08.10.2010

Today, Mr. Sen brought two of his former students, Can Tuncer and Can Soyak, to the class for us to learn more about the Junior Achievement Program. They had the control of the class throughout the 6th period of the day and informed the two business classes who were undecided whether to join an already existing business company, or to form their own one.

They gave us the information that we needed in the given amount of time, and it was even more useful because Mr. Sen let them to teach us in Turkish. They started with giving a brief information about Junior Achievement and continued by talking about their past experiences. We learned the advantages and disadvantages of both joining a company that already exists, and forming a new one.

As you can imagine, creating your own company requires more effort and time, so it is considered harder when compared to joining one. They talked about the process of forming a new company, deciding the departments and the purpose. A company does not have to have all the departments, but there are mainly 5 departments with a CEO in charge which are production, marketing, finance, human resources and public relations.

They let us know that it is essential for the head of the departments to take a business or economy course. When those are decided, the next thing to do is for the head of the departments to choose an assistant to help them through their work. There is a meeting set when the assistants are chosen, and the purpose of this meeting is for the CEO to decide whether the assistants are capable of handling this job or not.

After this meeting, the skeleton of the company is created. Now, it is the time for admitting the associates. The head of the departments present their company to possible candidates and explain them their purpose, their difference from the other companies. The applicants are then interviewed, and it is the time for the company to choose their members; smart, ambitious and hardworking students. Can Soyak warned us about not to admit people to the company just because they are our friends, he told us that it is important to choose the right man for the job.

When all of these are accomplished successfully, the company is at last formed and can start operating. It is now more obvious; the comparison between joining and forming a company. Can Tuncer told us their invention of spagetti fork, made out of automatic tootbrush. This idea came out from one of their companies associates, Ceylan Carhoglu, and she played a great role for her company winning the Best Company Award. She basically created the thought of replacing the brushing part with a fork, so that the fork would spin and hold the spagetti together.

During the last 5 minutes of the class, Mr. Sen wanted us to come up with ideas like these and mail it to him, Can Kaya or Damla Erkiner that night. We had the opportunity of talking one-on-one to Can Tuncer or Can Soyak, and this is how I learned so much about creating a company. At the end, I decided to form a company instead of joining one, and started to work towards this goal.