incremental innovation

Last weekend, I met the founder of a new business that provides an online trading platform for investors.  A new business taking on well established  companies like TD Ameritrade, Charles Schwab and Scottrade?  I felt my inner critic come out – what’s the hook?  Do we really need another trading site?  Isn’t one basically interchangeable with the other, aside from the transaction fee?   Then I learned that his company had partnered up with a game development company to create a more intuitive, fun and useful interface and that his goal was to get young people more interested in investing.  My interest was piqued – a cross of gaming and investing with the noble goal of getting youngsters financially savvy!  I created an account and played around on kapitall.com, and I have to admit, it was much more user-friendly and visually pleasing that any other platform I have seen.

The question is:  Is improved user experience enough?  More broadly speaking, can a business be built on an incremental innovation over an existing (and widely accepted) product?  Well, the jury is still out on kapitall, but despite our tendency to be dazzled by “revolutionary” and “proprietary” products and to pooh-pooh ideas that are “not unique,” research shows that many successful businesses sell products and services that are similar in function (if not completely interchangeable) with those of other businesses.  Amar Bhide’s work on Inc. 500 companies (companies deemed by Inc. magazine as promising, high-growth companies) showed that 58 percent of the founders said that there were identical or close substitutes in the market for their products and services and 36 percent said that there were slight and moderate differences between their products and their competitors’.  Only 6 percent claimed that they had a unique product or service.   

So, what differentiates these founders from all of the struggling business owners out there who also sell ordinary products?  It turns out that there IS a secret to these high-growth entrepreneurs’ success – exceptional execution.  The takeaway:  You don’t need to have a unique idea to build a successful business, but you have to carry out the idea very, very well.

Mina

(For those interested, here is the full citation for Bhide’s work:  Bhide, Amar.  2000.  The Origin and Evolution of New Businesses.  New York:   Oxford University Press.)

workaholic schmocoholic

You heard me, workaholic = schmocholic.  All work and no play makes you a very boring person.  I'll also jump in and say you're probably inefficient, ineffective, playing the game of "looking good" with all of that "face time" you're putting in at the office.  You're spinning - making up stuff to do, wasting time, trying to look busy.  That's not busy - that's stupid.  I've been there, I've seen it - I've even done it.  Oooohhh la la, everyone thinks you're a rockstar because you put in 80 or 100 hours at work.  Not me any more.  I'm way too busy.  Recently, my co-founders and I read this great book, Rework and found it to be inspiring - so here's my response to one of the big takeaways from that read. 

The busiest people get the most done.  I'll give you an example from my own life: high school, for me, was a time when I was insanely busy.  Okay - like the other preppy high school kids around, I took all AP classes, played in the school orchestra, enjoyed shopping and eating late night in diners, and baby-sitting here and there to make some extra cash for my shopping-hobby.  Unlike many other kids, I also was governor in the class student government, played in both the school orchestra and the New York State regional orchestra, played in our school pit orchestras, had my own string quartet, was the pianist for two churches, was a competitive pianist as I traveled to New York City every other weekend for piano, regularly did (3-4 times a week) and sometimes even taught Tae Kwon Do (black belt), had piano lessons sometime two to three times a week for four to five hours at a time, taught private piano lessons for 8 students (weekly), was part of the math club + speech and debate club,  did weekly community service working with the area nursing homes and hospital emergency rooms, worked on huge 5 feet by 5 feet paintings for my special advanced art classes, took care of my younger brother, went to Bible study groups, worked at the Empire State Plaza giving tours of Albany, NY, sang in a choir, and still was in top of the class with my grades ...  insanely busy.  Yes, call me an over achiever.  And that's just an example of a high school kid!  I definitely believe this: You want something done, ask one of your busier friends - if they believe in it/you, they will get it done.

Workaholics schmocoholics burn time.  The biggest grievance I had (and continue to have) with working a regular full-time corporate job was with expectations around "face-time".  I get it - sometimes you put in a little more when you start a new job or a new project at a client site until trust has been built, and your reputation (assuming a good one) is confirmed through solid work output and results.  Awesome.  But when you have a work environment or culture where people are counting the hours between when you arrive and when you leave, that's plain ridiculous.  When you have bosses/management praising those that don't know how to manage their time and that are regularly and normally pulling 55+ hours a week at the office, the place has got issues.  That's not busy = that's inefficient.  Billable hours my ass - it's inefficiency.  The "face-time" aka look for that "butt-in-the-seat" attitude disgusts me.  You end up with people creating work, making up work, spinning in circles and spending valuable time on ineffective tasks. If an employee can get the job done in two hours, makes the necessary meetings, gets things done - who cares? 

Click here to read more.

~Arry

Re-working

Hello from Mina.  While my partner has been diligently posting astute observations and thoughts about love and relationships, I have been… well, delinquent.  Not that this is an excuse, but the past several months have been full of changes for our business.  Some very exciting  progress – our off-shore development team finally finished their work!  (About 6 months behind schedule, but hey, it’s done!)   And some not so great news  – our CTO had to leave us for personal reasons.  After “courting” him for months then working with him for another several months, this decision on his part led to soul-searching and strategic re-thinking on my and Arry’s part as well as some inevitable delays just when we had been gaining momentum.   Where are we now?  We were incredibly fortunate that just before our CTO left, we had recruited another developer to become a part of our start-up family.  Michael gallantly and skillfully picked up the pieces, and we are happy to report that we have a team that is even stronger and more committed than ever before.

As our business regains its momentum and as we rally towards our launch, one thing that has helped me get  focused and clear-headed is the book Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson.  This concise and entertaining book was actually recommended by our new CTO Michael (another reason we’re  lucky to have him – he has great taste in books), and as I flew through it, I was reminded of all of my beliefs about start-ups that the past several months had successfully distracted me from.  It really is amazing how much of your own beliefs you can lose track of.   This book on entrepreneurship has 70 and more axioms, observations, pleas and otherwise clever sayings (although the authors would never use the term “entrepreneurship”  as they see it as  “loaded with baggage” and elitist).  Here are a few points from Rework that really hit home for me:

-“Planning is guessing.”  This reminder was really timely as I was pulling my hair out trying to come up with every possible financial scenario and corresponding projections.  Some readers of this blog might remember my post on business plans, but I temporarily got caught up with the need to have some certainty (or as much certainty as possible at the moment).  To do:  Make short term plans; be ready to improvise.

-“No time is no excuse.”  Enough said.

-“Draw a line in the sand.”  This reminds me of Guy Kawasaki’s point that a great business should polarize people.  You can’t be everything to everyone.  Instead, go for “superfans” who will love you and talk about you to anyone with two ears.

-“Embrace constraints.” “Build half a product, not a half-assed product.” Lack of resources can actually be a good thing, and help you be focused or to draw that line in the sand for a simpler product that works supremely well.

-Go for “quick wins.”  Break down projects into small tasks and milestones to build momentum and motivation.  Yes! 

-“Don’t be a hero.”  “Go to sleep.”  I have a real problem with the glorification of all-nighters and other acts of “heroism” in start-ups and the corporate world in general.  True, in some instances, sleeplessness is called for to deal with real crises that require real action immediately.  In most cases, though, (sorry to sound unsympathetic), this kind of heroism can be attributed to the need to create work for its own sake (to brag about being overworked??) and/or lack of judgment about what is important and/or inefficient work habits. 

-Lastly, my favorites:  “Good enough is fine.”  “Launch now.”  No business is perfect, and if every entrepreneur perfected their product before marketing and selling it, we would still be hunting and gathering.  I look forward to our launch, when our product may not yet be perfect but will certainly be good enough.

-Mina

3 things to look for when choosing your co-founders

This post was inspired by an article I read recently in VentureBeat, with the same title, "3 Things to Look for When Choosing Your Co-Founders".  It's quite eerie and amazing, again, how similar the three things you look for when choosing your co-founder for your business, aka the person you will go into business with – are to the things you ought to look for when choosing the co-founder for your own family and your future, a.k.a. the person you will grow your family with. 

1.       Choose a “friend” – not because they are your friend, but because they have the right combination of absolute loyalty to you and the team, and die hard trustworthiness and trust in you and the team.  Faith.  Commitment.  When the tough get rough, the bank is in the red and the world seems to be against you, will they stand by you?  Will they stick up for you?  Trust is an absolute must-have and without it, a deal breaker.  Take the time to get to know the person, grow the relationship and the trust.

2.       Choose your mirror, not your clone – choose a co-founder with the right combination of skills that complement you and the team. 

Click here to read the rest of the post.

~Arry

life of the unemployed - what's life like outside of the corporate job?

Imagine this: not having to drive your painfully long commute to work, or having time to finally meet up with your friends for a 5PM happy hour at that cool downtown bar you’ve always wanted to check out.  I always imagined that my life of unemployment would be great: sleeping in, vacationing, eating ice cream, watching lots of television, partying it up …   I imagined all this plentiful free time I would have to do all the things I never get to do.  It’s supposed to be great.  I thought how lovely it would be to have time to do groceries and cook at home, how clean my place would be, how happy my dog would be to have me around more often. 

It is great.  It’s awesome.  …   Just the part about the plentiful amounts of free time to play and hang out, that part is a myth.  Well, at least for me, I'm busier more than ever.

What have I been doing?  Well…  I left my nice salaried job back in July 2010, and for that first month afterwards: 1) I did an independent contract gig at Expedia for a month, 2) I went to Hawaii for the first time in my life for a week, and 3) then came back to a to-do list as long as the Nile River (I brought my trusty notebook with me to Hawaii and jotted notes down while there).  The second month, ...  Click here to read more

~Arry

[10] 5 ways social media has changed dating

I love social media.  I'm all over it - Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Blogger, etc...  I love how it's allowed me to keep in touch with friends all over the world, reconnect me with friends from decades ago, and build new ones in our ever so busy lives.  Even with Twitter, I cannot thank this tool for how many awesome women I've been able to connect with because of it.  Social media is fun when it comes to dating - you can instantaneously see how your love is doing throughout his day, see the comments from those in his life, virtually flirt back and forth, ... social media provides tools for building authentic relationships --> but in the world of dating, it is truly important to remember to consistently use the more traditional means in growing faith, trust and strength in your love: holding hands, talking on the phone, going on walks, cuddling, kissing, and eye contact (some of my absolute favorites).

As much as I love social media, there are some new challenges and changes it has produced in the world of dating and love.  Some things I've learned and will share:

1. Online personalities do not necessarily present the real person as they are in real life.  The person who interact with and see online is not necessarily the same person in person.  Why?  The person you are building in your mind from watching the conversations and persona's online creates a person that is a little different then who that person is in real life.  Without the other communication cues like facial expressions, body language and tone, what else do you have to work with?  None - you interpret with the lens and bias that you hope to find in this person.

Read the rest by clicking here... 

~Arry

[9] the disengaged and the 'absent-present'

It's super annoying, and we all do it.  The guy in the meeting checking and responding to emails, totally ignoring the actual meeting and people in the room.  The guy  talking shop during dinner at a restaurant with his girlfriend, while she sits there trying to be polite while looking painfully bored.  No, actually, she reaches into her purse and pulls our her own cell phone to check her messages.  Better yet, notice how people in the Pacific Northwest tend to look down when crossing a street, rarely ever do they look both ways.  It gets more fun when you have a person staring at their crack-traption as they cross the street.  What about when you're in a conversation, say with two other friends, and someone's cell chirps or rings MID-conversation - and the friend responds to it.  WHAT?  Yes, that happens too.  What gives one the right to throw all the rules of etiquette, honor and respect out the window because the crap-traption is ringing, dinging, and vibrating?  (I get it, there are special circumstances when this is excused - but hopefully, you still say "excuse me" to those present before going there.)

Click here to read more...

Thanks,
Arry

[8] 20 relationship rules

I've been working on this list for the past year or so, and it's been revised so many times.  Of course, this is from my perspective, a woman who dates a man.  Anyways - here's the current state it's in.  I welcome your feedback + thoughts.  xoxo

1.  Love yourself.  Be yourself.  Be true to yourself.  Be good to yourself.  Take care of yourself.
2.  If a man wants you, nothing can keep him away.  If he doesn't want you, nothing can make him stay.
3.  Trust your gut.  Don't make excuses.  Own it. 
4.  Don't try and change yourself for a relationship that's not meant to be.

Click here to continue...

Thanks,
Arry

[7] my cocoon

MY COCOON: I have gone through and am currently still going through quite a bit of change in my life.  I'm questioning who, what, when, where, why, and how ...  what am I willing to do, how far am I willing to go, at what expense/investment, and for what result?  Right now, it feels like I am nearing the closing finale to my 4 year stay in my cocoon - and I am doing the final revision putting on the finishing touches to me.  I am refining and working to fine tune the person I am.  Post cocoon?  I will come out knowing and liking the person I am, or rather, pretty darn close to whatever that answer is at the end.  It's probably always going to be a work in progress...  Read rest of the story here.

~Arry 
P.S. I've started a new site (www.arryinseattle.com) where all my posts will be going.  I will selectively post some of them here as well in the meantime. 

[6] marathon

The world of startups and the world of love have so much in common, and I'm starting to realize that it comes down to two main things:

1) the world of startups + the world of love are based on the foundational pillar of Faith.  Faith is the main pillar.  Without it, everything else is nothing.  It's a must.  Faith in the dream, in the past/present/future, in each other.  Assure your partner (whether it's business or love) with your words and behavior that s/he can have complete faith in you.  Be open - whatever you do, do it openly and honestly.  Don't play games.  Don't do it.  Look out for anything that'll weaken this pillar - kill any inkling or tiny bit of suspicion early and quickly. 

2) the world of startups + the world of love is like a marathon.  Assuming you've got Faith as a pillar that you are actively maintaining and growing - then it's about the marathon.  Pace.  Breathing.  Stretching.  Training.  Growing.  Working.  Persevering.  It takes diligence, hard work, and a common vision.  If you've ever run long distances before, you'll totally get what I mean.  Undeniable, unwavering focus.


Yours,
Arry