Condensed : Art of Start
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Guy Kawasaki, venture capitalist and former Apple evangelist is the author of The Art of the Start.
It's sort of a manifesto for entrepreneurship and capitalism. He put down on paper everything he learnt in 20 years so that others—entrepreneurs and intrepreneurs, product managers, and engineers—wouldn't have to repeat his mistakes. Make meaning
The first thing I learned is that the people who change the world—the people who really make a difference—aren't motivated by money.
The people who succeeded were the ones who wanted to make meaning and create products they themselves would use. There are three principle ways of making meaning. Increase the quality of life of your customer We thought that by creating this new computer (Macintosh), we could increase people's creativity and productivity. That's what motivated us: We wanted to change the world. Right a wrong Comparing Apple OS to MS-DOS : There must be a better computer interface. There must be a better way for people to interact.' This is another way to make meaning. Prevent the end of something good So to make meaning, you must improve the quality of life, fix something that's bad, or perpetuate something that's good. Thus, as a first step with any business, you must analyze your motivation and the motivations of your employees. Make mantra
Organizations need guideposts. They need an outline; employees need to know each day when they wake up why they're going to work. This outline should be short and sweet, and all encompassing: Why do you exist? What motivates you? I call this a mantra—a three- or four-word description of why you exist.
Now, many of you may believe that you need to create a mission statement. However, a mission statement is very different from a mantra. Wendy's mission statement: To deliver superior-quality products and services to customers and communities through leadership, innovation, and partnership. Wendy's mantra should be 'healthy, fast food.' It sounds like an oxymoron—healthy fast food—but that's what the company stands for. Make mantra, not mission statement. Get going
Don't waste your time in market surveys, statistics... just get going. Here are three key points :
Think Different Stand out from the crowd. Invent your new markets Innovators strive to jump to the next curve Polarize people Has to do with above keypoint. You may disappoint some people by your ideas, concepts or products, but they are not your target. Focus on your real one, and you will have many of them (maybe not all of them). Create something that people love or hate. Don't create mediocrity. Find a few soul mates Solo entrepreneurship is not so good. You cannot be good at anything think of Synergy. Steve Jobs had Steve Wozniak. Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer About innovation
But many people have problems with getting going: They want validation; they want risk reduction; they want to know there's going to be a marketplace and that there will be customers waiting. But you know what? You can't know that. You need to get going. This is a key step Don't worry - be crappy When you have elements of crappiness, its ok, since it's a revolution. If you wait for the perfect world, then you will never ship. The way is "Ship it and then test it. Note created Sep 28, 2006 veotag :.. Tech Coast Angels - www.veotag.com/... Churn baby churn It's ok if your revolution is crappy, but then you have to make it better and better. A revolution is not an event, its a process. Note created Sep 28, 2006 veotag :.. Tech Coast Angels - www.veotag.com/... People, bozos, will try to grind you down but as an entrepreneur, you just need to ignore this negativism, but accept criticism. Define a business model
Be specific
Don't think global. Don't say : We will have 1000000 eyeballs that we will monetize them all. Instead, think how will I get our money out of this customer's purse. Keep it simple yet realistic Don't innovate with business models. Have a down-to-earth approach. It cost me $1 I sell it 5, with a 20% margin. Ask women Ask women about your business model. They are smarter. Men tend to have very primal ideas : they just want to kill the competition. Weave a M.A.T
Milestone e.g "Finish Design", so you have a goal.
Assumption and check them. How many phone request a day can we handle ? Task Use them for achieve milestone or check assumption. Niche yourself
If, you produce something that's of high value to the customer but many other people are producing it as well, you'll end up somewhere in the middle of that graph competing on price. This is not the worst place to be—at least you're creating something of value. A not so nice place to be is where you're creating something of no value to the customer—though luckily only you are creating it. So you're just plain stupid. You're doing something nobody cares about—but you're the only doing it. Even worse than this is when you're one of 10 people creating something nobody wants. That's when you're a dotcom company! This is why the dotcom implosion happened: There were 10 companies doing stupid things that nobody cared about. [...] The only problem with this is that a book doesn't weigh much; dog food, in contrast, weighs a lot. So there goes the Amazon.com model. When you disintermediate the dog food store, you knock 10% off the price, but then you have to pay about $15 to ship the case of dog food. For this reason, it costs more to buy dog food online than it would if you were to purchase it at the store. You add no value to the customer, but there are 10 companies doing the same stupid thing. That's the dotcom explanation. The 10/20/30 Rule
Signum sine tinnitu--by Guy Kawasaki: The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint
blog.guykawasaki.com/2005/12/the_102030_rule.html For presentation : * "10" - Optimum number of slides in a presentation. Because people being cannot comprehend more than ten concepts in a meeting. * "20" - Number of minutes for presentation. Because afterwards attention decline and you must leave some room for delay, and discussion. * * "30" - Size of font on slides As much text as possible is jammed into the slide, and then the presenter reads it. However, as soon as the audience figures out that you’re reading the text, it reads ahead of you because it can read faster than you can speak. The result is that you and the audience are out of synch. The reason people use a small font is twofold: first, that they don’t know their material well enough; second, they think that more text is more convincing. Total bozosity. Force yourself to use no font smaller than thirty points. I guarantee it will make your presentations better because it requires you to find the most salient points and to know how to explain them well.
More thoughts
Make Evangelists
As they are committed to making the world a better place. They don't need to be your employees. It's actually even better as they would look partial. Hire "infected" people If you hire these people, they will be devoted to foster your company. Hire better than yourself. Don't be afraid or will end up in "bozo explosion". Let 100 flowers blossom You thought of everything, but customers you never anticipated, buy your products. and use it a way you did not expect. Take whatever money the market gives you. What's next ?
Watch this amazing video and you will be convinced to ...
Amazon.com: The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anythin
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