Last Saturday I provided links to innovation based on thinking different; there’s more of that this week, with some very inventive solutions to common problems.
The cost of setting up shop for a budding designer is beyond prohibitive, especially if they want to be close to their prime clients in urban areas like Manhattan. But just as an interest in food and fashion often go together so the food truck solution adopted by new chefs is being snapped up by young designers.
Styleliner is among a handful of mobile retail stores in New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Portland, Ore., and across the U.S that are hawking vintage accessories, sexy shoes and denim to die for in their haute wheels.
An old industrial building in Brooklyn is signaling what could be a small renaissance for local manufacturing. It’s an approach that could be applied in many urban areas by developers with a more creative and longer-term vision than loft condos.
A surge of young entrepreneurs eager to produce $7 chocolate bars made from hand-roasted and hand-ground cocoa, or build theater and movie sets or fashion high-end furniture for a connoisseur’s market find the smaller spaces carved out of these old factories precisely what they have been looking for.
And now the story of Tito Beveridge, whose career proves that rarely does one get from point a to point b via a straight line. It does prove that constant personal exploration is needed to get from, say, premed to computers to geology/oil to your true passion—even if it takes a couple of decades—which sure kicks a large hole in today’s instant gratification mindset.
I saw a motivational speaker on TV who suggested that people at a crossroads consider what they enjoy doing and what they’re good at doing — and to find a job where the two intersect. I had been making infused vodka to give to friends at Christmas, and I really enjoyed that. I thought that was my answer.
Even people who like babies get tired of the endless stream of pictures posted on various social media, but that is especially true for those folks who, by age or by choice don’t have any. Twenty-somethings fit that demographic and a group of them have provided a solution.
Launched last Wednesday, Unbaby.me will scan a users Facebook newsfeed for certain words and phrases that indicate that a picture of a baby will be looking back at them. (…)The service describes itself as, “A Chrome extension that deletes babies from your newsfeed permanently – by replacing them with awesome stuff.”
I love the English because they embrace the unusual, quixotic, eccentric and downright odd. Being pragmatic, they allow gambling (knowing people will do it whether of not it is legal). You can bet on anything if you find the right bookie—there is even a term for it—novelty betting.
The history of novelty betting in Britain can be traced back nearly a half century, Adams said, to a man named David Threfall, who in 1964 requested — and received — odds of 1,000 to 1 on a man walking on the moon by Jan. 1, 1970. Threfall, obviously, turned his £10 ticket into £10,000, giving rise to an ever-growing legion of bettors who are interested in betting on the obscure, unlikely and (sometimes) unimaginable.
We’ll end today on what I hope will be a thought-provoking note. How many friends do you have? Not Facebook friends, but real ones; the kind you would tell you need serious help and would be there for you. Take a look at why the further out of college the more difficult it is to form real connections. If this shoe fits then you may want to commit some time to finding at least one new pair.
As external conditions change, it becomes tougher to meet the three conditions that sociologists since the 1950s have considered crucial to making close friends: proximity; repeated, unplanned interactions; and a setting that encourages people to let their guard down and confide in each other, said Rebecca G. Adams, a professor of sociology and gerontology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read allIf the Shoe Fits posts here
It happens to founders with a strong creative streak, those who are focused on doing good, and the ones of any age, but often young, who “know [whatever].”
It happens most often to those who trust; who honestly believe that investors care about them as opposed to a 3X+ return on their investment.
Founders are often dazzled in the presence of success and so thrilled at the thought of funding they forget that part of due diligence is checking references.
They assume diligence and reference checks are a one-way street—checking on them.
They also forget that experience, objectivity and specialized training may be worth more than peer review and networking.
Not only have the women lost their company and even the right to use their names, but they have also been sued for almost $2 million by their former angel. Theirs is a story that may dissuade other young designers from seeking financial saviors.
What founders need to recognize is that the business side of any enterprise is critical to success and that, sadly, trust without contractual backup is prone to whims and change.
That’s the good news.
The bad news is that investors, who often know little and care less about topics such as moral, culture and intangible motivation, frequently dump successful founders.
Venture capitalists exhibit some strange behaviors, but none is more bizarre than the near-inevitable scheming to remove a company’s founder-CEO. Odder still is that these plans are often hatched just as the company begins to really perform. (…)Not every founder goes the distance, but it’s important that founder-led companies perform significantly better — a suggestive metric is that companies retaining their founders have produced substantially better returns than the S&P. There’s nothing surprising about this because thoughtful investors see no reason to interrupt a successful run and successful founders see no reason to leave their companies.
The key here is “thoughtful investors,” which brings us back to the importance of due diligence before you take the money.
Option Sanity™ is fair under scrutiny.
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.
With the exception of LinkedIn, which developed serious products that sell for serious bucks, they all rely on advertising for revenue generation; even Zynga’s virtual products revenue, which has tanked, is earned from its specialized ads on Facebook.
Creating something that could change the world—fabulous.
Generating non-ad-based revenue—priceless.
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Cheating is not a new topic here at MAPping Company Success.
Cheating has been and is currently an acceptable solution for addressing difficult situations by 95% of students, so what makes anyone think that the solution will change when that 95% is working/running our companies, media, governments and religious institutions in years to come?
In fact, we don’t have to wait years.
Consider Jonah Lehrer, author of “Imagine: How Creativity Works,” who, at the ripe old age of 31, blew up a potentially brilliant and lucrative career with that same 95% mentality.
Lehrer plagiarized content for his articles and invented quotes from Bob Dylan for his book.
He’s been fired from The New Yorker and his publisher has recalled Imagine, which has sold 200,000 copies since March.
Based on his apology, it’s hard to tell if Lehrer actually believes he really did something wrong or is apologizing because he got caught.
“The lies are over now; I understand the gravity of my position. I want to apologize to everyone I have let down, especially my editors and readers. I will do my best to correct the record and ensure that my misquotations and mistakes are fixed. I have resigned my position as staff writer at The New Yorker.”
Consider the first sentence; if you take it as stated it means that he didn’t see his actions as being very serious when he did them.
And, of course, he said he was sorry, which makes it all OK.
According to Todd Gitlin, a professor of journalism and sociology at Columbia, Lehrer combined a popular science niche and winning personality to become a 21st-century media star.
“Conjure me up a guy who talks science winningly, who shows you that everything is transparent, and does it in a self-help-y spirit. In our age, a guy who looks cute and wonky is better positioned to get away with this than others.”
And for all those who shake their heads and bemoan this fall from grace I would remind you that Lehrer’s cheating shouldn’t come as a surprise—after all, he is one of the 95%.
Brian LaFaille is young; just 12 months out of school and into the workforce, yet the attitude he recommends for other newbies is one managers at any level would, metaphorically speaking, kill to have on their team.
Additionally, many (all?) of the 10 lessons he says he learned in his first year have gone unlearned by people with 10, 20 even 30 times his experience.
Haven’t learned of just forgotten; either way they are the lessons and actions of the best employees, whether in a startup or a Fortune 25 Corporation.
Most are self explanatory, but Brian’s detailed explanation of each is worth reading.
Take Advantage of the Seasoned Veterans Around You (or the don’t-know-any-better newbies –Miki)
As Sharlyn Lauby, our August Carnival host, points out, we’re already a third of the way through third quarter! My, how time flies when you’re having fun—or fighting fires.
Along with the great posts this month, she queried everybody for their book recommendations, especially useful to the heavy travelers among you or those who just prefer curated reading lists. So without any more blathering on my part here is the carnival. Enjoy!
Joel Garfinkle, author of Career Advancement Blog, shared the story of a manager overcoming being passed over for a promotion in “How to Get a Promotion After Being Rejected”
On his summer reading list was “A Thousand Farewells: A Reporter’s Journey from Refugee Camp the the Arab Spring” by CBC journalist Nahlah Ayed
At the Driving Results Through Culture blog, S. Chris Edmonds utilizes the recent sanctions against Penn State to start a discussion about “Gauging Your Organization’s Integrity”
He’s reading Mark Levy’s “Accidental Genius: Using Writing to Generate Your Best Ideas, Insight, and Content” – and says, it’s well…genius.
He recommends reading “The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business” by Patrick Lencioni followed closely by “Great By Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck – Why Some Thrive Despite Them All” by Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen
Do you know what an ‘aphorism’ is? It’s a bit of accepted wisdom or observations recognized by the general population as being true. A friend sent me a list of aphorisms I grew up with—oldies but goodies (like me) and still true. I’ll share more oldies, along with more currents ones in the months to come. I’ve added explanations to the more obscure ones, but feel free to ask if you don’t get it.
A lick and a promise (a quick fix with a promise to come back and do the job right later)—sounds like a lot of software releases.
One bad apple spoils the whole barrel—apropos to managers who ignore the team member who is tearing the group apart.
Been through the mill (had a rough time)—a fairly accurate description of most entrepreneurs.
Scarce as hen’s teeth (hens don’t have teeth)—programmers in their twenties with 10 years of mobile experience.
Whatever floats your boat (or paddles your canoe)—an attitude opposite of the ‘my way or the highway’ so prevalent today.
Catawampus (out of place or crooked [I love saying catawampus, it makes me smile])—the condition of the stuff on most of our desks (definitely mine).
Stringing around or piddling (not doing anything of value)—worker action a day or two before and after holidays or vacation.
You ain’t the only duck in the pond (it’s not all about you)—there are almost as many variations as people who don’t believe it.
Innovation isn’t always about a new product or service (on or off the web); it applies equally to a change of thinking leading to a new approach.
Venture capitalists have long been known for shunning publicity for themselves, while funding innovation by others—now they are funding both.
Venture capitalists are hiring full-time public relations experts to tell bloggers and reporters of their investing prowess. They publicize their every doing and thought on Twitter and in blog posts.
Adeo Ressi, 40, a serial entrepreneur with eight companies to his credit, started Founder Institute a few years ago with a novel approach to moving new companies forward on a global level.
For tuition of less than $1,000, students attend classes with one goal in mind: to create a fully operational company. In fact, they are required to incorporate before they can graduate.
Utilities are rarely seen as cutting edge when it comes to convincing people to conserve energy; but that’s changing with the use of everything from a fictional family’s story in a series of web videos to social media ego strokes and neighborly competition for bragging rights.
Motivating people to save energy isn’t really about the money, behavior experts say. Successful programs foster a sense of achievement and identity. And competing to beat your friends and neighbors at the savings game doesn’t hurt.
Mention mobile technology to most people and they think of people talking and doing stuff on their smartphones from playing Angry Birds to email to closing deals for their company while on vacation. Talk to the mobile players and they are far more focused on machines talking to machines—no people involved.
Berg Insight, a research firm in Goteborg, Sweden, says the number of machine-to-machine devices using the world’s wireless networks reached 108 million in 2011 and will at least triple that by 2017. Ericsson, the leading maker of wireless network equipment, sees as many as 50 billion machines connected by 2020.
My day job involves supporting people and ideas that have the potential to change the energy game. It’s about managing disruptive ideas and managing people who have disruptive ideas. In my non-Shell life, I teach leadership development workshops based on meditation practices. (…) I approached my manager and proposed a program that would bring together my innovation management role and my leadership development background. He encouraged me to build an educational curriculum blending the two because innovation begins with an idea in the mind.
Users add $1.30 revenue to LinkedIn’s coffers for every on-line hour, whereas Facebook generates a whopping 6.2 CENTS for each online hour.
When LinkedIn users started using it for job hunting LinkedIn jumped on the band wagon and created a product called Recruiter that costs as much as $8,200 a year per seat. (Adobe pays for 70 seats—do the math.)
LinkedIn’s top salespeople make as much as $400,000
I can’t find mention of Facebook salespeople.
Facebook’s share price is $29 (IPO price $38; no first day pop), while LinkedIn is $104 (IPO price $45; doubled first day of trading).
Facebook is desperately trying to monetize its users, but there are no products that have emerged as they did for LinkedIn, so all that is left is user data and user actions.
In an effort to boost its advertising revenue Facebook decided to use the names and photos of anyone who clicked a product’s ‘Like’ button to plug that product—referred to as “Sponsored Stories”—and, as usual, did so without notifying users let alone getting permission.
Until now, Facebook users were unaware when and how they were exploited for advertising, and they may not have realized that a click on something as vague as a like button could be used to enrich Facebook, the company.
Zynga executives, including CEO Mark Pincus, CFO David Wehner, COO John Schappert, and general counsel Reginald Davis, as well as many heavy investors, such as Google, Venture Partners, Union Square Ventures, Reid Hoffman and others, all cashed out part of their stock in April, months before the stock cratered on the disappointing earnings report.
Google, under Larry Page’s leadership, is still making excuses for not fixing the privacy complaints in France (Americans have no privacy rights and so can’t complain.)
The French data protection authorities asked Google on Tuesday to examine private information that cars taking pictures for its Street View service collected, after Google acknowledged that it had retained some of the information despite promising to delete it.
You may want to rethink your role models along with your revenue model.
Option Sanity™ provides lasting value.
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.
Most people acknowledge the addictive quality of today’s technology.
Crackberries have long been a joke, but from email and texting to Angry Birds and Facebook people are staying online longer, often to the detriment of their families, their work and even their humanity.
The addictive qualities of technology have long been a subject for academics, psychologists and social scientists.
The question now is when building a product, what responsibility, if any, do entrepreneurs have for its effect on people?
That’s a question being asked by tech leaders from places such as Google, Twitter and Facebook and forming the basis for an annual event called Wisdom 2.0.
But hearing it from leaders at many of Silicon Valley’s most influential companies, who profit from people spending more time online, can sound like auto executives selling muscle cars while warning about the dangers of fast acceleration.
“We’re done with this honeymoon phase and now we’re in this phase that says, ‘Wow, what have we done?’ ” said Soren Gordhamer, who organizes Wisdom 2.0, an annual conference he started in 2010 about the pursuit of balance in the digital age. “It doesn’t mean what we’ve done is bad. There’s no blame. But there is a turning of the page.”
Wisdom 2.0 provides a forum and insights from the very leaders whose success most entrepreneurs want to emulate.
In the crush of 80 hour weeks it’s difficult to find the time or energy to consider the long-term effect of what you are doing, but it’s necessary if you are in it for more than the money.
However, the thoughts are worth having and you’ll find that creating a conversation among those who toil alongside you is a great way to share, bond, learn and grow personally, as well as build a stronger company.
Entrepreneurs face difficulties that are hard for most people to imagine, let alone understand. You can find anonymous help and connections that do understand at 7 cups of tea.
Crises never end.
$10 really does make a difference and you’ll never miss it,
Last Saturday I provided links to innovation based on thinking different; there’s more of that this week, with some very inventive solutions to common problems.
It happens to founders with a strong creative streak, those who are focused on doing good, and the ones of any age, but often young, who “know [whatever].”
Last Friday we looked at 
Cheating is 
Brian LaFaille is young; just 12 months out of school and into the workforce, yet the 
As Sharlyn Lauby, our 
Do you know what an ‘
