The Paradox Of Choice: The Ice Arena Manager

“Sonia, Congratulations, you just got promoted as the Ice Arena Manager”, I smiled and gladly accepted the compliment, as promotion and manager were two big words for a 16yr old. I spent the rest of the day retrospectively analyzing the chain of events culminating to being appointed the youngest Manager at the rink.
Entrepreneurship to me is a state of mind- it’s not about starting a new business. You can be an entrepreneur while being in a job- by taking a calculated risk and trying something new. I was initially hired as an instructor to increase the client base. As a student of revenue management, I created numerical models to extrapolate and interpret off-peak vs. weekend rates and introduced variable pricing scheme with promotions for
Since I was a child I have frequently dabbled in both business engagements and engineering projects. I still remember the middle school days when I used my emergent marketing skills to help launch my brother’s computer assembly business. Researcher Barry Schwartz in his book “The Paradox of Choice - Why More Is Less” argues that having too many choices makes buyers less likely to purchase. So we introduced just an ‘office computer’, a ‘gaming computer’ and a ‘homework computer’ with price bands. It was an instant hit with product demand from peers, neighbors and family friends. Since then, my endeavors have evolved significantly and I am now the proud owner of “Treats by Sonia” (Health conscious custom bakery) and as aforementioned a Manager at the local Ice Arena. Additionally, I have translated engineering from motherboards to the realm of nanomaterials and integrated intelligent microsystems. I am now exploring how Nanotechnology could help give millions clean drinking water with my mentor Dr. Sharma. This brought to my notice HydraVita, the project that bagged third place in the 2011 Senior Design Project Competition. I have since been researching past and current submissions, and hope to win this competition in my own time. I strongly believe technology is not successful by getting into a high-impact paper neither it’s successful by having people tell you it’s really interesting. It’s successful once
My political internship with the BJP the summer after junior year has given me a basic education in Indian development, and I would love to continue that education on a more global