Getting Our Ducks in a Row: A BizQuest Experience
Authored by Aditi Kiran, a year 11 student high school student
Published on the 09 March 2026 by UNSW Business School EDI Team
Creating opportunities for young people to explore their ambitions beyond the traditional classroom is a key priority for UNSW Business School. Through outreach initiatives and experiential learning programs, the School aims to introduce students to new ideas, build confidence, and open pathways that may shape their future study and career choices.
One such initiative is BizQuest: Unlock Your Future Potential, a two-day program delivered by UNSW Sydney for motivated Year 10 and 11 students from the Greater Western Sydney region. The immersive bootcamp invites participants to step into the world of business through hands-on activities, collaborative challenges and practical insights into entrepreneurship, finance, strategy and innovation.
In the reflection that follows, Year 11 student Aditi Kiran shares her experience of participating in 2025 BizQuest. Her experience offers a firsthand look at what can happen when high school students embraces an opportunity like BizQuest — building confidence, discovering new interests and imagining new possibilities for the future.
Much like how the word “networking” immediately conjures images of slightly awkward handshakes and forced enthusiasm over lukewarm coffee, the phrase business bootcamp tends to arrive with its own intimidating aura. It sounds serious. Structured. Possibly full of people using phrases like “market disruption” without irony.
So, when I signed up for the BizQuest Bootcamp run by UNSW Business School, I expected something informative but vaguely exhausting, the academic equivalent of wearing a blazer that looks nice but makes breathing slightly inconvenient.
Instead, BizQuest turned out to be one of those rare events that manages to be genuinely educational while also being unexpectedly fun…which, for something involving financial modelling and SWOT analyses, is frankly impressive.
The program ran across two days at the UNSW Parramatta campus, which already gave the experience a different energy from anything school-related. University spaces have this strange psychological effect where you automatically feel like you should be thinking more sophisticated thoughts. Even registration and morning tea felt vaguely professional. There was a quiet hum of nervous conversation as students arrived, did the classic pretend to check your phone so you don’t look awkward standing alone maneuver, and gradually started talking to each other.
But what became noticeable very quickly was the composition of the group itself.
Despite the event being open to everyone, the cohort ended up being entirely female. And honestly? That made the experience feel incredibly refreshing.
Business, entrepreneurship, finance — these are still often framed as traditionally “male” spaces, whether intentionally or not. You grow up seeing certain environments coded with a particular kind of energy: competitive, intense, and slightly intimidating.
Walking into a room where every participant was a girl completely dismantled that expectation.
Instead of people trying to out-speak each other or perform confidently, the atmosphere was collaborative and curious. People asked questions freely. Ideas were thrown around without hesitation. There was laughter, slightly chaotic brainstorming, and the collective realisation that business can actually be creative rather than purely analytical. It felt less like a competition and more like a shared experiment in figuring things out.
The professors and facilitators played a huge role in creating that environment.
Rather than delivering lectures from a metaphorical pedestal, they ran the sessions in a way that felt conversational and engaging. The opening workshop on the fundamentals of creating a business didn’t drown us in jargon or abstract theory. Instead, they broke down entrepreneurship into something surprisingly logical: identifying problems, figuring out whether people actually care about those problems, and then designing solutions that could realistically work.
Which, when you think about it, is basically problem-solving with slightly higher stakes.
Things became even more interesting when the Shark Tank challenge was introduced.
Suddenly we weren’t just learning about business, we had to create one. Teams formed quickly, and before long my group- Ipshita, Mackenzie, Davina, Eva, Emmy, and I- had entered the slightly chaotic but strangely productive phase of brainstorming where every idea is simultaneously brilliant and ridiculous until proven otherwise.
This is how The Working Duck was born.
The concept behind our idea was centered around a real problems many young people face: entering the workforce without clear pathways or accessible opportunities. There’s often a frustrating gap between finishing education and actually gaining meaningful employment experience. Employers want experience, but gaining experience requires employment, the classic paradox.
Our platform aimed to bridge that gap by connecting young people with employment and career opportunities, helping them transition more easily into the labour force after education. The goal was to simplify the process of entering the workforce, making opportunities clearer, more accessible, and less intimidating.
And yes, the name raised a few eyebrows.
But it was intentional. Ducks exist comfortably both on land and in water, navigating different environments with ease. Young people entering the workforce often have to do something similar — transitioning between education, training, and professional spaces while figuring out where they belong. The Working Duck represented adaptability, movement, and the idea of helping people “land” their first steps into employment.
Also, it’s objectively a memorable name.
The finance workshops “Money Matters” and “Dollars & Sense” added a layer of realism to our creativity. It’s easy to come up with ideas when money isn’t involved, but the moment budgets, funding, and cost structures enter the conversation, things get more complicated very quickly. The professors guided us through the basics of funding models and financial planning, showing us how businesses actually sustain themselves beyond the initial idea stage.
This part was surprisingly interesting, mainly because it revealed how strategy and creativity intersect.
Limitations force better thinking. Once you start asking questions like “Who would actually pay for this?” and “How would we fund development?”, ideas either collapse or become stronger. Thankfully, ours survived the financial interrogation.
Another highlight was the Powerful Pitching workshop.
Public speaking has a reputation for being terrifying, but the professors reframed pitching as storytelling rather than performance. Instead of trying to sound impressive, we were encouraged to focus on clarity and persuasion. Why should people care about your idea? What problem are you solving? How do you communicate that in a way that actually resonates?
It turns out pitching is basically just structured storytelling with slightly higher stakes.
Day two brought even more strategic thinking. The Risk Radar workshop forced us to consider all the things that could go wrong with our idea, which sounds pessimistic but was actually incredibly useful. The branding and marketing session, titled “Brand It, Sell It!”, showed how presentation shapes perception. Suddenly logos, messaging, and audience targeting became part of our thinking.
Then came the strategy workshop, where we applied tools like SWOT and PESTLE analysis to refine our concept. These frameworks sound intimidating until you realise they’re essentially organised ways of thinking critically about your idea.
The final stage of the program was the Shark Tank Showcase.
This was where each team pitched their business idea to a panel of judges and industry representatives. By that point, nerves were inevitable. Standing in front of professionals and presenting something you built over two days carries a particular kind of adrenaline.
But the panel itself made the experience far less intimidating than expected.
Instead of the harsh interrogation style you might imagine from television shows, the judges were thoughtful and genuinely interested in the ideas being presented. Their feedback was constructive and insightful, asking questions that helped clarify our thinking rather than trying to trip us up. It felt less like being judged and more like having a conversation about possibilities.
Presenting The Working Duck in that setting was oddly rewarding.
By the time we stood up to pitch, our idea had gone through two full days of discussion, refinement, and collaborative thinking. It wasn’t just a random concept anymore; it was something we had built together.
And that was probably the most valuable part of the entire experience.
Events like BizQuest matter because they expose students to ways of thinking that school doesn’t always prioritise. They show that business isn’t just about numbers or corporate structures; it’s about creativity, problem-solving, and communication. It’s about identifying gaps in the world and asking, what if we fixed this?
But beyond the academic benefits, there was something personally meaningful about the environment itself.
Being surrounded by a room full of young women discussing entrepreneurship, pitching ideas, and confidently engaging with business concepts felt quietly significant. It challenged the lingering stereotype that these spaces belong to a particular type of person. Instead, it felt like a glimpse of a future where those assumptions simply don’t exist.
BizQuest didn’t just teach us how businesses are built.
It showed us that we are capable of building them. And honestly, that’s a pretty powerful realisation to walk away with after two days.
