June 24th, 2014 § § permalink
A supernova remnant about 20,000 light years from Earth (Photo credit: Smithsonian Institution)
building a company is incredibly hard. so hard, that it often drives some of the smartest and most capable people i know mad, because in the spur of the moment they dont understand what is wrong with them that they are still ‘unsucessful’. truth is, they are pretty sucessful comparatevily, and they are doing all the right things, but building a company is just hard.
it takes 5-9 years to build a company said eric 7 years ago. i was shocked, because i lived in a techcrunch bubble, just like 80% of young ambitious entrepreneurs i meet. i guess this bubble actually enables creation of at least half of the startups, because it fills them with optimism.
2 years later, after blind optimism wears out, all you are (hopefully) left with is groundworks for the actual future company and the burning ambition to prove everyone that you weren’t wrong. in reality, if you survived 2 years, that probably means you have a team or some market validation or some traction, or some angels, or some advisors, or any combination of them, and you are actually light years ahead of where you’ve been. but it still feels dissapointing.
dissapointments is a function of expectation often said my brother and our first ceo ales. and he was right, entrepreneur must at some point in time suspend her expectations and face the reality – your company will be something else than what you imagined on that cocktail night, but it’s going to be real, and shaped by thousands of interations of other people with it, where you are merely a sheppard. observe, react, nudge, endure.
if the only thing that’s missing is ‘success’, you’re probably on the right track. forget your ego and enjoy and learn.
December 17th, 2012 § Comments Off on first three things every new startup founder/ceo should know § permalink
This post was inspired by an entrepreneur who I barely know from one of my previous lives, who sought a meeting because he was put in a position of running a startup. While thinking about what to say to him in the first 30 mins, I realized that it really can be boiled down to a handful of core truths. everything else is a footnote, or tactics.
So, you’re starting a startup with a couple of your good friends? there are only two ways you could have ended up in this situation:
- you are so smart, that you never had to really think hard about what you are doing with your life. you go where it takes you and make it work in your favor, and have fun while doing it;
- or, you’re so dumb, you think doing startups is fun because it’s fashionable and you want to be just like mark
I sure hope you’re of the first kind, or that you are at least smart enough, to recognize yourself in the second description and give up while you still can.
Odyssey (Photo credit: tonynetone)
If you’re still reading, I guess you really want to know what it takes to run a startup. For explaining startup management issues, I really like the Platonic metaphor of a Sailboat. I might explain this some other time in more detail, because for today, we just need to be aware of the Guiding Star – when you are in the middle of the sea, without GPS, and with a couple dozen crew member who’s fates depend on your judgement, it clearly is important that you know which direction to sail to reach the destination.
It is no different in a Startup. you start a startup, because there is something tangible in your mind, that you need to make tangible for everyone else – a vision / an idea, that you see clearly, and can imagine how to do it. that’s your Guiding Star. thinking of that idea gives you strength to move forward, and to think creatively about shortcuts. discussing that idea makes other people join you on the journey, because of your ability to paint it so clearly for them, that they can see their role in getting to the end.
so here’s the heart of the advice for any first-time founder of a startup: never ever loose your Guiding Star. if you stop being obsessed with it, just stop.
Robin Klein taught me a version of this statement: “the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.” the flip side of this statement is, that it is better to kill the startup, than to keep working on it without the inspiration of the Guiding Star. Here’s why: as Fred says, a startup CEO has only three jobs to perform:
- communicate the vision, internally and externally
- assemble the best possible team to execute on that vision
- secure the resources the team needs
I would argue that if you have your Guiding Star – if you can really feel your vision, if thinking of it is making you do things rather than sit still – only then will you be able to communicate the vision. and if you can do that, you will assemble the team, and convince the investors needed to succeed.
inevitably you will choose the wrong direction sometimes. and you will be running short on cash. you will have to do hard practical decisions. but if you have the Guiding Star in front of you, the decisions will make sense, so they will be infinitely easier to make. even if you run out of cash completely, and you are forced to kill your company, if you do that while knowing what you believe in, it’s not a failure, it’s just a learning experience.
and lastly, one thing that has nothing to do with you or your idea. Odyssey needed 10 years to return home, and that’s exactly what you are signing up for – assume your startup will consume you as a whole for 10 years. keep that in mind while you are deciding to start it, and while you are doing your everyday decisions. only if the idea is such, that it would still make sense for you in 10 years time, than you can consider it.
good luck.
August 30th, 2012 § § permalink
This article suggests that after 6 big exits, suddenly the whole space of web startups is less exciting and we should look to other fields.
In the wake of the Facebook IPO, something funny has happened to the world of startups. Suddenly, startups feel very boring. VCs and entrepreneurs say they feel it too. “I do feel a bit like that, but then again that could also just be the startups I’m happening to see,” one investor said.
via: www.businessinsider.com
I find that to be bollocks. There are still things on the world that can be improved or fixed trough web-based technologies, and that will never change. Sure, bio-tech and similar are emerging and creating new exciting spaces, that will bring improvements to our lives, and might generate bigger returns for investors in the next decade, but if returns are all that makes something exciting for someone, well, why don’t you go live on an island somewhere.
August 24th, 2012 § § permalink
Amazing how we never see opinions like these coming from within Silicon Valley itself.
Silicon Valley is facing an image problem. Facebook didn’t even leave the Valley to ring the opening bell on its tragic IPO, and that was after spending $1 Billion on Instagram. Meanwhile Zuck’s sister is shooting a “reality” show in San Francisco and calling it… well, reality. Let’s not forget the Angry Birds movie, either.
…
…the media in Silicon Valley needs to stop regurgitating the same stories to the top of Techmeme every day. Secondly, focus on BIG problems – stop saturating the media with acquisitions like Instagram which do nothing to actually change a significant problem in the world. Finally, look to the established giants who are solving the world’s most important problems – from healthcare, to politics, to green energy and education.
via: blog.loispaul.com
I agree almost completely, the valley as a business hub is becoming more about efficiently moving pieces of paper, than solving next greatest problem of the world. They are starting to resemble entertainment industry of south California.
One thing that we should see as their achievement and contribution to the world though, are numerous frameworks and recipes for reducing friction in entrepreneurship. Everyone around the world knows about the lean startup now, and it is helping to unleash new talents in other places.
Not sure why I’m remembering Monty Python right now.
August 18th, 2012 § Comments Off on Slovenian Startups: it’s personal § permalink
Roughly three quarters of the webpages of Slovenian startups don’t say who the founders are. Not on the front page, not on the about page, nowhere. Most of the list the tax ID numbers and official address of the company, but not the names of the people running it.
This is a catastrophe! Are you trying to hide your head in the sand until the success ‘happens’, and only after that will you collect the credit? The founding fathers of America wrote their names on the Constitution, before it was a success.
Every young company has two major challenges when it comes to public communication:
- how do I tell enough people we exist?
- how do I make them trust us with their money?
The best answer to the first one is – go out of the office and talk to people on events and in their native environment. It’s also a great way to get to know your core audience inside-out.
But for the trust issue, the absolutely best remedy is for the founders to be put up front, essentially saying loud and clear: “Trust Me”. Don’t just trust the words I’ve written (they are wrong), don’t trust the design (it’s bad), don’t trust what you heard on the street about us (it was probably wrong), trust ME, I believe in what we are doing, I believe we are changing the world into a better place, and should something bad happen, I will feel ashamed to death.
So startup founders, please, write your names everywhere you can and be proud of it. There is no other way your startups will succeed.
May 30th, 2012 § Comments Off on ‘The Golden Age of Silicon Valley Is Over, and We’re Dancing on its Grave’ § permalink
Memory is a Golden Sieve (Photo credit: kern.justin)
… following a point from yesterday, it seems US economy is catching up with Europe:
BLANK: I teach science and engineering. I see my students trying to commercialize really hard stuff. But the VCs are only going to be interested in chasing the billions on their smart phones. Thank God we have small business research grants from the federal government, otherwise the Chinese would just grab them.
via: www.theatlantic.com
May 25th, 2012 § Comments Off on #1 natural limit of web economy? Land! § permalink
Geeks live their lives peacefully in the online world most of the time, but every now and then reality hits us on our heads – this article beautifully outlines how old-fashioned housing legislation in silicon valley is limiting the ability of online business to grow.
THE financial press went ape this week over the highly anticipated IPO of one Facebook, the Harvard social network turned $100 billion phenomenon. Facebook’s soaring valuation has focused attention on a Silicon Valley that is once again booming, and it has led many to wonder whether social networking isn’t inflating into yet another tech bubble.
via: www.economist.com
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
May 14th, 2012 § Comments Off on The dangers of relying on startup steroids § permalink
all the entrepreneurs and VCs are drinking the same cool aid most of the time, and some get away with it. most have to come back to earth sooner or later and actually build business that provide hard value.
I find this metaphor of startup steroids very telling:
Startup steroids: Pinterest feels the burn of Facebook‘s Open Graph By Ben Popper on May 3, 2012 09:30 am 23Comments A packed room of more than 200 founders, VCs and internet bankers took a moment to look up from their iPhones and listen in hushed reverence as one of Silicon Valley‘s top investors explained what he looks for when choosing the…
via: www.theverge.com
… another buzzword in the valley these days is ‘virality engineer‘. everyone want one, who will save the startup by providing the growth everyone wants to see.
it’s great that we are aware of the users and obsessed with them, but the hockey stick is the end goal. the goal of an entrepreneur should be to create a sustainably growing organization, mix of products, people and processes that ensure continuos creation of value, with or without the original entrepreneur.
April 4th, 2012 § § permalink
I’m reading Guttenberg the Geek, fantastic essay / biography by Jeff Jarvis, focusing on entrepreneurial aspects of famous inventor.
Several topics here are super interesting, like similarities between inventors, geeks, entrepreneurs, and what it means for the future of mankind.
Guttenberg Bible (Photo credit: Joe Shlabotnik)
However, one is not so obvious, but it might be inspiring for new generations of entrepreneurs around the web – Guttenberg spent a lot of time, energy and risk in building out the typeset and printing the first book.
The situation was much harder than anything today – he could not know if he will even survive the project, but let’s still compare this risk and emotional investment with today’s entrepreneurs – geeks between 20 and 30, who choose the uncertain but shiny path of building their business.
The project you are working on, should compensate for the conditions of extreme uncertainty. Compensate by reward and/or importance for yourself, human kind, the planet.
The product you will be judged upon should encapsulate the shiny core of the promise, of the better world. That’s why Guttenberg wouldn’t stop until he fulfilled his mission and printed the Bible – there were several smaller projects before it, to perfect the technique, but nobody really talks about them these days.
He was able to change the world because he endured on his journey until he could crown the disruptive technology, with a really memorable crown. Respect.
January 30th, 2012 § Comments Off on and the geeks shall inherit the hollywood… § permalink
Image by Getty Images via @daylife
a couple of days ago I saw this article, from an obviously certified
geek, who believes our species has the right to reinvent everything it did or didn’t hear it existed before:
My idea to “Kill Hollywood” This is in response to the excellent Y Combinator “Kill Hollywood” request for startups. I think it’s simple (though not easy ): beat them at their own game by starting a new studio. A kind of studio that has never existed. A kind that could not have existed before.
via: blog.rsbrown.net
it caught my eye, because he is actually writing in response to Y-Combinators appeal to kill hollywood, not because it is supporting SOPA, but:
but because SOPA brought it to our attention that Hollywood is dying. They must be dying if they’re resorting to such tactics. If movies and TV were growing rapidly, that growth would take up all their attention.
via:Â http://ycombinator.com/rfs9.html
… now, coming from media background, I was doubly fascinated with this happening:
Note the cell towers lurking in the background... Image via Wikipedia
- what a stupidly short-sighted appeal from y-combinator – as if they don’t remember that TV didn’t kill the radio, than cable didn’t kill the TV, and that internet didn’t kill the cable. if anything they are all jointly killing our old ways of life.
- what an ignorant attitude from a random geek towards a humongous industry that developed trough 120 years. don’t get me wrong, his analysis is 85% correct – that’s exactly how the movie industry works, smart-ass!
and again, don’t get me wrong – i do similar ‘sins’ all the time – our generation seems to severely failed to learn from previous ones, or from history. we assume we know everything, because we are the first to really
know everything is calculable, and that we might live to see the
GUT.
because of that, whatever we do, think or say, is in fact, annoying, presumptuous and half-right. the other half we are yet to learn the hard way. it’s the curse of our generation.
