From ideation to realization

September 30, 2010 Leave a comment

While I was working at Autodesk, I really liked their tag line “Ideas Realized”. It was simple and had a core message to it: “how to get your ideas to become reality”.  We often link great thinkers with the ideas that came from their minds and the ones that make them a reality, visionaries.

Ideas are cheap

Don’t get me wrong, a great idea is not easy to find. But everyone in his or her own mind get once in a while a great idea; something that would be truly amazing and could change the lives of millions. I am sure there are many people that are claiming right now that they also had an idea similar to Facebook, Twitter and the iPod.

Making it a reality

An idea is just an idea. Making it a reality is quite another challenge. First, you need to ask yourself what does it take to make this happen. Are there any specific technological barriers? What kind of resources and talent do you need? How many steps are needed to your idea to work as planned? How much would it cost? How long will it take for it to happen?

Be precise about your idea

Before going crazy and try to make the impossible happen, make sure that you have a clear idea about your idea. While not always easy, try to be precise. If you are thinking about doing some cool app in the cloud, how it will work? Who will be the primary users of your idea? What problems are you solving? Taking the time to specify clearly what your idea is about will allow you to get more people on board. If you are the only genius that gets it, nobody will be able to help you in making it a reality.

Do you have a plan?

So you have a clear specification of your idea. You now need to build a plan that will get you from paper to delivery. If you need technical problems to solve, what is your plan to get them resolved? If you need funding, did you create a preliminary business plan? If things are too complex, simply start with a plan for the plan. Sounds silly but sometimes a short list of things to hammer out in order to get the plan done is the best way to get the wheels turning.

Build specific milestones

As you get ready to start realizing your idea, you nee to set proper milestones that will allow you to track your progress. As a rule of thumb, I like to have between 5 and 7 milestones for bigger initiatives. For each of the milestones, make sure that you have metrics that can help you quality your level of success. For example, get funding is not enough, you need to specify how much money you need to raise and by which deadline you want to close your round.

Hope this helps you get some of your ideas to realization. Please send me feedback; I always appreciate to receive comments from the blogs that I post.

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Business Confidential: how sensitive is your data?

September 27, 2010 Leave a comment

Do you find sometimes that you are swimming in a world of non-disclosures (a.k.a. NDA), whereas most of them are not really needed? Honestly, I believe that we could live without the majority of NDA’s that we are signing. In this day and age, people qualify anything as sensitive or confidential data – including their business address and who does the cleaning – lol. But seriously, how confidential is the data you want to share? Most of the time, we spend way too much time around the definition of a NDA, only to find out that there is very little information that is being shared.

What are you really afraid of?

How much can someone else do once they learn about your secret sauce? Can they just go and do what you’re planning to do? Information that needs protection is either information that would have an impact on the market (mostly if you are a public company) and specifically hurt your business if it becomes public knowledge. General direction of a business or a vague idea about your business plan does not cut it.

What competition would do?

That’s one of the most important question you need to ask yourself. What would be the impact if your competitor were to learn about this so-called confidential information? If the impact is low or nil, then there is not much you should be concerned about. Of course, if you have specific trade secrets or revolutionary new product coming, you want to make sure to safely guard this information.

Do you have just ideas?

You are in trouble if you have just a bunch of ideas but without the ability to execute them – NDA or not. People should spend more time on execution that to worry about others stealing their ideas. Beyond accusing others of taking your ideas, focus on making your ideas and plan a reality. If you execute well, competitors should never have enough time to beat you to the market. Nothing in an NDA is stopping you from badly executing – so stop blaming the others if you failed.

How much do you really need to disclose?

Again, learn to be selective about what you disclose. We actually say less when there is no NDA in place. People have a tendency to talk a lot more because “we can do it in confidence”. Staying quiet is the best method to protect confidential information. Let me burst your bubble and let you know that people still talk even with an NDA in place. Maybe not officially but people like to talk. Companies that have a culture of staying quiet have a better chance of keeping confidential information to themselves.

Learn to sign NDA’s when they are really needed. Talk less and focus more on your execution – these are the best tricks to stay ahead of the game and keep your information confidential.

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Why executives regularly need to free some time off their schedule

August 4, 2010 2 Comments

There is somewhat a conundrum when we like to think that executives are very busy, with not a single moment to themselves. If you can’t take a step back to look at the state of your business, who else will? As an entrepreneur and executive, I always force myself to have a bit of free time within my schedule. If it’s not the case, I will find solutions to get this much-needed free time. Not because I need to rest but rather to be able to better look at what is going on, to analyze our practice, to learn by observing around me.

There is such a thing of being too busy

Executives should not take any comfort in being overworked and overbooked. While this can be a pleasant feeling when people feel sorry for your crazy hours, there are no long-term benefits in keeping this behavior. Taking an analogy from sailing, you constantly maneuver around the boat, making changes here and there but if you don’t take the time to look ahead and what’s around you (including looking at your navigation tools), you will most likely hit something and sink the boat….

Make it a priority

You need to make it a priority to free up some time; without any efforts on your part, it will never happen by itself. Unless you really believe this is important for you, it will never happen. There are a million things you can work on and justify you did not have the time. The second you are serious about this, it will start to happen.

How to free up time

Here is a simple principle: every time you are about to do something, you need to ask yourself if this is something that someone else could do (either directed or delegated).  If so, then just have that someone do it for you. If you don’t have anyone that can do it, can you train and coach someone that eventually will? Then take the time (pun intended) to get that person up and running. Sometimes it takes a bit more work in order to free yourself. If you keep doing this on a regular basis, you will end up having some of that elusive free time.

Now what?

You have managed to get a few blocks of time to yourself. Now just sit back and look around you. What do you see? Take a walk around the office and notice what seems to be working and where things don’t. A great tool is to just drop by someone’s office and just ask a few questions such as: “How is it going?”, “What are your top issues?”, and “If you could change something, what would that be?”. Observing and asking questions are great assets when it comes to taking a step back and better accessing the state of your business.

Keep doing it

The more you do this, the more you will see how you can make you business run better, even find new business opportunities … In addition, your employees will feel that you are now closer to them (and not always behind closed doors). I have been doing this for many years now and I truly believe that I am now a better manager because I take the time to step back, listen and observe what’s going on.

If you want to embark in this great process, please let me know. I would be curious to know how this helped you (or not) in running your business.

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Note to investors: hope is not a strategy

June 2, 2010 2 Comments

How many times do you see companies that are not doing the right things or do not have the right management or strategy in place? You would be surprised to see how many times these same companies have investors hopeful that things will work out at the end. Well I have bad news for you: hope is not a strategy.

A good strategy does not happen by miracle
Unless a company has spent the time to build a proper strategy, it won’t fall from the sky. And when I say a good strategy, I mean one that can be actually executed. Nothing worse than a strategy that while fantastic on paper, will never be close to be well executed or realizable. A strategy needs to be realistic, something that you know that the management team can really accomplish. Expecting something amazing to happen without execution is a pipe dream.

Does the management team really know what they are doing?
Anyone can blame outside elements for lackluster results: economy, weather, customers, competition, etc. How capable is your executive team in foreseeing potential problems? Do they have a plan of action if these occur? Are realistic are these sales targets? How sustainable are these marketing activities (and at what real cost)? No matter how hard the market conditions are, a great management team is capable to navigate in difficult waters and find the best path possible (don’t mean it will be easy or flawless).

The role of the Board
A Board is not just about adopting resolutions and reviewing budgets. There is a great responsibility in making sure the company is well managed, with a well thought out strategy and the means to execute. How often is the Board meeting in difficult time? Are there any special committees being put in place when the tough gets going? How accurate is the information flowing back from management?  If you’re Board is not taking attention to red flags, there just as part of the problem as the executive team. And there are a lot of red flags we just prefer to ignore (it’s amazing on how much you can discover by doing a few internal reviews and ask a few questions). We should not just be diligent when we acquire a business. Everyday should have its share of on-going reviews.

Shareholder return does not happen by chance
If your executive team is not building a sustainable business and a competitive advantage, you might just end up failing to successfully sell the company; at the right valuation that is. Any investor should never accept hope as a strategy. Expect more from your Board and executive team. They are playing with your money and you should make sure they know it. If something is not working out to your liking, you need to make some changes – and sometime at both levels. Often enough, just getting a new Chairman or CEO can make a lot of good in cleaning up a business and making it better. Don’t wait until hope is your last chance.

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Business Plan: Knowing who is your real customer

April 20, 2010 Leave a comment

So your Company has identified a real market problem and you have the technology to solve it. You have drafted a business plan and are looking for funding in order to execute your plan. The revenue forecast sounds pretty exciting as you are looking to commercialize a solution for the general mass (B2C). But have you answered this question: who is your REAL customer?

End user vs. customer
There is a big difference between the end user (the person that will ultimately consume your product) and your real customer (the person that will give you money – that will help you monetize your technology). The answer is far from easy in this day and age with electronic distribution, apps stores and social media platforms that allow you to integrate and sell plug-ins.

Partners can be your competitors
If you are trying to acquire the wrong customer base, you might end up competing with someone you thought would be your partner. For example, if you are looking to release a great solution that will help Facebook increase its revenues, you need to make sure that they do not plan to do the same as well. If you follow closely the customer ownership trail, it will help you create an answer.

Monetizing vs. customer ownership
Great technology will allow your Company to get to bigger revenue if you pick to right way to monetize it. Don’t focus on customer ownership – this is even more important when you are making low prices one-time consumer products sold for a few dollars. OEM or Affiliate partners can be most of the time the better customers, giving you indirectly access to their large customer base and share revenue.

Listing all potential customer types
You should take the time to list all potential customer types you might have: consumer, hardware manufacturer, distributor, etc. Thinking out of the box can actually help you identify a better customer that you might have thought about initially. For each type, you need to recognize the benefits and revenue potential but also (and that is very important) the cost to acquire the end-user base.

Having clarity about your real customer will not only give you a better path to success but also minimize any burn rate you will have in trying to monetize with the wrong audience…

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The cost of Marketing and getting media coverage

April 12, 2010 Leave a comment

I always love to see Apple launch new products (iPad) or new updates (iPhone 4.0 SDK) and the quality of their presentation, message and media coverage they are getting. I don’t know a single company that would not love to have such a marketing machine. Many Entrepreneurs will just assume that this is only possible once you have a gazillion of dollars to spend on Marketing. But then again, if it were the case, every other Fortune 500 company would be just as good, right? While money is key in doing things at a greater scale, there are some basic fundamentals that every company can apply to get an excellent Marketing foundation – that will get just more impressive once you have more money to spend on product launches and marketing campaigns.

Marketing takes time

That is perhaps the most important point. No matter how some people think that marketing can be done in a quickie, it is far from the truth. First, you need to build a team and that does not end once you have hired the staff. As a rule of thumb, I assume that building a team and getting all the contributors to be working as a unified group takes at LEAST 6 months. It does not mean that nothing can be done in the meantime, but you can’t expect a team to function and work cohesively in less time than this (no matter how much you pout, scream, put your foot down and lose patience). I have a similar rule for tracking the impact of Marketing. Getting market traction and media coverage takes time, you won’t get it from a single event or even worse – expecting that one press release or a snazzy re-designed web site will do the trick. Consumers are bombarded with news and information; it takes time to imprint brand value and media awareness into the cerebral cortex…

Spikes vs. marketing buildup

Entrepreneurs (and their CFO) do not often see the hidden cost of doing sporadic Marketing activities. The amount of energy and time that you need to put in order to get a single event to move the needle on media coverage is borderline insane. But I still see companies every day still hoping that this will work for them. What startups don’t seem to understand is that marketing is all about buildup. This is just like collecting wine. Every time someone asks me how I got to build my wine collection (I have about 600 bottles), I simply answer that I just buy a little more than what I drink. After time, this builds up to bigger numbers. Now if I was trying to build the same wine collection over a small amount of time – the effort, pain and cost would be much higher than what it took doing it the right way (if you just won the lottery disregard this comment…). Think of marketing as a long term buildup that after a while (and this is at least beyond a yearly cycle), you will be doing more and more Marketing activities that combined will have a real impact over your business.

Planning and process
In order to get marketing buildup, you need to plan ahead and have simple, yet effective processes. Activities such as blogging, tweeting, writing customer stories & eBooks, and doing press releases all need to fit in a marketing timeline that allows you to successfully spread your message. Each element needs to have it’s own process where things are done on a regular basis and ultimately effortlessly. If each time you write something on your blog, it eats too much of your time, it will be very hard to continue contributing on a regular basis. Without a due process and regularity, you cannot yield more output from your Marketing team. As an example, I rarely take more than 30 min to write each of my blogs. Writing a few times a week then only takes me an hour (two at the most) to support my blogging effort. If it was more than this, I would not be able to sustain such a frequency…

Bottom line is that marketing is more of a process and takes longer than most entrepreneurs are willing to accept. Never underestimate the cost of building a team, and getting this Marketing buildup. Without patience, you will just simply keep changing your team every 6 months to a year, continuously re-working the foundation (and web site) and never achieve any kind of Marketing momentum and media coverage you desire.

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When does an entrepreneur become a visionary?

March 29, 2010 Leave a comment

Ah, the magical word Visionary … how many entrepreneurs dream of becoming one? How many entrepreneurs think they already are? First, let’s begin with the Wiki definition of a Visionary:

“A vision can be political, religious, environmental, social, or technological in nature. By extension, a visionary can also be a person with a clear, distinctive and specific (in some details) vision of the future, usually connected with advances in technology or social/political arrangements. For example, Ted Nelson is referred to as a visionary in connection with the Internet.

Other visionaries simply imagine what does not yet exist but might some day, as some forms of visioning (or gazing) provide a glimpse into the possible future. Therefore, visioning can mean seeing in a utopian way what does not yet exist on earth—but might exist in another realm—such as the ideal or perfect realm as imagined or thought. Examples are Buckminster Fuller in architecture and design, and some of the pioneers of personal computing such as Steve Wozniak.”

Here is my view of what is needed for an entrepreneur to be called a visionary:

  • A Visionary starts with a great idea (but does not end there)
    At the core of every visionary is a great idea but having a great idea does not make you a visionary. No matter how fantastic or novel your idea is, you can’t just call yourself a visionary because of that amazing idea – otherwise there would be a lot more visionaries out there. The mind is highly creative and the World is not short of amazing ideas. You need a few other things.
  • How can such a great idea unfold (strategy)?
    You have this great idea that will make you one day a visionary. Now do you know how this will unfold? Do you know what is needed for this idea to come to life? What is your strategy to make this life changing idea a reality?
  • Do you have the ability to execute?
    You now have a novel idea and a well thought out strategy. Do you also have the ability to execute? Without the means to make it happen, you still just have a really cool idea. If you had the idea for the iPod but could not execute, you can’t be the visionary behind the product (unless you are the one that convinced Steve Jobs in doing this).
  • Is there someone else beside yourself that recognize you as a visionary?
    Self-proclaiming that you are a visionary does not cut it. To become a visionary requires that it come from the outside. You need to get your peers and your industry to recognize your achievement. It’s only when several people state this as a fact that you can start claiming this elusive title.
  • You can only be a visionary after the fact
    And this is an important point. Visionaries exist only after they’ve done it. You can’t for example at the beginning of your first startup claim that you are a visionary. At the end of the day, and if you deserve such accolade, it will come in due time. There is no point in rushing this.

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Why I don’t believe in the virtual office

February 4, 2010 Leave a comment

In this day and age of Skype, chat, video conferencing, fast data transfer and IP telephony, we are seeing a lot more people looking at the virtual office concept. While technically possible, I don’t believe that this is really viable for the majority of people. Sure you have exceptions; some people are capable of being highly productive and autonomous in a virtual office. But that’s just it: these are exceptions.

Kids in the house
I love my kids but no matter how often I explain to them that I am working while at home, they are not really grasping what it means. Writing a document is already a challenge but I can definitively rest assured that when the phone rings, Murphy’s Law will prevail and one of them will come and see me about something they need. Quite a distraction when you’re making an important business call. And needless to say that every time I work from home, my youngest 2-year-old son just assumes that I am there to play with him on the Wii.

Chores to be done in the house
There is always something that needs to be done in the house. When you leave for work for a real office, you have no choice to leave these behind (and see how you can do them in the evenings or the weekend). But when you’re working from home, there are right there staring at you – waiting for you to do something.

Discipline and execution
I find that preparing to go to work entice a certain level of discipline and execution that do not pan well when working from home. Sure the one in a while day working from home in your PJs can be fun but I do not see how you can provide a regular and constant contribution to your company while doing this every workday. Also, you need to have the discipline to resist the temptation to take a break and watch your favorite TV show or answer the home phone.

Just tactical work
While the virtual office might work for very precise and tactical tasks (again not talking about the unique category of individuals that can do it all from a virtual office), forget about doing any kind of strategic planning. Even more if you need others to get involved. Strategic planning requires teamwork and collaboration and cannot be done in a vacuum. So yes, the virtual office can work if you have an engineer that is working on a precise piece of code or an artist that is designing new graphics for your web site (assuming they can ignore the points mentioned above).

Coaching and support
Working from home will rob you from one of the most important value in working in an office: the ability to receive feedback and support. When remote, people easily assume that everything is fine and dandy. Nobody things of checking with you and listen in to what you’re working on. No manager present to see how you are doing, to provide support and help you if he feels you are in a rot. No one is there to see if you are doing well – both mentally and physically.

Execs should never be in a virtual office
Members of the executive teams need to be engaged in many strategic discussion (and not just on a quarterly basis). Execs are mentors, coaches and are there to support all the employees – whether you are managing them directly or not. Executives are also there to show a good example of work ethics and performance. I would love for someone how you can achieve all of this remotely from your standalone virtual office.

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My top 5 core values: #5 Communication, communication, communication

January 8, 2010 Leave a comment

Thinking different – check. Challenging status quo – check. Plan first, act second – got it. Achieve quality of execution – in the plans. This is all good stuff but there is one last final core value that glues all of this together. This is communication.

Speaking is not communicating
No matter how much is coming out of your mouth, it does not mean you are communicating. From Wiki: “Communication is a process whereby information is enclosed in a package and is channeled and imparted by a sender to a receiver via some medium. The receiver then decodes the message and gives the sender a feedback. All forms of communication require a sender, a message, and a receiver.”

Repeat, rinse and lather
No matter how much we would like people to get it the first time, it rarely happens like that. I often like to repeat key information and make sure that the FEEDBACK I receive is in line to what I expect.

Miscommunications start with yourself
Although we have a hard time admitting it, a lot of miscommunications start with ourselves. Always ask yourself: “Was I clear?” “Did he or she understand what I was trying to say?”. Each individual should strive to improve his or her own communication skills. Expecting others to improve without requiring you to change anything is utopia.

Conflicts are sometimes signs of miscommunication
It is the role of any manager and influencer to help people better communicate. It is amazing how many conflicts often arise from miscommunication: from upper management that was not clear on roles and responsibilities, employees having a hard time working together to employees doing the wrong thing at the wrong time.

Invest in achieving better communication
Spend time with your employees and provide feedback to them. Invest in Leadership Development. Make sure your leaders learn to better communicate and your overall company to do better in return.

Meet face to face
While remote work can be efficient to a certain degree, you still need to have regular face-to-face meetings with everyone in the company. No matter how someone is doing well at a distance, you want to get a regular chance to be in front of him or her.

Bottom line, it’s all about communication, communication and communication.

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My top 5 core values: #4 Quality of Execution

January 7, 2010 Leave a comment

Now that we got all our planning under our belt, it is time to focus on execution. And nothing is more rewarding that achieving flawless execution; reaching high standards of delivery.

Making sure that everyone is following the plan
You spent a good amount of time to create your launch plan, you need to make sure that you have the right process to track progress and be confident that things are being done as documented. Just like the maestro conducting an orchestra, you want to keep everybody in line; this of course assumes that everybody knows his or her part.

Things don’t always happen as you planned them
No matter how much planning you do, you will have unpredictable events down the road. Expecting that some things will go wrong can actually get you more prepared and face adversity. But this is only possible if you have “free” time to take care of these problems. Again this is where good planning will support quality execution – letting you focus on items that truly need you attention.

Demand more, expect more
No matter how successful you are executing, you can always improve on things. Take the time to make sure that your employees are rewarded on their good work but also provide feedback on how you want things to be better next time. Make sure that everyone can see how he or she can execute and succeed even better. As much they are feeling part of the solution, the more they will be inclined to push their limits and seek to better perform, better execute.

Perfection is not instant, take your time
While I believe in quality of execution, this never happens at first and expecting so will result in frustration and failure. By supporting and coaching your staff, you can show them the right direction and guide them towards perfection. It will take time and energy but by enforcing a deep desire of reaching high quality of execution, you will feel a great impact to your business; and things will just keep getting better and better.

Satisfaction in a job well done
By rewarding quality in execution and supporting your team in achieving excellence will make your company run better on all cylinders; building a machine that will be hard to stop or beat.

Next and final Core Value: Communication, communication, communication

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