Graves lecturer inspires attendees, teaches about entrepreneurship

Terrie Wood, CSC business professor, gave a lecture on small business and life as part of the spring Graves Lecture Series, 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 22 in the Reta King Library.

CSC hired Wood last fall, but this is not her first time teaching here. Thirty years ago, she taught at CSC for a 10-year span.

The last 20 years she has been doing business consulting, event planning, and strategic planning for nonprofit companies. Wood’s speech related entrepreneurship principles to our day-to-day choices.

“I feel like it’s everything we do in life: business,” she said.

First she talked about “value clarification,” or the things we care most about in our lives. She explained the importance of knowing what your business stands for and what your purpose is.

Her second point involved pleasure versus pain, and the choices we make.

“The truth is, we work harder to avoid pain than we do to gain pleasure,” Wood said.

Her example was getting into a relationship not because we truly love the other person, but because of a fear of being alone.

This circles back to value clarification. Do business owners truly value integrity, or are they just trying to save face so they don’t lose customers?

Wood said we must try to move forward toward what we want instead of avoiding the bad things. She defined entrepreneurship as risking everything to build a business that produces something people want.

Wood said you have found your small business “when you can combine what you love with something that people are willing to pay for.”

She said we are the entrepreneurs of our own life, and we risk everything every time we have to make a hard choice. We have to get past the fear, and follow the values we set.

Tuesday is the final Graves Lecture this semester. Social and Communication Arts Assistant Professor Janice Haynes’ speech will be “Romance and Marriage Plots: Restoration for Family in Narratives of Single Mothers.”