HKN : discover your destiny

Starting up is a learning curve.

The faster we learn, the lesser we make ‘avoidable’ mistakes, we increase our chances of success.

The beauty about this is that if you are prepared to learn, you will realise how foolish you were when you started up. And how being foolish worked to your advantage.

A few pointers on how to re-look @ your business idea and your approach.

(Caveat Emptor : I may be completely wrong. I have consistently managed to be wrong in that past too.)

1. Execution

Is your idea the next revolution? Great.

But you know what. Ideas are dime a dozen. All that matters is execution.

You can spend all the time strategising but if you dont execute well, irrespective of how   well or how much you have thought about it, it just won’t work.

If you are a startup, act like one. Focus on ground reality. Get the pulse from the market – customers, vendors, competition. Ask the right questions – the painful ones. Know what you can do and more importantly, know what you cannot do.

Eventually market reality is going to stare down your face. Its wiser to deal with it upfront than wait for it to happen.

The point is – be in control of your ship as much as possible. Know what to do next, why and how. You may not have all the answers, but ask all the questions. And keep looking for answers.

2. Scalability

Lets face it. You are going to struggle.

Whatever you do, whoever you are, struggle is certain. And if you are not, there is something seriously wrong.

And you are struggling for a cause whose chances of success are based on a plethora of assumptions and even at the best case, look only bleak. (please note : the idea may succeed, whether you will in its execution remains to be seen)

So if you are up against so many odds, atleast have a cause that has a payoff that will justify your cost (time-effort-money). Plain and simple, build something which if at all does well, has a chance of making it really big.

Shooting for Mediocrity is a blunder. Do not ignore the opportunity cost for your effort - better idea, more money.

And lets stay clear of wishful thinking in painting up a future for our idea. It has to be based on clear facts – commercialistion model, investment / cost, market need, capability of team, ramping up, competition.

3. Time to Market

Dont wait to create a masterpiece.

Build fast, execute well and learn along the way.

The faster you are in the market, the sooner you will learn.

Everything that you have thought is time dependent. The faster, the better.

Thats it for now.

More as I learn along !

One common problem we all would have suffered is ‘Commitment – Delivery gap’.

Be it a normal shopping experience, the daily rickshaw ride or even a professional vendor – client relationships. What gets committed is never really delivered. And whats delivered is not what was committed.

Wonder why, but in our country, somehow we are in this habit of ‘Over promise and under deliver.’ It really is a sad state of affairs because so much of workable time is spent as a client just to ensure that the vendor sticks to the delivery sign offs. And then you wonder what the vendor had said in the first meeting – ‘we are looking at a long term relationship.‘ Aaaaargggh

So, why is it so hard to stick to one’s commitments?

As we do our BD, we realise the seed of the problem really lies because the client is often over promised without proper evaluation of delivery capabilities. Now as a startup when sales cycles are really long and sales pipeline really empty, it indeed becomes very tempting to commit anything in order to get business.

The risk we run obviously is a failed delivery. And lets not kid ourselves. Anything less of 100 % delivery is a failed delivery. Knowing how detrimental failed deliveries are to businesses (BD, Team Morale etc etc), every ‘over promise’ we make only increases the probability of having a ‘Failed Delivery’.

Considering this ubiquitous fact, is it not just common sense to refrain from saying ‘We can do that too‘.

Because really, you know what you can do. Then, lets stick our deliveries to facts and not assumptions and fool hardy optimism.

Simply said,

Commit only what you can deliver.

Deliver whatever you commit.

K.I.S.S : Keep it simple and structured

Often in our minds, we create ideas that start from scratch and very soon blossom into grandeur. Most of our ideas stem from serving a small market need. But as we dwell more on the idea, we grow it to the extent that it starts impacting industries, looks like market necessity and is surely the next revolution

And suddenly, newer revenue models are discovered. Valuation increases. More people are required. Investment requirement shoots up.

If this is the case, let’s step back and think.

The idea has grown to the extent we have only increased our constraints, whereas what we should have done was to work within our initial set of constraints. For instance, the idea that initially needed 3 people,0.1 mn $ and 4 months now needs 8 people, 1.2 mn $ and 7 months.

The fact is the idea has grown into a state where its hard to execute it well.

If only we could keep the grandeur aside and implement our idea step by step, grow it phase by phase. It is execution that matters and till we know how to execute, revolutions will have to wait.

So whats the point? Two things:

• Simple : identify the complexities in the idea from the standpoint of execution. Prioritise them with how critical they are to the idea. Once done, for the first step remove all complexities and implement the basic simple idea. If the idea seems unattractive without complexities that covered it, it cannot be compelling with the complexities either.
• Structured : Phase out the idea. Calculate the resources required for implementation in each phase. Keep a check on the jump in resources for each phase If not an incremental change, be very clear on – the necessity for such a jump, the capability of pulling it off.

As with ‘people’, so with enterprises,

’simplicity is always stunning’

Here is a good read about a day in the life of a VC backed entrepreneur.

Humor aside, it just shows how a wrong investor(s) can totally screw up the pleasure of starting up.

Money has colour, my friend. Be careful whom you take it from and how you use each penny of it.

Often I sit down and wonder.. what are enterprises all about?

Technology? Product? Strategy? ( Plain Luck? Rich Father in Law? ) and many more…

And slowly and surely, the answer I am arriving at is that, its ‘ People ‘. Eurekaa

Yes sir.. Its all about people.

People in general refers to I-C-E (something I learned at Withya)

I : Investors. Money has colour my friend. Be very careful whom you take money from and why. One thing I personally believe is that the investor(s) has to understand the business you are in. For example, if you are a technology business make sure the investor has a track record of investing in tech companies or understands the dynamics of the same. Its important to be humble and yet not be desperate. We are still looking for investors and maybe its this ’strong pre requisite’ thats taking us so long. But we’d rather wait than worry later.

C : Clients. I dont think I need to explain their importance. We all have heard this before – ‘Customer is the King (why not a Queen? )’. Just one insight, it is important to bring the customer back. Don’t sell but solve his/her problems. Call it anything ( Retainership, CRM, Customer Lifetime Value). Point blank – its repeat value that matters.

E : Employee + Exec Team. This is the starting point and perhaps the most important. About the exec team, I had a post.

But about employees, first and foremost, have a vision to share. Tell them why you are here and in turn, why are they here. Roles and Responsibilities. Be smart enough to learn from them. Because, at the end of the day, even you are only an employee of your enterprise.

My insight on the employee management gets summarised in a single philosophy
People are your asset and not cost.

Oops. Another long post