What I learned from a StartUp weekend

I had the privilege this past weekend of participating in, and pitching at a startup weekend in Melbourne, called Launch 48. It was organised and co-ordinated by a wise mentor & confidant of mine, Grant Downie. As well as participating in, and contributing to the startup community through leading the Melbourne chapter of Startup Leadership Program (SLP), Grant is also an inspiring startup consultant.

In participating, I had a number of objectives that I wanted to achieve, of which I hit every one. On reflection, I realised that I gained something immensely more valuable - perspective. This insight is too important to leave locked away, so important in fact that it's worth stepping away from my normal blog format of "challenging ideas".

The weekend was well run, and well supported by sponsors, advisors and mentors, (many of whom I've had the opportunity to meet & discuss concepts and projects within the startup space over the last 2 years of my own involvement) which gave me every chance of achieving the objectives that I had set.

Having previously developed 8 past startups  (although still seeking my first big exit), this was not my first rodeo. However, 8 years as a solo entrepreneur and  'lone-wolf' consultant have instilled in me some practices & habits which had, in times past, lead me to question my ability to deliver on a startup business, a number of which became obvious during the weekend. As an example, wide base of knowledge together with a gregarious personality can often be off-putting, especially to others with a much deeper understanding of immediate issues.
Initially my focus was on crafting & presenting a compelling pitch for an idea (later to become @TerraLingo) which I had been analysing for a number of weeks. I had seen an opportunity and realised that Launch48 represented a perfect opportunity to test that idea for validity -
It's worth noting my objectives, which were very clear -

• Deliver a compelling pitch for an interesting idea, around which to form a team,
• Develop a validated business model with clear objectives, within a collaborative team environment,
• Build a proof-of-concept (POC) around the current idea, from which a minimum viable product (MVP) could be formed,
• Test my abilities in leading and guiding a team towards those objectives,
• Identify 5-6 potential team members for a later much larger idea which I have in mind (& for which  I have a 6 other team members keen to go).

It also turns out that the actual idea that you might take to one of these weekend is actually less relevant than what you learn (both about the startup process & about yourself) and who you learn from.

The weekend started well; there was the usual meet & greet over pizza & ale, allowing everyone to change gears from their regular activities, mix & mingle with other particpiants, and at least initially for me,' feeling out' some of the other pitchers.

The format was simple enough, the nominating pitchers had 60 seconds to pitch their idea   (of which there were 11) to fellow entrepreneurs , after which and audience poll (of around 40) was taken as to how many people might be interested in working on that idea. The top 6 were then given an additional 30 seconds and after a second round, the top 4 lead ideas were selected around which the leaders had to for teams. My idea attracted the highest number of participants, so we had a deep pool of experience from which to draw & build upon.

Of our group, at least 4 guys had pitched their own idea, which demonstrated something early to me - that at least 4 of these guys were visionary leaders, or aspired to be. As it turned out over the weekend, all of guys showed great leadership qualities in such a 'pressure-cooker' environment. The team was slightly siloed, with myself, Sebastian, Christoph and Berlin handling research, marketing, customer development, UX/UI and the final presentation, whilst Nick, Stef & Matt handled some difficult technical, app & web POC, and API requirements.
I tried not to make my observations sound like recommendations, but when you spend a weekend with a group of such obviously motivated, skilled and clever guys, its hard not to.

• I had also made a list of the qualities & characteristics of the types & roles of 6 people that I last looking to attract as 'department leads' for my next project. The phrase 'be careful what you wish for' comes to mind, because what I listed is exactly who I found. (BTW, the 6th guy on my 'list' was a very interesting 'product' guy who was on another team, whom I met following the final pitch)

The first of my followers is Stef (the only one of the group that I had known prior to the weekend). Steph & I have known each for about 5 years, played poker together, shared stories-  tall tales and true - over the occasional sherbet, and share (generally) very similar life stories. I share an affinity with him in our individual capacities to endure & overcome personal difficulties -- and he's a really nice guy.  Stef is very good technically, with a great skill set , though like me, he suffers from the occasional crisis of confidence which has the capacity to hold oneself back. Friday night was one such evening, and were it not for my absolute insistence, he probably would not've turned up.

Nick is a stand-out leader. We didn't talk too much about his background (or perhaps I wasn't initially paying enough attention), but it became immediately clear that his depth of understanding of the processes, and of the technical requirements of building and scaling a tech startup were deep. He was the obvious stand-out leader for the technical side of the project.

Nick challenged me immediately (which not many people do) on a range of assumptions or concepts that I tabled to the group, and in hindsight, I am really glad he did. During the course of the weekend, we disagreed about quite a many things (it was a almost the classic 'marketing v tech' battle that many of us have so often seen). To his credit, in every discussion, Nick did something very important (and extremely rare) -when we disagreed about a method or an objective, he "played the ball, not the man"; a quality that my dad demonstrated when I was growing up, and which I have since always admired  and respected in people.
Nick also did something else critically important;  he immediately took Stef under his wing and lead him through the development process. In our wrap up conversation, Nick talked about successfully using 'peer programming', and the benefits of that approach for both Stef & himself.  I also suspect that this contributed greatly to the ultimate success in creating a cohesive team.

What started perhaps as a challenging discourse, turned for me, into a deep respect for Nick's skills & abilities, and for him as a person. Stef also came away from the weekend with a deep respect for Nick, both as a man, & as a leader.

Matt, our tech genius),apart from being a very likable guy, demonstrated himself as highly capable and skilled, with a deep understanding from the beginning  of what it would take to get to 'success' - almost a classical 'tech guy' archetype (there is no negative sentiment in that statement). He took a very methodical approach to identifying & addressing the challenges of the task, and delivered on every milestone exceptionally (at least from my perspective). He demonstrated early (unlike many tech guy that I have met) that he could be relied upon to identify the core issues, and solve them inside the tight time parameters that were set for us - whilst still exceeding our expectations. (Without knowing the answer, I imagine that Nick's leadership shone through in contributing to that). As Stef later told me, "this guy went way above & beyond !! He went home Saturday might and virtually built most of the iPhone app until two in the morning. Nick and I just put on the finishing touches." That is something special, & I couldn't have said it better.

Sebastian is something out the box; from the get go, his attitude screamed "let's get this done - well". His capacity to see where the destination was, and pick-up on the milestones, without needing guidance or managing, literally  blew me away .In many ways, he was the marketing 'mirror' of Matt. Because he knew his craft, he not only took the lead on some of the critical tasks, but was able to anticipate what was the obvious next step before we got there. His attention to detail as was impressive as his repertoire of skills.

Christoph, who is a wiz at design, had pitched an idea of his own, which didn't get up. However, he immediately saw the similarities of my idea with his own, and joined us. His willing to challenge (causing me to stretch) was impressive, though his ability to connect customer needs to design requirements wasn't too shabby either. From a 5 minute conversation with me, he put together a professional design that just 'worked'. I noticed how well he interacted with the other team members to bridge any skills gaps (including my own), and has a solid knowledge of the needs of the marketing strategy plays in the startup process.

Berlin is a great young guy (I say young, because he is compared to me), with good skills in marketing, & in being an engaging networker, which I had noticed earlier on Friday. He contributed early and often to the ideation & solution design process, and really shone in researching, and when the deadlines started looming.  I wonder whether, in hindsight, we might have made better use of them earlier by pairing him with Christoph for some of the customer engagement tasks.  Whilst a little 'green', he shows obvious indications of being a successful entrepreneur.  I believe Berlin will benefit from identifying a solid mentor to guide him on the path to his success, or slotting into an 'apprentice entrepreneur' role, but he might equally just need to find  the right co-founder to balance out his skill set.  

ME
This is where it gets a little hard; how does one give constructive feedback on one-self?  Perhaps by making an external observation. One of the obvious things about the weekend, apart from the long hours, and the commitment by everone to the task at hand (which by the way was exemplary), was the roller coaster of emotions that I experienced at the various stages. This went from the nervousness pre-pitch, to the elation of selection, through the challenging ideation process on Friday night & throughout the weekend, to the feeling of doom from the looming pitch deadline on the Sunday night.

So the concept of 'state control' is one that is clear and obvious to me now- to operate at your peak, you have to maintain control of your emotions  (or at least have a plan  for addressing),  and expect the both major highs and lows, and plan for how to deal with them accordingly when they inevitably arrive.>

The most challenging space for me occurred on the Saturday early afternoon after the series of 6 or seven pairs of mentors and advisor discussions, during which our idea expanded my two orders of magnitude from my original vision.  My head was swimming with the possibilities that had been put before us. To put it the words of Sean Parker "What's cooler than a million dollars? A billion dollars". Suddenly, we had gone from having a good idea worth potentially a good couple of million or two (purely by my own estimation), to perhaps 100 times that. So I was now pushing to the limits of enthusiasm for the tasks at hand.


But this process had put too many well-intentioned, and absolutely valid ideas on the tale from experienced & highly credible mentors. As a product team (& unbeknown to the tech team), after those meetings, we now realised that we actually didn’t know what the product was. No product meant no customers, meant no revenue, meant no Business proposition. It was later in the afternoon, that my self-belief, and my vision of a viable valuable outcome,  crashed to the floor. Whilst (I think) I did a good job of masking my concerns, my emotions showed through in the discussions around rebranding later on Saturday.

It wasn't until early Sunday morning after a  couple of hours of solitude (again, an important observation), that I gained some clarity and perspective about where we were  headed. The challenge for any leader is to do just that - to lead. To get out in front of the pack, raise his sword and charge forward  toward the enemy with a battle cry like "Glory or Death". But before you draw that sword, you better have spent some time alone or quietly with your generals in thinking through your battle plans, lest your battle be over & lost, before it is even started. 

I was also reminded of the need to make sure you frame your message to the needs of your 'audience'. I'm not just talking here about a large audience, but also in a  1-on-1 conversation. One of those 'dirty little habits' that we can fall into, is to continue to deliver the same message (or delivering a different message in the same way), perhaps because its familiar, and forget to think about what it is that the participants are looking for. Always starting from a position of honesty is good, and the highest ideal of 'serving' is worth keeping in mind. Because in seeking to serve, we take our eyes off what it is that we want, and focus on the needs of the other, which is great path to get away from 'delivering a message', and should take you closer to 'understanding'.

One of the other important lessons that I took away from the weekend, is that in a team approach, perhaps that most urgent, & important task for any leader , is to identify  the natural skills & strengths of each team member early, and harness those early in the pursuit of the larger vision. I'm not talking here about task allocation, although that is part of it, but more so about recognising early that which  each person brings to the table, and allowing that to shine through. In our scenario, in places, that happened naturally, and in some spaces, we left a lot on the table. 

I'd have no hesitation in working with any or all of these guys again. In one weekend, we went from one man's idea to forging together as a team and building  something 'very cool'. Our the next 2 or 3 weeks, we'll find out if TerraLingo has 'legs', and we'll leave no stone unturned in that process. Or it might be the next one where we come together. Either way, I give my thanks individually to each guy, and to them the team as a whole for the gifts I got from the process.  It's hard not to feel like you 'got' way more than you 'gave', which means you get to keep giving . 

But I also learned something critical; perhaps the most important thing; how special and rare 'startup guys' are. We commit, contribute and care about a goal (ours or some-one else's), journey through the dark across a valley of death, which we know from the tales of others before us, is filled with peril s & obstacles, and has very little chance of success, yet with little  more tools than our own skills, faith in a team (whom we barely know), and the meerest  hope of reward and recognition.

And we not only do this willingly, we also do it repeatedly.
>
I don't know what you think, but for me, I reckon that's pretty special and very cool.

What the h*ll is 'Augmented Content', & why should I care?

Is that even a good question? 

Possibly; although you've probably never that term before, the phrase 'augmented reality' has been around for a couple of decades. 

Why should I care?

'Augmented Content' has the potential to be a many-multiples-billion-dollar sector over the next decade. It will also very likely change the way you read, use & interact with published content over the coming decades.

So what is it?

The best way to describe it would be to use a practical, everyday in-use example - the humble hyperlink. That's the clickable web-link, for the non-techie, or URL (or uniform resource locator) for us more tech-types.*

Since their original form, URLs have been improved, such as by being optimised for search engine ranking, had data (& meta-data) attached to them, & have been shortened for use in character-poor social media platforms. Its hard to imagine using email, browsing the internet or navigating websites without them. Whole business models  & industries have evolved around this simple but practical concept.

So how are they similar?

Ok, let me give you a practical example of 'AC' in a simple form. If you hover your mouse over most hyperlinks, you will get additional information about where & what that link points to, such as perhaps an image, description, or an action to be performed. 

The concept of 'augmented content' is very similar; to enhance content with outcomes, activities, products or destinations that are important to both the publisher and consumer of the concept, in a way that creates one-to-one interaction & loyalty - you might call it the ultimate 'holy-grail' of marketers world-wide. It holds promise to become one of the 'next big waves' in marketing .

In following installments, I will describe how you can build- and profit from - augmented content in your own space. 

PS *Clickable URL's were originally invented (or so I'm told) by British Telecom in the 1970's. in hindsight unfortunately for them, neither the inventor nor BT patented, protected or commercialised the concept. 

A new form of Social Media spamming?

Have you noticed the new form of social media spamming popping up recently?

Its where a company/brand/SMwhore etc follows you, (with the expectation that you might follow them back) and then within 24 hours, unfollows you. 

I'll use the case in point of @pocketgems, (for no other reason than recency) a game creator in the social space, of whom I received a typical 'following' notification. I have never played, nor even viewed, their game, so I was curious to see if they held sway with any of my topics of interest. As at today, they had a grand total of 107.7k followers, 8 follows, and 45 (self-promotional) tweets. Does something strike you, as it did me, as being a bit out of kilter with those numbers?

BTW, they didn't hold any interest, so like many others, I didn't follow them back.

Clearly this is an automated process, and  the onus is on the followed to determine whether they are interested in the contents or topics of posts, before following back.

I get that this is a method of outreach, but what interests me is in the 'blowback' or brand reputation damage that organisations using this approach could be doing to their brand. 

For instance, if an automated process follows & then unfollows 100k people, which then captures, say 10% (a purely hypothetical number) as an interest group, what message do I send to both groups?

For example, in group a), those in the 90% that got spammed & chose not to follow, and b) those in the 10% that followed, that then got automatically unfollowed.

In the case of A) is the company risking labelling themselves as a SM spammer?

And in the B) scenario, what 'loyalty' or 'care' messages do they send to their followers by immediately unfollowing them?

What other brand or online reputation risks are companies such as these choosing to accept by such an approach, and do you as a SM consumer, even care?

What do you think?

Newton's Third Law of Motion for employers

III. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

If the law of reciprocity is as real as that law of motion, then as surely as action results in re-action, giving leads to receiving. 

Instead of asking "what did you do?"- which focusses in cold measurable output, employers could publicly recognise (in meetings, newletters, & in gatherings) their staff & teams, by asking:-

"What did you learn?"

"What did you create?"

"What did you share?"

"Who did you help?"

"Who helped you?"

"How did you contribute?"

"What did you give?"

And then share that knowledge. 

So....if you are wondering why you aren't 'getting', have you bothered to ask yourself "What am I giving out?"

Are you REALLY ready yet to do what it takes?

A 'new' mentor (whom I met 30 years ago), described my biggest startup problem directly. "Are you REALLY ready yet to do what it takes?

I sat down recently with Neville Christie, to gain some clarity & perspective about my journey. 

What he discussed with me was perhaps the most difficult and painful conversation I've had in a long time (excluding those with my lawyers).

After listening to me for 15 minutes, what he summed up was devastating. I was exactly where I was now, because I had chosen to be. That's right, in simple terms, all my challenges, and also my opportunities were as a result of my decisions. 

At that moment I realised something profound. No longer was it the fault of the economy, the government, my choice of co-founder, competition, funding, the team, the backers who didnt 'get' it. No of them. 

I was where I was because of the decisions & subsequent actions (or lack of) by just one person. "Great", I though, "now I've got some-one to blame".

And then the kicker; "That person is you." 

"What? No! That can't be right. What about - insert reasons A,B & C here- and -also insert factors 1,2 &3 here?"

"Wrong question" was the reply.

What he told me next was perhaps the most profound thing I had ever heard.

"The only reason you aren't yet wherevyou want to be, is that you haven't employed every resource at your disposal."

So profound was that statement, that I was blown way by the simplicity of it. "Surely, that could be it? I can't possibly be that simple?"

I thought for a second about countering. Surely I had operated (most of the time) at my peak capacity, turned over every stone, chased down every lead? Whilst that was true, when I thought it through, there is a major difference between doing "everything you know", and "whatever it takes".

Do you know the difference?

Can you identify every resource available to you?

Are you prepared to bring them all into play, without hesitation or reservation?

A new source of startup funding coming soon?

The opportunities for funding in the startup ecosystem have progressed rapidly in the last few years, with sources of funds going through multiple iterations, with the advent of new models, such as incubators, co-working spaces, accelerators, seed-funders, bank-backed capital funds and crowd sourcing to longer-standing angel investor groups & venture capital funds.

Each group has their defined space, but something still appears to be missing.

From my exposure to other 'ideas' people, I believe that only around 1 in 5 ideas every go on to get formally pitched as a fully-formed startup.

As a well known VC recently told me, in his 25 year career of listening to pitches (around 5000 fully formed proposals), only around 1% of those ever got backed. And from other sources, we know that only 8-10% of those ever go on to become significant businesses.

So if you follow the math (hazy as it is) for every idea that works, there is potentially 4999 others that didn't.

That's a hell of a lot of value/job creation/ GDP growth etc left on the table.

There are many talked-about reasons for this, including product/market fit, access to resources, funding, temperament, resilience and a plethora of other startup buzz-words that I've left off.

As governments around the world (including Australia) start to review existing legislation around equity ownership, investing & crowd-sourcing, that space is likely see a variety of new hybrid models also coming to the fore.

But I'm not sure that even these measures are necessarily the answers to the problem, in comparison to the pre-existing resources available right now, today.

What seems to have lagged to date is the ability of the corporate world to invest its considerable resources.

I believe that new wave of change is coming, but not in the way that you might expect.

In the distance, I see a new wave of change coming from the foresight of existing & upcoming leaders, which will revolutionise the startup landscape.

Can you see it too?

Be bold, be brave & be cause.

Startups a good place to lose yourself.

Here, the commitment to a purpose, to something that has value, is worthwhile.

So few entreprenuers will ever succeed; fewer still will see anything like the rewards so written about daily in TechCrunch or a dozen other places.

Yet the promise of peer recognition, fame, glory & success simply spurs more of us to strive, to stretch, to reach, often again & again. Why?

If we are honest, could it be that the feeling of risk & adventure can be intoxicating, even addictive?

Or is it that the mission, or perhaps the calling is stronger here than in an occupation, where we show up, perform our tasks, complete our objectives, and then go home?

Startups are perhaps also a great place to find yourself.

What do you think?

What does your audience see?

My dad was a clever man; he 'figured out' life (in his time) long before I even knew there were rules. But he taught me one of the most important rules early.

"Always play the ball, not the man" -this came from him coaching me in soccer, when I was 10 --and he applied it to everything else that he did in life.

But apart from the obvious behavioural implications, it also was about accepting responsibility for your outcomes & not blaming others. Therein lies the greatest of learning.

You see, in the game of soccer,as it is in startups, our ability to improve our ball handling skills is in our control, not some-one else's.

The better I get at controlling the ball, the more chance I have of directing it where I want it to go, ideally toward the goal.

And in the game of soccer, like startups, whether you win or lose the game, (even if it is just the coach & the players), there is always an audience. 

The Journey

After you've done a couple of startups (whether successful or otherwise), you quickly learn whether this is in your blood.

I'm not sure for me whether its thrill, risk, challenge, opportunity, or belonging that is the strongest motivator. After speaking with many other 'tribesmen', its pretty clear that all of these play a part in the decision of those of us that stay 'in the game'. For most of us, its something we were born to do.

But let me make distinction :- I think startup entrepreneurs are made, not born. I believe we are the product of our environments, and are a breed apart from the freedom seeking (but structure requiring) traditional entreprenuers, like a typical small business person or franchisee.

There are similarities, yes. But substantial differences too. The franchisee seeks a brightly-lit highway to follow, whereas for us, a dim, hardly-trod path is enough.

For them, the pre-existing tools, the certainty of outcomes, and the mechanics of the process.

For us, like the explorers of the new world, a glimmer of opportunity, a faint light of hope, and the stories of the path ahead from our fellow travellers, is often enough.

Small wonder that many of us never quite make it to journey's end. And yet, that is part of the promise - that we could succeed where others before us have failed.

"Everything we enjoy in society is a direct result of the accumulated learning derived from millions of mistakes. No mistakes, no progress. Yet we still look at making a mistake as embarrassing, wrong, an act bordering on sin. If you're making mistakes, it means you're doing new things, taking risks, stretching yourself. You're growing, learning. And isn't the journey, the experience, not the destination, what life is all about?." -Robert White

Mentor required, enquire within.

Because that is exactly what is required....

Not opinion, nor learned behaviour nor methods. Rather, the ability to look inside yourself, and impart the best of you; your wisdom, compassion, experience.

Requirements are maturity, experience (both life & business), a track record of success & failure, a lifelong willingness to learn & to share, and a journey that 'marks the trail' for those that follow.

Renumeration will be absolutely defineable, via multiple streams (in addition to the usual options), such as self-actualisation, a requirement to 'pay it forward', recognition, accolades and personal & professional satisfaction.

Do you meet these criteria?

Do I?