Lessons Off The Court
By Shrey
Founder Shrey’s Tennis Lessons
My goal joining WIT was to explore the field of business and entrepreneurship as a potential career path.
Prior to setting my goal, I did some independent research on business and entrepreneurship, but to gain more hands-on experience, I knew I needed support. I decided to search for an organization that would provide me with this guidance.
I found WIT (Whatever it Takes) and participated in their course called Intro to Social Entrepreneurship + Leadership Development. My course spanned the two months and involved participating in intensive two-hour weekly Zoom sessions with business owners from a variety of fields. The business owners would mainly focus on talking about their experience about starting a business (like we were), answering our questions, and giving helpful tips and information on expanding on what we are creating.
To apply what I was learning, I launched a small preliminary business called Shrey’s Tennis Lessons. In order to start this business, I had some assistance from my mom who would post on Facebook about how I was offering tennis lessons. That helped me start building up clientele. I applied advice on growth strategies from my Doing WIT mentors to reach more people and get more engagement with my business in other ways such as selling tennis bags and merchandise. This then led me to make a Facebook page, where I had the most success in finding clientele. With my Facebook page, my clients went from 2-3 to around 10. I think Facebook was the most successful since it is the most popular and active social media app for the general age of parents who were looking for opportunities for their children (who are between 6 and 13 years old). Part of my business also involved leading the one-on-one sessions with kids.
It was interesting to learn about the fundamentals of starting a business, especially the intricacies of developing a business plan, pitching it to potential investors, and figuring out how to use marketing and promotions to expand my business. For me, the most interesting part in all of this was just the feeling I got entering the immense world of business and that I am taking the steps to build upon something I, myself, have created. This was just all-around a one-of-a-kind and unique feeling and experience for me.
Hearing and learning from already successful entrepreneurs was very helpful, especially talking about the hurdles of starting a business. More than anything else, I learned how to use failure as a learning experience.