Fred Wilson has posted a few times about arrogance & ego. He’s mentioned that some folks find him arrogant, which is far from the impression I get from his blog. What I see is competence derived from experience.

But I’ve noticed in my own career that there are plenty of folks who confuse knowing something from experience with arrogance. When you’ve experienced a problem or set of circumstances before, you’ll have a clear idea of what did or didn’t work last time around. It’s easy for your own “oh, that’s obvious” moment to come across as arrogance…

Some of the blame doubtless lies with me — I’m not known for being tactful when something needs to be said. Generally I err on the side of blunt as it’s how I prefer to be treated. So I might state something as a fact, or simply act based on the information at hand based on prior experience. And that doesn’t sit well with everyone.

But I have three nifty items to keep it under control, one of which has come up a few times lately so I thought I’d share.

Exhibit A: I have a Producer credit on a PS2 Video Game, but…

During my career, I’ve worked on some interesting projects… some of which I am very proud of (an A&E documentary, a Christmas special for ABC Family among others).

I’ve also worked on some total turkeys.

Reminding myself of the latter less-than-impressive projects is a great way to keep perspective.

Oh. The shame.

Yeah… Britney’s Dance Beat. That Britney. Oh boy. In my defense, I was only a producer for the animated cut scenes — the rest of it was not my fault. But still, it’s not something I’m proud of. At least she still had a career back then.

Exhibit B: I have a credit on an album, but…

This one requires a bit more explanation. Back in High School, there was a period when we were “encouraged” to go get an internship at a real job. I couldn’t see the point in getting a real job, especially since (a) I was planning on going to college and (b) I could presumably get a real job at some point in the future. At the time, I was an avid musician, so I called every recording studio in town until I found one that would take me on as an intern. The owners of the studio I worked at were putting together their own album and I ended up doing some audio engineering work on it (very minor stuff like “okay, press record now”). They were gracious enough to give me a credit on the LP when it was released. So I have my name on the sleeve notes of a vinyl LP. And that is incredibly cool.

Unfortunately, the album pretty much sucked. The only reference I could find online gave it a 2 out of 5.

So while they sound neat in principal, both of those trophies are humbling in the ego department

Exhibit C

My third check and balance is my personal favorite: my ever supportive and ever bluntly truthful wife. She does a fantastic job of walking the line between encouragement and realism, telling me like it is when I need to hear it most. And unlike my other two ego checks, I’m always proud to have her with me.

Categories: Live 'n' Learn..., Thoughts 'n Ideas
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This post was inspired by a conversation with Pete Warden, one of the smart cookies I met while trying to start disruptorMonkey. I should say “smart biscuit”, since he’s a fellow Brit, but back to my post…

We were discussing the oft cited concept of “building a better mousetrap”, and Pete is one of those rare engineers that understands that building a better mousetrap does not equal building a successful business.

One of the local CEOs I admire, Steve Wiehe of SciQuest, once asked me the following question:

“If I buy this thing, who can I fire?”

His point being: is this a nice tool to have that will make “things” get “better” or will it deliver significant and tangible benefit to my business.

In old school sales lingo, this is the “soft need” versus a “hard need“. Or if you prefer, the difference between “nice to have” and “have to have”. If you have heart trouble, a pacemaker is probably a hard need. If you like some of the features in Outlook 2007, buying the upgrade is a soft need.

Products that meet hard needs are great as they’re easy to sell (you have to have it, and not just in an “I want my iPhone 3G” kind of way). But relatively few software products meet hard needs… And a soft sell is a whole different kind of beast to wrestle to the ground.

Back to mousetraps… In the big scheme of things, the mousetrap itself is almost irrelevant. You can have a great product in the wrong market and get nowhere. Equally, you can have a truly shitty product in exactly the right place at the right time and do very very well.

If you’re trying to sell the One-Touch DeathTron 3000 mousetrap in the hamster/mice section of Petsmart, you won’t do well. But grab a sturdy 2×4, head to the nearest rat infested grain barn & hang your shingle and business will boom.

Which brings me to my point: It’s not about the mousetrap, it’s all about “location, location, location”.

Don’t focus on an elegant solution to an interesting problem. Instead, figure out where the ideas you are excited about can have a real and meaningful impact. If you apply your magic widget to scenario X for company Y, who can they fire and how much money will they save.

So in Conclusion:

1. The person with the most dead mice wins
2. It doesn’t matter how the mice get squished
3. You need to be squishing the kind of mice that people don’t want around… not their favored pets

p.s. As ever, I’m focused on B2B, not B2C. Crazy consumer apps are a whole other bag of dead rodent metaphors…

p.p.s. This was one of several things we didn’t do well enough at disruptorMonkey, so I speak from experience…

Categories: Live 'n' Learn..., Thoughts 'n Ideas
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I am particularly fond of “Crawl, walk, run” as a motto.  The idea of taking baby steps until you know the ground under your feet is firm seems like a good one to me.  Especially in the world of a startup.

But throughout the history of business, certain phrases have been mis-used, misappropriated and generally abused, and “crawl walk run” is one of them.  

I was talking to a colleague the other day, and he said flat out that he hated the phrase.  It had been used repeatedly by people he knew to throw up roadblocks to prevent him from starting a business.  For him, it represented everything non-entrepreneurial in the business world.

Can’t start a business without a business plan.  Can’t write a good plan without an MBA.  Can’t get a good MBA without a strong undergrad performance etc etc etc.

As with all things, it’s relative.  And for me, it’s a motto I like to apply to the execution of specific strategies.  But just because I like it doesn’t mean I’m going to get bogged down in process or not be able to move quickly.

Some examples:

#1: Your company has never done a print ad before.  Do you:

(a) Do a small/inexpensive print ad and see how it performs
(b) Commit to a 6 month recurring campaign in a higher profile publication

or
(c) Commit to multiple publications and multiple ads 

My preference is to do (a), get some results, then do (b) and finally (c).  But I would try never to go straight to (b) or (c) unless there was a really good reason.  And there is almost never a good enough reason, despite how things may appear at the time.

This doesn’t mean you take a year to get a campaign in to gear, but it does mean you test out the path ahead before committing significant sums of money to the print campaign.

#2: You want to pursue some partnerships.  Do you:

(a) Start with a low profile partnership
(b) Start with many partnerships at once

or
(c) Go after your #1 target first 

I personally would begin with (a), at least while you start the conversations.  That way you can find out whether your fantastic opportunity actually resonates with a potential partner.  I recently started a discussion with a small potential partner, got some useful feedback and within two weeks was chasing a big dog.  That’s maybe a little fast, but there was a convenient alignment of the universe that would have been foolish to ignore.  However, without the groundwork and lessons learned in conversation with the smaller partner, I would have been poorly prepared for the big dog conversation.

For me, “crawl, walk, run” is always the way to go.  Even if you do it quickly.

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It’s been a busy couple of weeks and I’m trying to catch up on my blogging.  

A couple of weekends ago, we all went to the State Fair — a thinly veiled agricultural show.  I’m not a huge fan of such things, but nothing holds my daughter’s attention better than the prospect of a petting zoo.

And in all seriousness, I find it useful to get out of the technologically-oriented world I live & work in.  It’s good to get your baseline reset every so often. 

There were three principal things I learned from/was reminded of by this event:

1. Traction is not an overused Web 2.0 word.  It’s actually a real word with a real meaning.  And it sure comes in handy when you’re doing a tractor pull.
2. Fried Twinkies Rock!  Yes, I was as surprised by that as you probably are reading it.  I bought one more or less on a dare and it was fabulous.  I have no idea how or why it could possibly taste as good as it did. Something to do with the melting point of plastic, lead paint and transfat no doubt…
3. Ticks are evil.  My daughter got her first, probably from the afore-mentioned petting zoo.  We discovered it pretty quickly but good lord do those things drill in.  As non-native North Carolinians, my wife and I were pretty freaked out by the whole thing.  But apparently Rocky Mountain Fever is more likely than Lyme disease.  How’s that for comforting?

So all in all, Fried Twinkies yes.  Everything else, not so much.  My daughter did find the cow poop pretty hysterical though…

Categories: Live 'n' Learn..., Random Rants
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I don’t know how closely you’ve been watching the Yahoo debacle, but yesterday’s letter from Carl Icahn to the board at Yahoo was a doozy.

If you somehow don’t know who Carl Icahn is, think “possible role model for Gordon Gecko“.  He’s very, very  effective at what he does.  And he’s not someone to be toyed with on any level.

Some highlights from his letter (in case you’re too lazy to click the link):

"It is clear to me that the board of directors of Yahoo has acted irrationally"

and

"It is irresponsible to hide behind management's more than overly optimistic financial forecasts."

and just in case you still thought he was kidding:

I have therefore taken the following actions: (1) during the last 10 days, I have purchased
approximately 59 million shares and share-equivalents of Yahoo; (2) I have formed a 10-person
slate which will stand for election against the current board; and (3) I have sought antitrust
clearance from the Federal Trade Commission to acquire up to approximately $2.5 billion worth
of Yahoo stock.

Ouch.  I think he means it.

Now I personally think a Yahoo/Microsoft combination is a bad idea.  Adding big companies together is rarely a way to drive innovation — it usually has just the opposite effect.

But here’s the thing: Microsoft offered a significant premium over Yahoo’s stock price.  When the offer first came in at $30-odd, Yahoo was trading below $20 a share.  Whether you liked the idea or not, Microsoft were paying a huge premium over what the market believed Yahoo was worth.

And at the end of the day, most shareholders hold stock to see a return on their investment.  It was a very foolish decision by Yahoo to just try and ignore them.  At best it was naive…

And don’t forget, the board of directors are answerable to the shareholders. Not Yahoo founders or employees.

Let me put it this way:  Imagine your Mom’s car hadn’t been running too smoothly for several years.  Out of the blue, someone offered you 150% of the Kelly Blue Book value if you’d sell it.  You said no, we can fix the car and make it worth much more than that.

When you explain your “no” to Mom later in the day, is she happy or pissed?

By ignoring Microsoft, Yahoo have attracted the attention of a much more dangerous suitor in Mr. Icahn (and by dangerous, I mean dangerous to whatever chance they had of hanging on to their company).

Is this the point where the Yahoo board step up and start playing the game well?  If this letter is anything to go by, apparently not.

At this point I see zero chance of Yahoo continuing to exist in anything like it’s current form.  Congratulations to the board on successfully shooting yourselves in the head…

Categories: Live 'n' Learn..., Random Rants
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