A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read allIf the Shoe Fits posts here
During a recent conversation I heard several entrepreneurs say they didn’t have time, energy or money to invest in the holidays.
I get the money, but they are wrong about the time and energy, especially if they would like to goose both the creativity and productivity of themselves and their teams.
Just the act of getting away from your startup for a few hours, both mentally and physically and eating real food will clear your brain leading to improved creativity and productivity.
You can accelerate that improvement if you unplug completely.
The holidays are a tough time of year for many; even more so if they are feeling rejected—whether real or perceived.
Just touching a warm object seems to stem the feelings and subsequent depression and even loss of self-worth.
Notably, touching something warm after a feeling of ostracism — like holding a warm cup of coffee — is enough to halt and even reverse some of these autonomic responses. (…) The findings, of course, don’t just explain why so many lonely souls while away the hours at Starbucks, embracing a warm cup of joe.
Knowing that, you can jump your own efforts an order of magnitude by taking a few minutes to reach out to someone who is lonely—not just now, but all year ’round.
You may not have the time or energy to volunteer, but how much effort does it take when you’re getting coffee to chat with a stranger who looks down?
And who knows what great things will result or what you may learn from your caring effort?
Option Sanity™ is inclusive. Come visit Option Sanity for an easy-to-understand, simple-to-implement stock allocation system. It’s so easy a CEO can do it.
Warning.
Do not attempt to use Option Sanity™ without a strong commitment to business planning, financial controls, honesty, ethics, and “doing the right thing.” Use only as directed.
Users of Option Sanity may experience sudden increases in team cohesion and worker satisfaction. In cases where team productivity, retention and company success is greater than typical, expect media interest and invitations as keynote speaker.
As Laurie Cronenbold, who just received a patent for a snap-on protective cup that a player can easily remove the moment he leaves the field, said, “Moms solve problems.”
Pam Ryan designed and patented a softball helmet incorporating an enlarged panel for long hair or a ponytail; she licensed it in 1998 and has sold more than a million units.
Barb Chaisson designed a cushioned bandage for girls (and some boys) who wear earrings and play soccer and other sports.
Then there are the entrepreneurs whose compassion drives them to follow their hearts and solve problems.
Two of my favorites are the ball that never dies and a totally new take on the water wheel.
Tim Jahnigen developed a ball that would never wear out, go flat or need a pump out of PopFoam, a hard foam made of ethylene-vinyl acetate similar to the stuff used to make Crocs, that brings undiluted joy to children around the world.
Cynthia Koenig dreamed up the Wello WaterWheel that moves 25 gallons of water at one time eliminating the 25% of their time women in developing countries spend carrying five gallon jugs (42 lbs.) on their heads along with the resulting injuries.
So look around; there’s a lot that needs fixing and some of those fixes could be simmering in your brain.
SUBMIT YOUR STORY Be the Thursday feature – Entrepreneurs: [your company name]
Share the story of your startup today.
Send it along with your contact information and I’ll be in touch.
Questions? Email or call me at 360.335.8054 Pacific time.
The concept of Internet-connected machines that collect data and communicate, often called the “Internet of Things,” has been around for years. Information technology companies, too, are pursuing this emerging field. I.B.M. has its “Smarter Planet” projects, while Cisco champions the “Internet of Everything.”
But it is General Electric that is really pushing the envelope in a new East Bay (extended Silicon Valley) software center where they have already hired 250 engineers in the last year and a half.
The company plans to increase that work force of computer scientists and software developers to 400, and to invest $1 billion in the center by 2015. The buildup is part of G.E’s big bet on what it calls the “industrial Internet,” bringing digital intelligence to the physical world of industry as never before.
GE believes it can leverage the breakthroughs across its product line, from jet engines to medical equipment.
GE is a much different, not to mention much smarter, company under Jeff Immelt than it was under Jack Welch.
Welch used financial engineering as GE’s engine for profit during his tenure all but abandoning and gutting the industrial R&D expertise that had sustained its profits for decades—short-term thinking vs. long-term.
Nor does GE doesn’t believe or expect to do it alone.
Now G.E. is trying to rally support for its vision from industry partners, academics, venture capitalists and start-ups. About 250 of them have been invited to a conference in San Francisco, sponsored by the company, on Thursday.
GE and its ilk are opening up new opportunities for those who love to innovate, but don’t love startups. (And that’s OK.)
And if you do have that entrepreneurial bent why not focus it on industrial or enterprise efforts, instead of yet another consumer boondoggle.
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In case you’re curious, I had a fabulous Thanksgiving and four wonderful days off (I could get used to that:) Better yet, I got everything on my to-do list done. Yea!
There’s more than money to be made by applying creativity and imagination to innovate the mundane, especially applying creativity to the communications your customers typically ignore.
Adding a liberal dose of creativity can create great buzz and in many instances that innovation goes viral and provides advertising and brand-building value well beyond anything you planned.
Innovating customer instructions may even save lives.
Seriously.
The safety and emergency procedures video shown by most airlines is a great example of something critical, yet so mundane that most passengers pay absolutely no attention to it.
Whereas Air New Zealand’s video grabs and holds passengers’ attention, proving that even the most mundane communication is a platform for creativity and open to innovation.
What do you think? Would you watch?
SUBMIT YOUR STORY
Be the Thursday feature – Entrepreneurs: [your company name]
Share the story of your startup today.
Send it along with your contact information and I’ll be in touch.
Questions? Email or call me at 360.335.8054 Pacific time.
Of all the high profile entrepreneurs who have built wildly successful companies my favorite is Tony Hsieh.
Hsieh is amazing from his MAP and the culture it engenders to the lengths he’s willing to go to propagate and share it—which includes renovating an entire city.
Hsieh is one of those increasingly rare people with an abundance of common sense who eschews ideology and focuses on doing real good in his community well beyond what’s necessary.
A healthy take on doing good by doing well in a very capitalistic way.
The $350 million breaks out as follows, $200 million invested in land and buildings; $50 million for small businesses; $50 million for tech startups/companies and $50 million to be used for education.
Typically companies like Zappos build spectacular campuses offering their employees all the amenities in their own little world, but that approach actually went against parts of the Zappos culture, which promotes unstructured interactions among the staff.
Hsieh took that attitude and created a different vision for the new campus.
He leased the former City Hall — smack in the middle of downtown Vegas — for 15 years. Then he got to thinking: If he was going to move at least 1,200 employees, why not make it possible for them to live nearby? And if they could live nearby, why not create an urban community aligned with the culture of Zappos, which encourages the kind of “serendipitous interactions” that happen in offices without walls? As Zach Ware, Hsieh’s right-hand man in the move, put it, “We wanted the new campus to benefit from interaction with downtown, and downtown to benefit from interaction with Zappos.”
In typical Hsieh fashion the effort is summed up in a way that reflects what is really needed from today’s business leaders.
“Every factory in the world is doing everything to maximize R.O.I. We’re doing everything to maximize R.O.C.—Return On Community.” –Tony Hsieh.
Reddit has come under fire for harboring a forum that encourages people to covertly photograph women on the street and upload the images to the site for others to ogle and comment on.
Posted anonymously, of course.
And, of course, those who posted the objectionable pictures, often of underage girls, were extremely upset when they were outed.
These actions, in turn, prompted an outcry from those who felt that they should be able to retain their own anonymity while posting photographs of women without their consent.
Reddit uses the ever popular “Freedom of Speech” defense for not doing anything, but, as Zeynep Tufekci, a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill says it doesn’t qualify.
“…those running Reddit are twisting the logic behind that notion because the free speech referenced in this case refers to images of women, often underage girls, taken without their consent, and passed around for pleasure.”
I’m glad I’m beyond the age anyone would bother with my picture.
90% of the 90% mentioned earlier own iPhones, on which they tend to wax lyrical with little to no provocation and immediately upgrade when a new version is launched.
You weren’t imagining things. Apple’s new iOS 6 does, indeed, come with a default setting that tracks your activity, gathering a constant stream of personal data. Apple’s advertising arm, iAd, uses that data to create a targeted, personal ad campaign based on your recent Googling…
The tracking function isn’t just on the iPhone 5, but applies to anything that uses iOS6, like the iPod touch or iPad.
But at least Apple provides a way to turn the feature off (instructions in the article).
If having your cellphone track everything you do in order to send you targeted ads is supposed to improve life then I prefer my life to remain unimproved.
My friends and I will continue to disagree, but I can honestly say I am one happy dinosaur.
A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read allIf the Shoe Fits posts here
Do you recommend sharing entrepreneurial skills and experience with others?
Are you willing to put you’re money and time where your mouth is?
Creativity, innovation, focus and execution are as much key factors in crimes as diverse as financial scams and drug dealing as they are in entrepreneurism.
Defy Ventures is the name of a non-profit in New York.
Defy (v.): To challenge or dare a person to do something deemed impossible.
Today, whether you are an entrepreneur or investor, I defy you to start a similar effort wherever you live.
And if you choose to accept the challenge, please let me know and share your experiences here.
Option Sanity™ defies conventional ISO allocation.
Come visit Option Sanity for an easy-to-understand, simple-to-implement stock allocation system. It’s so easy a CEO can do it.
Warning. Do not attempt to use Option Sanity™ without a strong commitment to business planning, financial controls, honesty, ethics, and “doing the right thing.” Use only as directed.
Users of Option Sanity may experience sudden increases in team cohesion and worker satisfaction. In cases where team productivity, retention and company success is greater than typical, expect media interest and invitations as keynote speaker.
If you plan to spend the sweat, blood and tears it takes to start a company isn’t it best to start one with the greatest chance of succeeding?
Then why not follow in the market steps of Palo Alto Networks, Jive, and Splunk, instead of Facebook and Groupon?
According to Sequoia Capital’s Jim Goetz, the $500 Billion market for enterprise software is ripe for disruption; doing so makes you far more likely to succeed.
“At Sequoia, upwards of a hundred entrepreneurs a week present and if we’re lucky, maybe a dozen of them are focusing on the enterprise. In the last 10 years, there have been 56 IPOs in the enterprise space that have gotten north of a billion [dollars in market capitalization] and just 23 in consumer.”
I have a somewhat cynical take on why there’s a shortage of enterprise startups.
Enterprise solutions rarely start in a dorm room.
You need to have some familarity with a market to disrupt it.
It’s difficult to create a solution to problems of which you are unaware, haven’t experienced and wouldn’t know how to solve if you had.
It’s easier to create something jazzy and fun and give it away than it is to solve a real problem that must be bought (with real money).
Appearances can be deceiving, but looking at the management of Palo Alto Networks, Jive Software and Splunk it seems that only one founder (Jive) was actually “young” when the company started.
Another thing is that they didn’t fast-track to their IPO based on hope and hype; instead they IPOed on revenues and real growth.
These are the kind of companies that grow, add value and help create a new middle-class.
Be sure to join me next Wednesday for a look at founder Henry Ford’s thoughts on that subject and why you should care.
Option Sanity™ spreads the wealth fairly.
Come visit Option Sanity for an easy-to-understand, simple-to-implement stock allocation system. It’s so easy a CEO can do it.
Warning.
Do not attempt to use Option Sanity™ without a strong commitment to business planning, financial controls, honesty, ethics, and “doing the right thing.” Use only as directed.
Users of Option Sanity may experience sudden increases in team cohesion and worker satisfaction. In cases where team productivity, retention and company success is greater than typical, expect media interest and invitations as keynote speaker.
It’s a sad commentary that when discussions turn to technical careers so many people immediately assume that means software/startup/consumer product monetized by advertising.
Today, I thought I’d introduce you to Millennial Matt Heverly, who heads the team driving NASA’s Curiosity as it explores Mars.
Yes, you drive by programming, but how much more exciting to work on a team that explores a planet than to build another social app.
And for those who think working for a large, semi-governmental corporation (Jet Propulsion Labs) means an uptight attitude you couldn’t be more wrong.
Bobak Ferdowsi, a flight director who sports a mohawk with red, white and blue streaks…
But it was the group’s esprit de corps that left the lasting impression. A spoof video, “We’re NASA and We Know It,” recorded to the beat of the song “Sexy and I Know It,” now has 2.4 million views on YouTube. Mr. Ferdowsi, now known online as Mohawk Guy, has 53,000 Twitter followers, up from a couple of hundred before the mission. People inside Building 264 here, part of the Space Flight Operations Facility, have long had a sense of humor about themselves — at one rocket launching, a group of scientists wore Spock ears.
It’s great to get kids involved in science and math, but they need to know that there are dozens of career paths out there that have depth and meaning and aren’t necessarily startups.
Just for fun, I’m posting the spoof, but you should also take a look at these videos of Mars.
And be sure to join me Friday for a look at the new, more solid direction of internet and software startups according to Sequoia Capital’s Jim Goetz.
“The Information Technology Innovation Foundation ranked the U.S. last of 40 countries in terms of improved innovation capacity over the past decade.”
What if you asked business leaders? More than two-thirds would give their organizations high marks for innovation.
But what happens when you ask the working stiffs in those same organizations? You’d find innovation marks well below half.
Some 78% of leaders said yes; just 43% of employees agreed. Does the leader “urge employees to continually expand their understanding of business trends and emerging issues”? Leaders 77%; employees 51%. Does he or she “guide employees who fail or make mistakes to reframe the experiences as learning opportunities”? Leaders 77%; employees 47%. And does he or she “champion the merits of employee-initiated ideas to senior management”? Leaders 75%; employees 42%.
Those questions were asked of “513 leaders and 514 non-leader employees.”
I found grim amusement in the recommended fixes.
Senior Management Sets the Pace
Choose the Right Leaders
Develop Innovation Leaders
Build a Business Process for Innovation.
I thought senior management were the leaders, but obviously not since they are supposed to choose the “right leaders” and develop “innovation leaders.”
The idea that innovation thinking and support can be delegated by senior management to specialists at lower levels is just plain ludicrous.
During a recent conversation I heard several entrepreneurs say they didn’t have time, energy or money to invest in the holidays.
“Necessity is the mother of invention” is a well-worn truth, but compassion runs it a close second.
Of all the high profile entrepreneurs who have built wildly successful companies my favorite is Tony Hsieh.
My wired friends (which is 90% of them) rag me for my resistance to being wired and periodic rants about privacy, which is so last century.
If you listen to the media, especially new media, you would think the US is a hotbed of innovation.
