Category: Entrepreneurship

Just as you can’t judge a book by its cover, you can’t judge an entrepreneur by his/her desk. Or can you?

Standing desk, traditional wood-trimmed table, lap-desk, or a makeshift corner of a dining table, the desk is an entrepreneur’s kingdom.  Key characteristics of the desk can tell a lot about the type of entrepreneur and the type of work being done.

Clutter

A meticulously clean desk may indicate a a deeply-entrenched entrepreneur, and perhaps someone who must think logically about their business.  A cluttered desk may indicate more creativity and divergent thinking.  Here are some more details about the nuances between clean and messy desks.

Stuff

The daily work of an entrepreneur is timely, pressing, and relevant. The daily work of a wantrepreneur, on the other hand, is superficial, distracting, and fleeting.  For example:

Other work – the wantrepreneur probably has a day job or is keeping his/her options open.  A resume, a “day job” laptop, and the job postings section may be tell-tale signs.

• Motivational propaganda – many entrepreneurs have a guru or a mentor, but only wantrepreneurs surround themselves with the books, audio, video they think will make them then entrepreneur they want to be.
• To do lists – the wantrepreneur will add in unnecessary non-business related items just to make the to do list seem longer – e.g. doing the laundry, going to the bathroom, etc.    

So what type of desk do you have? And is there room for improvement? Let us know in the comments below.

This was originally created and posted by Kriti Vichare on #entrepreneurfail: Startup Success.

New Webcomics series brought to you by #entrepreneurfail and GetEntrepreneurial.com. Enjoy!

Ravaging through the rough, grunting and seeking out the next victim….Scavenging anyone and anything that comes in the way…

No, we aren’t describing the latest wildlife channel special about predatory beasts in the jungle.  We are referring to the angry, stressed, tense new entrepreneurs on a tight deadline.  At this stage in the startup journey, fresh-faced founders may get a little anxious, as the viability of their new startups is dependent on each deadline.  Sure, you could argue that it is just the passion coming through, but this attitude could cost a new entrepreneur his/her business.

If your actions are making your employees cower in fear of being the next stop in your slaughter trail, these are a few pointers to help you:

• Foundation
  • Ensure you have employees, partners and teammates you can trust and delegate to, without having to micromanage
  • Ensure there is a support system, including lifelines to rescue you as needed
  • Develop the infrastructure so that as deadlines come, you are not scrambling for administrative things like paper for the printer
• Expectation Management
  • Simplify all of your project lists with these tips and reminders
  • Count the proportion of the times you say “NO” to requests and the times you say “YES” and make sure it is skewed in the direction of “NO”!
• Cost/Benefit Analysis
  • Choose your battles wisely and select only the ones that are worth your time and energy. This is a resource that may help you quantify your time, to see if it is really worth pursuing all the deadlines on your plate.

Remember a calm mind is actually more productive than a harried, stressed and suffocated mind.  This article reminds us that staying calm, cool, and collected is highly correlated with better decisions.

How do you handle deadlines? Do you have any other suggestions that we missed? Let us know in the comments below.

The Truth about the Role of an Entrepreneur

Scour the profiles across LinkedIn and you’ll be blinded by the countless “Entrepreneurs” and “CEOs”. Rummage through the business cards you collected at the last networking event and you’ll find an endless sea of “Founders”, and “Owners”.

While non-entrepreneur types may be impressed by these lofty titles, the rest of us can see right through you.  Those lovely euphemisms actually stand for “monkey”, “gopher”, “donkey” and various other creatures from the animal kingdom, and here’s why:

Monkey: Running around (sometimes aimlessly) fixing things

Gopher: Searching and fetching, then repeating the process

Beaver: Busy as one, sometimes biting off more than you can chew

Donkey:  Getting kicked around by investors and customers

So who do you pretend to be, and who are you actually?

Learning from my Business Card Mistakes

When I launched my own business I instantly printed business cards emblazoned with my self-appointed title. I might as well as written “your royal highness Excellency”.  I didn’t have a product but I had a shiny stack of glossy business cards declaring me as the head of the kingdom that didn’t exist yet.

What happened? Well within a couple of months, my logo changed, my website name changed, my company colors changed, and (gasp) yes my role changed. And here I was gazing at my pretty stack of unused business cards! I’m not committing that #entrepreneurfail again.

Alternatives to Business Cards?

I’m now here to overturn the conventional sport of printing and passing around business cards when you are just starting out.  Now introducing the MVP of a business card: No business card!  This is what I recommend:

1. Everyone has a smart phone.  If you meet someone interesting, do the green thing and take a photo his or her biz card.  Email the person on the spot.
2. If they don’t have a biz card, compose a blank email before you go your separate ways.  Ask them to fill out the To: field.  You should fill out the cc: field with your own email. The subject can say: “Nice to meet you today. Stay in touch.”
3. If email isn’t your style, ensure you have the LinkedIn app on your phone. As you meet an interesting person, ask them if they are on LinkedIn and before you bid adieu send them a request as a contact.

Do you have business cards? What do they say? Do you find them useful? Let us know in the comments below.

This comic and post were originally created by Kriti Vichare for #entrepreneurfail: Startup Success.

New Webcomics series brought to you by #entrepreneurfail and GetEntrepreneurial.com. Enjoy!

“Rome wasn’t built in a day either…” 

I first saw this unapologetic declaration on a billboard sign on a highway that is perennially under construction. And it always reminds me that startups have to be treated the same way.

Entrepreneurs and wantrepreneurs approach creating a startup empire differently.  Firstly, what’s a wantrepreneur? They are the eager beavers who may look, act, and seem like entrepreneurs – but all without owning an actual business!

Let’s examine the wantrepreneur scenario when building a startup empire:

1. This is the one…the idea of the century!” Wantrepreneurs rarely focus on the problem to solve.
2. “Oooooh features! I love features!” Wantrepreneurs don’t create a foundation and work incrementally, but instead fast forward and jump in the deep end before learning to swim.
3. “I’ll just whip together the business in no time!” Wantrepreneurs always underestimate the time it takes to grow a business.
4. “If you build it they will come.” Wantrepreneurs believe the only thing stopping them from customers, is the lack of product.
5. “Money… I’ll figure it out later.” Wantrepreneurs severely minimize the needed funding for their projects.

To build an empire you need a foundation, vision, support, and patience. Serial entrepreneurs know this; it is second nature to them. As they move with tremendous speed, they know they have to learn to walk before they run. A scalable, repeatable business model is necessary before expanding too big or out of reach.

How do you approach building an empire? Let us know in the comments below.

New Webcomics series brought to you by #entrepreneurfail and GetEntrepreneurial.com. Enjoy!

“With no marketing budget I resorted to techniques I would have never considered – cold calling, cold emailing, cold presentations, and crashing networking events, amongst others.” 

To spread the word to customers in a big company, the marketing department gets the big bucks to make sure the sales team is out there busting down doors to grow the business. And since chances are the brand or product already has recognition, the marketing helps reiterate and boost the brand in the market. The huge marketing budget pales in comparison to the return on the investment.

In a startup on the other hand, every employee – from founder to developer to gopher needs to be a marketer and a salesperson. The thick skin each employee will develop after hearing constant rejections will only make the value proposition stronger.

This article by Anita Newton goes deeper into the comparison! It’s a good read especially if you are making the transition from big company to small, or vice versa.

Key Startup Lesson: Use inexpensive methods of marketing and PR that all team members can use help grow the business.

Tell us about your experiences marketing in your startup in the comments below. 

This comic and post is from the book: Cheating on Your Corporate Job: A Comic Look at the Startup Dream. Read the review on Forbes.com. You can get the book on Amazon Kindle or PDF. Use the code “fifty” to get a 50% discount on the PDF.