources.
• Customers.
• Security.
• Stability.

28. Environment Market
Venn diagram.
How would you arrange the below ideals: market,
environment or both?
• Resources.
• Security.
• Customers.
• Local population well-being.
• Diversity.
• Monopoly-free.
• Stability.

29. Environment Market
• Resources.
• Security.
• Stability.
• Customers.
• Diversity.
• Monopoly-free.
• Local
population
well-being.
Do you have any others to add?

30. What happens then?
Can you operate a business in a marketplace that is unhealthy or
failing as well as if it was healthy and supportive of your ventures?

31. How do you control for
environmental and
market degradation?

32. Environmental and market
management.
• Understanding & continuously
researching offensive impacts (not
always obvious).
• Government laws and initiatives.
• Social attitudes (media,
advertising).
• Business prerogatives
(collaborations with clear
objectives).
• Personal conservation planning.
• Measurement and standard setting.

33. Understand impacts.
• Remember dripping tap
example: it seems as if it’s not
a big deal, but once you do
your research it’s a
tremendous loss.
• Some decisions are difficult or
non-obvious. Example non-
GMO products.
• Can you think of another non-
obvious example?

34. Government policies.
• Country, regional, town and
enterprise governments all are
familiar with the environmental
and market conditions. It is in
their interest to act favourably.
• However, there still needs to
be pressure applied
constantly in order to influence
the policies to favour small
businesses and individuals
over large corporate donors.

35. Social attitudes.
• Consumers tend to favour eco-
friendly and local products more
and more. This attitude shifts
revenue towards business that
follow those practices.
• Remember that consumer might
not always realize what “eco
friendly” or “good for small
business” really is (regardless of
their good intentions).
• Their attitudes could be further
altered by presenting your good
business practices in a favourable
light (ad campaigns).

36. Business policies.
• Collaboration could lead to better
positive impacts on both the market (i.e.:
fighting monopolies) and the operational
environment (i.e.: better waste disposal).
• No business lasts forever, however the
consumers and the beneficiaries of the
business might want to prolong and
better their lives. Therefore it’s important
to consider into business objectives the
policies which could benefit both the
environment and the market/community
it operates in.
• Occasionally, the environment is actually
the main source/reason of income.
Consider tourism: would anyone come to
see a polluted territory operated by a
monopoly?

37. Setting & measuring
standards.
• What is an acceptable environmental
impact? Consult research and scientific
sources about what would be a sustainable
practice (remember that it might not be
obvious).
• What are the favourable market conditions
that could breed innovation? How can your
region succeed and stand out from the
competing markets?
• After setting the guidelines create a plan and
policies (company- or community- wide).
• Follow those guidelines and monitor (track)
and deviations.
• How can you enforce those policies as a
company or a community? Ensuring that your
rules work is just as important as creating
them.

38. Assignment.
❶ Pick one of the following
businesses: delivery company,
restaurant business, tour guide
company.
❷ List potential (at lest 3)
environmental impacts.
❸ What would be considered a healthy
market for your business? List at
least 3 properties.
❹ Create a company policy to alleviate
environmental impacts.
❺ How can your business contribute to
a healthy market?

39. The list.
• Research.
• Diversify.
• Manage feedback.
• Apply empathy.
• Track everything.
• Collaborate.
• Disrupt*.
• Practice market & environment
sustainability.
*Depends on your business objectives.

40. Mini-assignment.
❶ Your questions, please :)