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Fab Lab Divas – Unexpected Start-Up

Jim Correll, director Fab Lab ICC at Independence Community College, Independence Kansas 

Part of our Fab Lab ICC mission has to do with inspiring and nurturing business start-ups. Our intentioned method is through an initiative we call our Growth Accelerator. The Growth Accelerator includes a set of start-up and small business management tools. After our new building is finished, it we’ll also include incubation space in what we’ll call the Entrepreneurs Bullpen. 

Often in life, from many sources, we are told develop the plan, and then focus on the plan. The problem with too much planning and focus is that we often miss unexpected opportunities due to the blindness caused by the too narrow focus on the plan. No one will ever accuse us of over-planning. We do some planning but we try to keep our eyes wide open and cast a net for unexpected opportunities. There have been many in our short two and one-half year history, but few as unexpected as the development and growth of Fab Lab Divas. 

Good friends April Whitson and Laurie Rutland began coming to the Fab Lab early this year. Their focus was to develop something they could sell together even though both have rewarding careers in full-time, demanding jobs. One of their first product ideas was to reinvent some of the classic board games, like Chinese Checkers, in cool new packaging to reintroduce family game-playing. We observed and helped as they learned quickly about cutting things like game-boards on our computerized routing table. 

One evening, I sat down at a table with them as they told me they might have a change in their goals. They decided that it should be their mission to show other women how to use the Fab Lab. They envisioned holding class in the Fab Lab that would be fun for women while showing them that the technology is not that difficult to learn, especially if it’s needed for a project of great interest. Their last words to me on this night were “Are you sure you’re ok with us taking and running with this idea?” I told them it was exactly the kind of thing we needed. That signaled the beginning of a new totally unexpected but fabulous opportunity for Laurie, April and Fab Lab ICC as well as a growing community of women from throughout the area. 

Doing business as Fab Lab Divas, the two have hosted six class sessions covering two topics; wine glass laser etching and wooden wall art and chalking. They tried to cap the sessions at about 12 participants each. Most sessions sold out and were over-booked. In one session there were nearly 25 women in the lab working intently on their wooden wall art. They had planned to suspend the classes during summer to work on their own projects as well as fall classes. After all, summer is such busy time and no one wants to do indoor activities, right? Not so. Women were so disappointed at the thought of having to wait until August for new classes that the Divas will be holding at least couple of classes before fall. 

April and Laurie could have been so rigid in their planning and focus that they missed the opportunity to share the self-confidence of the Fab Lab experience with other women. We could have been so rigid and focused in our planning about how we would deliver Fab Lab classes that we missed the opportunity for a member-driven effort to include a whole class of new Fab Lab ICC users. This story will continue to unfold for the next couple of years so we don’t know exactly what will happen. One thing is clear, by the time another year or two goes by, hundreds of women will be introduced to the boost in self-confidence resulting from making things in the Fab Lab. 

Jim Correll is the director of Fab Lab ICC at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship on the campus of Independence Community College. He can be reached at (620) 252-5349, by email at jcorrell@indycc.edu or Twitter @jimcorrellks 

 

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