The Startup Ethos

3 Ways to Give Beyond #GivingTuesday

'Tis the season for giving and in case you missed it, today, Tuesday December 2, 2014 was the official 'Giving Tuesday'. Maybe this can offset the Black Friday and Cyber Monday "getting" frenzies (though you could be "getting" for "giving" to others).

Did your inbox get flooded with "Giving Tuesday" solicitations for a kazillion charities? Mine sure did. And all the social media feeds were not very different either. #GivingTuesday was the top trending hashtag on Twitter. And just in case you don't really want to help others (channeling Scrooge), there are many studies and talks trying to convince you why you should, for example how to get happy giving money.

Maybe you were on the ball and had already figured out how much you're going to give and to whom and made it happen today - on Giving Tuesday. Then again, maybe you were super busy with the business of living and working and didn't have time to do so, or you just don't know who you'd like to give to, yet.

Not to worry, you can give any day of the year. Yes, there are matching grants offered on this day, but it doesn't really matter - announcing the matching is just a way to get more donors like you to hurry up and give right now. The 'match' donor is most likely going to donate the planned amount anyway.

I'm glad that I can give at any time, and I can give in three different ways.

1. Giving Money.

Much of Giving Tuesday is about monetary donations, which is understandable as non-profits need money to be able to offer services to those in need. The good thing is that they will take the money any time you can give it!

Figuring out who you should give money too takes a bit more effort. If you have money to give and you're ready to do so, you can do it for:

A charity drive sponsored by your workplace
A charity drive in your (or your kids') school
A charity that a friend or family member is involved in
A charity for a cause that you are intellectually/emotionally attached to

If you're picking your own favorite cause, take some time to check it out and make sure it meets your standards and it's legit. A quick look at http://www.charitynavigator.org/ would be help. And if you're up to it (and not likely to be caught up on how it'll be used), go ahead and give some money to the panhandler on the street. It's all good!

2. Giving Time.

Otherwise known as volunteering, this is the one thing, other than giving money, that keeps non-profits running. When you donate your time, you are giving of yourself in more personal way, and, most organizations welcome that, especially if you have some specialized skills that they need.

Before donating your time to an organization (check them out first!), you may want to consider a few things:

Do you want to do this just one-time or on a recurring basis?

One-time may help you ease into it if you're just starting out in volunteering

Can you make - and keep - the commitment?

Thinking of mentoring after work each week? Consider if your schedule would allow it.

Would you enjoy the other people you would work with?

You're more likely to keep your commitment if you're comfortable your co-volunteers

Would you like the work you'd be doing?

Frankly, I'm not big on cooking large vats of food, so it's a good thing that soup kitchens often have more helpers than they need.

But, you're not limited to organizations. You may have family members or friends who need companionship or some help (lonely grandpas, aunts who don't drive) who would greatly appreciate your gift of time. And don't they say that charity begins at home?

3. Giving Spirit.

No, not 'spirits', but giving of your spirit. Of the three ways of giving, this is probably the most spontaneous and the least structured. It is nothing more than showing compassion and spreading some cheer, and you can do it as often as you want, to anyone.

Some examples of how to give of your spirit:

Thank the barista who gets your latte with some genuine warmth, eye contact and a little personalization. As in "Thank you! You are fast, even with this crowd!" vs. a mumbled, face-averted "Thanks".
Praise your coworker's effort, especially when no one else is paying attention to it. ("It was really nice that you stayed late to help John figure out the bug.")
Give a meaningful compliment to a family member. ("You even got your introverted cousin laughing at the party last night.")
Email a friend you haven't been in touch with for a while with a link or story she'd like.
Say something nice to the person waiting in the checkout line with you.
See something that makes you feel good on Facebook? Don't just 'like' it, be bold, and write an authentic comment about how you feel. It'll make more people feel the same way.

The funny thing about giving of your spirit is that it can be the easiest thing to do but also the hardest, especially when we're so wrapped up in our own affairs and can't remember to do things without prompting. And for some people, it also not easy to connect emotionally with those who are not close friends or family. But it does get easier the more you do it though, and best of all, it makes you feel good!

Giving Tuesday is over, for this year at any rate. Do you still plan to give?

Image courtesy of rakratchada torsap at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Never too late!

So, it's been eons since I posted on this blog. There was always something else to be done. And since it didn't appear that any readers were having paroxysms of withdrawal symptoms because of the paucity of posts, there was no external pressure to do so. I had started the blog mostly to get myself to write something which was not 'business-y' on a regular basis, which unfortunately is not a strong enough motivator for me to make the time. So when weeks became months and I still hadn't posted, I got to thinking that maybe it was too late to post and I should give up.

But, I do have another motivator - I don't give up, not easily. If I were a canine, I'd be a bulldog (or is it a terrier?), sticking with stuff, growling and yapping long after a sensible creature, like a cat, would have walked away. Anyway, what's the worst thing that can happen if I posted after a long hiatus? Nothing more than spambots getting happy.

Plus, there was the bonus of having a ready-to-go topic to write about in my not-too-late post: it is never too late for most things in life. (Let's not get literal about this with a "it is too late to catch the train if it's already gone!" type of argument, though.)

Here's my random, very incomplete, list of things that get pushed way, way out to the background until it seems their time has passed, but they clearly belong in the 'never too late' category.

It's never too late to get in touch with an old friend
It's never too late to tell someone how you feel about them if it's good (if not, file it under 'things better left unsaid' - after all, you've managed to not say it for so long)
It's never too late build on relationships you care about
It's never too late to start a fitness program, or just start moving (if you want to keep it simple)
Expanding it a bit, it's never too late to start paying attention to your health and what you eat
It's never too late to start learning a new language
Actually, it's never too late to start learning anything, as long as you have the basic capacity to do so (it might help if you first learn swimming before you try surfing)
It's never too late to end a bad habit (still smoking?) or build a good one (call your mom every week!)
It's never too late to start saving, even if you're a boomer who partied like there's no retirement
It's never too late to read the book you've wanted to for years (Shakespeare waiteth for thee)
It's never too late to start a new activity/hobby - like blogging :)
It's never, ever too late to be compassionate

What's special about a New Year

Image courtesy of [Stuart Miles/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Why is the first day of the New Year so special? It's not just the good times and watching the ball drop in Times Square even when you're thousands of miles away in a different time zone, though when you're young, good times may be all that you care about. But, as you get older, you want more from the event than just the ephemeral experience of partying. It is because the new year promises a new beginning and we all want another chance, if not for 'do-overs', at least for 'do-betters'.

And new beginnings require changes and big efforts require big changes. If you're already on an fitness program, it is not difficult to add another 15 minutes or do another routine, but if your exercising consists only of clicking your TV remote from the couch, starting to exercise requires you to change. Change is difficult for many of us who've been conditioned to aim for comfort and predictability and avoid any chance for failure. But change is life and as we're all changing in small ways even if we don't know it, we might as well sign up for the big changes that we can consciously make to get us to where we want to be and who we want to be.

Considering a change in 2014? Check out this post from James Altuche r. Wild and crazy, but totally on the mark in its message. Vive la change!

Post Thanksgiving

Thankful for the beauty of fall

(Excuse the small pun!)

It's still Thanksgiving weekend and even with the possible food coma, Black Friday shopping and overload of family and friends, we may still have a bit of the actual 'giving thanks' feeling lingering in us. A glow of gratitude. A counting of blessings resulting in warm fuzzies. After all gratitude seems to be the easiest, cheapest and safest drug to help fight stress, depression, anxiety, the general blahs. So we can take a couple of minutes and extend the good vibes by giving thanks (skipping the attendant gluttony) for a few 'extensions' to the standard lists.

Family. For sure we're thankful for our immediate family and sometimes our extended family (especially when they're at the table). How about the many generations that went before us to make us who we are? We may have names and occasionally faces for a generation or two (or, if lucky, three) before us, but just thinking of our ancestors and the place(s) they came from and imagining their lives gives us a much better appreciation for our own lives and times (where we can obsess about the selection of heritage vs. 'all natural' turkeys).
Health. We tend to give thanks for our own and our family's good health if one of us recovered from something nasty, but we forget we stay healthy with exercise and diet. Give thanks to the fact that you can bike to work, or live close to a wilderness area with great trails, or your daily life is so full of activity that you don't need to 'work out'. And many of us should thank our good fortunes for the plentiful access to healthy tasty foods (yay for farmers markets!).
Work. While being routinely thankful for having jobs and incomes (sadly 'at least I should be thankful I have a job' is all too common), we could extend our gratitude to our coworkers who enrich our work lives, the mentors who help us out, the innovation around us (if we're lucky) and the sheer satisfaction of accomplishment which work of any kind brings to us.
Challenge. We don't like it when the going gets rough. We get hurt or disappointed by people. We're frustrated when things don't work they way we want them to. We're stressed when projects sputter at work or kids act out at home. But, if you stop to think about it, you'll recognize that you grew and learned something from every one of these 'I wish it didn't happen' events. The 'difficult people' and 'rough patches' that make you stronger and add texture to the tapestry of your life are worth your thanks.
Fulfillment. The feeling that you've been of help to someone is right up there with gratitude as a happy drug, being 'fulfilled' is the best possible state. So make it a double-shot, give thanks for all the opportunities you've had to be compassionate and of service to others.
Fun. If you're reading this post, you're one of the fortunate ones with access to the Internet and discretionary time (both of which are in themselves worthy of serious gratitude) and you probably get to do something fun maybe even on a daily basis. It doesn't matter what it is - video games, cartoons, music, foodie fests, football, books, sitcoms, art, scrabble - you should give heartfelt thanks you're so lucky to be able to indulge in something just because it pleases you.
Beauty. It is all around us, in the earth, the sky and stars, the creatures that share our planet, in the people of the world from babies to babushkas, in the ideas and artifacts we humans conjure. It gives us joy, sometimes even when we're not aware of it and deserves gratitude for its presence.

That's it, a few extras for consideration in giving thanks - I don't feel compelled to make it a list of 10 (another thing to be thankful for). What's on your thanksgiving list?

Nurture the nature

The prevailing conventional wisdom for doing pretty much anything, from losing weight to packing lunch or changing jobs, is:

There should be an article, or more likely a blog post, posted somewhere, anywhere. Literally anywhere in the world, Singapore Times, Belize Bulletin, Capetown Courier. Whatever. Preferably shared on Facebook by your cohorts (not your parents' generation!).
It is neatly encapsulated into a checklist. Something you can put (better yet download) into your to-do list. There's an app for that? Even better. (There isn't? Then build one!)
There's a study! Some university doctoral candidates researched this very topic and published it in some journal. Never mind that the topic could be as common-sensical as lack of sleep makes people tired and cranky (something you already know from past, painful experience), but hey, the study makes it worthy. (Hope you're the type to check out the details, because studies can be, hmmm, spurious sometimes.)

Anyway, here's the thing to do (and the subject of this post): Talk to your kids about your family, give them the 'backstory'.

For generations this was something that was pretty much taken for granted. Kids spent so much time around their parents, as well as grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins (essentially the tribe), that they heard these stories all the time (and probably rolled their eyes when hearing them as teenagers). Genes were not enough to make a 'family' - being together and knowing about each other were needed. You heard about grandpa running a grocery store not because your parents wanted to make sure you'd grow up believing you could be a successful tech entrepreneur, but because that was just part of your history. And knowing the good as well as the bad was a given, because it showed that (a) things work out (b) families stick together through thick and thin and (c) there's probably a moral in there somewhere that nana just couldn't pass up in each telling.

We live differently now. Our families are not close and in our hyper-competitive, uber-structured, always-on lives we need a strong reason (and peer pressure!) to take the time to tell stories.

Want the article? Here you go.
Want the checklist? Voila! Here's another article which lists the twenty questions your children should be able to answer.
Want the study? Mentioned in the articles above.

All these exhort you to talk to the kids and build a family narrative. This is not just so you give your kid an edge in growing up to be a billionaire entrepreneur, an Olympic athlete or an arena artist. It is so they can grow up stronger, more resilient, and happier in whatever path their lives take them. It's not enough to pass on the DNA, but to nurture their nature. Kids need to hear about the people around them, just ordinary folks (not celebrities), who've managed to live decent lives. This helps kids build confidence in their abilities to manage their own lives. (I've seen it work for my friends' adopted kids too - maybe there's a study somewhere.)

But please, don't stick to those twenty questions - they may not be relevant, and worse, may just be boring. Twenty fleshed-out stories (like how your grandma's grandma drew water daily from the well when she was 90 years old or how your uncle traveled to Africa in the Peace Corps and never came back), may be more memorable. Stories need to be told over dinner, on road-trips, around campfires, curled up on a couch on a rainy day (hint, hint, make the time to talk to your kids!), but e-books and videos are good backups (note: backups) too.

I enjoy channeling my strong, independent great-grandma who survived being gored by a cow in her late eighties ("it was only a cow!") - do you have a story that inspires you?

To blog or not to blog

From its inception and growth in the late nineties, the blog has evolved hugely from being just a 'web log' suitable for early adopter geeks. Last year Wordpress alone (which accounts for about 49% of the blogs) had over 72 million blogs (2012 numbers from here) and that's not counting millions in China. There are the professional corporate blogs and news blogs, the 'thought leaders' and self-marketing blogs along with the millions about anything and everything - causes, celebs, TV shows, pets, athletics, make-up tips, political leanings and of course, the ever-popular mommy blogs. So should you blog too?

Restating it by replacing the word 'blog', the question becomes 'should you write too'? The answer is 'yes!'. If you need convincing, here's why:

Writing helps you think clearly (why 'critical writing' is - and should be - so big in schools).
You can be a teensy bit creative and shake up the right side of your brain that's in a dull stupor from the dominant data-drunk left side (especially in the past decade).

Done. You're convinced that writing is good for you, and, even better, you're kinda enjoying the prospect of writing without having assigned topics, deadlines or report cards clogging your creativity. You're ready to go and then you ask yourself 'should I write a blog'? And then, to your dismay, you have your internal editor popping up with 'what if no one reads it?' and you stop right there, even before checking out the relative merits of Wordpress and Blogger.

Here's why you can disregard your anxious inner worry wort and embrace blogging:

There are free blogging tools.

So it doesn't cost anything to try. Failure is most certainly an option.

You don't need a large readership.

You're not Huffpo. You're not blogging for dollars.
If you need to blog for marketing purposes, you're doing it already (and not reading this).
Give your ego a break and exercise your creativity instead.

Someone WILL read your blog.

Family will usually oblige by subscribing, and if your writing is interesting, they'll tell others. Your mom will read anything you write, and grandparents and older family members would love to be connected to you through your writing - especially if they live far away. Be prepared for embarrassing Facebook shares.
Friends would subscribe too, especially if you're writing about stuff they relate to - but don't push.
Mention it to 'friendly' co-workers, but again, don't push.
Believe it or not, if you're writing about topics that get Googled, and you do a few things to make your blog easy to find, you're likely to get random readers from random corners of the world, which makes it fun.

You can hide your blog if you DON'T want your coworkers/boss/mom to read it.

Yes, you can go stealth and share your blog 'by invitation only'.

It's a snap.

The tools are super simple and you can even get help if you insist on it.
Write what you'd like to read. Don't try to be someone else though, it gets tiring.
You just have to pick one topic out of the many that you probably have rattling around in your head. Your hobbies, passions, travel, pet peeves, kids' antics - all are good options for a post.
If you want guidance, a search will bring up oodles of sites offering (free) advice on how to get blogging.

Jump in and join the millions (and my entire family) - start a blog (and tell me about it)!

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Study science with soul

The pendulum has swung. First there was the hand-wringing that we didn't have enough graduates with 'hard' degrees - science, engineering, technology and math - now, recent news from a Harvard study is about the 50% drop in the number of students in the humanities. And the phenomenal rise in online learning shows vastly greater interest in computer science or business courses than in philosophy or anthropology.

Though my own major was in math, I was always attracted to the liberal arts, auditing classes when I could, and strongly believe that not only are the liberal arts fascinating, they are necessary for individuals, as well as society as a whole, to be complete.

Why? Because:

The 'hard' subjects are all about the 'how' - humanities help us with the 'why'.
Calculus and compilers don't teach you about different cultures.
The past formed our present which informs our future (why history matters).
We need a moral compass to guide us through the unprecedented changes caused by medical and technological advances, from clones to drones. Philosophy helps.
Art expands the mind (think different).

The United States holds the innovative edge largely due to its ability (so far) to pay serious attention to the arts and humanities, as well as the sciences - a fact that other countries are recognizing and working hard to emulate. We're at a time when we can discuss the science of the soul as well as the soul of science. We should embrace this kind of 'blended learning' and keep it going, don't you think?

Images courtesy of renjith krishnan & Simon Howden / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Time is money

A truism. And some variations below, noted while waiting for a software fix ;)

Wasting time is wasting money.

Well maybe, for commercial endeavors. Otherwise, wasting time is just that.

Spend money to buy time.

That works for personal and business 'work', from paying someone to clean your home to outsourcing your social media research so you have time for other things.

Your time is worth money.

Depends on what you do with that time doesn't it?

Saving time is saving money.

See #3 above.

Saving money is saving time.

If it is time spent in making money, sure.

Spend time to make money.

Yup, if what you're spending time on is income-worthy. Like polishing up your coding skills or 'networking' for consulting gigs or baking cookies.

Money is time.

The reverse of 'time is money' though hardly anyone says that. Maybe because of the perspective - if you're not hurrying up, you're losing money, but if you're spending money, you're what, losing time?

If you don't have money, spend the time.

Assuming people who don't have money, will at least have the time - why students wait in line for hot concert tickets, and the rich pay the students to wait in line for them.

If you can't spare the time, spend the money.

Again with the assumption that you're the kind of person who is more flush with cash than hours.

Money can't buy you time.

Sounds like a contradiction to #2 doesn't it? But this is about the time that you don't have at your control and is often controlled by nature, the time for stuff like healing.

Final thought: time is worth more than money. Especially in relationships, ask any counselor (or mom!). Spending time on the things you care about gives you experiences to savor, builds memories to cherish and long term happy feelings from both. Wouldn't you agree?

Equal Value?

Entrepreneurial attitude

I believe entrepreneurs are distinguished more by their approach to life than anything else. Here are two stories I ran across recently that bolster that belief, of two very different people who exemplify the 'just do it' ethos of the entrepreneur.

First up, an 'oh wow' account from a young techie about how he went about making a new dice game. It details how he went from concept to a game that is now ready to buy, pulling together whatever resources he needed (and learning a lot on what they were and how to find them) to make it happen - a departure from delivering software to delivering a physical product. The 'oh wow' part is not only does the game sound cool, but that he took on the effort, and more importantly, the risk of failure, at building something new.

The second story is more of an 'awww...' one - an 89 year old woman (yes, 89!) who decided to pretty up her walking stick and seeing how everyone liked it, she started a business selling decorated canes to anyone else who wants a little cheer on their stick (cherry on the top - she raised expansion funds on Kickstarter!) Here's a lady who happily plunged into entrepreneurship when everyone would be expecting her to be sitting back and relaxing in her rocking chair.

How many of us think of products like these and don't ever take them beyond a Sunday afternoon daydream spin? These may not be ideas that "put a ding in the universe", "disrupt" anything or aspire to "billion dollar market caps", but their creators didn't let modest goals, lack of experience, or age hold them back from bringing them to market - and clearly, they had a lot of fun in the process.

Enjoy the stories on Happy Canes and Space Dice - do you have a story to share?

Image courtesy of Master Isolated Images/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The problem of solving problems

If you want to read upbeat, perky posts about the business of life and a life in business, you might want to subscribe to Claire Diaz Ortiz. One of her recent posts was about problem solving and it was definitely something I could relate to.

Claire suggests that you should ask yourself three questions before jumping into solving problems (I'm paraphrasing a bit): Is it really a problem? Do I want to do something about it? Should I do something now or later?

All valid questions, though most of us just jump into solving problems, or, more accurately, reacting to problems, without much thought, unless they tend to be big enough to warrant analysis before resolution. But, if we do take the time to step back and consider problems, there is one important question that I would add to this list: Who owns the problem?

Answering the question of who owns the problem often changes the definition of, and the resultant solution to, the problem. For example, you might say 'My coworker keeps eating chips half the day and the sound drives me nuts'. Who owns the problem? You might be tempted to say it's the coworker, but he's obviously having fun chomping down on the chips without a care as to what you think about it or what it's doing to his waistline. It is you who owns the problem, and now the problem is not that he snacks on chips loudly but that you are bothered by it and might be better off investing in noise-canceling headphones.

Of course, if the problem is not owned by you, it can't be solved by you either - something that every parent should remember before taking over their kid's science projects. Though I must admit there are some of us who actually enjoy solving other people's problems, way more engaging than grappling with Sudoku. Ah well, we can't all be Dear Abby.

(Image courtesy of photoexplorer / FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Ikigai

One of my least favorite things about the end of the year is the ubiquitous 'year in review' list. The best, the worst, the whatever-the-editor-fancies list. So, as my last post for the year, I decided I would not do a 'look back' piece, but a 'look ahead' one instead. As I work with a for-profit as well as a non-profit organization, I thought it might be good to reflect on encouraging and inspirational to-do items for entrepreneurs who are hoping to make a difference in 2013.

But, then as I was randomly web-surfing while drinking my chai, I ran across a mention of 'ikigai', the Japanese word which roughly translates to your reason for being. The 'Why?' of your life. Ikigai has been recently mentioned in various articles (like this one) as one of the secrets to a healthy long life. Frankly, I'd think that it would be great for anyone, at any age, to know his/her own reason for being. In fact, most people who seem happy with their lives appear to have a good sense of their own 'ikigai' and are living it, whatever it may be - feeding a family or fighting for causes.

Ikigai is probably what is driving most entrepreneurs - at least the ones that stick with their ventures. There is something powerful driving the middle-class woman who starts a school for destitute children in India (here's the story) as there was something driving Steve Jobs. Ikigai might be the answer to the question 'what makes an entrepreneur?'.

Of course, the 'reason for your being' is available to everyone, it is just different for each of us. And it takes effort to figure it out. When you do, you're half way to fulfillment. The other half is figuring out how to live your ikigai. In a long-ago post, I wrote about why I do what I do - create, care, connect - and it is good to be reminded of it as I make choices, big or small. After all, the ikigai is only the reason for your life, you still have to take the actions that make it your life.

Wish you a happy 2013 - may you find your ikigai and bounce out of bed every morning in anticipation of living it!

Startups - too much of a good thing?

It is possible that we've got to a point that everyone wants to 'do' a startup - whether one has what it takes or not. This is especially true in places like Silicon Valley, and arguably the trend has peaked when there's a reality show about startups in Silicon Valley (though it appears likely to be short-lived, like most startups).

There's a lot of buzz and hype on finding ideas and starting companies, even dropping out of school to do so. While entrepreneurship is undoubtedly a powerful factor for growth, there's more to making entrepreneurship work than 'doing a startup' - you have to build a successful business. That is a much harder proposition as it takes toughness, dedication and smarts to stick with it and make it work.

Daniel Isenberg writes about the importance of 'scaling-up' over 'starting-up' in this HBR post. Scaling-up results in entrepreneurial growth and value creation. He compares the start-up/scale-up actions to giving birth to a child vs. raising a child - the first is necessary to be able to do the second, but the second makes the first meaningful. Too bad 'Scaling-up in Silicon Valley' is unlikely to be the next big reality show.

Scary thoughts on startups

Top 10 scary things for entrepreneurs, in no particular order:

Actually getting started. It's much easier to talk about starting a company - everyone thinks it is so exciting and gives you a 100 suggestions and you feel you're floating on air and are high on enthusiasm. But actually start a company and suddenly there's a metric ton settling down on your shoulders - now you have to talk about reality, not dreams.
Building a team. Yes, you have your best friend from college as your co-founder, but what if you say zig and he says zag? What if you can't find any good people with the right skill sets, for example, you can't find developers and you have to learn how to code (all over again)? What if there's nobody but you in your company?
Having the right idea. You did talk to 100 people before you started, but they were friends of friends at that huge end-of-summer party you went to and though they all thought it was cool, it could be that they were in party mode. How can you be sure your idea is really good?
Business plans. It's either a big mystery and you have no idea how to go about it, or, you know exactly what to do and hate the idea of having to re-word, re-calculate, re-format every time you show it to someone new.
Getting money. What if you don't know any rich angels and your friends and family have slim wallets? Maybe you can bootstrap, but you'd have to figure out if there's a boot to strap (or a strap to boot) - and it has to work with your specific idea.
Legal coverage. Lawyers cost money (see above), but could you get sued, cheated, conned out of money/stock/intellectual property if you're not sufficiently lawyered-up?
Competition. The horizon is full of 800-lb gorrillas and pesky little startups (not yours) that want to do exactly what you plan to, and look like they'll get there faster and blow you out.
Customers. Or users. What if they don't show up? Or worse, they don't show up only randomly and you can't show a chart-popping growth rate? Is it a bad idea or bad marketing?
Time. As in the thing you can run out of, along with money.
Expert advice. The blogs, the pundits, the classes, the social media groups, all making holding forth on why your startup will fail, and, to add insult to the injury, why your company is not even a startup because it doesn't fit some VC's startup profile or, to rub salt in it, why you will fail because you don't have the profile of a successful entrepreneur - wrong college, wrong age, wrong degree, wrong home town, whatever.

This stuff could make you want to throw up your hands and head back to the safety of a corporate job. And you would, but for the fact you believe the scariest thing of all is not being what you want to be - an entrepreneur.

Happy Halloween!

Image source

The business of writing well

Writing is communication, so it should not come as a surprise that good communication skills (writing) are absolutely necessary in just about any career, especially the ones where you need to influence the thinking or behavior of others. Even those who can write reasonably well, still want/need to work with someone who can do it better - providing jobs for the oodles of marketing/messaging pros out there. Coincidentally that's what I've been doing the last week, enjoying the focus on the wording of the message instead of the features of the product, for a change.

One of the top education stories this week is the recently released report from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, assessing writing competency for 8th and 10th graders. The results themselves are not encouraging, only a quarter performed at the 'proficient' level or higher, but the way the test was done was definitely cheer-worthy. It not only made the test computer-based, but it paid attention to whether students used the tools available to them through computers - even basics like spell-check. Many of us have seen (among family, friends, coworkers) that the top students are often accomplished at writing, as well as math and science, and, unsurprisingly, they have ready access to tech resources (unfortunately the digital gap still persists, feeding the achievement gap). Though the fundamentals of good writing (and critical thinking) are timeless and technology-independent, the way we write has definitely changed and the person who knows how to access and use the myriad tools and services available has a clear advantage. Kids need to learn to write well, using digital tools, if they're to flourish in the jobs of the future - and it's a challenge that we can definitely meet.

By the way, the example of the 'Lost Island' test (listen to nature sounds and snippets from a diary and write about your imagined experiences on that island) appears skewed to the more imaginative among us. I personally would have loved it as an 8th grader, but I know many super-smart and successful people who would have not welcomed it that much. They'd enjoy reading Harry Potter (or Robinson Crusoe - extending the island theme), and obsessively watch episodes of 'Lost', but would get lost themselves trying to imagine something like it. Here's a report on the NAEP writing test if you want to know more details. What level of creative writing is necessary for every student? And should creative writing really be bounded ('stifled') by rules or should it flow unfettered? (You might want to check out my older post on why entrepreneurs should write too!)

Good products do social good

I got to thinking about this when reading a Quora post on how to get people to notice your startup. There are many suggestions for marketing, social or otherwise, but the key is always just one thing - build a good product that people want to use. Marketing is good for only so much, if the product doesn't do it, for whatever reason, it's not going to make much of a difference.

Thinking about some of the really good products of the past few years made me realize how many of them have had huge, positive, social impact - even when they didn't start out that way. Apple created iTunes to get people to quickly and easily buy music for their iPods - no stated social goals, purely revenue/profit driven. But, it (was) is a product that people want to use, and now it has vast numbers of educational podcasts and videos, from top universities too, and iTunes has, as a side effect, made quality educational content available to everyone. Social good? Check. Take Google, from search to YouTube. It has changed the way people get information, and more, it quickly and easily delivers previously unavailable information to people who need it. For every person who wastes hours watching dancing cats, there's someone learning about how to identify heart attacks from just plain stomach rebellion to too much spicy food. I don't know about the 'don't be evil' mission of theirs, but their tool is seriously used for good.

Let's not forget the now ubiquitous smartphone - and it all started with Apple's iPhone, though the med tech visiting villages in India to provide on the spot assistance is not using an iPhone necessarily. It's changed education, health care, emergency assistance - you name it. Again, the goal was not to do good directly, but provide this must-have tool which has changed our lives that could be used by any number of people to deliver the 'good'.

Then there's Facebook. Almost a billion users strong, recently reviled for its tanking stock price and the social network that everyone joins and many kvetch about. It started out as an exclusive, somewhat elitist (only the cool schools are in) online student group, almost a gossip board. Now it is not only keeping far-flung families connected and feeling loved (go grandmas!) but providing a platform for a myriad socially focused groups and even played a part in mobilizing people during the Arab spring of 2011. It fosters conversation, whether someone is sharing their latest idea for going green or slamming the convention speakers. It is bringing people together, and helping keep them that way (though arguably some of them need to be reminded to get out and do it in person too). Much of it may be banal and self-serving, but there's no question that Facebook has been an agent of social change

By the way, the older companies like Microsoft and Yahoo are also doing good on a daily basis with their products. Whatever you may say about MS Office, the world still uses it - and that includes kazillion non-profits - because it does the job, and I'm finding that tons of social groups, especially small volunteer ones, are all active users of Yahoo groups. And of course, there's their email - used for distributing sketchy jokes as well as tips to manage your money - the app that just refuses to go away. (By the way, if you're a fan of the all 'good' ideas bubbling out there, check out The Daily Good.)

Yes, this list is mainly of tech companies, because, honestly, that's the field I'm in and what I was ruminating about. This is not to imply that these companies are all warm and fuzzy like gargantuan, but cuddly, teddy bears. It's just that all of these are for profit, in a major way, yet they have achieved vast, global social reach and impact - because of the nature of their products.

Maybe more wannabe social entrepreneurs should focus on their products and why people would want to use them, knowing that the good will follow (along with the money). What do you think?

(Image courtesy of digitalart / FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

A social entrepreneur starts early

Last Friday, as I was driving back from a meeting, I heard just a couple of sentences on the radio before I turned it off to think (I still do that sometimes), but what I heard was something that stuck in my mind. (If you're interested in the whole thing, I tracked it down to this talk on Forum, here it is: Silicon Valley Culture). The part that stuck was that Valley entrepreneurs prioritize 'entrepreneurship, family, philanthropy', in that order.

It is definitely one of those statements that evokes a 'hmm...', a statement that would not resonate with everyone, but certainly reflects what we've seen with a lot of entrepreneurs, Gates being a notable example. But what made me think about this was a meeting with someone who appears to be embodying the exact opposite in terms of focus.

A couple of days ago I had the opportunity to meet Joel Mwale, a young man with a strong entrepreneurial drive. He's visiting here from South Africa (where he's attending the African Leadership Academy), his visit sponsored by his mentors Terry and Carolyn Gannon (retired, Silicon Valley entrepreneur/execs super-active in various social causes). The Gannons believe that Joel would get a lot by meeting the many entrepreneurs and academic stars in the Valley and he's definitely making the most of his visit. When we met, I heard about his journey from poverty in a small village in Kenya through school, where he was well on track to be under, or even 'un', educated, until a chance study tip from a classmate lit a fire in him and catapulted him to the top 10% of students in the country. And Joel is fired up to be an entrepreneur.

Joel is not thinking of just getting rich himself and helping his family though. Joel dreams of doing something to improve the education situation in Africa (though he's from Kenya, his scope is for the whole continent). He's not thinking 'philanthropy' (after entrepreneurship and family, as in the Valley), he's thinking 'social enterprise' - and how he can use his drive, his smarts, his life, to make a difference.

Joel has started working on his next venture and, as as a fellow edupreneur, had a deep conversation about the learning community platform provided by my startup. He is one of the 10 winners of the Google Zeitgeist 2012 award for Young Minds for young people showcasing how they are making a positive impact on the world. Amazingly, Joel's award was for an enterprise that he started a couple of years ago to bring safe, clean water to his village and is now employing over 30 people.

Joel is not waiting to do well before he does good. For him entrepreneurship is fully integrated with helping solve some of the basic problems impacting people's survival and growth. And just to put it in all perspective, Joel hasn't celebrated his nineteenth birthday yet.

Top CEO trait: Stick-with-it-ness

It's been said before: what a startup needs is a CEO who doesn't give up just because the outlook is bleak. I've covered this in a previous post about Pandora which was one of those companies that everyone expected to fade away but went public and is still going strong.

This applies to large companies too - what helps a shaky enterprise survive and succeed is a CEO that believes in its potential and digs in for the long haul to nurture its growth. We know all about Jobs and Apple. The story of Ariba is less well-known. I was one of those who was surprised that Ariba was still around when I heard it was to be bought by SAP for $4.3 billion. Today's article on Ariba story and CEO Robert Calderoni in the Merc News reminded me again why persistence is a virtue in CEOs.

Too many entrepreneurs think if you don't make it big fast you might as well get out ('go big, or go home'). That may be true for some companies/industries, but it is certainly not universal. For sure it could be difficult to stay with a venture that doesn't produce enough revenue to pay the team, but that's why entrepreneurship is not for everyone, regardless of the prevailing hype. True entrepreneurs stick with it as long as they can see there's potential in their vision - they bootstrap, moonlight, crowdfund, whatever they can do to keep the fire burning. (For sure, Ariba didn't have to go ask Granny for funds, but they had the same problem - at a different scale - of staying afloat and re-tooling their business.)

The trait of determination is even more critical for social entrepreneurs. All change is hard, and effecting social change definitely takes a patience, learning and perseverance. The people who need to change the way they live, work, eat or learn may not be ready to do so just because you have this wonderful idea to make it all better, even if it costs nothing. Behavioral change takes time, and may require many failed efforts before hitting a successful model, which means the company needs a CEO who's willing to stick with the vision and do what it takes.

In an earlier post I'd quoted Randy Komisar on entrepreneurs matching up to different breeds of dogs at different stages of a company's evolution. One important breed got missed there - bulldog!

Fresh thinking

Yes, successful entrepreneurs are expected and encouraged to be dedicated, focused, even consumed by their ventures, 24/7. But they're also expected to be sharp, unfettered and creative thinkers capable of coming up with innovative solutions for the marketplace as well as more mundane issues like punching up your presentation. Are there things we should/could be doing to keep the creative juices flowing?

In my view, there's one simple directive to help keep the noggin fresh and peppy: get out. In all possible ways. Get out of your office (or your garage). Get out some evenings to do something other than hanging out with your team in a bar over beer and chips. Get out of reading the same old, same old, and mix up TechCrunch with the Economist or vice versa. Get out of your chosen field and meet people in others, and if you're very much in the left brain world, make it a point to get to know folks in the arts. Mostly, get out of your comfort zone and do something different fairly often.

Which brings up the obvious point, not all entrepreneurs think that they need to be creative - they'll leave it to the design guy or the marketing gal. There are many entrepreneurs who believe they're done being creative as they came up with their business idea and now they should just focus on execution. But execution draws on outside the box thinking too.

An example is a possible new market niche for us, an idea that came to me when I was sitting at the Startup Conference in Mountain View a few days ago with a friend who wanted to check it out (I attend one of these occasionally as part of my 'getting out'). Funnily enough, the keynote speaker, Dave McClure, started off by pretty much calling all the entrepreneurs there losers for attending a conference instead of being busy building their companies. It is a totally valid point on how to use your time, or not. These events may be worth attending if you're just thinking of starting a company, and want to know what others did (no live-streaming video of yourself - Justin Kan already did that.) But my expectations are pretty much to hear something different and maybe meet someone I wouldn't have otherwise met - an unusual mental break for a few hours. Best of all, it worked!

There's another hot new book being pitched to entrepreneurs - Jonah Lehrer's 'Imagine: How Creativity Works'. (Side note: seriously, how does one keep up with all the reading and still accomplish something? Sure, it's part of keeping your brain fresh but your time is limited. Realistically, the best one can do is to skim blogs to pick and choose the few books that resonate.) Anyway, there's a listen-worthy interview with Lehrer on video here. He provides a well-reasoned approach to creativity, offering some hope that creativity can be cultivated and you can keep it going even as you get older - you don't have to lose it.

Choose to be more creative. Shaking up the brain is good, but you need to care enough to want to zumba.

Finding Balance in Life is Work

Now, here's a topic that affects only the privileged - work-life balance. Think about it, it is an issue only for those who have the luxury of choice on how much they work or don't. I'd written about this a while ago (yes, this topic is also frequent fodder for bloggers, writers and researchers) in what I thought was a cleverly titled post 'The work of life' in which I mused about our cave-dwelling forebears whose view of 'life' was more about avoidance of death than finding time for a family dinner. Fast forwarding about fifty thousand years, today, for most people the world over, a work-day and its duties are clearly defined with little or no flexibility in it (as at Foxconn).

I'm writing about this again as I read a recent HBR post 'Entrepreneurs don't need work-life balance' which made me conclude that we're going about this the wrong way. Previously I'd written about how to manage being a committed entrepreneur who wishes to meet all personal responsibilities, not just the ones in his/her company. Now I'd like to step back from minor coping tactics, however useful they may be, to take the long view, a more philosophical one - and not just for entrepreneurs, but any of us who is lucky enough to be able to even to have the option to adjust our work schedules.

Mahatma Gandhi is credited with the quote 'Happiness is when what you think and what you say and what you do are in harmony'. Less poetically, I believe it is when you are in harmony, or in balance - balance being something you experience, not achieve. Equanimity is an even better word for it. And equanimity comes when there's no guilt or stress or regrets - all those unbalancing feelings that come with thinking you should be doing one thing while you're saying/doing another. As in having promised to be home for dinner but going to a mixer your investor invited you to in the last minute, or going on a long-planned ski weekend with a best friend and fretting about not being onsite for a product release. These get to be stressful because you're thinking you're doing something for others (and failing in it), when in fact all the choices you make are for yourself. You enjoy your work, you enjoy family and friends, you want to be physically and emotionally fit and you want it all - without conflict.

Can it be done? You bet. But it takes work to get you and your life in balance. Plan your life blocking out as much time as you think you'd like/need for all components that are important to you (for sure, if you're an entrepreneur, work's going to take a mega-chunk of it). When conflicts arise, bring your values to the fore when making your choice. Again, it should be yours, not anyone else's - after all, you're one of the privileged few that can afford that. Also add a dash of pragmatism - be where your presence makes the most difference. If you feel balanced with the result, you know you've made the right choice. And one more tip, once you've made the choice, forget about the alternative - that way lies the wobbly woe of unbalance.

Exit signs

Entrepreneurs are probably one of the most 'advised' groups out there. There's oodles of advice on how/why/when one should start a company and how to keep it going (though the going gets tough on that one). But presumably entrepreneurs need to be told how to know when to pack it in because there's advice out there on that topic too.

Recently I read a much-commented guest post by Mike Troiano on the OnStartup blog, titled 'Be Captain of Your Destiny, Not Prisoner of Wishful Thinking', which listed five indicators which should convince an entrepreneur that it is time to admit that his idea doesn't work and exit. While those criteria are worthy of consideration, I do believe that a true entrepreneur is not in the game because of a single idea, but because of a vision. And if one idea doesn't work, it is highly likely she'd adapt and make it something else. If you read the post, make sure you read the comments, especially the one by 'V' which I think is more in line with those of an entrepreneur who doesn't 'roll over and die' quite that easily.

In my view entrepreneurs have one sure-fire sign that it's time to move on - when the money runs out. As long as there's money, and, even more importantly, as long as there are customers, the entrepreneur is still in the game. An example of this tenacity is a friend of mine who's helping her husband in his startup. The idea is his, but they're partnering on the effort, especially in taking turns bringing in income, and they've been working at it for quite a while. They'd run into various roadblocks, including the 'great' recession, and every time they reached out to customer prospects, or pitched to investors, they learned things that got them to re-tool their product and adjust their market position, and they've done this multiple times. After many months, I got to meet with my friend a couple of days ago when she told me that they're in launch now. The product looks promising and their prospects are exciting. This appears to be the real deal.

One of my early posts was about a VC wondering when to hold on to a company, and in my view, it was when you could see the founder/entrepreneur still engaged and still passionate about making it happen - it was 'know when to hold' without being hung up on the 'know when to fold'. Entrepreneurs who have a vision about a problem that needs solving, are willing to change their ideas on how to solve it, but don't give up on the vision, unless it is something they didn't care for that much in the first place. Someone who's an entrepreneur by conviction, not an entrepreneur by convenience, would rather detour than exit if at all possible.