Startup Stages Archives - Page 28 of 31

Sign-up for Software Startup Checklist Seminar at Silicon Valley Code Camp

1 Idea Stage, 2 Open for Business Stage, 3 Early Customer Stage, Events, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / July 15, 2009

With Athol Foden‘s encouragement I have submitted the following session (links added) for this year’s Silicon Valley Code Camp: Software Startup Maturity Checklist This session is for both aspiring and active entrepreneurs. We will walk through a 36 point checklist that covers Product Development, Customer Development, and Business Operations. You will leave with a better […]

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The Limits of “I Will Know It When I See It”

1 Idea Stage, 4 Finding your Niche, Rules of Thumb, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / July 13, 2009

Both engineering and entrepreneurship alternate exploration and verification cycles to develop a solution that satisfies a customer’s need. Both of these rely on the scientific method of “observation, hypothesis formation, prediction, and experimentation” to develop and validate testable theories, engineering solutions, and profitable products. Both require that a new configuration or an opportunity be recognized

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Founders vs. Employees

5 Scaling Up Stage, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / July 10, 2009

An exploration of the tensions in roles of founders vs.employees and their different motives, incentives, and compensation.

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Michael Schrage on Innovation, Collaboration, Tools, and Incentives

3 Early Customer Stage, Customer Development, Favorites, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / June 28, 2009

Michael Schrage offers some useful insights on innovation: he stresses the need for collaboration both within the startup (or new product team) and between the startup and its early customers.

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Why Partners Are Critical

5 Scaling Up Stage, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / June 27, 2009

We invest a lot of effort in finding partners and maintaining partner relationships. We do this for a variety of reasons. One of the advantages to working in a large firm is that there are normally resources and expertise you can call on when confronted with a challenge. There are typically other specialists who have

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Hadoop Summit 2009 – Quick Impressions

4 Finding your Niche, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / June 10, 2009

A quick overview of the Hadoop Summit 2009: we are looking at project CPU budgets measured not in CPU years but CPU millennia.

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Andrew Chen: Most Web 2.0 Media Startups Have a B2B Enterprise Model

4 Finding your Niche, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / June 7, 2009

I don’t know how I overlooked Andrew Chen’s “Your Ad-Supported Web 2.0 Site is Actually a B2B Enterprise in Disguise” He succinctly outlines some hard facts that many founders of media startups spend a year of their life to learn:

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Website Peer Review at PATCA June 11

2 Open for Business Stage, Events, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / June 3, 2009

We are facilitating another website peer review Thursday June 11 at PATCA. At our April 17 website peer review, we were asked by Jerry Rice to produce a similar event for PATCA and were happy to oblige. Theresa is a member of PATCA and regularly attends their events. She blogged about “Three Reasons to Attend

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Athol Foden at Friday May 8 Bootstrapper Breakfast in Milpitas

1 Idea Stage, 2 Open for Business Stage, Events, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / May 5, 2009

Athol Foden of Brighter Naming is our guest speaker Friday May 8 for the Bootstrapper Breakfast™ at 7:30am at the Omega Restaurant in Milpitas. Athol has over 16 years of experience helping clients name companies, products, services, and taglines. Athol’s opening remarks will be followed by a question and answer session on developing the right

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Conway’s Law: the Co-Evolution of Business Organization and Product Design

5 Scaling Up Stage, Rules of Thumb, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / April 28, 2009

One formulation of Conway’s Law is that communication problems in an organization will manifest in their finished products: communication channels matter.

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If Revenue is Drying Up

4 Finding your Niche, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / March 24, 2009

You are not alone. We talk to firms every day that are challenged by the current economic environment. Let me suggest a couple of things you can do: Come to a Bootstrappers Breakfast™ and compare notes with other bootstrapping entrepreneurs for the price of your breakfast. We host four a month, the next one is

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Startups Need Sisu and Creative Improvisation To Survive Recession

4 Finding your Niche, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / March 21, 2009

We are clearly in a recession that will test many startups in Silicon Valley and the rest of the United States. Those with determination and a willingness to embrace creative improvisation are more likely to survive.

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Cecily Drucker’s Startup Secrets

1 Idea Stage, Rules of Thumb, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / March 15, 2009

Cecily Drucker, CEO and Founder of Bottom Line Time–and daughter of the late Peter Drucker–has a good post up on the “What Would Dad Say” blog entitled “Secrets of a 64 year old Startup Virgin” that lists fourteen startup secrets she has learned with her first startup. She has a few more insights in her introduction

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Sales 2.01

5 Scaling Up Stage, Customer Development, Sales, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / March 6, 2009

Sales 2.01 addresses some additional thoughts on the Sales 2.0 conference, the focus is on enabling customer self-service

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Other Customer Development Models

3 Early Customer Stage, Customer Development, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / February 9, 2009

In addition the Steve Blank / Eric Ries approach to exploring non-existent markets, here are other customer development models from Mark Leslie and Frank Robinson.

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Fewer of You Will Be Listening To Someone Else

2 Open for Business Stage, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / January 27, 2009

I worked at Monolithic Memories from 1984 until 1988, in 1985 Irwin Federman, who was CEO at the time announced that the company was informally banning meetings on Fridays. It seemed reasonable to me and I thought it would probably make us more productive. A few weeks later he announced that the company was going

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William Feather on “Dead Business”

2 Open for Business Stage, Books, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / January 25, 2009

William Feather’s “Dead Business” details the stark differences between a going concern and all the agreements and understandings that have been reached to make it viable, and a bankrupt one.

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Drucker on Profit and Business Purpose

1 Idea Stage, Books, Favorites, Quotes, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / January 18, 2009

After thinking some more about yesterday’s post on entrepreneurial motivation I thought I would re-read some Peter Drucker, his clarity and prescience continue to impress me.

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Entrepreneurial Motivation

4 Finding your Niche, Favorites, Quotes, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / January 17, 2009

Tim O’Reilly offers three ways to sustain entrepreneurial motivation: work on what matters to you, create more value than you capture, and take the long view.

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5 Tips For Writing a Startup’s First Backgrounder

2 Open for Business Stage, Demos, skmurphy / By Sean Murphy / January 5, 2009

Focus on establishing your team as trustworthy and dependable. The biggest question in a prospect’s mind is how your team will you perform when things go wrong. Stress earlier engagements with the problem you help your customers solve. Make this “phase two” of efforts to solve these problems, building on earlier relevant experience and accomplishments.

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