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1. Architect a clear business strategy from the very beginning. Will your company be a lifestyle business? Go public or stay private? Any of the above are fine, but don’t set expectations for employees or investors that you can’t commit to. This will lead to what I call the “boulevard of broken dreams.”
2. Think global from day one, if applicable to your business. This will pay off tremendously down the road and offer great opportunities for sustainable and profitable growth. I met a yucca farmer from the U.S. in Paris last summer who had transformed his business to farming yucca in Brazil because he could not keep up with the demand for his product in EMEA.
3. Carefully select a technology platform that will grow with you and enable you to build and implement sustainable business processes worldwide. This will also help you to do business with big companies, execute at their level of business velocity, and may provide a competitive advantage; even against the big guys, but certainly against the competition.
4. Think big. Although the key to many startups’ success is finding a niche and dominating it with superior products and/or services, big picture thinking will serve you well in all your business decision making and enable you to more thoroughly think things through. This thinking can be leveraged into what I call the “illusion of largeness” and facilitate business model innovation down the road.
5. Only the paranoid survive. Keep one eye open even when you're asleep and never think you don’t have any competition. Even the Mafia had competition. You may not know about them even after you have completed your due diligence and business plan, but they are out there.
6. Immediately form a trusted band of advisors, and/or board of directors that has relevant business experience and networks. The value provided by the gray haired ones who have been there and done it before is invaluable and can be leveraged in many way,s including networking for new customers, employees and partners.
7. Take money even if you don’t need it. There is nothing better than a large war chest for fighting the competition, or building out new and innovative product ideas, or for surviving the economic storms ahead. This may not be a good idea for those striving for a life style business with limited upside.
8. Lead by example; never show fear, doubt or uncertainty as a leader. Read Colin Powell’s thirteen rules, from his book My American Journey. Go to the front lines and just sell baby--an idea from the Oakland Raiders' Al Davis “just win baby.” Know your customers personally.
9. Stay focused on the original ideas and business plan, but do not hesitate to change direction if market forces dictate that you should. This is not easy and requires great vision, execution and the ability to innovate quickly. This is something that big companies can’t do. Don’t become the Titanic! Read Henry Chesbourgh’s Open Business Model Innovation books.
10. Remember always that you are at war. Establish a command structure beginning with a trusted lieutenant and build a strong team of employees who clearly understand their responsibilities and can run the marathon. Insure that they have the top ten characteristics we discussed two weeks ago. This may be perhaps the most important business strategy that you will follow, I often greeted new employees into startups by saying, “Welcome to the war.” Two weeks later they would tell me how right I was. Remember that a startup is like running a marathon that never ends. Don’t end up like a discarded plastic water bottle on the road side; pace yourself and your employees.
Being in a startup is far from Gestalt thinking; the whole really is the sum of the parts. It means always looking at the light at the end of the tunnel and maintaining course and vision. There are some people who can only live for the day and this can be a major challenge for those who think they belong in startups. In Silicon Valley, success often requires not only hard work, but an element of luck. Many adventurers come to California seeking the new gold of startups. The conquistadors were the first comers; they risked all, family, friends and their lives seeking fortune in the new world. Even before Cortes and De Soto were the Chinese. Read the book 1421: The Year the Chinese Discovered America, by Gavin Menzies you will see what I am talking about.
And, now the moment, you've been waiting for; this week's fish story.
Personality of Fish: MOCNESS Nets & Jelly Fish
Setting out on a research cruise requires a solid strategy, vision and the ability to innovate, primarily because of the unpredictable nature of the ocean and often the use of very sensitive equipment. People and equipment are challenged by the elements, constant motion and noise associated with launching and retrieving gear. One of the greatest innovations in the world of biological oceanography during the 1980’s was invention of the multiple opening and closing net environmental sensing system (MOCNESS) plankton net. The MOCNESS enabled biological oceanographers to sample vertical layers of plankton down to nearly 1000 meters. This was a major breakthrough for scientists and allowed us to understand the plankton distribution and stratification in the ocean. This also helped the U.S. Navy hide submarines. When a large stratified layer of jelly fish forms at a certain depth in the ocean it is easy to hide a submarine under it because the layer blocks transducers and sonar from seeing the sub. So you might guess that we spent a lot of time mapping scattering layers of jelly fish and other plankton.There are many types of jelly fish in our oceans. Those that are actually colonies of symbiotic cells, such as the Man O War, which is actually not a jelly fish but a siphonophore and others, such as the lions mane and cannon ball jellies that are actually complete organisms, and still others called Ctenophores that emit wonderful bioluminescence at night and during the day. Most gelatinous organisms are subject to the currents within the water masses that they are formed in; however, the salps and Man O Wars ride on the surface of the ocean and have modified sails.
During our research dives on the Johnson Sea Link, we encountered an amazing 30 meter long cannon ball jelly on the Georges Bank at a depth of 50 meters. Cannonballs have a large ball like head with long strands of tentacles armed with stinging cells called nematocsyts. Nematocysts are actually darts that the Cannonball shoots into plankton and small fish as the tentacles move through the water column. These stinging cells paralyze plankton and small fish and then they are carried up the long conveyor belt of tentacles to the mouth of the cannonball just under the head. Cannonballs and other jellies can regulate their buoyancy and also swim up and down the water column by undulating their bodies. This particular Cannonball was one of the largest that we ever encountered and had amazingly long lion like manes that it was using to sweep the water. As we approached the jelly and zoomed in with the video we were stunned to see juvenile haddock swimming in and around the tentacles eating small plankton. As you know the research focus of our investigation was haddock and cod and this was indeed the first ever observation of a symbiotic relationship between haddock and Cannonball jellies. Until next time, think of the early stage of a startup like you are beginning and planning a research cruise, don’t hesitate to innovate and stay on course if that is what the market dictates. Until next time great selling.
