No matter what your child’s unique personality type is, your goal is ultimately to help them understand what good social skills mean. Following a list of things that the children should and should not do can be a good way to help them set social standards.

Things to Do

Children are encouraged to watch others and see what the group is doing. This will help them determine if it is an activity that the child wants to join in on. Encouraged your children to be aware of themselves and to appear friendly and approachable in their voice and posture. One of the most important things to do is wait for appropriate times to enter the conversation. Wait for a break in the conversation before speaking.

Encourage your children to look others in the eye when they speak to them, and to follow the group’s flow while they contribute. Sometimes children with ADHD will find it difficult to speak with a group, but by finding common interests and sharing those, they will be able to engage the group in conversation. Share these interests by offering conversation points and ask relevant questions. With a little bit of practice and review, you can make it easy for your child to join group activities without having to feel as though they are being alienated for their ADHD.

Things to Avoid

In addition to nurturing positive social skills, it is important to discourage negative ones. One of the most important things that you need to teach your children is to not tease others. If the conversation begins to take a mean turn, or begins to change to a subject that they are not comfortable with, tell your children to excuse themselves from the group. Children may be proud of their accomplishments, but make sure that you teach your children not to brag about themselves. Have them avoid criticizing others in non-constructive ways as well.

Make sure that your children avoid standing too far away or too close from others as well. This can take a little bit of practice, but body language is one of the most important parts of developing social skills. Teach your child to avoid disrupting the game or social activity as well, and be sure to reinforce their positive behavior when you practice with them. With a little bit of hands on activity, it can be easy to prepare your child for social interaction.

My experience at the first Trinidad & Tobago Startup weekend held May 22-24 motivated me to return to writing. Overall it was a great experience and joy to witness teams pitching their ideas and products so passionately. Although, I only had the opportunity to attend the last day which was designated for individual teams pitching, I acknowledge the planning committee for an excellent job at coordinating this event.

This is not a report on the event (reporting is not my day job plus if you are currently reading this article then you should have been present; no “excuses, buts or maybes”). I will briefly highlight the highs and lows of the event from the perspective of an entrepreneur and business.

As a quick teaser, there were attendees from Jamaica and Barbados and a huge group picture in the end…

For the record let me state that: This Startup Weekend event was the first event of its kind to be held in Trinidad & Tobago and like every new initiative, there is always room for improvement.

Now For the High’s and Low’s

High: Great initiative for raising the Entrepreneurship spirit in the country and across the region while inspiring people to be doers, movers, thinkers and shakers.

Low: Not enough marketing, promotion and exposure of the event and “how” it would benefit potential participants and attendees.

High: Great platform for teams and members to gain experience on how to move a product from idea stage to a minimum viable product.

Low: three (3) days is a very short period in order to hammer out all the kinks, bugs, obstacles and questions that may arise when dealing with project planning and product development but that’s the rules for the event around the world (I don’t know about you but my weekend only has three (3) days hence the name of the event). If you play the game you have got to play by the rules.

High: All entrepreneurs love any opportunity to pitch his/her idea or product to anyone who is willing to give them a listening ear; hats off to the organizers for creating this opportunity.

Low: Many of the teams pitching where not clear on their target market and did not know or present their projected financial numbers.

Side note: One of the key questions of any potential investor is how they are going to get their money back. How long will it take to get a return on initial investment? Many investors may require roughly 3x times (some may require more) return on their initial investment for an estimated period of three years.

It makes little sense for an investor to send his or her hard earn money somewhere to die; I personally would not. For every dollar from an investor that goes out, the main goal is to bring back a new dollar and that new dollar has to bringing with it a +1. If you have a viable, scalable idea or product and you can show an investor how he/she is going to get a return then you are beginning to tick the checkboxes for raising capital.

High: The winners of the competition were awarded some form of capital which is a great step for getting any business of the ground while paving the way for participants to become business owners and future leaders.

Low: There were teams who stated the amount of funding required however I can’t remember any of them stating the amount of equity/ownership of their business they were will to give away. Unless you are seeking a loan (which is debt financing) you will be required to give away some of your pie to get the funds required to make more pie.

Side note: If you are in the idea stage, potential investors may require roughly 40% – 100% equity based on the amount of capital required. However if you have a solid idea, great team, proven traction and profitability you will be in a position that enables you to negotiate lower percentages for more capital.

Once you put a percentage of equity which you are will to give away to the amount of cash require. You will be atomically creating a valuation for you company, product/idea which the investor will then calculate simple by doing the math then determine if your valuation is worth the stage you are currently in he or she will also know whether or not your valuation is good or utter rubbish; It makes sense to know your financial numbers before seeking investment.

High: The helpful judges and mentors; it’s always good to have others around you who are experts in their domain. People who will make you think outside the box and help turn your idea/product into a viable business.

Low: I can’t say much about the mentors as I’m not fully aware of the level of involvement with each team. However I do have my bone to pick with the Judges. Firstly your main role is ask the hard thought provoking questions to determine if an idea or product is viable and can be sustained in a specific industry.

The harder the questions are, the more thinking, testing and research would be needed before an idea is turned into a product and product brought to market. Yes, there time during the event is limited however they can always revisit these questions after the event to further improve their offering; in my opinion some of the questions were just too easy.

That’s it for now, overall congratulation to all the teams who participated in the first Trinidad & Tobago Startup weekend I hope your experience was a great one and it will help mold and shape new entrepreneurs to help move the Caribbean forward.

The second Trinidad & Tobago Startup weekend event was held on November 22-24, which I also had the privilege to attend. I shared my thoughts on each team presentations via Twitter so you can follow me @oudinsamuel to get a recap on the team’s presentations while you are on twitter show us some love follow @caribonix. I will be publishing my thoughts on the second event within the next few days.

Your turn to share:
Did you attend the first event held on May 22-24? What were your thoughts?

Image source: trinidad.startupweekend.org

As budding entrepreneurs, your first task is to prepare your entire body and mind to face and overcome new challenges every single day. Challenges may often reinvent themselves over time taking up new shapes and forms. However based on how you choose to overcome these challenges, will determine success or failure as these challenges create the foundation and building blocks for success.

Have you ever stopped and asked yourself, “Why do I want to become an entrepreneur?” Is it for the fancy cars (preferable Audi), the yachts, private jets, having your name on a building? Or is it to be known for your wealth like Bill Gates or cool gadgets like Steve Jobs? May be its simply just to make a difference in the world. Whatever your reason, take a pen and paper and write it down, while I go grab a glass of juice.

Now that you have written down your reason(s) on paper and I have quenched my thirst. Let’s get straight into it, by the end of this article we will revisit it again and see whether or not your reasons need to be improved or changed. If you didn’t write anything its ok, you can write them after you have finished reading.

First challenge – Paperwork: Remember those 6-8 pages paper you detested doing in college, double spaced at font size 12? Ok good! Now forget about it because until you can afford to hire those expensive lawyers and a secretary, YOU will be the one stuck with the task and responsibility of writing and organizing 18 page contracts, single spaced, font size 11, business plans, revenue models and the list goes on.

Second challenge – Delegation: There is a famous saying which goes “No man is an island.” Let’s face it. No matter how skilled you are, no matter how many times you can rub your belly and pat your head at the same time, you simply CANNOT do it all by yourself. For me, the main thing I had to learn was trusting that the person who I assigned a task to would be able to do it AND do it well. As I did, you will have to learn to let go of perfectionism and learn to empower others to do the job in their own creative way.

Third challenge – Projects: Many project fail due to lack of planning or strictly no planning at all. Even if you do manage to muster up one of the best plans ever, you still have to ask yourself, “Do I have the capabilities to manage this project from start to finish ensuring it’s successful?” If the answer is No, I would suggest getting somebody who can do it well. It will be a hard task but it will save you a lot of anxiety and frustration as well as preserve your company’s reputation in the end.

Fourth challenge – Procrastination: We all have been bitten by the procrastination bug from time to time: “Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?” The issue arises if you allow yourself to be bitten too often by the procrastination bug. There is no vaccine for the procrastination flu. Your new venture depends entirely on you completing even the most mundane tasks. Let’s rephrase the question to this: “Why do tomorrow, what can be completed today?”

Fifth challenge – Getting Organized: As your organization’s first employee, you will need to have an idea as to how every link in your organization chain connects. You are the captain of your ship! It is your job to ensure that whoever comes on board, will know exactly how to connect and be in sync with the organization because as they say “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.”

Sixth challenge – Lack of Focus: You have so many brilliant ideas, that each one seems “shinier” than the next, so you start with one then realize, “Oh!! This new idea seems way more fun than the previous one! I’ll just do this one on the side while I work on getting the other one fully operational” I’ll share with you an analogy which I shared with one of my entrepreneur friends:

“Imagine you are in the construction business and you received a contract to build five houses. You have planned everything right. You know one house requires x amount of blocks therefore you would need x amount for five houses. You gave a contract to the biggest block manufacturer of which they inform you that they would not be able to supply you with all the blocks initially before the project begins but will supply you as your project progresses. So, you start all five houses and everything is going as planned. Midway through your project, you receive a phone call from the block manufacturers who have been hit by an unforeseen circumstance (it may be a flood, hurricane, tornado or whatever you like) and they are unable to supply you for the next six months. Now you are stuck with five unfinished houses. What if you had started and focused on completing each house one at time. You would now have had at least two houses ready for sale.”

Moral of this very long story is to pick one venture, stick with it and see it through from brainstorm to an established business. If you have to pivot, change your business model or accept its failure then do so. At least you know you gave it your full focus and everything it needed to succeed.

Seventh challenge – Time Management: Time is money we all know that. If you can’t manage your time wisely, you will lose money. It’s just that simple. You are frequently late, over-committed and over-promising. You underestimate the duration of completion of projects and often scramble to catch up late into the night. Time is your most important asset. The key element is learning how to use it wisely to avoid losing money.

Your turn to share
These were just some of the challenges I have faced and had to learn to overcome. Share with us some of your challenges. If you are not yet an entrepreneur, feel free to share with us why you want to become an entrepreneur.

I recently had the opportunity to be interviewed by CaribDirect.com, a UK- based Media Company. The interview covers many areas such as Caribonix.com, mentorship, challenges, family life and much more…

Special thanks to CaribDirect.com for reaching out to me and for helping to market the talent enriched Caribbean to the world.

The Interview:

What Prompted You to Set Caribonix?

Like many young entrepreneurs, who we frequently hear about in the media, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg and the others who went on to become icons in their respective fields/industries, I also got my start while in my junior year at university. I began with an individual who needed web development services and I needed the extra cash (being in University you can never have enough). It was a great feeling getting paid for doing what I loved. Soon after the project completion, another one came in, and then another. I was quickly beginning to create a name for myself based on the quality of work I provided. I decided to formulate something more long term which had the potential to grow and be recognized by others around the Caribbean.

Do You Have a Mentor?

I have had different mentors at various stages of my life and career beginning with my mother Mrs. Angela P. Samuel. She has always believed in me and pushed me to do great things. Even as a child, her love and support were endless. My brother, Trestan Samuel, former boss Mr. Horatio Sutton (he gave me my first web job as his Junior Assistant Webmaster) and former colleague, Mr. Nads Alfred.

Based on the definition of mentor I wouldn’t say that I presently have a mentor but I do have a support system that I can always contact in order to receive feedback and insight on any situation that I’m faced with or needs clarification.

Read full interview here…

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