Tag: Startup company

Re-start

When I read up on Relay (grocery delivery), I can’t help admiring the tenacity and tag line (Think Outside of the Bag).

After all, the article did mention dot.com bust (Webvan). Something about our shopping habit, running errand etc… despite the high gas price.

It’s a disconnect we allow ourselves to fall into: think hard at work, and let go after work (acting out of reflex and habit).

Entrepreneurs are what they are: latch on to a compelling idea, research market need and launch the company. Many failed out of the gate due to ill timing or under capitalized.

But most failed because of what’s inherent with start-ups: the tiny odds, the fleeting consumers and  the burnt rate.

I have met people with cute feedbacks like “at least, I have learned what not to do”.

Since each experience is unique, chances are the next venture will surprise us again with curve balls and hidden traps.

Are we to give up?

It’s the same question as you would ask a divorcee whether he/she will stay single. It’s in the nature of serial entrepreneurs to keep stumbling upon another opportunity, another challenge.

Guy Kawasaki had a book named The Art of the Start. That was a decade ago.

Today, he would have to rename it The Art of Re-Start. For young entrepreneurs like those at Relay or Petco.

Or those who are in Financial and Housing.

You won’t see a lot of veterans doing D2D asking business to open a checking account (they do that now a days).

But the young bankers would be eager to win customers over in the school of hard-knocks.

It’s a different business environment, where bankers walk the street and groceries delivered to your door.

It’s our Post-recession era, Post-Cold War world, and the end of History as Fukuyama coined it.

Especially at a start-up, whose partners have learned “what not to do”. This time, it’s a relay race, not 100-meters speed race. Share the pain and split the odds. Throw in some prayers too.

Start-ups vs instutional memories

Vincent Cerf is a case in point.

He is perhaps the oldest employee at young Google. Before that, a lifer at MCI.

But you need someone who has been there, done that. Who could connect the dots (or see them at all).

Start-ups got money and the juice.

Most of, start-ups got the goods and the guts to make it happen.

Then when things fly, ROI positive and dividends paid out, things get complicated and dull.

Start-up phase is giving ways to institutionalizing process.

This is where precedent comes into play. Where expertise and wisdom are in demand.

The White House employs a few Senior Advisors for this very function.

Lately, news has a ring of the familiar: Saturday Evening Post gone, then Saturday Post Office closed.

Instagram is taking over where it used to be My Space. Dell has outlived its just-in-time idea.

And HP is HP (could have become another Lenovo).

At least we recognize the telecom bubble (Enron and AOL). So this time, someone like Vincent is needed to give wise counsel.

To see ahead of the curve. To go through the check list of that which quacks like a duck.

We need a healthy dose of self-disruption. A life unexamined is not worth living. The same with companies, and start-ups.

In the absence of wise counsel, institutions perish.

What  you don’t need is a historian (who will do a post-mortem). What you do need is someone from the inside who was from the outside, and whose comments you might not like, but desperately needed. Someone with some institutional memories to serve up a healthy dose of “you might want to take a look at this”, ” I wouldn’t do it if I were you”. They might be that embodiment and personification of the impersonal beast we call institution. In each system, we need a living and breathing wise one to serve as a speed bump. Or that they can work from the future backward, to pre-mortem a project and visualize certain death to save it.

V for valley

Silicon Valley that is.

Palo Alto. The hype, the anticipation and burst.

Dream and dread.

It’s here for the taking. You game?

Pine trees and even banana trees.

Years ago, one would see Vietnamese technicians and Indian engineers.

Now, the work is mostly outsourced and off shored.

The design and creative work are still here. But it takes fewer people (Google, for its revenue, would have required nth time current headcount had it been a 20-th century company).

Still, there is something about V.

Peace sign. Victor. And even venture funding.

As long as you don’t lose that entrepreneurial spirit.

Can-do attitude.

Work is now anywhere and anytime.

Are you gamed?

You can do it here or you can do it elsewhere.

But something about the Valley.

Its ethos, egos and yes, eco-conciousness.

A bunch of old classmates are attending a funeral today.

Cremation.

Dust comes to dust.

But the spirit lives on.

In the valley and on the hill.

That spirit that says, Yes we can.

The shoreline is not the limit. Neither is the sky.

Take it to the next level, next shore line and skyline.

Start here in the valley then move up the mountain top.

If you don’t stand in opportunity’s way. If you don’t sabotage yourself.

No one can stop a man or woman whose mind is made up.