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Lists of entrepreneurial qualities abound on the web.  Heck, I even ran a couple surveys when I first started this blog.   After a couple years of working with entrepreneurs and start-ups, I’ve come to the conclusion that while entrepreneurs in aggregate do exhibit many similar personal qualities, the success of their start-up is a different issue altogether and tied to a much more subtle and extensive set of factors.

That observation combined with my natural orientation to practical, real-world information, and I’ve personally grown very tired of talking about entrepreneurial qualities.  I’ve met plenty of passionate, committed, tireless, social, driven, etc., etc., etc. entrepreneurs whose start-up didn’t succeed.  I’ve also met a handful of very successful entrepreneurs.  While it is true that they exhibit quite a lot of the qualities generally subscribed to entrepreneurs, I personally think that success requires much broader support than simply the personal qualities of the entrepreneur.  (Not to mention that any tight cohort most likely exhibits similar qualities.  That’s why they are a cohort.  Let’s not confuse shared experience with success.  While most squirrels in my neighborhood are brown, simply being a brown animal doesn’t make you a squirrel.)

So my personal “scorecard” for initial evaluation or entrepreneurs includes both personal factors and opportunity factors.  I typically look at four factors in each category.  What follows is a quick overview of my though process in an initial meeting with an entrepreneur.

Personal factors

There’s an old cliche in the investment community that they would rather invest in “an A team with a B product, then a B team with an A product.”  This speaks to the importance of the people involved in any start-up, and truly I tend to judge the entrepreneur before I judge the idea.  Following are the four factors that weigh heavily in my evaluation of the personal side of the entrepreneurship equation.

Passion and Commitment

Just about every article you read on entrepreneurial qualities talks about passion and commitment being critical for success and I couldn’t agree more.  Building a successful business is hard enough with passion fueling complete focus and commitment to keep going when the going gets tough.  Whenever I meet a new entrepreneur I’m constantly looking for signals that tell me their force is strong.   Things like working evenings and weekends on their startup while they work a full time job speak to passion; and investing personal money or not being dismayed by a couple failures tells me a lot about their commitment.

“Inner Circle” support

The first few years of a startup tend to require almost exclusive focus and commitment.  This can be very hard on family and friends.  Many an entrepreneur I’ve talked to has spoken of past divorces due to their focus on the business.  Work/life balance is hard enough when you’re an early stage entrepreneur.  If you try to do it without having a real-world conversation with your spouse, family and close friends, you’re asking for trouble.  I will specifically ask questions of entrepreneurs in this area – not only have they had the conversation, but is their family behind them.  Having the most important people in your life in full support of the crazy ride you’re embarking on can be a tremendous help.  Just remember, it IS possible to be successful and stay married.

Realism

I’m also on the lookout in those first meetings to get a sense of the entrepreneur’s sense of reality when it comes to starting a new business.  Are they aware of their risks and chance of success?  Have they overestimated the potential of the business?  Have they underestimated their capital and resource needs?  An entrepreneur with a clear head and sense of the risks, and rewards, of their start-up shows me they’ve done their homework.  The entrepreneur’s realistic approach helps shield them from disappointment and provides a sound basis for business planning.

Ownership

Finally, on my scorecard, it’s highly important that the entrepreneur demonstrates ownership for their own success.  Too often I have entrepreneurs in my office that think it’s my job to find them money or get them started.  Any entrepreneur who demonstrates in any way a mindset that their success is dependent on the actions of other presents a huge red flag and is a topic I will immediately address.  If I challenge an entrepreneur on this topic and they become defensive or angry, and I don’t believe they can be coached out of their beliefs, I wish them well and send them on their way.  In my corner of the world there are all kinds of support resources for entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes to tap into, but your start-up’s success is no one’s responsibility but your own.

Opportunity factors

Even an A team needs something to sell, and when I say “opportunity” I mean the product, service or concept the entrepreneur has at the core of the start-up.   Opportunity factors, for me at least, get weighted differently than personal factors.  First – as I said above, the personal factors are always important and almost always where I started asking questions first.  Second – the nature of the opportunity impacts how deep I need to dive and how critical it is to success; the discussion is much different if I’m talking to someone opening a pizza shop versus a medical device start-up.  The questions below speak primarily to the bulk of my current clients: high-growth potential start-ups in the technology space.

Something that’s real

I talk to lots of technologists with plenty of exciting ideas.  However, there is a big difference between an idea and showing that idea works.  Whether it’s a prototype, or a pilot, or lab research, the entrepreneur that can prove, even if it’s on a small scale, that the technology works is light years ahead of anyone with simply an idea or research.  Of course, the challenges don’t end there and the next hurdle is to show the technology can scale into commercialization, but if you are technology start-up and you have a meeting with a potential investor, be prepared to answer this simple question: “Does the technology work?”

Market need, and a way to get there

We all have our personal cliches and one of mine is “not every good idea is a great business.”  A crucial part of any evaluation I have with an entrepreneur is understanding why someone will take a dollar out of their wallet and give it to the entrepreneur for their product/service.  This is critical and I can’t count the number of entrepreneurs that either aren’t focused on sales or underestimate the effort involved in selling.  You simply must be able to tell me (and more importantly your future customers) why they should buy your product.  The more compelling the argument, the better.

The “way to get there” is equally important and speaks to how the entrepreneur intends to get the word out.  Almost as hard as getting a customer to take a dollar out of their wallet, is getting the opportunity to try to convince them to take that dollar out.  So I look for what the entrepreneur’s plan is to get in front of potential customers.

Team that can deliver

Team, team, team – I can’t say it enough.  Once I’m done evaluating the founding entrepreneur(s), the other team element is to look at their support team.  The basic service team (legal, financial, etc) is not so important in my mind as their advisory board, if they have put one in place.  Most people think of the value of an advisory board as the coaching and mentoring they can provide and certainly that is invaluable, but more so to first time entrepreneurs.  The real value in my eyes though of the advisory board (or “real” Board, if they are that far along) are the technical and sales contacts they can provide.  To an investor, this lowers risk by providing not only high-level introductions, but an accompanying “instant credibility” that helps make those early sales more likely.

That said – I don’t want to overplay the board of advisor, nor understate the founders.  The people running the company on a day to day basis still have the greatest impact on it’s chances for success and a high level of scrutiny is given to that person or team.  I’ve had many a “tough love” conversation challenging an entrepreneur to convince me they have what it takes to start, run and grow a company.

Profitability

You would be amazed at the number of pitches I hear where the entrepreneur doesn’t tell me how they are going to make money.  Not how much money, or how big the company will be in five years – simply no information on where revenue comes from.  Sometimes these are presentations to reviews committees I sit on for 5 – 6 figure loan/grant funds.  So before I go any further, entrepreneurs please get out your checklists and add “Tell them how my company makes money” to your pitch list.

When you do tell me how you are going to make money, I’m looking for a well-reasoned approach that fits your market and your sector.  If you are proposing a revenue model new to the market, then walk me through why you are passionate about the new approach and convince me that your customers will positively respond.

Hand in hand with how you make money is how much of you get to keep as profit, so a basic understanding of your financials and operational costs is part of this analysis.  Investors will probably be categorizing your business model and I admit I’m no different (high-value; commodity; up-sell potential, etc.).  This leads into what most folks call “scalability”, or now that you have a handful of customers and you’re hopefully making money, how do you make a lot of money?  So for profitability, you need to tell me two things: first, how you make money then second, how you intend to make a lot of money.

Your thoughts?

So that’s my scorecard, what do you think?  It’s not intended to be anything other than an initial vetting tool as obviously deeper information is needed to truly judge the potential of any start-up.  However, as a tool to evaluate early stage entrepreneurs and their businesses it has served me well and I can tell you that many of these areas are also important to my peers.

Entrepreneurs – how do you fare against this scorecard?

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My entrepreneurial scorecard

Yes, I have things to talk about on my running progress last month, but before you think I’m one dimensional, let’s talk about another one of my personal passions: movies.

I like all kinds of movies from special effects “guy movies” to emotional “chick flicks”, and everything in between.  The movies that I end up loving though, the ones that go on my all time favorite list, have to bring something special.  Last month I reconnected with one of those special movies Fantastic Mr. Fox.

I first saw this movie while visiting my sister in Chicago a year or so ago.  While she didn’t care for it, I thought it was magical.  Shopping at Target last month, I saw it for sale on an endcap and bought it.  I’m not one of those movie collectors, in fact this is the first movie I’ve ever bought I think.  I’ve since watched it a handful of times and am just as entranced by it as I was the first time.

The movie is based on a children’s book of the same name, and there is certainly a playful element to it, but real-world adult issues are dealt with throughout the movie.  It could well be the theme movie of this blog, as I think one of the core themes is that of staying true to yourself, yet doing so responsibly within the world.  One scene any of us over 30 or so can relate to, sums up this balance in very real terms.  After Mr. Fox has created a situation requiring his entire family to go on the run (after breaking a promise to his wife), his wife confronts him on the issue.  When Mr. Fox points out that “we are, after all, wild animals”, his wife replies by saying “yes, but you are also a husband and a father”.  Conflict is not avoided in this movie, but neither is it wallowed in. Mr. Fox is, after all, Fantastic and the movie ends happily although with more than just a touch of “the consequences of your actions”.

I’ve seen a small handful of movies throughout my life I considered magical in their own right.  Magic means different things to different people, but if you are a movie lover at all, I think you’ll enjoy Fantastic Mr. Fox.

Fitness

As you know from a couple months ago, inspired by that darn book I’m in the process of transforming from a short distance runner to a long distance runner.  My goals are to run a 15 mile race/run by the end of this year, and a 30 mile race/run by the end of 2011.

April running

My April highlight was the trail race I had registered for.  I’ve never been much of a race runner, preferring instead to do my own things, at my own speed, on my own trails.  Then I came across an announcement that Xterra, was kicking off an Ohio trail racing series.  That sounded like fun so I registered for the first race – Vulture’s Knob, listed as a 15K (around 9.5 miles) on a mountain bike track in Wooster.  That distance was right at the limit of the longest I was running at the time so I knew it would be a challenge and I was really looking forward to it.

The race ended up being a lot of fun with the only downside being some rain falling for the first few miles.  It was a challenging course with several decent hills.  What I like most about trail running though is the scenery and this course didn’t disappoint – for the most part it was through wooded areas and it was gorgeous.  I finished with a time of 1:43 for a pace just under 11 minutes a mile (#48).  This put me squarely middle of the pack for all racers.  While I wasn’t happy with the 11 minute pace (I was shooting for around 10), I was quite happy finishing middle of the pack.  With around 100 racers of all ages present, and only a couple months training at the longer distances, I was quite satisfied with my finish position.

While I was able to finish, I probably wasn’t ready for a run of that distance under race conditions.  For anyone who has run you know that race conditions take a lot more out of you than training.  The race kicked my butt and it took a while to physically recover.

April lessons learned

My big April lesson learned was born out of that race – the importance of rest.  After researching distance running training plans online, one thing I noticed they all have in common is a rest week.  This isn’t a week where you do nothing, but a week where you let your body catch up to where you’ve pushed it.  A typical training plan would be to increase your mileage 10%, run that for two weeks, then run your previous mileage for a week before upping your mileage again.  Before Vulture’s Knob I had been all about push, push, push.  After Vulture’s Knob I have a whole new appreciation for rest!

In April, I also learned I had slayed a Beast.  When I started this journey I wondered if I had the passion to see it through.  Time will tell, but I’ve already overcome several instances where I’ve got my running done even though I had lots of excuses at my disposal “do it tomorrow”.  That leads me to this month’s time out…

April Time Out: Passion and Commitment

Almost any list of entrepreneurial qualities you see will list passion and commitment at the top of the list and I would agree.  I know understand at a deeper level what’s so important about these two qualities, for me at least.

To be passionate about something is to feel the consuming nature of it – it’s all you can think of, it’s all you want to talk about, it fills your thoughts.  Commitment brings an element of translating that passion into action.  So put the two together and you take that “fire in your belly” and direct it, via your actions, into real world results.  The most obvious outcome of this equation is that passion + commitment = goals.  Without goals, committing to your passion really doesn’t mean anything.

My personal revelation though in April, and what has help me relate to (and in some cases evaluate) entrepreneurs, is what the combination of passion and commitment can make happen.  What I found at least was, oddly, comfort.  There have been times in my life that I was really passionate about something, and just never did anything about it.  Other times I was committed to a goal, but ultimately didn’t follow through.  With both passion and commitment involved in the process, I’ve found a comfort in knowing that I will do what I said I would do, without exceptions.

I have got my daily training in on the treadmill at 11 o’clock in the evening.  I have rolled out of bed at 7 a.m. Sunday morning to get my long run in before spending a day with my parents.  That’s commitment.  Add in passion though, and what happens is that even if I didn’t get up early Sunday morning, I’m not stressing out all day wondering if I’ll have the commitment to run when I got home.  I just know I will.  I’ve seen this in some of the entrepreneurs I’ve worked with.  A million things may be happening but they stay calm since they just know they will do what they need to do to accomplish their goals.

The real test, as we all know, is the test of time and keeping that passion and commitment at the levels required to reach your goals.  I’d love to hear your comments on how to stay charged, how you recharge.

In closing

So that’s it for now; a pretty good month.  I hope you all had a great April as well – what did you get accomplished?  Leave me a comment and let me know what you’ve been up to.  What’s your current personal goal(s) and what progress did you make last month?

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

Personal Recap: Apr 2010

Physically, running can be a funny sport.  Some days you feel terrible, then go out and have a great run.  Other days you’re on top of the world, and fight just to keep going.  Unfortunately tonight, the run quickly devolved into the second category.  I greatly suspect my lunch (late and heavy on the pasta) was a prime culprit.

Good Cop, Bad Cop

It didn’t take long before I started thinking about only running one loop.  It’s funny how it creeps up on you, isn’t it?  Sure you’re struggling, but you came out with a goal regardless.  Then out of the blue comes the first unbidden thought: “what would be so bad about just running one loop?”  From there it’s like a good cop, bad cop scene where you literally argue with yourself; one side taking the position that there’s no shame in quitting if you don’t “have your stuff” (and you can always do extra in the coming days), the other side sticking to toughing it out and saving some self-esteem.

The issue, as we all know, is that history tells us that we don’t make up for it in the coming days.  While we may struggle to get through the task we’ve set before ourselves from time to time and not complete it as quickly or as eloquently as we had hoped, the fact that we did complete it greatly helps balance out that minor disappointment.

So this back and forth in my mind went on for the better part of the first run, and I still didn’t know what I was going to do as I rounded the final turn and headed up the last hill toward the parking lot.

But I kept going

I’ll jump to the end of the story and tell you that I kept going and did my second loop.  The satisfaction in doing what I said I was going to do absolutely made up for the crappy, sub-par run.  And you know what?  The second loop was far better than the first.  Sometimes if you just stick with it long enough, things work themselves out.

So what trick did I employ to talk myself into running the second loop?  What incentive did I use?  What logical argument won out over the bad cop?  Actually, I don’t really feel like I did anything, it all kind of took care of itself.  What I can tell you is that it was really the opposite of all those questions I just asked:

I simply stopped trying to talk myself out of it.

That’s right – as I rounded that last corner and headed up the hill toward the trailhead, without even thinking of it I just kind of stopped trying to convince myself that I shouldn’t continue.  I let the goal of running two loops settle back into my subconscious, and my active mind just re-occupied with random thoughts of the trail and the day.  After that everything took care of itself.  As I came up on the trailhead, I just kept running without thinking and continued on to my second loop.

Sure, it’s not always that simple, but…

…then again, maybe it is.  We spend so much time and effort trying to look for ways to do what we say we are going to do, that sometimes I think we end up spending more effort than if we would just keep running in the first place.  Plus, we all know what it feels like when we don’t do what we say we’re going to.  It feels pretty crappy, right?  But following through and staying true to our goals feels pretty awesome right?  So even though my run tonight didn’t satisfy my evening goal I stayed true to my long term goal and I did what I said I was going to do.  On balance, I’ll take that any night.

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Do what you say you’re going to do

So most of March on a personal level was directed toward my running pursuits.  As I prefaced last month, inspired by that darn book I’m in the process of transforming from a short distance runner to a long distance runner.  My goals are to run a 15 mile race/run by the end of this year, and a 30 mile race/run by the end of 2011.

I’ve always been fairly focused on fitness and staying in shape, but this pursuit had me upping my weekly miles fairly significantly so I was anticipating facing some Beasts.  Most notably I had figured I’d be facing off against fatigue and commitment.  Also, at 50 years old (now 51), there was another Beast looming that I couldn’t control – age.  While I don’t buy in to what I would call the excuse of age, and I think you can stay in great shape no matter how old you are, it’s hard to deny that changes are unavoidable as we get older.  In particular to running longer and longer distances, I was concerned that maybe my knees and ankles would rebel.

So how’d it go?

Things went well in March and I’m happy to report that I averaged 25 miles/week during the month.  It wasn’t always easy and based on the research I did throughout the month I raised my mileage way too much way too fast, but that’s kind of how I do everything.

I did bump up against fatigue here and there and feel really good that my commitment to my goal won out.  Just in one month of running these longer distances I can tell you it is a completely different feeling versus short distances.  I felt like I had a “buzz” just about the entire month and I was constantly hungry.  Both have abated somewhat heading into April.

Physically, I haven’t lost much weight which was surprising.  However, I can definitely tell my body has changed.  I almost feel taller and I have leaned out considerably.

Sleep has been sometimes more elusive than I thought it would be.  Running so many miles I thought would help with sound sleeping nights but it has really been the opposite.  Leg muscles are often sore, especially after the long, Sunday run and Tylenol doesn’t seem to help much.  Even when the legs aren’t particularly sore, it seems like it still takes a long time to fall asleep and many nights are very restless.  I can’t tell yet if this is linked to excess energy from the high level of activity or simply “too much on the brain”.  I will be keeping an eye on this one.

Two lessons learned

First – legs are like cell phone batteries.  The first time you charge them and use them, they last forever.  The more you use them, the less they seem to last.  I was noticing this with my legs and toward the end of March, they were really starting to feel sluggish and sore.  I ended up going for a massage, with a deep tissue focus on my legs.  Rejuvenation! So now, a monthly deep tissue massage for the legs is on my agenda.

Second – like anything new, you don’t know what you don’t know.  Based on the research I’ve done throughout March and now into April, the approach I’ve taken to upping my miles hasn’t been especially well planned.  There are a ton of resources out on the web on how to train for marathons and longer, and some of the training regimens are not what you’d expect.  I may write more on this in April, but for now I’m sticking with my current schedule.  I did kind of bludgeon my body into this, and now that things have evened out a bit, I’m going to ride that current schedule for a while and let things catch up.

The month’s highlight

No doubt the month’s highlight was my visit to my sister and her family out in Arizona.  Not only was it great to see my sis again, but Arizona was beautiful.  They live really close to a couple of major parks and I ran a couple of the trails there.  One in particular, a 7 mile trail up and around a small mountain, was probably the most fun I’ve ever had on a trail run.  There were a couple places, up the side of the mountain, where the scenery was gorgeous.  However, I decided not to look too much as many places the trail was about 2 feet wide, covered in loose gravel, and slanted away from the mountain toward the 700/800 foot dropoff.  In fact, a couple times I stopped running and walked these short sections as they were so narrow.

This got me thinking about goals…

The importance of goals

When I started this whole distance running thing, I set myself some goals as I’ve shared with you.  I also have daily goals – some days you run for tempo, others for distance.  In running the Pass Mountain trail, it was definitely for distance: it was a new trail for me so I didn’t know what to expect.  Plus, I was on vacation so it was for fun too.  Normally though, I’m pretty competitive when it comes to running and training and especially on a fun trail (and I was having a great run), I tend to push myself fairly hard.

Well, it can be a wakeup call when you almost fall over the edge of a 800 foot dropoff into rocks and cactus.  So when those few sections came up, I immediately slowed down and walked through them for better “navigational control”.  I found it really didn’t bother me since I had a goal – and the goal for the day was Distance and Fun.  I wasn’t worried about how long it took me to complete the run in, as long as I had fun and ran the distance.

Goals, especially long term goals, help provide a context in which to evaluate your actions and put them into perspective.  Without my goals for that day, I may have beaten myself up over slowing down, perhaps putting myself at risk of significant bodily injury.

I know I’m not telling any of you anything you don’t know – but I think it’s a topic that’s worth revisiting once in a while.  Do you have personal goals?  Are your goals truly long term?  How much of your life do you live without a goal (and how satisfying is that)?

I never used to be a goals person, and I’ll admit there is still part of me that thinks the whole thing can get really overblown by certain folks (especially those selling books and consulting).  But I have found it is very important to have some strategic, long term goals.  They provide context for your personal and professional life, they generate short term tactical goals to help guide your day, and the thought process leading up to crafting those long term goals can be invaluable for deciding what’s important to you in your life.

In closing

So March was a good month.  I’m halfway into April and it’s going well too.  I hope to have some interesting thoughts to share with you the end of this month as well.  Not much else to talk about on my other personal passions as kickstarting this new goal consumed much of my time.  I hope you all had a great March as well – what did you get accomplished?  Leave me a comment and let me know what you’ve been up to.  What’s your current personal goal(s) and what progress did you make last month?

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Personal Recap: Mar 2010

The particulars aren’t important, although it wasn’t easy and it wasn’t quick.  But I can tell you I’m looking at a hot, steaming pile of freshly slain EXCUSE on my living room floor, and I moved one day closer to my personal goals.

Why it’s hard

It’s hard because it’s so much easier to come up with reasons not to do something versus reasons why you should:

• I’m tired
• I’ll do double tomorrow
• I don’t have enough time
• I’d rather do this other thing
• I have so many other things to do
• etc., etc.

Even more nefarious is the reasons not to do something always somehow seem to make more sense than the one or two reasons you should.  “I’m really tired today and maybe getting sick” seems like a really good reason to not do your workout compared to “I know I should”.

So, how to make it easier?

Sorry, kids, I don’t have an answer for this one.  If there was a secret, someone would be making millions off it, and if it was easy everyone would be doing it.  But there isn’t, and it’s not.  It’s a one day at a time affair; you against The Beast.  All I can say is that when it comes right down to it, right now this second, you can either decide to DO what you’ve said/promised you will do, or you can decide to NOT do what you said/promised you will do.  And making that decision, really, is pretty easy either way.

What’s the payoff for slaying the Beast?

Ah, that one I can tell you and it’s pretty sweet.  You know that feeling when you decide not to do something you’ve promised yourself you would do?  Feels pretty crappy, right?  And it doesn’t feel any better tomorrow.  Well the feeling you get when you slay that Beast, and you follow through on your promise, and you do what you promised yourself you would do, is a thousand times better.

And, as an added bonus, it may be tomorrow, it may be next week or next month, but the next time The Beast thinks about sniffing around your rodeo, I can guarantee you it will think twice.

Good hunting, my friends…

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

Why it’s hard

In my first review post, I wrote on a central theme of the book, the “secret to their success”, which is bringing a sense of joy to your life.  This sense of joy is what the author largely credits to the Tarahumara Indian’s ability to run 100 miles or more, all with a smile on their face.

With this post, I’d like to focus on a short segment in the book that I found particularly inspiring.  It’s about The Beasts the ultra-distance runners in the book encounter and how they respond to them. While the stories in the book are told by these runners, they nonetheless have just as much relevance for all of us.  Even as most of these runners do what they do because they love it, a point that really stuck out for me is that when they race, they are challenging themselves by not only attempting something most rational people would think verges on the insane, but doing it while pitted against some of the best in the world that do the same thing.  It dawned on me while reading the book that this is an apt metaphor for our own most aggressive, visionary and challenging goals, whether business or personal.  Some use the term BHAG to stand for Big Hairy Audacious Goals.  Those goals that will truly stretch us, where there is a good chance if not high probability of failure, and which (unfortunately) we are usually up against some world-class naysayers.

So, whether you’re running 135 miles through 130F heat, or tackling your own personal or professional BHAG, eventually you’ll bump up against The Beast.

What Beast?

For ultra-distance runners, The Beast is often fatigue related to pushing the fringes of human physical endurance.  For you and I, The Beast is usually more personal.  For some it may be self-confidence, for others, it may be competing priorities.  Even more nefarious are subtle Beasts like impatience and unrealistic expectations.

You don’t confront The Beast by joining Toastmaster to work on your fear of public speaking; you confront The Beast by agreeing to be the keynote speaker for a conference of your peers to work on your fear of public speaking before joining Toastmasters.

So what lessons did Born to Run teach me on how to fight The Beast?  I took two lessons out of the book.

Lesson #1: Learn to love The Beast

Lisa Smith-Batchen, who trained through blizzards to win a six day race in the Sahara, gave me the most direct lesson is dealing with The Beast: learn to love it.  In her own words:

I love the Beast.  I actually look forward to the Beast showing up, because every time he does, I handle him better.  I get him more under control.

The author adds his own commentary:

Once the Beast arrives, Lisa knows what she has to deal with and can get down to work.  And isn’t that the reason she’s running through the desert in the first place – to put her training to work?  To have a friendly little tussle with the Beast and show it who’s boss?  You can’t hate the Beast and expect to beat it; the only way to truly conquer something, as ever great philosopher and geneticist will tell you, is to love it.

Lesson #2: Believe Know the Impossible is Possible

Lisa’s comments came within the broader context of a story about Scott Jurek, an elite ultra-distance runner who was looking for a new challenge.  He found that challenge in the Badwater Ultramarathon – 135 miles through some of the most brutal conditions in North America, perhaps the world.  Having conquered virtually every ultramarathon available, Scott was nonetheless humbled by Badwater 60 miles in, and collapsed to the ground:

…Scott was vomiting and shaky.  His hands dropped to his knees, then his knees dropped to the pavement.  He collapsed by the side of the road, lying in his own sweat…his friends didn’t bother trying to help him up; they knew there was no voice in the world more persuasive than the one inside Scott’s own mind.

Call it fatigue, call it exhaustion, call it the limits of human endurance, The Beast had arrived.  His thought process to pick himself up off the ground went like this:

There’s no way, you’re done.

You’d have to do something totally sick to win this thing now.

Sick like what?

Like starting all over again.  Like pretending you just woke up from a great night’s sleep and the race hasn’t even started yet.  You’d have to run the next eighty miles as fast as you’ve ever run eighty miles in your life.

No chance.

Yeah.  I know.

When The Beast arrives, there can be no doubt as to the goal and whether it will be reached; the only question can be what needs to change to get there.  The result of this race?  Scott not only finished the race, but with a new record time.

Change in perspective

The real message in this particular chapter though I found in Lisa’s comments about The Beast.  Literature abounds that prepares us to fight The Beast.  Whether it’s Nietzsche’s concept of the overman always fighting, always struggling; or your annual performance appraisal identifying “areas for improvement” – we seem to be programmed to view challenge as something to overcome.

The important change in perspective here is to view challenge as something to look forward to and welcome.  What a change in perspective – not to view overwhelming challenges as a battle, but something to be welcomed, even looked forward to.  The Beast then becomes a real-life laboratory to put into practice all that self-development you’ve been working on.  The Beast becomes an opportunity to grow and develop even further.

More importantly perhaps, learning to welcome The Beast puts YOU in control, not The Beast.  Oh, you may lose a battle here and there, but welcoming The Beast means you have already won the war.

This change in perspective also helps me put words to describing my concept of “personal excellence” I reference here on this blog but have never felt like I could adequately describe.  Learning how to do things better, even becoming an expert, is personal development.  Welcoming The Beast is personal excellence.

Your thoughts?

Does this resonate with you?  What Beasts do you encounter?  Do you welcome them or fight them?  Does the distinction between development and excellence ring true with your experience?

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

Welcoming “The Beast”

My recent post on rethinking and refocusing on how I wanted to approach this blog has reinvigorated me.  I also appreciate the wisdom of fellow blogger John Ettorre when he speaks to the tapping into the “authentic you” when writing.  I totally agree with John when he says writing from the authentic you is important because:

Nothing else is very interesting, and readers pick up on when you’re not being yourself.

Personally, I’ve definitely felt more passion lately when it comes to writing.  Writing from your heart and your passions has so many benefits, not the least of which is joy.  So with this post I thought I’d start a more personal series, sort of a monthly recap on what I’m up to with respect to my personal passions and what I learned throughout the month.  I’ll be posting these recaps over the weekend, so feel free to ignore them if you’re just not that interested in what I’m up to.  Really – you won’t hurt my feelings.  I’ll be sticking to the “Personal Recap:” text in the title so it should be pretty easy to filter them out of your E-Mail if you want (at least in Outlook; I haven’t figured out filtering yet for Mail on Mac – anyone?)

I’m going to keep it short with this kickoff post (especially since we’re already a week into March), with a lead-in for what is sure to be an interesting recap for March.

Combining my ever-present need to be inspired/challenged by crazy goals with the book Born to Run that I just finished (and am writing about), I’ve set upon the goal of transforming myself from a short to middle distance runner into a long distance runner.  I’ll talk a bit more about this next month, but I’ve set myself two goals:

1. Run 15 miles in one outing by the end of 2010
2. Run a 30 mile race (or outing) by the end of 2011

Since we’re already one week into March I’ll cheat a bit and tell you things have been going well, but I can say it is a completely different feeling running longer and more consistently than my normal 3 miles, 3 or 4 times a week.

I’ve also just received the book Fascinate by Sally Hogshead, and if I get it finished in March, I’ll be sharing some thoughts on it.

That’s it for now – should be an interesting update for March.  Talk to you then.

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

Personal Recap: Feb 2010

BASEBALL may be our national pastime, but the age-old tradition of taking a swing at Congress is a sport with even deeper historical roots in the American experience. Since the founding of our country, citizens from Ben Franklin to David Letterman have made fun of their elected officials. Milton Berle famously joked: “You can lead a man to Congress, but you can’t make him think.” These days, though, the institutional inertia gripping Congress is no laughing matter.

Challenges of historic import threaten America’s future. Action on the deficit, economy, energy, health care and much more is imperative, yet our legislative institutions fail to act. Congress must be reformed.

There are many causes for the dysfunction: strident partisanship, unyielding ideology, a corrosive system of campaign financing, gerrymandering of House districts, endless filibusters, holds on executive appointees in the Senate, dwindling social interaction between senators of opposing parties and a caucus system that promotes party unity at the expense of bipartisan consensus.

Many good people serve in Congress. They are patriotic, hard-working and devoted to the public good as they see it, but the institutional and cultural impediments to change frustrate the intentions of these well-meaning people as rarely before. It was not always thus. While romanticizing the Senate of yore would be a mistake, it was certainly better in my father’s time. My father, Birch Bayh, represented Indiana in the Senate from 1963 to 1981. A progressive, he nonetheless enjoyed many friendships with moderate Republicans and Southern Democrats.

One incident from his career vividly demonstrates how times have changed. In 1968, when my father was running for re-election, Everett Dirksen, the Republican leader, approached him on the Senate floor, put his arm around my dad’s shoulder, and asked what he could do to help. This is unimaginable today.

When I was a boy, members of Congress from both parties, along with their families, would routinely visit our home for dinner or the holidays. This type of social interaction hardly ever happens today and we are the poorer for it. It is much harder to demonize someone when you know his family or have visited his home. Today, members routinely campaign against each other, raise donations against each other and force votes on trivial amendments written solely to provide fodder for the next negative attack ad. It’s difficult to work with members actively plotting your demise.

Any improvement must begin by changing the personal chemistry among senators. More interaction in a non-adversarial atmosphere would help.

I’m beginning my 12th year in the Senate and only twice have all the senators gathered for something other than purely ceremonial occasions. The first was during my initial week in office. President Bill Clinton had been impeached and the Senate had to conduct his trial. This hadn’t happened since 1868, and there were no rules in place for conducting the proceedings.

All of us gathered in the Old Senate Chamber. For several hours we debated how to proceed. Finally, Ted Kennedy and Phil Gramm, ideological opposites, were given the task of forging a compromise. They did, and it was unanimously ratified.

The second occasion was just days after Sept. 11. Every senator who could make it to Washington gathered in the Senate dining room to discuss the American response. The nation had been attacked. The building in which we sat had been among the targets, and only the heroism of the passengers prevented the plane from reaching its destination. We had to respond to protect the country. There were no Republicans or Democrats in the room that day, just Americans. The spirit of patriotism and togetherness was palpable. That atmosphere prevailed for only two or three weeks before politics once again intervened.

It shouldn’t take a constitutional crisis or an attack on the nation to create honest dialogue in the Senate. Let’s start with a simple proposal: why not have a monthly lunch of all 100 senators? Every week, the parties already meet for a caucus lunch. Democrats gather in one room, Republicans in another, and no bipartisan interaction takes place. With a monthly lunch of all senators, we could pick a topic and have each side make a brief presentation followed by questions and answers. Listening to one another, absent the posturing and public talking points, could only promote greater understanding, which is necessary to real progress.

Perhaps from this starting point, we can move onto more intractable problems, like the current campaign finance system that has such a corrosive effect on Congress. In the Senate, raising in small increments the $10 million to $20 million a competitive race requires takes huge amounts of time that could otherwise be spent talking with constituents, legislating or becoming well-versed on public policy. In my father’s time there was a saying: “A senator legislates for four years and campaigns for two.” Because of the incessant need to raise campaign cash, we now have perpetual campaigns. If fund-raising is constantly on members’ minds, it’s difficult for policy compromise to trump political calculation.

The recent Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, allowing corporations and unions to spend freely on ads explicitly supporting or opposing political candidates, will worsen matters. The threat of unlimited amounts of negative advertising from special interest groups will only make members more beholden to their natural constituencies and more afraid of violating party orthodoxies.

I can easily imagine vulnerable members approaching a corporation or union for support and being told: “We’d love to support you, but we have a rule. We only support candidates who are with us at least 90 percent of the time. Here is our questionnaire with our top 10 concerns. Fill it out.” Millions of campaign dollars now ride on the member’s response. The cause of good government is not served.

What to do? While fundamental campaign finance reform may ultimately require a constitutional amendment, there are less drastic steps we can take to curb the distorting influence of money in politics. Congress should consider ways to lessen the impact of the Citizens United decision through legislation to enhance disclosure requirements, require corporate donors to appear in the political ads they finance and prohibit government contractors or bailout beneficiaries from spending money on political campaigns.

Congress and state legislators should also consider incentives, including public matching funds for smaller contributions, to expand democratic participation and increase the influence of small donors relative to corporations and other special interests.

In addition, the Senate should reform a practice increasingly abused by both parties, the filibuster. Historically, the filibuster was employed to ensure that momentous issues receive a full and fair hearing. Instead, it has come to serve the exact opposite purpose — to prevent the Senate from even conducting routine business.

Last fall, the Senate had to overcome two successive filibusters to pass a bill to provide millions of Americans with extended unemployment insurance. There was no opposition to the bill; it passed on a 98-0 vote. But some senators saw political advantage in drawing out debate, thus preventing the Senate from addressing other pressing matters.

Admittedly, I have participated in filibusters. If not abused, the filibuster can foster consensus-building. The minority has a right to voice legitimate concerns, but it must not employ this tactic to prevent progress on everything at a critical juncture for our country. We need to reduce the power of the minority to frustrate progress while still affording them some say.

Filibusters have proliferated because under current rules just one or two determined senators can stop the Senate from functioning. Today, the mere threat of a filibuster is enough to stop a vote; senators are rarely asked to pull all-nighters like Jimmy Stewart in “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.”

For this reason, filibusters should require 35 senators to sign a public petition and make a commitment to continually debate an issue in reality, not just in theory. Those who obstruct the Senate should pay a price in public notoriety and physical exhaustion. That would lead to a significant decline in frivolous filibusters.

Filibusters should also be limited to no more than one for any piece of legislation. Currently, the decision to begin debate on a bill can be filibustered, followed by another filibuster on each amendment, followed by yet another filibuster before a final vote. This leads to multiple legislative delays and effectively grinds the Senate to a halt.

What’s more, the number of votes needed to overcome a filibuster should be reduced to 55 from 60. During my father’s era, filibusters were commonly used to block civil rights legislation and, in 1975, the requisite number of votes was reduced to 60 from 67. The challenges facing the country today are so substantial that further delay imperils the Republic and warrants another reduction in the supermajority requirement.

Of course, the genesis of a good portion of the gridlock in Congress does not reside in Congress itself. Ultimate reform will require each of us, as voters and Americans, to take a long look in the mirror, because in many ways, our representatives in Washington reflect the people who have sent them there.

The most ideologically devoted elements in both parties must accept that not every compromise is a sign of betrayal or an indication of moral lassitude. When too many of our citizens take an all-or-nothing approach, we should not be surprised when nothing is the result.

Our most strident partisans must learn to occasionally sacrifice short-term tactical political advantage for the sake of the nation. Otherwise, Congress will remain stuck in an endless cycle of recrimination and revenge. The minority seeks to frustrate the majority, and when the majority is displaced it returns the favor. Power is constantly sought through the use of means which render its effective use, once acquired, impossible.

What is required from members of Congress and the public alike is a new spirit of devotion to the national welfare beyond party or self-interest. In a time of national peril, with our problems compounding, we must remember that more unites us as Americans than divides us.

Meeting America’s profound challenges and reforming Congress will not be easy. Old habits die hard. Special interests are entrenched. Still, my optimism as I serve out the remainder of my final term in the Senate is undiminished. With the right reforms, members of Congress can once again embody our best selves and our highest aspirations.

In my final 11 months, I will advocate for the reforms that will help Congress function as it once did, so that our generation can do what Americans have always done: convey to our children, and our children’s children, an America that is stronger, more prosperous, more decent and more just.

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

Plenty of lessons in here for all of us…

• On-time delivery
• Project management expertise
• Local presence
• Senior staff

I remember thinking these sounded more like must-haves as opposed to key differentiators.  The thing is if you’re going to start talking about key differentiators, aspects of your business that  set you apart from your competitors, they really should be different.

So was born the seeds of my “so what” question.  I’ve since turned the question into a facilitated process I run entrepreneurs and personal clients through.  It can be helpful in a variety of ways, but I find it’s best suited to helping companies get to the bottom of what is really special about their company/product/service.

The basis of the game

It’s a “game” I play with entrepreneurs or anyone really who is working hard to represent the true value essence of their business.   Every time they portray an aspect of their business as “strategic” or “game-changing”, I ask them: “So What?”.  I usually get this look that conveys something along the lines of “What are you, crazy?  So what?  Isn’t it obvious?”.  We then have a chat about the difference in perspectives between business owners and their customers and how too few business owners judge the value of their products through the eyes of their customers.

My service is available online through a SaaS (software as a service) model.

So what?  So are a thousand other companies.

Sometimes I have to explain the game, sometimes they catch on quickly.  The point here is to both weed out talking points in your pitch that aren’t truly strategic while getting to the root of what is strategic in others.  The goal of course is to move your message “up”, making it more strategic, while simultaneously connecting deeper with the value you are truly offering your customers.  You know you have a winner when you can connect your strategic value to a customer’s emotional driver.

My product offers features not currently available in this space.

So what?  Maybe no one wants those features.

So you can see the game might sound a bit blunt, and to be honest it can be.  My experience though is that almost all the entrepreneurs and personal clients I’ve worked with that truly are committed to succeeding, take no offense.  In fact, they see the game as quite the opposite and generally embrace challenges to their business model as an opportunity to either reinforce their value proposition or identify an area that needs improvement.

I only work with non-profits.

So what!?

Turning the game into a process

So this idea had been rummaging around in my head for a while how to turn my little game into a process, and several months ago I got the opportunity.  An entrepreneur I’ve been working with had an important funding presentation upcoming.  She had a good product, but one that suffered from an image problem – the potential of the opportunity was getting lost in aspects of a business model that came off sounding small.  She also suffered a bit from having a technical background.  I find technicians to have no shortage of big ideas, but sometimes they can struggle conveying them conceptually without retreating to the comfort of details.  And, stereotyping here, technicians are horrible marketers.

So, in a coaching session, using a large whiteboard, I drew five columns with room for headings and asked her to name up to five key/strategic differentiators of her product.  Those things that truly set her apart, would ultimately make her a success and were essential elements of her value proposition to customers.  She came up with five key differentiators and we boarded those as headings for the columns.

Why up to five?  This is just my number, one that “feels” about right.  I say that if you have more than five key differentiators then you have way too many to start with.  Likewise, I would say that you should try to start this exercise with at least three differentiators as I’ve found the process may lead you in directions you hadn’t anticipated.

Working the board

So, after the starting 3-5 key differentiators are on the board as column headings, I work one column at a time.  There’s no magic here and I generally work left to right unless there is some over-riding reason to attack a particular column first.  For each column, I start by re-stating the key differentiator, then asking:

So What?

From there, you whenever a answer is offered to that question, I follow up with another “So what?”.

Obviously, it’s not quite that easy and there is much more to facilitating a strategy session than asking a simple question.  It helps to have a background in facilitation and knowledge of the entrepreneur’s industry.  In my days as a consultant, I ran many facilitated sessions and went through a variety of training sessions on how to facilitate. All that training really helps these sessions as many times you need to draw the entrepreneur’s thoughts out and help them answer that So What question.

It’s also important to be able to “work the board” as more and more information gets posted in more and more columns.  What I often see arise out of these sessions is interesting linkages between thoughts in columns and new messages arising out of other comments.  Staying aware enough to recognize when these new pathways of discussion present themselves can help take the session in important new directions.

So when do you know you’ve answered the So What question?  I really don’t have a good answer.  With very few exceptions, you just get to a point when the subject of the session answers the question and you just know that what they said is important enough, strategic enough to qualify as a So What.  I know that sounds kind of soft, but I can say that most of the time my client’s have agreed with me.  I think it helps to have a seasoned facilitator who is both brutally honest about what is strategic or not, and also has a fair amount of business perspective to bring to the session.

Frankly, the other option is the column is simply crossed out.  Sometimes after extended conversation, it just becomes obvious that the differentiator really isn’t all that special, and the discussion isn’t leading in the direction of a replacement.  Crossing out a column is an opportunity to hone your message and focus in on those differentiators that truly are special.

Outcomes

So obviously, the main outcome is the more targeted strategic differentiators for the client.  As I’ve mentioned though, all kinds of other linkages and information can arise out of a So What session.  In particular, I have found the following to be quite common:

• Central themes – in a session with the Marketing Director of a regional park system that has several extraordinary spaces available for rent, we uncovered two central themes aligned with two different target markets.  The information spoke to potentially two separate marketing campaigns for the spaces.
• Emotional drivers – any time you can connect your brand with emotional drivers you have the potential to create especially strong ties with your customer.  Working with an entrepreneur offering an online service targeted at college students, we uncovered emotional drivers of laziness and fear; two very strong emotional drivers in support of their brand.
• New directions – sometimes, like the session I most recently ran for a consultant focusing on C-level services, between columns crossed out and answers to repeated So What question, we find the general theme of the company’s strategic differentiators heading in a completely new direction, or uncovering new themes.  In this particular session, a theme rose out of several columns and ultimately became an important new direction for the consultant to market their services.

How do you approach defining your key, strategic product differentiators to your clients?  How would you answer the So What question for each one?  Are you sure your differentiators are important to your clients and not simply what you think is important?  Feeling uncomfortable answering any of those questions?  Let’s run a session together…

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

So what?

So what’s their secret?

Well, my take on it is a bit more involved than the writer is, but in a nutshell their secret appears to be something we all remember fondly, is well within our grasp, but we (wittingly, or unwittingly) choose to live without on a day to day basis.

Their secret is to combine their running with pure, childlike joy.

Yea, right, I hear you saying.  For many of us, it wouldn’t matter how much you smile, you wouldn’t be able to run 10 miles, let alone 100. Let alone without resting.   And there is where the book gets more complicated, but also where I think the message gets more relevant and more broadly applicable.  In fact, I’m taking notes and hope to write a small series on the personal growth and excellence lessons I’m learning out of this book.  For now, I’ll tell you the following story.

I AM a runner.  I’ve had my ups and downs over the years, but I do enjoy the sport.  Much like the Tarahumara, I generally shun sidewalks and roads and do almost all my running on trails.  I tend to be a short to middle distance runner preferring outings between three to six miles.  Luckily, I’m blessed to live in an area of Ohio loaded with nature trails in that range that are not only beautiful, but challenging to run.  There’s nothing like flying down a hill, half running, half jumping, testing your legs (and the trail) with a do-or-die proposition: either I’ve still got the energy after four miles to jump these three steps and still stay running, or I slide headfirst down the rest of this hill and probably end up in emergency.  (Yes – it helps to be a little crazy to be a trail runner.  Or trail runners just are a little crazy, I’m not sure which).

But that’s the essence of the book – because I can guarantee you whenever I’m running down those stairs, jumping two or three at a time and challenging my body to keep me upright, I’ve got a huge smile on my face.  And anything you’re doing, personally or professionally, that you do with a smile on your face, gets done better and feels better doing it.

I tested this theory out over the last week.  I like to stay in shape over the winter so I run treadmill a lot in my basement.  I’m sure many of you can sympathize with me when I say treadmill running is boring at best, a grind at worst.  There is nothing joyful about running on a treadmill.  Or is there?  In anticipation of better weather, I have been slowly increasing my distance, which correspondingly was increasing my boredom and ability to stay focused.  So the other day midway through a 5 mile run on the treadmill, I started imagining myself running outside, jumping from rock to rock on a hillside trail overlooking a beautiful vista.  A half-smile came to my face which I let blossom into a full-blown one.  Immediately, I could feel a change happening to my body.  A slight energy increase, a lessening of fatigue, a greater connection with that “runner’s high”.  Literally before I knew it, I had put in my last two miles or so.

I’m sure to many of you this sounds like new-age hocus pocus, and that’s fine.  If you’re a runner, or if you just like interesting stories, the book is still a great read.  Runners especially will appreciate all the information on how all the foot, shin and knee injuries that 80-90% of us experience every year, started occurring only after the introduction of the high-tech running shoe!  I’ll be talking about the Tarahumara’s answer to that one too.  The stories about some of the ultra long distance runners and races where the Tarahumara ran with them are simply a blast to read as a runner.  You will really enjoy this book.

But for those of you committed to excellence, whether personal or professional (or both), try a simple experiment.  The next time you’re doing something that is complete drudgery, remember a time it wasn’t drudgery or tie it in your mind to something else that makes you smile and brings a bit of joy to the activity.  I’ll be interested in hearing your feedback, even though I already know what will happen…

Look forward to more on this book in future posts.

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

The Secret to Success from Mexican Outback Runners

Shortly after that I read a post by another blogger I follow.  He was recounting a lunch he had with a friend of his.  When his friend asks him what he’s been up to and he says blogging, his friend rolls his eyes and says “you’re still blogging?   When are you going to give that up?  Are you making ANY money?”  The guy took it as a challenge and read his recent blog posts, asking the question “If I wasn’t me and just happened across this blog, would any of this stuff mean anything to me?”

His answer was no.  (Kudos to that guy for the brutal self-honesty).

Well, I went through the same process and honestly – came up with the same answer.

I’ve had plenty of distractions, both personal and professional, over the last year to blame for both both the lack of quality and quantity of posts, and in some cases validly so.  But a quick review of my last couple months of blogging has really convinced me that not only have I been playing it safe, but I’ve spent way too much time on topics, or at least contexts within topics, that I’m either not passionate about or knowledgeable about.

So, some things are going to change. First – I want to re-focus on what I’m truly passionate about and can speak from authority.  So while that will still include plenty of business and personal topics, I’ll be mixing in a fair dose of technology articles, re-focusing most of my business writing on small to medium-sized companies, and speaking on Leadership more from the point of view of the individual, as opposed to corporate leadership.  I’m also going to write a little bit more about things that may be considered off-topic, but are interesting nonetheless.

Extending the conversation

If all this post did, was recap some personal musings on this little blog, then it would be of little value to you.  I think the bigger point is that if you are committed to continuous personal and professional improvement, then it helps to:

• Stick your head out of your shell once in a while and take a look around,
• Be honest with yourself about where you’re at, and
• Change course if necessary.

So what do you all think?  Make sense?  Is this something you do, and if so what’s the process you go through?  I’m interested in how others think through what they are doing in the moment versus the path they set out on and where they want to get.  How have you changed course recently and why?

This is a post from: DaveCrainOnline.com. If you liked this post, and haven't done so already, you can sign up to receive future posts via E-Mail. If you prefer RSS, here's my feed.

Rethinking / Refocusing

I manage an incubator for high-growth technology companies.  As a good portion of my funding comes ultimately from public sources, it’s important for me to be able to show the success of my program – what my funders might call “leverage”.  So while I do some satisfaction surveying here and there, the majority of the surveys I perform with my customers (the entrepreneurs in my incubator) is geared toward capturing information to help prove the success of my program and the leverage on the public dollars entrusted in my program.  I, along with my sister incubators across the State of Ohio, use something called Table 3.  Table 3 captures a myriad of relevant growth statistics on our tenants, but for many the stats on revenue, investment and job creation are important metrics on how much leverage an incubation program has created with their funding.  (If you’re interested, I recently published my 2009 year-end statistics.)

All this is to say – “I know me some surveying” – and have used a number of offline and online tools over the years.  When the National Business Incubation Association announced a strategic partnership with chide.it, offering a free account for their FluidSurveys product, I was eager to sign up.  I was happy with my current provider (PollDaddy), but it’s hard to argue with a free basic account, which is what FluidSurveys was offering any incubation program through the partnership with NBIA.  That said – so called “free” programs sometimes aren’t worth it, so I did a little homework before signing up.

I’m happy to say that not only is the free account chide.it offered to us incubators was really free, it was also a fully functional account, limited only by the absence of some advanced features that I don’t use.  The best part is chide.it has agreed to renew our incubator’s free account every year.  Thanks chide.it!

The person in charge of the partnership between chide.it and NBIA is Rich Fialkoff.  Rich was included in all the introductory E-mails NBIA sent out and responded promptly to all the questions I had about the tool and the partnership.  Given that Rich is responsible for the U.S. introduction of chide.it products, this responsiveness was even more impressive.  After getting to know a bit more about chide.it (somewhat of a start-up themselves) and Rich (created and led several start-up business within larger companies and founded a consultancy focused on software startups), I asked Rich if he’d be willing to participate in my 10 Questions With… series.

If you run an incubator and you’re a member of NBIA, be sure to check out FluidSurveys – not only is it free through the NBIA partner program, but it’s a great tool and just makes it so darn easy to create a survey.  (If you’re not a member of NBIA, then you really should be.  It’s a great organization with extremely helpful members and two very useful conference every year.)  Chide.it is offering it’s second product, MyReviewRoom, at a discount to NBIA members.  MyReviewRoom helps teams facilitate application acceptance, evaluation and decision making.  I have an application process for the incubator that would be greatly facilitated by this product and I’m looking forward to the demo Rich has promised me.

So, on with the interview…DCO: Tell us about your company.  What was the genesis of your business?

Rich: We had some novel concepts on leveraging web collaboration in a way that would provide significantly differentiated feedback and evaluation services.  As we deployed some pilot projects, it reinforced our understanding of the gap emanating from the typical online solutions for surveys and review processes.  Frankly, being late to the party is not so bad when you have the benefit of validating the market, and hearing from customers on their experiences and what they need to do a better job while reducing their time/costs.

DCO: Describe the moment when you knew you were an entrepreneur?  What defined that moment and how did it feel?

Rich: As our products evolved this summer into the latest releases of  FluidSurveys and MyReviewRoom we realized that from a capability, usability and technology perspective we had amazing features, broke the mould on ease-of-use, and leveraged self-configuration to allow customers to do things for themselves that previously required an IT shop or expensive tools.  But, once you see this enormous potential, it turns up the contrast on success, and you are grabbed by the inevitable feeling of entrepreneurship.

As our websites for our tools evolved along with the tools, we saw users signing up from all over the world.  While we felt encouraged, we knew that we had to rely on every bit of our experience to transition this product set into a business.  Personally, it was exhilarating to draw on my many years of experience, including systems development, product management, business development, customer support, communications, and alliance and contract management.

DCO: What marketplace issue are you solving and for whom?

Rich: Our two products each address the market in different way.  ReviewRoom is without a peer in the market, in terms of capability and price point—it enables organizations to process online applications, receive document/video submissions on their website, review/comment them, and make decisions.  Since it’s totally customer-configurable and priced so affordably, it’s perfect for many applications that today are done manually—through emails, spreadsheets, etc.   FluidSurveys, on the other hand, enters a crowded survey market but simply, outperforms the rest.  Our customers are in all market segments from individuals, to small and large business to government agencies and all rave about our ease of use and capability.

DCO: How do you define success?  At what point do you consider yourself successful?

Rich: When this business is self-sustaining and allows me to take more freedoms in extending the business and how I spend my time. For now, I’ll continue to measure success based on customer satisfaction, revenue and growing our own staff in the US.

DCO: What does it take to be a successful entrepreneur?

Rich: You really need to be balanced in your work on all aspects of the business.  For example, while we’re competing in the internet online space, we also differentiate ourselves by keeping it a “people” business.  We talk to our customers and are responsive in our support.  Similarly, you need to be balanced in how you engage the customer– we’re socially connected and easily contacted through Twitter & Facebook, and have many video tutorials on our own YouTube and Vimeo Channels.

DCO: To what do you most attribute your success?

Rich: Through my career I have had the opportunity to create and manage start-ups within large companies such as Bell Labs/Bellcore, Ameritech and Telcordia Technologies.  I have managed all aspects of successful software businesses and that experience is invaluable today.

DCO: What motivates you?

Rich: I’m motivated by a strong desire to do the best I can, and to have as many customers as possible using and loving our services.  If we can do that, all the other advantages of success will naturally follow.

DCO: What are three pieces of advice you would give to others considering becoming an entrepreneur?

Rich:

1. Validate the market and understand how you are going to differentiate yourself
2. Make sure you have a solid product that excites customers and provides them with high value
3. Recognize that you are rarely ever done—you must continually evolve your products and your approach and that this takes time

DCO: What is your favorite aspect of being an entrepreneur?

Rich: It’s the freedom to explore approaches to the market and determine which paths will be the most effective.  And to do this within a business that is still small and responsive while you have some control of all the levers of the business.

DCO: How did you come up with the name for your business?

Rich: I can’t take credit for the name chide.it, although I did like it from the beginning.  Since we’re about empowering feedback, the name seemed to reinforce the ability “to chide”.   But, we do get some curious responses—my personal favorite is when we’re asked if we’re an Italian company because of the “.it” extension on our www.chide.it URL…we’re not.

Thanks for the great interview Rich.  Best of luck to you and chide.it!

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10 Questions With… Rich Fialkoff of Chide.it

Luck favors the prepared.

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How to be Lucky in Business

I especially liked a quick little article in the recent December 2009 issue entitled House Rules: Ten gentle suggestions for keeping the domestic seas tranquil.  Written by Meg Hirshfeld, writer and wife of Gary Hirshberg (who just happens to be CEO of Stonyfield Yogurt), the article lays out a list of simple suggestions Meg and Gary developed together for “entrepreneurs who aspire to a happy marriage and thriving family life.”

I’ll bullet the list here, but I highly suggest you click over to the article for Meg and Gary’s more complete thoughts for each suggestion.  It’s a quick read.

1. You are not the boss at home.
2. Set the bar low.  But set it somewhere.  (As in, make time for time together.  As Meg so aptly puts it “Being together reminds you that you enjoy being together.  And that reminds both of you why this enormous undertaking is worthwhile.”
3. Please, turn off the Blackberry.
4. When a big business decision looms, give your spouse a seat at the table.
5. Enter your spouse’s universe from time to time.
6. Make her communications a priority.
7. Don’t squeeze her in.
8. Treat your spouse like she’s your most important client.
9. Acknowledge her role.
10. Take frequent inventory.

My thoughts

I’ve been doing a lot of research over the last year on the topic of interpersonal relationships: why certain people gravitate together, the dynamics of relationship stages, and the difficulties in developing and maintaining long-term, constructive, meaningful relationships.  This focused research has taken place on top of my normal business reading, both books and magazines.

What’s surprised me a bit is not just how much both bodies of work have in common, but how applicable each is to the other.  While Meg’s list above is written from the context of keeping your marriage happy when one spouse is a workaholic entrepreneur, the suggestions are just as applicable for any couple.  Likewise, all the material I’ve been reading about interpersonal relationships contain a wealth of actionable thoughts on developing and maintaining authentic relationships based on respect and trust at work.  Something I think we can all agree is often in short supply.

Perhaps my thoughts are colored by the stage of life I’m at.  Being later in my career with much more responsibility than I had in earlier jobs, the line between my business and personal life has blurred quite a bit over the years.  But while it’s a fair question to ask, I would suggest that the answer really doesn’t matter.  If we can strengthen, even deepen, our relationships at work and at home, who cares what aisle of the bookstore helped us?

Comments are open

What do you think?  Do you agree that relationships, whether at work or at home, follow similar “rules”?  Is there a relationship lesson you’ve learned professionally that you applied in your personal life, or vice versa?  What suggestions would you offer entrepreneurs to keep a happy marriage and a thriving family life?

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How to be successful AND stay married

Simple Mom recently published a post on tips for handling “extended family holiday stress”.   That’s a very polite way of expressing what most of us know to be a truth during this time of year, and what is succinctly described by the post’s author in the opening paragraphs:

My father-in-law aptly stated it this way: one of the best things about the holidays is seeing the headlights of family members coming up the driveway to visit. The second best thing about the holidays is seeing their taillights as they drive away.

I think we can all relate!

The post is much more than just inside jokes about family relations though, and offers some practical, and positive tips on coping with can be stressful family situations during what should be a joyous time of year.  I particularly like the author’s point of view on what ultimately is most important, as tip #1 is “Your Spouse Comes First”.

This is a great little article and I highly recommend you check it out: 8 Tips for Handling Extended Family Stress During the Holidays.

Stay sane.  Stay positive.

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Just in Time – Destressing the holidays