I’ve learned that the first brave act of entrepreneurship isn’t raising money or designing a logo. It’s saying your idea out loud and clearly enough that someone who isn’t you can repeat it back.
Every semester, I’m invited into David Carter’s Tourism Innovation Lab at Thompson Rivers University to help students make that leap. I don’t “lecture” so much as run a practical dialogue on positioning, segmentation, and early value propositions—how to turn a hunch into a statement you can test in the real world. This time, we tried something new: I trained an interactive avatar coach named TESSA with the same material I teach so that students can keep iterating after I leave the room. TESSA isn’t there to do their work; she’s there to keep them honest, focused, and moving.
This is the first piece in a short series following this cohort from first articulation to final pitch. Consider it a field note for the community: what actually happens inside the lab, who makes it work, and why this matters for Kamloops.
The room, the rhythm, the work
The session opens the same way it always does: a few jokes, a quick reset of the projector, and an invitation to interrupt me at any time. I tell the students I’m not a professor; I’m an entrepreneur who’s exited a few companies and now spends most days helping people go from idea to traction, with an increasing focus on AI and digital avatars. Then we get straight into the heart of early venture work: making your offer easier to buy by making it easier to understand.
Positioning is my favorite “boring superpower.” It’s the craft of expressing what you do in a handful of sentences that are short enough to memorize and sharp enough to test. We start with a hypothesis—who it’s for, what matters to them, what value they get, and how you’re different from the alternatives—and we refine by talking to real people. I often frame it this way: ideas live happily in your head, but businesses have to live in other people’s calendars and wallets. Until you can say it out loud, you’re not ready for either.
To get there, we look at three building blocks:
Value chains: What bigger flow are you part of, and is that river rising or falling? You can’t control the whole chain, but you can choose where to plant yourself and how to adapt as it shifts.
Segmentation: Who’s most likely to say “yes” first—specifically? We borrow a classic exercise (originally used to find early EV buyers) to show how geography, behavior, and timing combine into a first beachhead. The punchline is simple: a small, clear segment you can reach beats a broad, fuzzy crowd every time.
Positioning statements & value propositions: The elevator version that opens the door, and the buyer-specific version that closes the deal. We design both early so students can practice saying them out loud, get correction, and try again.
If you peeked at our slide deck, you’d see simple scaffolding rather than poetry:
For [customer], who need [outcome], [venture] is a [category] that provides [key benefit]. Unlike [alternatives], we [differentiation].
It looks almost childish until you try to fill it with a real idea and realize how much fuzz you’ve been hiding behind.
Then we flip the lens to value propositions: the same story, tuned to the three “hats” every buyer wears—user (do I want this?), technical (does it fit the constraints?), and economic (is it worth it now?). Trips, tours, and experiences trigger all three, whether your buyer is a parent booking a family activity or a destination partner curating options. Talk to each hat in turn; don’t make them do the translation for you.
This term’s experiment: a coach named TESSA
My goal is to spark momentum. But the questions that really matter tend to appear after I leave—when students turn the idea into a first draft and encounter the resistance of words. So this term, I built us a teammate.
TESSA is an interactive avatar trained on the content I teach about positioning, segmentation, and value props, plus a local knowledge layer from Tourism Kamloops and TOTA, so examples and feedback stay anchored in our region. I introduced her at the end of the session and ran a quick demo: I asked how she would coach one-on-one, then prodded her to critique a sample positioning statement. She answered calmly, asked clarifying questions (Who exactly? What key benefit? What alternatives?), and nudged me toward sharper differentiation. Then I logged off and handed the link to the class for the rest of the semester.
Under the hood, I trained TESSA to behave like a coach, not a shortcut:
She asks first, then suggests. If you don’t tell her who you’re serving and what outcome matters, she’ll ask until you do.
She refuses to “do it for you.” She’ll critique and offer patterns, but she won’t write your positioning statement end-to-end.
She stays local. The knowledge bank includes regional context—what’s saturated, where partners see demand, and how visitors actually search—so the feedback doesn’t drift into generic advice.
Does an avatar replace mentorship? Of course not. But it does something human mentors can’t: it’s available at 11:30 p.m. when you finally sit down to write, and it never gets tired of your third revision. Given how much of entrepreneurship happens between sessions, that matters.
What students wrestle with first (and how they get unstuck)
1) From “everyone” to “someone.” Early drafts almost always reach too far. “Visitors to Kamloops” becomes “photographers who plan around golden hour and want local access,” and suddenly the route, the timing, and the price make more sense. Narrowing doesn’t close doors; it opens the right ones first. It also lets you write a homepage that reads like you’ve been waiting for the right person rather than broadcasting to the entire market.
2) Saying the promise in one breath. The moment a student condenses their idea into a single, true line—“A calm, guided way to capture Kamloops’ golden hour with whatever camera you brought”—you can feel the shoulders drop. The project gets lighter because it has a center. From there, everything else is elaboration.
3) Choosing a category word customers already use. Inventing categories is fun; it’s also expensive. Most of the time, you win faster by placing yourself where people already look, then standing out on benefit or approach. If your experience feels like “a photography tour,” don’t label it “visual journeyware.” Let the value do the differentiating.
4) Designing for the three buyer hats. A great photo on the landing page (user hat) isn’t enough. People also want to know what to bring, how to get there, what you’ll handle (technical hat), and what it costs or what makes a time slot scarce (economic hat). When students map these explicitly, they stop losing bookings to avoidable uncertainty.
A word to the community watching
If you’re in Kamloops’ tourism ecosystem—hotels, attractions, guides, restaurants—this lab isn’t separate from your world. It’s a farm team for good ideas and conscientious operators. When you offer feedback to students, or open a door for a pilot, you’re shaping the quality of experiences our city exports.
If you’re a potential partner curious about how AI coaching intersects with tourism training, come by the TRU Generator or reach out. We’re experimenting in the open because we believe that well-guided students build better ventures, and better ventures make for better guest experiences.
And if you’re a student reading this with a half-formed idea in your notes app: come to class ready to say it out loud. Then say it again, sharper. We’ll help you find the words that hold.
Gratitude (and tags for the people who make this work)
David A. Carter — Associate Teaching Professor, builder of the Tourism Innovation Lab.
Tourism Kamloops — partner and market compass.
Jada Glen — Coach and Guest Speaker from Tourism Kamloops.
TOTA — regional backbone and program supporter.
ETSI-BC — enabling the leap from plan to pilot for student ventures.
TRU Generator & CIBA — my home base for mentorship that bookends the course.
The students — you’re the reason the lab has a heartbeat, and the energy in the room proves it every term.
What’s next in this series
In a few weeks, I’ll share an update from the first online coaching session: what changed once drafts met real conversations, what TESSA is being asked most, and how teams are choosing their first beachhead segments. By the end of the term, you’ll be able to see the full arc—from idea to articulation to pilot to pitch—through the lens of a few representative ventures.
If you’re curious, follow along. Strong ideas deserve daylight.