post by Ramneek (Athwal) Rai (2023 cohort)
What a great 3 months!
I completed my internship over the summer with Obu Invest, a business that is dedicated to addressing the inequalities that exist within the entrepreneurship and investment space. The impact business works towards closing the gender investment gap by creating an angel investment platform to demystify, democratise and diversify angel investing.
I started my internship at a time when Sarah, the CEO, was innovating new ideas to realise Obu Invest’s vision. Our first meeting covered a recap of their upcoming exciting projects, my ideas and what I hoped to achieve from this placement opportunity.
I still remember the motivation I gained from this first meeting. I felt my entrepreneurial spirit was in action and I was in a space where I could share all my crazy and wonderful ideas with Sarah who radiated the same energy. A particular highlight was Sarah asking me to share my ‘out there ideas’, where I got to share anything that I thought would be great for the business both short and long-term without any judgement! We also discussed the microlearning content that Sarah was working on to build know-how and understanding of angel investing.
By the end of the meeting, we agreed on my placement goals, which included:
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- Understanding the investing world
- Journey from idea to implementation
- Smash Obu’s potential
- Gain corporate experience
- Opportunities to create greater awareness of Obu and its mission
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We both decided it would be best to have at least one regular weekly check-in, where I could update my progress and discuss the upcoming tasks to focus on. Due to my expertise and placement aims, many of the tasks were research focused such as on partnership and collaboration opportunities and various sectors.
A key learning was understanding the different types of angel investors that exist:
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- High net worth investor
- Certified sophisticated investor
- Self-certified sophisticated investor
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I was not aware of the different categorisations that existed for angel investors, this new knowledge will be pivotal for my research as the different types of angel investors may influence who I interview, generalise data about and the recommendations I make.
Sarah informed me of an event of interest – Louder Than Words: The B Corp Festival. This was the largest-ever gathering of B Corps, which are companies that meet high social and environmental standards, as verified by B Lab. On the first day, I sat in my seat in the theatre, notepad and pen in hand, ready to make notes on panel discussions and keynote speakers. Whilst this happened, I did not expect the opening of the event to be an impactful theatrical performance which instantly had the audience engaged.
I also attended an interesting seminar at the event on the topic of reframing diversity, which was very relevant for my PhD. In the seminar we discussed the impact of Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) in this area, covering issues such as ‘checkbox’ in recruitment, understanding the different terminology and how to reduce bias in the recruitment process. This was topical for my research, as I explore the bias in the investment process for female entrepreneurs and ways to reduce the bias in this process. Additionally, it enabled reflection on the importance of diversity which I will explore further in my research. In general, I gained an insight into the work of B Corp, but also realised how many items I buy on a regular basis are B Corp! Furthermore, I also gained ideas on the research I could conduct on the topics of social & environmental impact, business and diversity.
Sarah kept me involved on the current projects that Obu were working on, invited me to events where she would be speaking and was kind enough to let me sit in meetings.
Key takeaways from my experience:
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- Prioritisation: operating a business often involves many ideas and ongoing projects. However, it is important to prioritise what is currently important for the business
- Learn to enjoy to the process of idea to implementation
- Write down all your ideas. It may be THE idea, or it may lead to another interesting idea.
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Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience of working in a start-up culture. I further developed professional skills such as time management to complete tasks by the set deadline and learnt the importance of creative problem-solving and the benefit of different leadership styles. These are also relevant skills that can be applied to my academic career as I need to focus on prioritisation of tasks to meet research deadlines, potentially find creative methods of displaying my research and how to work effectively in different group projects.