Today's Entrepreneur: Jayati Sengupta

Kristin Karaoglu · April 18, 2012 · Short URL: https://vator.tv/n/25d4

No. 1 mistake: Trying to launch with a bucketful of features

Today's Entrepreneur is Jayati Sengupta, CEO and Founder, Flipgigs. According to her VEQ Jayati is a thought leader and is good at product management and team motivation.

Vator’s community is the home to entrepreneurs who embrace their passion and follow their dreams. Our profiles allow members to express themselves by sharing their interests, lessons learned, as well as bits and pieces of their roller-coaster journey.

These profiles give entrepreneurs an opportunity to showcase themselves and tell their story. So if you are an entrepreneur, a serial entrepreneur, or even an aspiring entrepreneur, we'd like to hear from you.

I am a(n):
Entrepreneur

Companies I've founded or co-founded:
Flipgigs

Startups I worked for:
DeviceAnywhere, Flipgigs

If you are an entrepreneur, why?
I'm bursting with ideas!

My favorite startups:
Social Twist, Box.net, Pandora, Airbnb, Flipboard

What's most frustrating and rewarding about entrepreneurship/innovation?
Frustrating 48 hour days and rewarding when you are told that you have one of the most beautiful and refreshing websites by dozens of people

What's the No. 1 mistake entrepreneurs make?
Definitely making a mistake of trying to launch with a bucketful of features when you should put out a few and test it in Beta

What are the top three lessons you've learned as an entrepreneur?

I trust too easily so have learned how to always ask for references
I run away with ideas and before long I have built this gigantic platform in my head which I have learned over a period of time to trim and cut back.
I almost have no patience when work doesn't get done. I learned how to be a little more patient.

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Kristin Karaoglu

Woman of many skills: Database System Engineer; SplashX event producer; Author of Startup Teams

All author posts

Related Companies, Investors, and Entrepreneurs

Flipgigs

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on March 13, 2012

While everthing else seems to have gone social including shopping and online dating, one thing that has been stuck in the past is the way students find odd jobs and gigs. Believe me. When it comes to odd jobs students still have to knock on doors, ask their parents network or school officials. That's what we had to do many many decades back. Enter Flipgigs. Flipgigs is a talent based student skill sharing social network connecting savvy consumers and businesses with a motivated, affordable , scrappy network of students in High Schools & Colleges eager to find gigs and jobs. Our website, http://www.flipgigs.com.

Students also get to build a portfolio of work that can showcase their passion and commitment to prospective colleges and employers. There is not a single site that creates these connections and creates these opportunities. Flipgigs has the potential to be the LinkedIn for students

Flipgigs is currently in Private Beta and is growing virally locally and in communities across the US.

According to a recent post on Forbes, Flipgigs is the top 5 most promising social sites for students and has the potential to be a very large company.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/shelisrael/2012/05/05/5-promising-social-sites-for-students/

Flipgigs has also been declared Winner of The Best Startup award at The Startup Conference in Mountain View on May 2, 2012. Flipgigs was unanimously voted by a panel of investors consisting of Dave McClure of 500 Startups, Thomas Korte of Angel Pad , Joyce Chung of Garage Ventures, Manu Kumar of K9 and a few others.

http://thestartupconference.com/startup-competition/

Formidable Target Market Size : About 28.2 million College Students + 16 million High Schoolers in US . 75% of them work part-time. By the time they are in College they represent about $60 billion in buying power . Something needs to feed that buying power besides the bank of mom and dad.

Flipgigs is the only innovative platform that taps into student talent and provides a solution to the most vexing problems faced by many. If you are looking for cheap affordable scrappy services - maybe you just bought a new Macbook but don't know much about the Mac OS, maybe you need a Math Tutor for your kid and can't pay exorbitant fees, a music mentor or a Varsity Sports Instructor, you have to check out this amazing service.

Unlike some other players in this space that targets retired people or homemakers to run errands, we are less into errand outsourcing and more into top 5-7 kickass student services mainly academic tutoring, music mentoring, sports instruction, babysitting, social media marketing, blogging , translations etc.

At Flipgigs we hope to socially revolutionize the student short and part -time employment market. So far we have been very well received by investors and the greater entrepreneur community and are actively seeking funding.