Accomplishments and Lesson Learned Friday! - (December 04, 2020) Entrepreneur |
- Accomplishments and Lesson Learned Friday! - (December 04, 2020)
- Tony Hsieh’s American Tragedy: The Self-Destructive Last Months Of The Zappos Visionary
- Why most “culture work” actually HURTS your company — and the simple process to ensure your culture eats strategy for lunch
- A quick and easy way to find Angels, VCs, and Accelerators
- Empower a soft spoken employee
- Professional logo designer for your business
- What's the best quote you have ever heard?
- I avoid doing things that matter, so I am creating an app for it
- Covid Positive SOS
- What questions should every entrepreneur ask themselves before they go to bed?
- Projects that never gets finished
- You should follow the money-maker community on Twitter ("money Twitter")
- I've found a product that's very cheap in South Africa, but commands a high price in the UK, but I'm having trouble finding an agent to help me export it?
- Give a sample of each industrial or B2B market.
- Am I allowed to show another company’s logo on my website?
- Have any Entrepreneurs Here Raised Capital Via Intrastate Offering?
- A Dose Of Perspective For The Workaholic
- Chinese-Language Help With Purchasing on Alibaba?
- Searching for side hustles
- Anyone in the IT/Pc repair industry use homeadvisor?
- My December Strategy - 6 things I'll do this month to get new web design business
- How do you start a SaaS or cloud computing company with no technical skills?
- Finding a target niche or business for a SAAS product...
- Hiring Hip Hop Artists and Venues for profit?
- How is your company making the world a better place?
| Accomplishments and Lesson Learned Friday! - (December 04, 2020) Posted: 04 Dec 2020 05:11 AM PST Please use this thread to share any accomplishment you care to gloat about, and some lessons learned. This is a weekly thread to encourage new members to participate, and post their accomplishments, as well as give the veterans an opportunity to inspire the up-and-comers. Since this thread can fill up quickly, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts. [link] [comments]  |
| Tony Hsieh’s American Tragedy: The Self-Destructive Last Months Of The Zappos Visionary Posted: 04 Dec 2020 11:39 AM PST Really insane read about his last year: https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2020/12/04/tony-hsiehs-american-tragedy-the-self-destructive-last-months-of-the-zappos-visionary/?sh=1ec404db4f22
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| Posted: 04 Dec 2020 03:20 AM PST About six years ago I scaled my company from 15-employees to 75-employees in about nine months, which was one of the most painful experiences of my business life. Our corporate culture, previously a strong suit of the business, was completely unprepared for the stresses of that type of rapid scale-up, and the growth almost killed my company. Then we did the incredibly challenging work of transforming our culture from the inside out, while still hitting milestones of a venture backed, high growth company. With the support of a ton of dedicated people, we did it, and the company is now back on track to (fingers crossed) win the market. All this to say that, having nearly ruined my company due to underinvesting in culture at a critical time, and having done the hard work of fixing and rebuilding our culture to become a strength once again, I have a unique appreciation for the importance, and delicacy, of corporate culture. Why most "culture work" actually hurts your company, and what to do about it"Culture eats strategy for lunch" — Peter Drucker This is one of the most popular quotes on corporate culture. And it's true. The best company cultures are the foundation on which successful strategy after successful strategy are built. So everyone should hire people to focus on culture, point them in the right direction, and get out of their way. Right? Wrong. According to Fred Kofman, author of Conscious Business and culture consultant to hundreds of organizations, the vast majority of culture work does more harm than good. As in, not only doesn't it improve the culture, most culture work actually harms the culture it's trying to help. America spends billions on corporate culture each year, and the sad reality is that, on average, companies would be better off simply crossing their fingers. But why? Why does most of the effort put toward the most powerful lever in business backfire? Perhaps even more importantly, how can you ensure that the work you put into building your culture intentionally is among the small percentage that eats strategy for lunch? Start with discovery, not GenerationAsk ten CEOs what makes a good company culture, and they'll all say something similar: Trust, freedom, autonomy, mastery, purpose, ping pong tables... For many leaders, when they set to work thinking about company culture their first instinct is to simply brainstorm (generate) the culture they want, usually some version of the above, and then figure out the quickest way to communicate those values to their team. This is the single most common way to disillusion your team and hurt your culture with the best of intentions. Because culture work must start with discovery, not generation. "There's no way to open the future without closing the past. Unless the company's leadership does a serious examination of their previous disengaging behaviors, and convinces the workforce that they are committed to change that behavior in a serious way, any engagement program is dead on arrival." — Fred Kofman The reality is that even if you've never thought about it, your company already has a well-engrained culture with very specific characteristics, all of which your employees know well even if you do not (and if you think you do, but you haven't asked employees to confirm, don't be so sure). As a result, any values or mission you put on the wall, if they don't match the actual, existing culture already present, they will communicate to your team you are clueless and, slowly or quickly, they'll begin to check out. It's as if your parents, after consistently missing your soccer games for partner calls (hi Peter Banning)), call a family meeting to say their core family value is "togetherness." Effective culture change work, the kind that changes an entire company rather than simply making an executive team feel progressive, begins with a deep discovery process. It asks the question: what is our existing culture now? What are our current values, whether or not we actually took the time to create them intentionally? Your parents first have to admit to their demonstrated value of "work>family" and convince you they're going to change, before you'll hear the word "togetherness" without dripping cynicism. Similarly, you have to first discover, cop to, and clean up any messes resulting from your existing culture before you have the ability to change it. So how do we do this? Where do we look?I know of two places to look. One is hard for one reason, and one is hard for another.
Anonymous surveys are a great tool to understand how your culture is viewed by your employees. Anonymity is key, lest you get a bunch of sunshine blown up your butt. We built our own survey based on specific questions we had at my previous company, but a quick Google search will give you many more options to choose from. There is risk to this approach, however. A survey like this communicates to your employees that you understand the importance of culture, and that you will presumably listen to what they say and attempt to address it. If you take this route and do nothing to address the feedback afterward, it can cause the kind of harm we discussed above. This is a genie that is difficult to put back into the bottle.
At some point in every entrepreneur's journey they realize that their company is simply a manifestation of their personality. The good and the bad. No matter what's on the walls, the behavior of the leader dictates the culture. This presents a shortcut, in that you can understand your corporate culture by understanding yourself. Are you late to meetings? That's your culture. Others are late, too. Do you hold yourself to the grindstone, sacrificing holidays to make more progress? That's your culture. Others do that, too. Do you pass the buck and blame others when things go wrong? You get the picture. While most entrepreneurs resist the hell out of this (it's scary considering your foundational role in creating the problem you see in everyone else), in my experience looking internally is the most reliable route to determine your culture. For those brave few, it's best done with either a 360-degree survey, allowing you to get feedback from all your colleagues, or a dedicated coach to help you see your blindspots. I've reconciled with my current culture. Now what?No matter which discovery route you take, how you get to an understanding of your current state of affairs, the process of changing a corporate culture without hurting the business is always the same: Step 1: Change yourself such that you live the values by which you want the company to live. Step 2: Write the values by which you live on the wall. And if you're wondering, yes that's what we did to transform our culture at speed, in 5 simple steps"
Simple, yes. But nobody said it was easy. ——— From Second Mountain Startup, the weekly newsletter for purpose-driven entrepreneurs. [link] [comments]  |
| A quick and easy way to find Angels, VCs, and Accelerators Posted: 04 Dec 2020 06:46 AM PST Looking for new investors seems like a daunting experience. If you're still wondering where to start in this process, here's my 1st recommendation: Talk to other entrepreneurs who have gone through the process. That's an easy one right? That's what I did as well and the first step that all entrepreneurs in my network told me to do was:
Well, let me tell you. Way too many hours are spent on this list if you're trying to gather investors one by one and then realizing that they were not a good fit for you. So, here's my 2nd recommendation: gather lists with data about investors that already exist out there and start narrowing down. Pro tip: one month ago I shared a post on this sub that explained how to leverage advanced google searches to find lists with investors' data. That was a cool tip so here is one search you can easily try: site:docs.google.com intitle:investors But this time I've done some homework for you. Here are a couple of lists that I found to be quite complete:
----- Happy Prospecting! Happy to help. [link] [comments]  |
| Empower a soft spoken employee Posted: 04 Dec 2020 03:07 PM PST I have a fantastic employee who I'd like to develop. The position that I'm trying to bring him into requires him to be much more assertive and direct than what he's most used to. Have you employed any strategies to help employees make that jump? [link] [comments]  |
| Professional logo designer for your business Posted: 04 Dec 2020 03:39 PM PST Hey, I'm an expert designer with the experience of 5 year with a long list of satisfied customers. A business logo appears on all of the company letterhead, communications, marketing and advertising pieces of a business as a graphic representation or symbol for the company. Essentially, the logo is typically the first thing a reader may notice before reading the text, and as a graphic designer with a good experience on logo design I'm willing offer my services to anyone intersted! I will provide the following : *High quality and unique design *Fast delivery time 10-20hrs *Very fast replies *24/7 availability *Friendly communication *Complete satisfaction please consider hiring me My previous works : https://artopedia.myportfolio.com/ My instagram : https://www.instagram.com/_arto.pedia_/ My discord : Artopedia#7396 Delivered files would include PNG, AI, PSD, EPS and SVG. [link] [comments]  |
| What's the best quote you have ever heard? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 07:53 AM PST I'll start: — Eleanor Roosevelt [link] [comments]  |
| I avoid doing things that matter, so I am creating an app for it Posted: 04 Dec 2020 03:46 PM PST Hey Entrepreneurs! I have recently started writing a blog which is about me (noob) trying to enter a bootstrapping world. In the second post - S01E01 - I revealed my first app idea. An app to make use of Pareto principle for your personal life - make couple of goals very prominent and visible for you while ignoring others. This app is an opposite of productivity apps. It's about doing very few, but constantly and in the chosen direction. It also automates tracking of goals through geofences, NFC and qr-codes. Let me know what do you think. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 04 Dec 2020 11:33 AM PST Whatsup guys I'm currently stuck in my basement with a laptop for the next 336 hours (14 days) because I am Covid Positive! I feel fine and will be fine but just quarantining for others safety. Hoping you guys could give me an idea, skill, side hustle or book to attack over the next 14 days? [link] [comments]  |
| What questions should every entrepreneur ask themselves before they go to bed? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 04:25 PM PST Interested to know how you guys make your tomorrow better. [link] [comments]  |
| Projects that never gets finished Posted: 04 Dec 2020 04:01 PM PST As the title states; I've been through alot of ideas that I've begun investing my time and effort in but never finish before launch. I do feel bad about myself for giving up so easily but at the same time I don't know how to work out my issue. Most of my ideas are web based, meaning that it often requires knowledge about web design- which I don't have. I've been trying no-code tools but they are often very limited or doesn't provide as much flexibility for the thing(s) i'm trying to create. Some would say that paying a developer will solve everything, but sadly I don't have the money to invest. What I usually do is identifying the technical parts needed for my idea and so I start of by making a simple test design of it, but since that's not enough to launch my product I never manage to come any further. How should I work this out. Anyone else in my situation and if so, how did you do it? [link] [comments]  |
| You should follow the money-maker community on Twitter ("money Twitter") Posted: 04 Dec 2020 03:56 PM PST These people differ from most (developer-type) indie hackers in that they're not as focusing on developing a product but rather find other ways to make money, usually by selling info products for example, running a community, or doing consulting, sales, and marketing for other businesses. They have a lot of good insights and case studies that aren't usually seen in bootstrapper or SaaS style communities. For example: https://twitter.com/thecammartinez1/status/1296898114343690247 This person runs a community of SaaS founders and to make money, he does affiliate marketing for products that a SaaS would use, like Zoom, Zapier, etc. He charges a yearly subscription and also resells licenses at a markup. He can do this because he buys licenses in bulk (e.g. 200 Zoom enterprise licenses for $2,100 total) and then sells them at markup ($25/month), making a profit from the spread (25 * 200 - 2,100 = $2,900) plus the yearly subscription cost. Another example is this guy: https://twitter.com/thedulab/status/1275521147459665920 He does sales on behalf of course creators. He will find a creator with a high value course (4 - 5 figure range) and then he optimizes their funnel by adding a form that the potential buyer has to fill out, which includes their email and phone number. Then he will schedule a call with the customer to figure out if they need the course, and if so, how it might help them, and this guy basically does high-touch sales. He makes money by taking a commission on each sale, something like 35%. These are just a few examples of people I follow that have given me a lot of value in terms of thinking about other money-making opportunities than making yet another SaaS, as well as what to do for better sales and marketing of the product. Usually these people are much less perfectionistic than I am and just want to get their services out the door in order to make money, and then they worry about optimizing their processes. Sometimes us developer-focused indie hackers can get stuck in the "perfect MVP" cycle rather than thinking that the product is there to make money at the end of the day. I'm actually making a community for people who like money Twitter, will link it if allowed to. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 04 Dec 2020 05:52 PM PST So basically I've found a product that cost around £1.50 in South Africa, but sells for £40 on ebay in the UK, there is only one other seller who seems to be doing it, but I don't know how to export it from SA, what's the best way to go about it, its a small product that could probably fit 20 pieces of it into a shoe box. I need to find someone in SA who I can trust, and who is willing to post it to me in exchange for a profit share, what is the best way to go about it? [link] [comments]  |
| Give a sample of each industrial or B2B market. Posted: 04 Dec 2020 05:27 PM PST |
| Am I allowed to show another company’s logo on my website? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 12:53 PM PST I have a website where I have my own logo, but I resell products from various retailers. Am I allowed to include a picture of the retailers store/logo on my website ? [link] [comments]  |
| Have any Entrepreneurs Here Raised Capital Via Intrastate Offering? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 12:16 PM PST There's a relatively new funding mechanism called intrastate offerings that aren't subject to much of the regulation involved with raising capital nationally. See here: https://www.sec.gov/smallbusiness/exemptofferings/intrastateofferings This makes for a much more efficient sale of securities, because there's no requirement to file with the SEC and the legal and accounting requirements/costs are much less. You can sell securities to an investor in-state OTC. I have no experience with this but it was brought to my attention by a businessperson in my network who recommended it heavily for smaller funding rounds like my company is pursuing. I don't really know how to go about sourcing leads for this type of funding, so I'm curious if any other entrepreneurs have taken this approach and have any recommendations or warnings. The chances of this type of prospecting being successful likely vary a lot by state, but my company is based in Massachusetts where there are plenty of high-NW individuals and family offices, so I think it's interesting and at least worth pursuing. [link] [comments]  |
| A Dose Of Perspective For The Workaholic Posted: 04 Dec 2020 09:30 AM PST By the end of 2007, I was in the best place of my personal and professional life. My commissioning company had grown from one truck, one employee, one service, and one client — to I can't remember how many trucks, almost fifty employees, over a dozen services, and national coverage for several clients while we focused on the eastern US for the rest. We bought a house in the neighborhood of our dreams, and while we didn't know it we were about to grow are little family to a point where we no longer had a "spare" room. At the beginning of 2008, everything changed. The economy was getting worse, but we still felt safe because our customer base (mainly grocery and big box retail) had historically been recession proof. That feeling quickly dissolved one Tuesday afternoon as I received phone calls from our three largest customers. Each one informed me their construction programs were on an indefinite pause, and in less than an hour we lost half our business. Then, while we were on vacation celebrating the news that a new daughter was on the way, our house burned down. I was now tasked with rebuilding both our home and our business. To say I was putting in the hours was an understatement. A typical day involved me arriving at the office around 6:00 am and finishing up a bit of flooring or custom cabinetry in our home around midnight. But I thrive in chaos, and at the time I felt like I was in my zone. For eleven months in 2008, I pushed myself to accomplish more than I ever had, and it was working. The house was coming together, our business was back on track, and our family was growing. It felt good, and the positive comments from friends and colleagues weren't exactly damaging my ego. Every single day, I pushed myself to the limit. With all the good things happening, my sense of accomplishment was thru the roof. There was no reason to slow down, but the Thanksgiving holiday forced my hand. Our tradition of Thanksgiving Eve drinks with old friends was the beginning of the change. Because of those drinks, we continued our Thanksgiving day tradition of sleeping a bit late (we had a five-year-old so sleeping late as 8 am, but it was still glorious). As the day progressed, I thought of all the things I could be doing instead of enjoying the time around our friends and family. By the end of the day, I was feeling a bit off. The next morning, a little more off. By that evening, I was in the emergency room. I was making good the enemy of great. We had good ideas in 2008 and 2009 that saved our company. But, in 2010, when I actually allowed us to slow down enough so our brains could take a break to process things, we had great ideas that forever changed our company. That year we created the first punch list tool for the iPad, worked with contractors all over the world on their construction tech strategy, opened the first mobile development shop for the construction industry, ended up being profiled by Apple, and I became one of Engineering News Records Top 25 Newsmakers in the world.never let up. If I wasn't in that hospital room, I could have been installing that crown molding in the basement, lining up new clients for our commissioning company, or marketing our mobile applications. I was driving myself and everyone around me a bit crazy. If this sounds like the part where I learned my lesson, it's not. I was down until the New Year. By the end of January, I was once again pushing myself to the limit each day. As a result, just before Christmas Eve in 2009, I was right back in the ER. For two years I tried an alternative way of working, achieved amazing results, and put myself in a dangerous medical situation (not to mention the negative effects on my family and personal life). I was nervous about taking a break, but it was obvious I had to do it. I forced myself to slow down, take time to rest and recover, and I was prepared to watch productivity drop. But it didn't. It improved. My "personal" productivity didn't improve. I was doing less. But productivity around the projects at work and at home improved. Productivity in my personal relationships improved as well (poor word choice there, but you get the point). I was spending less time doing and more time planning, delegating, and enjoying the company of those around me. The extra planning reduced mistakes, the extra delegation meant more projects were in motion at one time, and the extra time with friends and family — that was paying off more than anything. We weren't just more productive. We were more successful as well. I had set a poor example for my team for two years, and they noticed. Now I was trying to set a better example, and they noticed that as well. They were watching our company accomplish more, and they could take the time to enjoy it. People were happy, and it motivated them in ways I had never seen before. This is the period in which we produced some of our best ideas, and almost all of them came from the down time. Today, I'm still a workaholic. But I get away with it because I focus my efforts on different things. Those two years taught me several valuable lessons that still motivate me to this day.
While it's true that the amount of work an entrepreneur puts in will be key to their success, the law of diminishing returns is also true. I encourage you to take time to relax this holiday season, especially after all the additional stress 2020 has provided us. Eat breakfast with your family as much as you can, pet your dog more, take long walks, and sleep in a bit. In order to set a good example, I'll be slowing down a bit here at the Blue Collar Business School as well. The podcast is on a temporary hiatus while we review all the great feedback we've received and decide what changes we'll be making to the format. The weekly newsletter won't be weekly in December. Instead, we will send out what we have time to put together—after we've taken a bit of time for ourselves. I hope you do the same before you read it. [link] [comments]  |
| Chinese-Language Help With Purchasing on Alibaba? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 03:25 PM PST We are starting a van upfitting business in the United States, and are looking to purchase a bunch of our components on Alibaba. We're finding the language barrier to be excruciating, and thinking this might be a common experience. Does anyone here have experience hiring a bilingual (English - Mandarin) to do their purchasing? Any suggestions on where to find someone? TIA! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 04 Dec 2020 06:36 AM PST Hello guys! I am a college student in Greece. I study as an electrical and computer engineer and I am a freshman. I want to find a side hustle that does not distract me much from studying. My schedule is hard because I have free time for 3-4 days a week that I can take advantage of. Also we are in quarantine so I think it is a good time to invest my time in something productive. I want to see how it is to earn my own money. I have seen some videos about freelancing but it is not very common here. So I need original ideas to earn money through my computer but it is not necessary I commit to it full time. I am good at physics and math and I try to learn python on my own. I also have the knowledge that a slightly above average electrical and computer engineering student has on his first year. So please if you think of something write a comment. Thank you [link] [comments]  |
| Anyone in the IT/Pc repair industry use homeadvisor? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 02:55 PM PST Is it lucrative? Any alternatives? Are you satisfied with the results and what would you recommend? Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| My December Strategy - 6 things I'll do this month to get new web design business Posted: 04 Dec 2020 02:48 PM PST This is more of a post to get my ideas out there and hold me accountable. I hope people get some good ideas from this : 1) Refer businesses to others. I believe that when you give you shall receive. I'm also part of BNI (a networking organization) so that makes this easier. 2) Sales- Through LinkedIn, other BNI groups, my chamber of commerce. Hunter.io will be a very valuable tool here. 3) Facebook Group Unique Offer - free optimonk (that's an exit-intent popup) for 3 businesses. This doesn't take much for me to setup, maybe 1 hour and I'll have 3 businesses that I start a discussion with and give me access to their site. On the flip side it's quite attractive as when set up properly it's free money- it converts people that were going to leave. I used this on a client of mine to increase revenue ~3% per month which amounts to $2500. 4) Partnerships - find referral partners (like social media marketers, photographers/videographers, graphic designers). Main avenue would probably be Facebook groups, but might post on LinkedIn (I've taken the time to cultivate my LinkedIn profile and have close to 500 reasonably-valuable connections in my local area). 5) Promote youtube - on millionaire fastlane, facebook groups, and LinkedIn. Filmed 10 videos in my office to test this out. I believe one of the best things a leader or owner can do is work on developing their ideas - because that's one of the few things you can't delegate. I'll be posting 1 a week and if I get traction I'll be recording more. I didn't want to just film 1 and decide after that but wanted to give it a real shot. So far I got 40 views on my first video posted today and haven't even promoted it much so I'm optimistic. 6) Online ads - linkedin, facebook. Going to do this very sparingly ($5 a day?) - but I've written up some ads and I'm looking forward to split-testing them. I'm 22 and from Canada, by Toronto. I'd love to get to know more entrepreneurs by me, especially ones around my age so give me a shout. [link] [comments]  |
| How do you start a SaaS or cloud computing company with no technical skills? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 01:56 PM PST I've always wanted to launch a tech startup, particularly enterprise SaaS and/or cloud computing services, particularly now with how much of a hot market cloud computing is. I think I have a rather good understanding of what my potential products need to be to properly stand out and compete in the fast growing market. My only problem is I have no technical skills or money to invest in professional developers. What should someone in my situation do? I'm not exactly in a great positions to find a technical co founder so I'm kind of on my own. Thoughts? [link] [comments]  |
| Finding a target niche or business for a SAAS product... Posted: 04 Dec 2020 12:51 PM PST I have found many good resources on this board, and lots of good advice, however I am still a bit lost as to how to get started. I am a moderately successful programmer with a decent job, and I absolutely love what I do. I feel comfortable enough now with my skills now that I am confident I can develop the full stack for a web application on just about any platform, or device. I am convinced that the best utilization of my skills and time would be to develop a cloud-based SAAS of some kind, however I don't know what. It's killing me! I understand the following:
What I am stuck on is how to find the niche demographic to serve. In the case of developing a SAAS product, how would you recommend I do research to find a target business type and niche? Any particular websites to see what's trending in terms of digital solutions? Thank you. [link] [comments]  |
| Hiring Hip Hop Artists and Venues for profit? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 12:08 PM PST If you were to rent a venue out for a night and a popular artist, would this be profitable? I live in a popular area for Hip Hop , (Atlanta) and I think this could be a great investment but want advice. Thank you! (Capital is a minor issue if that helps) [link] [comments]  |
| How is your company making the world a better place? Posted: 04 Dec 2020 12:01 PM PST Let me go first: I help people get super productive, [link] [comments]  |
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