Cameesa - The Blog

When studying successful entrepreneurs I always come across a recurring theme. I am probably very receptive to theme because I sincerely believe in it, therefore I may possess a bit of selective attention. The theme is create something you are passionate about. Randy Komisar, a venture capitalist at Kleiner Perkins, in his book “The Monk and The Riddle” puts it best:

“Passion pulls you to something you cannot resist. Drive pushes you toward something you feel compelled or obligated to do. If you know nothing about yourself, you can’t tell the difference. Once you gain a modicum of self-knowledge, you can express your passion”

The problem is people usually work on something for some end goal. Once the end goal is achieved then they’ll do what they want. Randy gives this problem a name, “The Deferred Life Plan”. I have to do something really unsatisfying first so I can make the money to do what I really want. If you’re going to put in all the hard work and time why not devote it to something you give a damn about? If things don’t go as planned at the very least the time will not have been wasted.

I subscribe to Google Alerts for the terms crowdfund, crowdfunded, and crowdfunding, among other things.  The other morning when I awoke I was alerted to an article on crowdfunding from the Sydney Morning Herald.

I checked it out, and noticed a few familiar names on the crowdfunding scene: Sellaband and MyFootballClub.  But there were two other companies that I had never heard of: Catwalk Genius and BeerBankRoll.  After poking around a bit, it appears that Catwalk Genius plans to use crowdfunding to sponsor fashion designers.  A noble cause, but I didn’t learn much more since their website is not currently functional.

The other company, BeerBankRoll is much further developed, and aspires to be a crowdfunded brewery.  They have received a fair amount of press around the web, and appear to be steadily signing up people who believe in the idea.  As I lurked around the nether regions of the site, I noticed that they are actually located in a suburb of Chicago!

It’s rare to find crowdfunding companies, but even more rare to find one in your own back yard.  It was encouraging for me to see that crowdfunding is starting to proliferate in the United States.  Hopefully we can catch up to our UK/European brethren soon.  I feel like the biggest challenge is education on the concept.  Once people grasp the premise they start to feel comfortable with participating.

If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.

-Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Although execution is of crucial importance, especially in a small business, it is important never to lose sight of the overall vision. It is this vision that will inspire your partners to get the business to a new level despite the large amounts of work. It is also important not to get consumed by daily tasks to the point where you lose sight of the future and stop innovating and improving.

Is the universe trying to tell me something?

Many entrepreneurs get their business ideas in the following way : a) find problem, b) think of solution, c) base a business around the solution.

Are there any daily tasks that while undertaking them, you think to yourself “there’s gotta be an easier way of doing this.” If so, then these are perfect startup business opportunities. Next time that thought runs through your mind : 1) write it down, 2) let one day go by, 3) think of a solution.

Here is a recent example in my life :

I was recently folding my laundry and pairing up my 40 different pairs of white socks. I thought to myself, “I HATE pairing socks together, what a brainless, waste-of-time task. There has to be an easier way to do this.” A few days went by and then the ANSWER suddenly popped into my mind. I threw out ALL of my white socks, drove to Wal-Mart, and bought 40 mid-cut, white Hanes socks. I don’t pair my socks anymore because they are all identical so I can just grab two white socks from my dresser.

The business idea you ask? To create a David Allen style Getting Things Done book for the home. It would contain time saving tips for around the house chores like the sock example mentioned previously.

This is just a small example but there are probably hundreds of opportunities you encounter on a daily basis. If you start writing down a couple a day you will have amassed a giant list of ideas that you may be able to convert into an entrepreneurial endeavor.

As time goes by you will find that small problems arise all over the place, you just have to keep your eyes open and be ready.

I have a tendency, I’m sure you probably do too, of starting one book and stopping half way through it to read another.

At the beginning of 2008 I swore to myself that I would stop swapping books, unless the current book was “a bit crap (Ali G voice.)” I began reading Founders At Work by Jessica Livingston about 2 months ago and am almost finished. The book consists of 30 interviews with the Founders of startups such as Hot or Not, 37Signals, Blogger, Craigslist and many more. I highly recommend this book for people that want to start their own company, as Vik recommended it to me.

Here is some great startup advice from an interview with Joel Spolsky, the author of a brilliant blog, Joel On Software :

Don’t start a company unless you can convince one other person to go along with you. If you don’t have two people that you’ve convinced to devote their lives to doing this, it’s just going to be a different thing. There are a lot of programmers that are very tentative about starting their own companies. There are a lot of working programmers doing something they hate, with some company that they hate, but they need money to pay the mortgage. So they figure, “I’ll develop something in my spare time. I’ll put in 1 hour every night and 2 hours on the weekends and I’ll start selling it by downloads.” And you say to them, “Who’s your co-founder?” And they say, “My significant other-husband or wife. My cat.”

But because they never really take the leap and quit their job, they can give up their dream at any time. And 99.9 percent of them will actually give up their dream. If they take the leap, quit their job, go do it full-time –no matter how much it sucks — and convince one other person to do the same thing with them, they’re going to have a much, much higher chance of actually getting somewhere. Because they either have to succeed or get a job. Sometimes, “succeed” seems like the easier path than actually getting a job, which is depressing. So quit your day job. Have one other founder, at least. I’d say that’s the minimum bar to getting anywhere.

Are you willing to risk everything, or are you part of that 99.9% and going to give up your dream?

Do the following :

1. Find someone else that believes in the same idea as you do, and is willing to devote themselves to it. (Cannot be your wife, girlfriend, or cat)
2. Get private health insurance.
3. Quit your job.
4. Start the company with your partner and try it out for one year.

If you are succeeding after one year :

A. Continue succeeding.

If you are failing after one year and want to give up :

A. Put the company on your resume and find a new job.

B. Continue paying your mortgage.

Here is how I look at it, I’d rather pursue my dream with 100% passion, and suffer financially in the short-term, then to give up my dream and keep paying my mortgage. You will have the rest of your life to pay your mortgage.

By the way, don’t quote me on this one, I think that your income may be higher when you pick up that second job after failing in a startup. Imagine the experience, knowledge, and connections that you will gain in that one year of starting a company.  I think that all signs point to ‘quit your job and start a company.’