Fred Wilson's post a few days ago "Starting is Easy, Finishing is Hard" speaks to the grind going on for many tech startups today. He says the easy exit days feel as if they have gone and for many it is taking raw tenacity to finish. And he's right. When you are the CEO or in the founding team of a startup the years are long. It feels as if it will take forever to get to the next stage of product, or growth, or market development. But the days [...]
Entrepreneurs can be a hard headed lot. It takes courage, determination, a lot of luck, and sometimes just old fashioned, bull-headed persistence to create a company but as a result entrepreneurs don't always listen well.But even if you know you resemble this description, ask yourself - is it more important for you to get to the right answer, or to be right? You want to be right because your team wants to follow someone who knows what to do. You want to be right because it's more efficient, and it [...]
I've been working with a number of small companies this year. I'm on a mission to help CEOs, especially women, figure out how to grow their businesses, manage their investors and boards and to create a level playing field for themselves. But as I have spoken to some of these CEOs I've seen several data points which are very worrying, and which I hope don't make a line! These data points are investors putting money in to companies, and then taking the money back out for services - so effectively [...]
One of the first decisions an entrepreneur needs to make once she has raised money for her great new idea is to build a board. This is a conscious act. Yes, your investors probably have board seats, at least the lead investor will. If your investors are angels maybe 2 or 3 of them have demanded to be on your board. But beyond this crew you owe it to yourself to step back and think about who do you want on your board to help you build your company. It [...]
The NACD (the National Association of Corporate Directors) held a discussion afternoon in San Francisco in late April designed to make directors smarter about current events (not hard to do since so much is always changing!) The agenda was politics, a cyber attack simulation, CEO succession planning, and the economic outlook. All interesting, but the cyber attack simulation was chilling. The simulation was run by Mary Galligan who was with the FBI for much of her career. She’s an expert in crisis management having been the supervisor of the FBI [...]
15 years is a milestone I think. Short enough that I still remember, long enough that is seems far in the past.We took Simplex public 15 years ago today. May 3, 2001. It was the culmination of a wild ride, and the beginning of another. Going public is a rite of passage. It's not a birth (founding a company), it's not a marriage (M&A), it's not a death (shutting down) so maybe it's like a bar mitzvah or confirmation - a rite of passage into adulthood. You take a company [...]
Thinking of starting your own company... or you're already in it? There's a fun new self-help book out for entrepreneurs called "Build Something Great!: Fifty Best Tips for High-Tech Startups" that is a must read and excellent reference book for anyone wanting to win the first time. Written by two of the Simplex founders, professors Resve Saleh and David Overhauser, it boils down valuable startup advice into 50 tips on how to build your own successful venture. And yes, I admit I'm biased since Resve and David hired me to [...]
My post in Inc a week ago: While sitting at a restaurant in London Heathrow airport yesterday, I found myself between the unfortunate cross hairs of a helpless server and his useless manager. At noon, while the restaurant was full of customers from around the globe, the credit card machine stopped working. Many patrons, myself included, did not have enough British pounds to pay for our meals as we were on our way out of the country. The waiter explained that I would need to pay my tab in cash. [...]
I’ve loved being a technology CEO. It’s been 20 years, and the CEO journey has taken me from pride to humility, from exhaustion to exhilaration, from courage to fear and often all in the same day. It’s a fantastic job and a huge responsibility and I’m honored to have been trusted with the job not once but twice and in two very different markets. I’ve worked with talented executives, loyal investors, and customers who’ve become friends over the years. And I’ve also always been incredibly conscious of the role I [...]
My latest post in Inc. Have you ever listened carefully to the language your leaders use when they talk about their plans and accomplishments? It can be very revealing, if you listen to the subtlety of their speech. There are leaders who are all about themselves and there are leaders who are all about their team, or their dream, and these two types of leaders sound entirely different from each other. A few weeks ago, I was talking with a group of executives from a large company and I was [...]