Yesterday was the last class of the semester. The longer I teach entrepreneurship the more I realize that the keys to a successful new venture are the same keys to a successful life. Consequently in class I now talk more about the way to live your life as an alternative means to communicate the concepts of entrepreneurship. The cross over concepts from entrepreneurship to life are listed below:
Passion-which sustains you to achieve excellence
Focus-which eliminates the debilitating distractions
Discipline-the foundation of all the other disciplines
Routine-a systematic, step-by-step approach
Mentoring-you are not alone
These concepts supported by education and life long learning are the keys to a successful, productive life. A previous post on the relationship between life and entrepreneurship is here.
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
QR-Code is an alternative method to present text, a URL or other data (such as a resume). Very efficient, if you know what it is and have a phone with a camera and a de-coder app.
Many reported today that Microsoft Office documents can now be synched to Google docs, which provides all the advantages of Google Docs to Office users. The Official Google Enterprise Blog reported it as follows:
"For those of you who have not made the full move to Google Docs and are still using Microsoft Office, Google has something great to offer. With Cloud Connect, people can continue to use the familiar Office interface, while reaping many of the benefits of web-based collaboration that Google Docs users already enjoy.
Users of Office 2003, 2007 and 2010 can sync their Office documents to the Google cloud, without ever leaving Office. Once synced, documents are backed-up, given a unique URL, and can be accessed from anywhere (including mobile devices) at any time through Google Docs. And because the files are stored in the cloud, people always have access to the current version."
What caught my attention is what I bolded above. With cloud-based applications the interface is the only thing important to the user. Effectively in this new service from Google, Office is nothing more than an interface. Yes--there is obviously functionality built into the Office app running on your PC, but that is really just a decision on where you want the functionality. This functionality could just as easily have been resident in the cloud on Google apps or the Office cloud product.
Fred Wilson, VC extraordinaire, had a related post today entitled Mobile First Web Second. He said:
"Using the mobile web as a constraint to think about web design is growing in popularity...When users spend more time accessing your service over a mobile device, they are going to get used to that UI/UX. When you ask them to navigate a substantially busier and more complex UI/UX when they log onto the web, you are likely to keep them on the mobile app and off the web app."
Fred's point is that customers are becoming accustomed to the simple interfaces of mobile apps and will not tolerate the convoluted interfaces of many websites. This has always been true, but it is now more important as the evolving technologies of mobile apps and cloud computing dictate a simpler more elegant interface. Previous thoughts on simplicity and elegance are here.
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
I am now officially an adjunct professor at MIT in the Sloan School of Management. In January I will be teaching a course in social entrepreneurship (15.997). Co teaching will be Chuck Kane, an adjunct professor at Sloan, and Walter Bender, the former Director of the MIT Media Lab.
As my teaching progresses I should thank my wife (who thought I had something to teach) and Florida International University. FIU has given me the privilege to teach for five years. Special thanks at FIU should go to my colleagues at the Pino Entrepreneurship Center and the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management (where I teach entrepreneurship).
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
I have shared the articles here that I send to my entrepreneurship students during the semester. Will add articles during the remainder of the semester and in future semesters. The mix is mostly blog posts and videos. Naturally it is a bit eclectic and reflects my interest in design as a model for innovation, social entrepreneurship and venture capital amongst other topics.
I used Evernote to make the articles available. Evernote is excellent for organizing large amounts of information.
"We're gathered today, just as we have gathered before, to remember those who served, those who fought, those still missing, and those who gave their last full measure of devotion for our country. We're gathered at a monument on which the names of our fallen friends and loved ones are engraved, and with crosses instead of diamonds beside them, the names of those whose fate we do not yet know. One of those who fell wrote, shortly before his death, these words: ``Take what they have left and what they have taught you with their dying and keep it with your own. And take one moment to embrace those gentle heroes you left behind.''
When the XO laptop was launched by One Laptop per Child, Steve Jobs reportedly called it a "toy". What did you expect for children Steve? There are now 2 million XOs in the hands of children around the world and quite a few adults also use the XO on a daily basis.
The notion of technology "toys" intrigues me and there have been several good posts on the subject recently. The GarlicSlim blog has a post entitled Technology principle: The toy will win. In this post the writer defines a toy as
"a technological product which is simple and fun to use, and which may be criticized by some people as being weak and not suitable for serious work".
He cites the iPod as an outstanding example of a toy. Another example of toys cited is the micro-computer in the computer era dominated by IBM mainframes. To explain the success of a 'toys" approach, the author cites two reasons:
Toys do not lose sight of the fact that the product must serve the user
Toys focus on the user experience and "fun"
Another post on the subject of toys comes from Jon Kolko's recent talk at TED London. Jon is a designer with Frog Design in London. As is typical of the Frog designers, Kolko provides the intellectual or conceptual basis to understand toys..and their success as products. Kolko believes that personality plays a big role in creativity and states:
The most successful designs have the ability to “turn everything on its head,” while also being playful, humorous, and risky.
That sounds like another definition of a toy to me.
The iPad is another Apple "toy" in the good sense of the word. Maybe he learned from OLPC :) I have never heard Jobs discuss toys. Does anybody have a link to Jobs on toys. Leave it in the comments.
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
It has always surprised me that with a fairly large readership at SF, the comments are scarce.Today one of my students provided an explanation. He asked if I accepted comments on SF. SF has always accepted comments, but the comment link was obscured in some less valuable links. So today I have cleaned up the footer in each blog post to make it easier to post comments, as shown below.
Comment ^
Let me know in the comments if this makes it clearer.
An article in Huffington Post by Bill Whitmore inspired this post. The article basically outlines the qualities in military personnel that make them such attractive employees--teamwork, commitment and results oriented.
I recently hired a young Marine just back from Iraq at one of the companies I work with. The truth is I hired him simply because he was an Iraq veteran. No other reason. He was looking for a part time job to supplement the GI bill and pay for his college degree. After two months this is what I have noticed about him:
He is never late
He never complains
He works constantly and never wastes time socializing
He is very interested to learn new skills and never interprets it as criticism
My only criticism of him is that he still calls me Mr. Hacker. In fairness I still call him the Marine.
I have not posted a new business idea in awhile. This one was inspired by a Tweet. It's not my usual $100 million dollar company idea, but it could provide a nice living to someone one with creativity and humor. I suggested it to my daughter but she never developed it.
Facebook is filled with lots of people and all those company pages (which are really boring), but there are very few dogs that have Facebook pages. Let's do the analysis of this idea:
Problem: Facebook is getting boring
Innovation: Humorous character on Facebook
Barrier to entry: the wit and creativity of the posts
Size of Market: dog lovers on FB or people on FB that need more humor in their lives
Sales strategy: duh-Facebook or FB ads
Capital investment required: about two small boxes of dog bones and working capital for merchandise inventory
Competition: all the other FB pages that are funny (13 as of 11/9/10)
Revenue: sales of merchandise featuring the dog, e.g. t-shirts that say "I friended ________ on Facebook
For those of you who feel the need for some market research I provide the following:
Ms. Tripp (@michelletripp) is a brand strategist. The respondent at the far right is the noted social media commentator Mr. Ben Parr (@benparr). With such thought leaders engaged in the idea of dogs on FB we have clearly documented the market potential of the idea. The first mover advantage is still there but you may need to move quickly....and don't forget to walk the dog.
Additional posts on dogs and business are here and here.
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
While China gets most of the press coverage for its outstanding economic performance, Latin America (excluding Mexico) has been chugging along quite well. Part of the reason is that LATAM avoided most of the negative consequences of the 2008 economic crisis. Also helping has been strong commodity prices, as shown in the graph below from Infectious Greed courtesy of Finviz.
Given the delays to add commodity production capacity and the increasing demand in Asia for these products, this commodity price appreciation should continue for several years.
Business Insider has a post up in which they criticize Verizon for forcing the Verizon App Store on HTC Android phones. BI's argument is that such practices further fragment the Android App marketplace and subscribers have no choice but to accept the Verizon App Store. BI is echoing Steve Job's remarks, which are here.
I am not particularly a fan of Verizon and their App Store. Their app store is pretty anemic but their network and customer service are very good..and customer service is why I disagree with BI. The typical Verizon subscriber needs the occasional support of a customer service call not just for voice but for apps. By offering the App Store Verizon can provide complete customer service for the average customer. Verizon customers are not concerned by the theoretical issue of Android market fragmentation and forced downloads are so common these days that again BI is worried about an issue that only a geek might care about.
Now if Verizon would expand the range of the apps I might find something I need.
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
On December 1, 2010 The Pino Entrepreneurship Center at FIU is hosting its second Shark Tank. This is a variation on a business plan competition but the judges are largely investors interested in early stage investments. Such judges make the event more valuable to entrepreneurs and you may even get funding.
The previous Shark Tank is described here. The event is open to any entrepreneur in Florida. The most fun is watching the professors from FIU present and how they take feedback from the judges. I will be a judge at this event.
Note to all the entrepreneurs I mentor, you should seriously consider presenting. For more information on presenting or attending contact [email protected].
Years ago I recommended to the CEO of a Japanese company that he hire women graduates from the top Japanese universities for management positions. At the time women college graduates in Japan were only offered positions as a combination maid/secretary. My thinking was that the brightest women graduates would be attracted by the better opportunity and could quickly improve a rather weak management team. The CEO responded that it was "a crazy idea". (Not the first time I have heard this for one of my ideas to a CEO...you get used to it.)
An article from HBS Working Knowledge proves that I was probably correct. Jordan Siegel (HBS), Lynn Pyun (MIT) and B.Y. Cheon (Hanshin) have published a study "Multinational Firms, Labor Market Discrimination, and the Capture of Competitive Advantage by Exploiting the Social Divide". The study basically shows that multi-nationals that encourage women's advancement in countries where discrimination is the norm generate a one percent better return on assets. Hopefully the researchers will do similar studies on class, religious and racial discrimination. A previous writing on this theme is here.
My new book, Billion Dollar Company: An entrepreneur's guide to business models for high growth companies, is available on Amazon. Learn the fourth strategy Michael Porter should have included, how to determine if a market opportunity is large enough to interest venture capitalists and how product differentiation is more than just a feature set. Book website.
