Don’t forget the dream to change the world that got you started: your passion is an important element of craftsmanship and a commitment to excellence. What’s Your Passion? Recently, I chatted with a well-established consultant–she’s been working for more than a decade. She was having trouble developing a short elevator pitch to describe what she […]
What’s Your Passion? Read More »
Greg Knauss wrote “An Entirely Other Day” sporadically from 1994 to 2006 (with five year or so gap between 2001 and 2006 and who knows, he may start up again). It’s experiential blogging at its finest, with some sharp observations–some introspective–of work, marriage, children, illness, aging, and death.
9 From Greg Knauss’ “An Entirely Other Day” Read More »
An excerpt from Soren Kierkegaard writing on helping others to understand. The key is to start from a deep understanding of the other person’s world view. This echoes Steven Covey’s fifth habit: “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”
Kierkegaard on the Art of Helping Others to Understand Read More »
Is my topic this Thursday, February 15, at 7:00 PM, at the IEEE-CNSV meeting at KeyPoint Credit Union, 2805 Bowers Ave., Santa Clara, CA. The event is free. I will cover a number of practical suggestions for using blogs to promote a consulting practice and wikis to foster project team collaboration against a deadline. Blogs and
Ten Tips for Leveraging Blogs and Wikis in Your Consulting Practice Read More »
I attended FASTforward ’07, this week. There were some very interesting talks: John Battelle, author of Searchblog: Search is a conversion. Search becomes a way to have a dialog with your customers. Interaction with your website should mirror a conversation. Batelle offered the New York Times site as an example of one that did not seem
Interesting Discussions From Fast Forward 2007 Read More »
Another excerpt from William Feather’s “The Business of Life” From page 262, an entry entitled “A Conservative Club.” More than forty-five years ago a group of men…organized a club for men of common intellectual interest. It was agreed that the membership would be limited to thirty, and that twelve meetings would be held each year
Recipes For Longevity in “Mutual Improvement Clubs” Read More »
Join other bootstrappers–startup CEO’s, CTO’s, and founders–for breakfast and discussion. We meet at different restaurants in Silicon Valley from 7:30-9AM, your only cost is your meal and a tip. Come compare notes on operational, development, and business issues with peers. If you are serious about your business and are open to discussing substantive issues and helping your peers,
Bootstrappers Breakfast – Bootstrapping Startups Invited Read More »
Greg Knauss was a guest blogger on kottke last year and ended his two week stint with this observation on referential and experiential blogging: There are two kinds of bloggers, referential and experiential. […] The referential blogger uses the link as his fundamental unit of currency, building posts around ideas and experiences spawned elsewhere: Look at
Greg Knauss on Bloggers: Experiential vs. Referential Read More »
In “Perseverance Rewarded” William Feather offers some good advice for getting started. Many folks succeed because they don’t realize how hard it is to accomplish what they have set out to do (of course several orders of magnitude more fail).
William Feather on “Perseverance Rewarded” Read More »
The Annual Stanford Entrepreneurship Conference featured Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios, as its keynote speaker. Ed gave a great presentation on lessons learned from structurally organizing a company for effective communication across its departments. In the beginning, Ed believed they had created a very strong culture at Pixar. They had paired up programmers
Pixar’s Ed Catmull Highlights Value of Post Mortems Read More »
Today I attended the 2007 Entrepreneurship Conference at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. One session that I truly enjoyed and found very informative was the “Going Solo or Partnering” Panel. Going Solo or Partnering Panel: Stanford E-Conference Below are three questions and answers I believe capture the importance of developing a solid team. Moderator Andy
Going Solo or Partnering Panel: Stanford E-Conference Read More »
Six quotes from William Feather’s “The Business of Life” offer practical business wisdom from a successful publisher.
More from William Feather’s “The Business of Life” Read More »
I found an interesting little tool Website Grader which evaluates your website. It produces a score and a list of things you can do to improve it. Some of the things I don’t agree with, but most are pretty good. Last night I played with it and the best sites I looked at were 80-70/100
What is Your Website Grade? Read More »
I had lamented that I always Google too late, but lately I’ve been getting better. Here are some tools to use beyond Google and LinkedIn for searching for different kinds of specialized information. A9 let’s you search the contents of any books that Amazon carries, all of Amazon, and another 500+ specialized information sources. Citeseer,
Beyond Google: A9, Citeseer, and Krugle Read More »
Last night I attended the IBDNetwork Strategies Series: Stepping on the Web 2.0 Scale. The event was hosted at Shasta Ventures and featured these guest speakers: Moderator: Tod Francis, Managing Director, Shasta Ventures Panel of Experts: Adam Gross, VP Developer Marketing, Salesforce Shawn Hardin, CEO, Flock Jason Pressman, Partner, Shasta Ventures Sam Schillace, Engineer, Writely/Google
Stepping on the Web 2.0 Scale at IBDNetwork Jan-23-07 Read More »
Over lunch today I attended the SVASE Startup-U Event: Do I Have What It Takes To Be An Entrepreneur? Which was held at Plug & Play Tech Center. The guest speakers were John Kim founder of Five9 and LeadMarket, and Steve Stephansen, Board Director of the Sand Hill Angels. It was an open discussion with a
SVASE: Do I Have What it Takes to Be an Entrepreneur? Read More »
Some quotes from William Feather’s 1949 book, “The Business of Life.” It’s a collection of short notes, letters, newspaper columns magazine articles. Very insightful, and something like reading a blog from the 1930’s and 40’s. The way to get things done is to have a good assistant. In closing a deal, what you don’t say
William Feather’s “The Business of Life” Read More »
Everyone has advice for you about how to run your company! Even if it’s in the form of question like “When are you going to Get a Job?” Friends and relatives who have only been employees may have your best interest at heart but not have the background or temperament to help you get your
Evaluating Business Advice Read More »
Hugh MacLeod posted “Random Thoughts on Being an Entrepreneur” earlier this week. I’ve picked the best five and added some of my own comments 4. Once you become an entrepreneur, you find the company of non-entrepreneurs a lot harder to be around. You’ve seen things they haven’t; the wavelengths alter, it’s that simple. There are different perspectives
Hugh MacLeod’s Thoughts on Being an Entrepreneur Read More »
As a follow-up to yesterday’s post on thinking about your business goals for 2007, it’s also worthwhile to look at your own motivations and needs. In an extending interview in Fast Company “Are You Deciding On Purpose,” Richard Leider advises that you ask yourself two key questions: What do you want? How will you know
Thinking About Your Business Goals for 2007, Part 2 Read More »
