SoCal CTO
JANUARY 26, 2010
I’ve been having discussions with several people recently about the role of the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) in very early stage companies. In December 2007, I described how I commonly take on an Acting CTO Role in a Start-up. I used an image from Roger Smith that describes the varying roles of a CTO as the company matures. However, I’ve now begun questioning how and what an early-stage / startup CTO should be.
Both Sides of the Table
JANUARY 26, 2010
This is part of my series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I originally posted it on VentureHacks , one of my favorite websites for entrepreneurs. The full list is now posted there if you want a sneak preview. I’ll try to add a few extra comments in my posts to keep in interesting. I started the series talking about what I consider the most important attribute of an entrepreneur : Tenacity.
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A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks
JANUARY 25, 2010
Eric Sink says that tradeshows are like sex : When it's good it's really really good, but when it's bad. it's still pretty good. A lot of tradeshows have been cancelled due to low attendance (which in turn is probably due to slashed travel budgets), but those which remain are that much more interesting. It's easy to waste time and money at tradeshows.
Startup Professionals Musings
JANUARY 24, 2010
Lack of confidence in your self, your product, and your startup is a surefire recipe for disaster. At the other extreme, too much confidence or arrogance can kill you just as fast. It’s always painful when a startup fails, but as a mentor to founders I would hope that you can learn from these failings and not stumble on the same issues: “Business plans are for dummies.
Speaker: Nick Noreña, Innovation Coach and Advisor, Kromatic
Every startup and innovation project exists within an ecosystem that either helps or hurts that project. As innovation managers, we need to keep a pulse of that ecosystem and make sure we're helping those innovation projects we're managing every step of the way. In this webinar, Nick Noreña will walk through an Innovation Ecosystem Model that he and his team at Kromatic have developed to help investors, heads of product, teachers, and executives understand how they can best support innovation in
SoCal CTO
JANUARY 28, 2010
Yesterday, I met with someone at the early stage of a startup. He has a great concept with some complexity to it. He was struggling to find high quality developers in Los Angeles. Just the kind of person I like to meet. :) But I was a bit surprised when he emphasized how hard it had been for them to find a web developer in Los Angeles. My flippant comment was, “If you do a Google search for Los Angeles web developer, you’ll find a LOT of people and firms.
crowdSPRING Blog
JANUARY 25, 2010
In March, Ross and I will be hosting a talk at South by Southwest; it’s called “ Third Coast: How to be a Startup Outside of Silicon Valley.&# We have been thinking a lot about this lately and discussing the challenges we have faced on our own path. When we first conceived of the idea that would ultimately become crowdSPRING, we never even discussed the possibility of starting the company anywhere but Chicago – it never occurred to us that we might have an easier go of it els
Start Up Roar brings together the best content for start up professionals from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
This is going to be BIG.
JANUARY 27, 2010
I can’t tell you how I got this, but I hear that the iTablet user manual comes with a whole host of unexpected disclosures: Warning: Pregnant women, the elderly, and children under 10 should avoid prolonged exposure to The Apple iTablet. Caution: The Apple iTablet may suddenly accelerate to dangerous speeds. The Apple iTablet contains a liquid core, which, if exposed due to rupture, should not be touched, inhaled, or looked at.
Both Sides of the Table
JANUARY 25, 2010
Chris Dixon wrote a blog post last week titled, “ Techies and Normals &# in which he defined “Techies&# as people who are not just “early adopters&# but also have more of a geeky, technical, product bent. Normals (or “Muggles&# as Catarina Fake called them) are people who, unlike Techies, don’t just use products simply because they’re infatuated with them and with showing the world how cool it is that they’re using the latest tech product.
crowdSPRING Blog
JANUARY 26, 2010
Every day on the crowdSPRING Twitter account and on my own Twitter account , I post links to posts or videos I enjoyed reading or viewing. These posts and videos are about design, startups, entrepreneurship, small business, leadership, social media, marketing, and more! Here are some of the links that I’ve liked and shared this past week! Breathtaking Collection of High Resolution Free Photoshop Brushes – [link].
Steve Blank
JANUARY 25, 2010
Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm. Winston Churchill. Everyone knows what a startup is for – don’t they? In this post we’re going to offer a new definition of why startups exist : a startup is an organization formed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. A Business Model. Ok, but what is a business model ?
deal architect
JANUARY 28, 2010
On a day when President Obama acknowledged he had to think much smaller than the 60s “Great Society” vision of Lyndon Johnson, Larry Ellison actually went the other way and said “Our vision for the year 2010 is the same. Tags: Enterprise Software (IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP).
Both Sides of the Table
JANUARY 29, 2010
This is part of my series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I originally posted it on VentureHacks , one of my favorite websites for entrepreneurs. I started the series talking about what I consider the most important attribute of an entrepreneur : Tenacity. I then covered Street Smarts , Ability to Pivot , Resiliency , Inspiration , Perspiration , Willingness to Take Risks and Detail Orientation.
Startup Professionals Musings
JANUARY 29, 2010
OK, so they tell me that Bernie is safely tucked away in prison for the next 150 years, but there are clones out there who look and act just like him. See this LA Times article from last year about a likely scammer closer to startups, and an ongoing saga of events from the victim’s perspective. Most frauds are not on the scale set by Bernie, but even a few thousand dollars lost would hurt you and me as much as a few million did for some of his victims.
Steve Blank
JANUARY 28, 2010
In the 1950’s the U.S. Military and the CIA enlisted balloons (some as tall as a 40-story building) as weapons systems targeting the Soviet Union. Throughout the decade they launched a series of Top Secret/ codeword balloon projects and thousands of balloons, to gather intelligence about the Soviet Union. The stories of these programs are interesting but the unexpected consequences of their secrecy created a mythology that outlasted the missions.
deal architect
JANUARY 26, 2010
As the Apple Tablet speculation grows to a fever pitch I thought I would share views from one of the most adept tablet users I have ever encountered. John Dean used to be CIO at Steelcase, the innovative office furniture.
This is going to be BIG.
JANUARY 29, 2010
So you just finished up the year at Harvard/Wharton/Stanford/NYU, etc. and since your lifelong dream of being a banker doesn’t seem like a viable route anymore, you’re thinking that a startup might be the place for you. (You’d much rather be a VC, but you’re smart enough to know that there are like 8 junior VC positions open a year, so you’re looking for a backup.
Startup Professionals Musings
JANUARY 28, 2010
I’ve long believed that entrepreneurs are different. We all know successful entrepreneurs who dropped out of school, and people with high IQs that cannot manage a business. I used to call this “street smarts,” but recently I found a better explanation, called multiple intelligences. Successful entrepreneurs always seem to have several good intelligences.
Rembrandt Communications
JANUARY 29, 2010
Last week, I was on a much-awaited, exclusive teleconference with a well-known and very successful business and marketing consultant. As the call began, the tips and ideas started flowing, and I feverishly took notes and tried to digest all of the information. Everything was going really well, but then…things started to get ugly. About half [.].
deal architect
JANUARY 27, 2010
Oracle has invited me to what looks like a 6 hour event to describe plans for the integration with Sun. Several reasons I am not going: a) Client commitments. I asked for an agenda last week and got one last. Tags: Enterprise Software (IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP).
crowdSPRING Blog
JANUARY 26, 2010
The name of your company and your logo are two creative elements of your brand, but your brand is much more than the name and logo. A brand is the sum total of the experience your prospects and customers have with your company. A strong brand communicates what your company does, how it does it, and at the same time, establishes trust and credibility with your prospects and customers.
Startup Professionals Musings
JANUARY 25, 2010
Many people, especially those who have spent years struggling up the corporate ladder, dream of jumping ship and becoming an entrepreneur. But every job move is fraught with risk, and the move from employee to entrepreneur is on the high end of the risk curve. This is a big jump, so do your homework first on this one. According to a recent article in the Harvard Business Review, “ Five Ways to Bungle a Job Change ” there are at least five common missteps that executives make when moving to a new
Startup Lessons Learned
JANUARY 24, 2010
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Sunday, January 24, 2010 Lo, my 18891 subscribers, who are you? Way back when I first started blogging, I was amazed to have any subscribers at all. In fact, when I crossed the five subscriber threshold, I was moved to write about my excitement and about the advantages of having a pathetically small number of customers. And, in the survey that was attached, I learned a lot of useful information about how to make this blog better.
deal architect
JANUARY 25, 2010
By now many of you have heard about the Charles Philips “scandal”. Over the last few days I talked to a few folks who have known Charles for 10-15 years or longer, certainly prior to his moving to Oracle. Friend.
Growthink Blog
JANUARY 24, 2010
UPDATED Wednesday, January 27th at 2:01pm EST The "Ultimate Internet Marketing System" is Now Available. Click Here to Get All the Details UPDATED Monday, January 25th at 5:27pm EST Be sure to check out the " Special Announcement " at the bottom of the this blog entry. If you've already read the original version of this blog entry, you can click here to go straight to the special announcement. -- Dave.
Startup Professionals Musings
JANUARY 26, 2010
Many entrepreneurs send me invitations and accolades for their latest Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) companies, and others tell me how much they hate these things. It’s hard to find neutrals on this subject. I’m simply annoyed that their pervasive use of social networks like Twitter and Facebook devalue that medium for all businesses. I know there are a few companies, like Amway and Mary Kay, who have a generally positive image, but there are many more, often built around some investment scheme, wh
Gregg Fraley, Author of Jack's Notebook
JANUARY 26, 2010
I have no idea who Steven Weber is, but I’m going to find out. He posted a piece on The Huffington Post today that I think is brilliant. In my view, it’s one of those things that needs to be said more often. The simple fact Steven brings up is this: creativity leads to prosperity. Value [.]. Tags: Creativity and Self-Expression Innovation Creativity entertainment Gregg Fraley picture deck prosperity Single White Female Steven Weber TEDx The Huffington Post.
deal architect
JANUARY 27, 2010
I missed the Oracle-Sun session but catching up on Tweets I am not sure I missed much. Here we are in 2010 and Oracle and Sun announce they are putting together a stack that IBM, HP put together – without.
This is going to be BIG.
JANUARY 25, 2010
We need to get millions of American kids, not just the geniuses, excited about innovation and entrepreneurship again. We need to make 2010 what Obama should have made 2009: the year of innovation, the year of making our pie bigger, the year of “Start-Up America.”. via www.nytimes.com. Tags: Politics.
Start Up Blog
JANUARY 28, 2010
I took this photo while shopping at Australian supermarket giant Coles yesterday. I’ll start by saying not returning supermarket trolleys, or worse stealing them is not cool. It probably adds some cost to our grocery bills, albeit small. But when I saw this poster up in my local Coles, I tweeted it and made the comment that it was reasonably amusing.
crowdSPRING Blog
JANUARY 28, 2010
Don’t worry – we’re not replacing Jay Leno on the Tonight Show. But we did, like Conan O’Brien, have a brief appearance on NBC (on the Nightly News tonight) in a special report about the reaction of small businesses to the initiatives that President Obama announced in his State of the Union speech last night. That report (crowdSPRING appears at 1:37 of the video) is below.
deal architect
JANUARY 28, 2010
My wife has been on me to shred a bunch of old financial paperwork. Instead of scanning many of the statements I thought I would see what archives are available from various financial, utility and other companies which have moved.
Berkonomics
JANUARY 27, 2010
Taking in angel or venture money requires a setting of an entrepreneur’s expectations that may come as a shock at least at first. From the moment such an investor looks seriously at your company, the investor or VC partner is thinking of the end game, the ultimate sale of the company or even of an eventual initial public offering. There is no middle ground.
Start Up Blog
JANUARY 29, 2010
? Come in and see the good, good good guys. Pay cash and we’ll slash the prices… ? If you live in Australia, you’ve seen the TV advertisement and heard the jingle. It’s a pretty simple proposition. It encourages customers to negotiate a price. I went to the Good Guys to buy a fridge and negotiate like everyone else does. After we cut the deal and agreed on a price, I proceeded to pay in cash, when the sales guy said; ‘Credit card is fine.
crowdSPRING Blog
JANUARY 28, 2010
Prior to crowdSPRING, I practiced law for 13 years. During that time, I counseled and represented clients (from internet startups to Fortune 100 companies) in transactional matters and in complex trials. I’ve set at the table as a lawyer, and now have the perspective of an entrepreneur. This week on my personal blog , I’ve been talking about the biggest frustrations expressed by entrepreneurs when working with lawyers.
deal architect
JANUARY 26, 2010
Larry Ellison is a brilliant man. For many reasons, but particularly for knowing the limits of his company. Tomorrow, he is going to talk about synergies between software, hardware and services as he discusses the Sun acquisition. Except that he. Tags: Enterprise Software (IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP).
Eric Friedman
JANUARY 25, 2010
I finally got around to installing Windows 7 in my laptop a few weeks ago (had to reformat – always fun). After installing it and getting back up and running I have noticed some unnecessary animations in menus and windows. After doing some research for how to turn them off, do you know what they are called? Unnecessary animations. Yes, seriously.
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