Last week, we took a look at two student-run businesses, the challenges they faced, and the keys to their success. Alex Berman CMC ’12 and Charlie Walton CMC ’12 run a tutoring business in which they contract out college students as tutors for elementary and high school kids; Daniel Black CMC ’11 runs the textbook-matching site bookmatchers.com, with plans to start a more extensive “buy, sell and trade” site in the works. This week, the founder of the 5-C entrepreneurial society offers advice to a first-time or potential entrepreneur. Black, Berman and Walton also share their wisdom on how best to start a company and ensure its success.

Jason Tolkin CMC ’11 not only initiated the entrepreneurial society Kairos on the 5-Cs, but he was also one of the first college students to conceive of the society in May 2008. Kairos started at Wharton and has spread across the country, including to USC, Stanford and the 5-Cs on the west coast. Tolkin is now Vice President of the national organization.

As a means for entrepreneurially inclined college-goers to network and share skills, Kairos “is a way to cement relations with other students,” says Tolkin. “It fills in the gaps” there might be in an idea for a business. For instance, a student with ideas for a green, environmental business might contact a Kairos member at Harvey Mudd or MIT for help with the scientific or technical aspects of his plan: “This allows students to more easily collaborate and fuse their ideas.”

Along with regular speakers and events at its individual member institutions, Kairos puts on a major, national summit every April. Each year, a small number of students from each college present their businesses and business plans—as a way to share ideas, but also to inspire some friendly competition between young entrepreneurs. Important guests also add to the summit’s clout: last year, Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, and Phil Condit, former CEO of Boeing, spoke at the conference.

Tolkin, who started a not-for-profit business that gives yacht rides to cancer patients when he was in junior high school, said that Kairos is an excellent resource for those “who have an idea, but want to learn how to take it to the next level.” Though Kairos is essentially an invitation-only society, Tolkin says this is changing as more students become interested in joining.

As an employee for Soleil Venture Management and with other companies in the works including an exotic car rental company, Black is well positioned to advise others who have an idea for a business but don’t know where to begin. Luckily, he says that he loves to advise other students on their business plans; in fact, his ultimate goal is to start an incubator for college students to start up companies, and to travel around the United States to college campuses supporting young entrepreneurs. Black names Xerox and Subway as examples of successful companies started by college students to show that starting a business at a young age isn’t so far-fetched as it may seem.

When you’re young, you should take big risks, said Black: “Failure’s great. I’ve failed many times. You learn from it.”

Walton stressed the importance of networking. “It’s all about who you know,” in starting a business, he said. “You have to establish yourself before you establish yourself. Meaning, you have to find clients who are willing to attest to your credibility. Once you’re at that point, the rest comes more easily.”

Black is eager to aid other students focus and improve their business ideas. “I help a lot of students for that.” Fittingly, he uses his own website to advertise free consulting: go to collegematchers.com to contact him for advice on starting your own business.

They’re a rare bunch on elite, liberal arts college campuses, where the focus is often on the academic rather than the practical: these undergraduate businessmen are already diving right into the business world. However, one in twelve Americans attempts to start a company at some point in their lives. Take note of these young entrepreneurs’ words of advice: one day down the road, you may follow in their ambitious footsteps someday with a business idea of your own.