I'm a big fan of entrepreneurship (duh!) and also of education, and when you put the two together, general goodness ensues. I'd written about BUILD in a prior post - they help under-resourced, under-motivated kids finish high-school and get into college by turning them on to entrepreneurship. I've been a friend, and a huge admirer, of BUILD for a few years now, but this year I felt that I can walk the talk and go beyond donations to actually volunteering as a 'business' mentor to a group of budding entrepreneurs.
The premise, in brief, is that the mentors meet weekly with their team and help them through the business planning process (which BUILD uses as a lever to help their academic goals) and at the end of the year they get to present their plans and possibly win 'seed' funds. We've had a few 'getting to know you' meetings in preparation for starting on the real 'business' work soon.
It's been a really fun and eye-opening experience:
- It's great to see so many mentor volunteers. Understandably, many are fresh out of college, as life seems to get busier as you get older (due to kids and careers in equal measure) until you get old enough to be in charge of your schedule again.
- The kids are very smart. In some ways they're just like the kids in prep-schools in their obsessions, but unfortunately, there is a substantial knowledge gap and that seems to bring down their confidence and they don't think they're smart enough.
- When asked what they'd do if they had $10 million in the bank, every single one would spend a big chunk helping their families and helping others, very few talked about getting specific material goods like a Ferrari.
One of the most encouraging signs I saw was that in every one of the 'business' discussions we had (the last one was on the most profitable way to sell s'mores), the kids are very passionate about quality. They were vehement about not wanting to sell low-quality goods just for increasing the profit (s'mores with less chocolate? nooo!). While almost all of them said they were in this class to learn about making money (which is a great thing), they seemed to have an innate desire to go about it the right way - money is good, but not at the expense of others. Making jokes at the expense of your classmates is perfectly OK though (they seem to be pretty aware of not crossing the line into meanness).
It is inspiring to see the essential goodness even in kids who have less-than-comfortable, or even acceptable, home lives - especially when we're flailing through a financial meltdown caused by pervasive greed and are despairing about the lack of ethics in the business world. There's hope!
Channeling the inner entrepreneur who views life as a startup. Musings about people, their spirit, the startup ethos and the entrepreneurial attitude, with an emphasis on education and social ventures. The 'how-to'? Not so much. But definitely the why, the what and the whatever.
Experience may not be required
Hiring for a startup in the early stages sometimes requires you to go counter-intuitive. For example, take experience - it's not always a good thing.
This is not a be-young-or-die creed. It's more about the need to have a certain approach - a 'beginner's mind', which is open to new ways of doing things and is willing to find out what's needed and learn it. And while age alone is not a barrier to the open mind, ego often is.
I'm beginning to believe this approach is critical even for tactical, technical positions, though here experience in specific skills would be a definite requirement. But along with those skills, you'd need to check if the person is walking in with a 'Let's see if what I did before would work here' versus 'I've done this before, I know it all'. For example, how many of us have tried to rescue project management from the set-in-concrete opinions of 'experts'?
But what about the executive/strategic positions? Here the issue is even more pronounced as most executives have a very healthy opinion of their accomplishments. They have their own blueprints, templates and strategies on how to get things done. And these are useful, and often sought after, if they're switching from one corporation to another. They may even be helpful in established startups with stable teams, product and market. But an early stage venture is a shifting stage where you're better off polishing your improv skills and putting your well-thumbed script from past positions in the bottom drawer for a later date. For example, the VP of engineering shouldn't be surprised if there's no backup process and no sys admin to delegate it to either - he should be googling backup strategies and trying stuff like getting his comp sci major cousin to moonlight for a bit.
So how do you figure this out without some fancy psycho-savvy interviewing? Smart interviewing is important, but you can do some smart resume filtering first. Too much experience of the 'wrong' (read 'same') type is a handicap in a startup. You might have a chance if the candidate has a track record for learning/doing in different jobs and a demonstrated ability to work in places with big and small budgets (frugality, the retro startup chic), but even then you may want to go the consult-then-convert route to make sure you have a good fit - way less stressful than hire-then-fire. Startups need to be adaptive and flexible, and if you get the guy who's made a career out of driving nails with his hammer you get nothing but a pounding headache - while the one with a swiss army knife can uncork some wine, slice some cheese, open up a can of olives...
This is not a be-young-or-die creed. It's more about the need to have a certain approach - a 'beginner's mind', which is open to new ways of doing things and is willing to find out what's needed and learn it. And while age alone is not a barrier to the open mind, ego often is.
I'm beginning to believe this approach is critical even for tactical, technical positions, though here experience in specific skills would be a definite requirement. But along with those skills, you'd need to check if the person is walking in with a 'Let's see if what I did before would work here' versus 'I've done this before, I know it all'. For example, how many of us have tried to rescue project management from the set-in-concrete opinions of 'experts'?
But what about the executive/strategic positions? Here the issue is even more pronounced as most executives have a very healthy opinion of their accomplishments. They have their own blueprints, templates and strategies on how to get things done. And these are useful, and often sought after, if they're switching from one corporation to another. They may even be helpful in established startups with stable teams, product and market. But an early stage venture is a shifting stage where you're better off polishing your improv skills and putting your well-thumbed script from past positions in the bottom drawer for a later date. For example, the VP of engineering shouldn't be surprised if there's no backup process and no sys admin to delegate it to either - he should be googling backup strategies and trying stuff like getting his comp sci major cousin to moonlight for a bit.
So how do you figure this out without some fancy psycho-savvy interviewing? Smart interviewing is important, but you can do some smart resume filtering first. Too much experience of the 'wrong' (read 'same') type is a handicap in a startup. You might have a chance if the candidate has a track record for learning/doing in different jobs and a demonstrated ability to work in places with big and small budgets (frugality, the retro startup chic), but even then you may want to go the consult-then-convert route to make sure you have a good fit - way less stressful than hire-then-fire. Startups need to be adaptive and flexible, and if you get the guy who's made a career out of driving nails with his hammer you get nothing but a pounding headache - while the one with a swiss army knife can uncork some wine, slice some cheese, open up a can of olives...
There's hope!
No this is not about the election (though today is election day and I'm voting for hope and hope the majority does the same). It's about the wobbly times we're in. Credit crunch, sinking home values, disappearing jobs, diving stocks and a general feeling of global malaise.
I know there's a ton of ink, digital and otherwise, comparing these times to the Great Depression, which most of us have only read about. But, there's also the comparison to the 70's, which were marked by inflation, high gas prices, political blunders and crashing stock markets. And it was exactly in those gloomy times that the fired-up Jobs, Gates and others launched their now iconic startups.
I'd read that the Chinese word for crisis, weiji, is made up of the characters for 'danger' and 'opportunity'. Wikipedia assures me that it's a common misconception, but there's a reason why it is so - it sounds cool and inspiring, and a lot easier to remember than the other description that I've already forgotten.
So, yes, this is the time for opportunity too, as long as you can be patient and don't expect the dot.com boom-like fast returns which were fueled on hype (hype is suspect now). You may have to reset your expectations on what people would want/need, but wants and needs are still out there and can still be filled with innovation and enterprise. And there are even investors who're willing to fund ventures now, as long as there's enough substance that they can start to dream too.
For entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs who're willing to work harder and longer, these are times of hope - if they could innovate their way of the 70's doldrums, we sure could do it now!
I know there's a ton of ink, digital and otherwise, comparing these times to the Great Depression, which most of us have only read about. But, there's also the comparison to the 70's, which were marked by inflation, high gas prices, political blunders and crashing stock markets. And it was exactly in those gloomy times that the fired-up Jobs, Gates and others launched their now iconic startups.
I'd read that the Chinese word for crisis, weiji, is made up of the characters for 'danger' and 'opportunity'. Wikipedia assures me that it's a common misconception, but there's a reason why it is so - it sounds cool and inspiring, and a lot easier to remember than the other description that I've already forgotten.
So, yes, this is the time for opportunity too, as long as you can be patient and don't expect the dot.com boom-like fast returns which were fueled on hype (hype is suspect now). You may have to reset your expectations on what people would want/need, but wants and needs are still out there and can still be filled with innovation and enterprise. And there are even investors who're willing to fund ventures now, as long as there's enough substance that they can start to dream too.
For entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs who're willing to work harder and longer, these are times of hope - if they could innovate their way of the 70's doldrums, we sure could do it now!
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