Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2010

My first company launched in 1999 and we were offering a SaaS document management in the cloud (we were called ASPs back then). I didn’t have first-hand experience in document management systems other than as a user and nobody had SaaS experience – the market was too new. I’ll always point out when I am.).

San Diego 267

San Diego Entrepreneur Philadelphia Cloud 267

Steve Blank

JUNE 29, 2009

I was met by a very apologetic manager who said, “We’ve been trying to get a hold of you for the last week. The manager of the training department who hired you wasn’t authorized to do so – and he’s been fired. With my offer letter in-hand I reported to ESL’s Human Resources (HR) department.

Agile 251

Agile Silicon Valley RSS California 251

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

And they rolled all of this up into a set of financial forecasts with a “size of market” forecast from brand name management consulting firms that said they’d have 42 million customers by 2002. iridium-9500 satellite phone ~1999. Instead management was more comfortable executing to the plan. Lessons Learned.

Business Plan 335

Business Plan Customer Business Model Customer Development 335

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 13, 2013

Like most startup entrepreneurs, when I began my first company in 1999 I had no formal sales experience. I did have the wherewithal to visit potential customers and try to understand the pain points that I thought could be solved with our solution. This article originally appeared on Inc.com.

Sales 393

Sales Startup Framework Search 393

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 8, 2008

I was building a new startup in 1999, and wanted to do it right. So did I when I finally found myself building an app with real scalability, a few years later, but a combination of our just-in-time scalability technique and great open source scaling tools, made it manageable. Were in a new wave of platform evolution.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Technology Continuous Deployment Lean 68

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

A few of the detailed case studies include: Tech legend Bill Gross building an MVP in 1999 to test demand for online car sales, which grew into CarsDirect.com. Struggling to explain the successes and failures of those companies, I discussed principles like continuous deployment, customer development, and a hyper-accelerated form of agile.

Lean 167

Lean Entrepreneur Agile San Francisco 167

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 14, 2009

The response so far has been nothing short of overwhelming, and I want to especially thank those of you who participated in the survey and customer validation exercise that helped shape this event. I joined a financial services tech startup in 1999. Amazing lean startup resources Is Entrepreneurship a Management Science?

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Software Review 60

Steve Blank

MAY 17, 2011

I managed to find a job at the Miami International Airport loading racehorses onto cargo planes. Eighteen months after arriving in Thailand, I was managing a group of 15 electronics technicians. In 1999… with the company’s revenue north of $100 million…I handed the keys to a new CEO and left. You get to make your own luck.

Philadelphia 336

Philadelphia Miami Thailand Silicon Valley 336

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2009

In the summer of 1999, I started working on a startup from my college dorm. Id been on the internet since I was playing MUDs as a kid, but by 1999 I felt Id already missed the boat. You can even see the humiliating evidence of my smug incompetence in this absurd article from 1999.) I pretty much missed all the trends.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 94