Surviving the holidays can be hard for entrepreneurs. If you visit family or see old friends few if any may understand what you are doing or going through. You may face a variety of suggestions that essentially treat you as unemployed–strictly speaking it’s an accurate assessment for many early stage bootstrappers–and possibly unemployable–again, strictly speaking, it’s often an accurate assessment.
Tips for Entrepreneurs on Surviving the Holidays
- Tell stories about past experiences you have had that provide evidence for the need and the value of your offering.
- Don’t talk about plans, talk about what you have achieved.
- Stress how your startup builds on your past experience and talents.
- demonstrate that you have relevant expertise and insight into how to solve the problem you are focused on.
- Ask for introductions to people who may need your product or service or whose experience would allow them to provide insight into the problem you are trying to solve and potential constraints on your solution.
- This is a good time for some personal reflection and a review of what you have learned in the last year. The new year is starting soon enough take some time now to look back. Try and make it less of an “if only I had…” exercise and more of an “next time I will…” Be more lenient on taking actions that at the time seemed reasonable than on refraining from action to wait for more data.
- The holidays can be a lonely time, be careful about disrupting your sleep cycle with too much caffeine and be careful of alcohol. See below for a heartfelt monolog by Craig Ferguson on the latter.
Bootstrapper Thanksgiving Potluck in San Jose
We are having Bootstrapper Thanksgiving Potluck on Thanksgiving Day starting at 2pm. If you don’t have family to visit on Thanksgiving then join us for Thanksgiving dinner. Bring drinks or your favorite dish to share. We are supplying the turkey and some sides and are looking forward to a Bootstrapper Thanksgiving.
Please RSVP if you plan to attend and let us know what you plan to bring so we can get a final headcount. Plan on dropping by around 2pm.
Craig Ferguson On Staying Sober
I want to talk about something tonight that’s been bothering me for a little while now. I make fun of a lot of people on this show.
Now a couple months ago, Kevin Costner got himself into some kind of bother, and I made fun of him in the monologue. A couple of weeks later, I meet him at this event, and I could tell he was angry at me. He’s a very polite man, and a gentleman, and I could see in his eyes he made a decision to not go after me, just to be polite and nice. And that kind of freaked me out. It was the look in his eye that bothered me. And I began to think, at what price am I doing this stuff? And I started to think about the effect it was having on real people, and it’s been needling at me a little bit ever since.
For me, comedy should have a certain amount of joy in it. It should be about always attacking the powerful people. We shouldn’t be attacking the vulnerable people. This is totally a mea culpa, I think my aim’s been off a bit recently. I want to change that a bit.
This Sunday, I was 15 years sober.
The good rehab clinics say to you, “You’ve done your 28 days, this is a beginning, you now have a lifetime of vigilance. This is a chronic condition that you’re gonna have to manage for the rest of your life.”
I have been sober 15 years. There is absolutely no way I have a drinking problem. I don’t have a drinking problem! I can get one fast, but I don’t… I don’t have a drinking problem. I have a thinking problem.
You can say to me, “drink responsibly”, and I’ll say I’ll try… but I can’t. Certain types of people can’t drink. I’m one of them. I threw in the towel with alcoholism 15 years ago.
You know, all of us, in America and in Scotland and anywhere I’ve ever been in my life, everybody knows an alcoholic. They’ve worked for one, or they have one work for them, they have a parent, or a sibling, or a child, or a friend, or God forbid some of you poor people are married to one, you know what it’s like.
I only speak for myself, I have found that the only way I can deal with it is find other people who had similar experiences… and talk to them. It doesn’t cost anything. It doesn’t cost a thing, and they’re very, very easy to find, they’re very near the front of the telephone book. Good luck!
excerpts from Craig Ferguson‘s Late Late Show Monologue for President’s Day Feb-20-2007
(transcript from “Talk Show Host Makes All Other Hosts Look Absurd During Devastating Monologue“and ‘”Late Late’ comedian turns darts on himself”