A Fun Way To See If You Really Want To Be An Entrepreneur

As an Entrepreneur I know that starting a company isn’t always fun. Since Venture Capitalists can only invest in less than 1% of the companies they review I just like most other founders have often left investor meetings sporting a sad / discouraged face. Building a real business can be stressful and difficult, but at the same time it can be extremely rewarding. When things “click” being an entrepreneur can feel euphoric and if your company skyrockets to “Unicorn Status” you and your team may become extremely wealthy — it doesn’t happen often, but the fact that it’s a possibility fuels many people to hop of the entrepreneurial roller coaster before they realize what a crazy ride they’ve buckled themselves into. I’m a big believer that anyone thinking about starting a company should not just blindly jump in, they should start by making sure that they are truly excited and prepared for the entire entrepreneurial journey including all the big ups as well as the big downs. That said, figuring out if you want to move forward on the wild ride that is a startup does not have to be stressful or expensive.

That’s why my husband (a Venture Capitalist) and I created the board game “The Next Big Thing: The Game of Entrepreneurship” which is available for pre-order now on Kickstarter. The game let’s you experience entrepreneur, from beginning to end from the safety of a fun board game that you can play with your friends and family. In this game players take on the role of startup founders to launch “the next big thing” that will change the world and eventually make them millions or potentially billions of dollars. Players start by bootstrapping their companies using initial cash savings and “superpower” skills such as programming or marketing to create a minimal viable product. They then grow their team, get their first customers, and move into an office. Along the way players experience multiple significant events (good and bad), take different paths such as an accelerator or a detour with pivot paths. As players grow their companies, they raise multiple rounds of capital from investors, increasing their company’s valuation, while watching their founder’s equity get diluted. At the end of the game, players must strategize and decide the best path to “cash out” for the most amount of money by choosing either to get acquired or to do an IPO. The player with the highest final Founder’s Value wins! The board game has received wide support from the venture capital and entrepreneur community, including top accelerators, crowdfunding platforms, angel groups, seed funds, and venture groups which are included in the game rules to help educate players.