Evidently Marcus

On Monday night I went to my first general meeting of Bootstrap Austin, a local entrepreneur community, that was the founding chapter of the Bootstrap Network. I had already been to a couple of the subgroup meetings, but attending the general meeting where entrepreneurs with ventures in both various industries and various life-cycle stages come together for mutual support, learning, and networking was particularly rewarding. Bootstrap Austin is definitely not your normal stodgy professional organization though, it is all Austin in it’s friendly, laid-back, nature… a wonderfully organic, vibrant, disorganized (err, I mean decentralized ;-)) organization.

I was first introduced to the concept of bootstrapping several months ago in Guy Giafornte’s book. The book cited various examples of entrepreneurs who successfully started their companies without outside funding and highlighted a number of creative organic growth strategies and tactics. Unfortunately, while this was all highly motivational, Guy never really presented a coherent framework for understanding and leveraging the bootstrapping process. If anything, the book perpetuated the simplistic view that bootstrapping merely involved not taking funding and being creatively cheap.

The bootstrap network attempts to fill that gap with an overarching model (graphic below) developed by Bijoy Goswami, one of the original founders, that I have found both simple and useful. In essence the model divides the boostrapping process into five life-cycle stages, and emphasizes different strategic actions at each stage.

My brief take on the model’s five stage Boostrap life-cycle:

• Preideation - emphasizes the awakening and preparation of the boostrapper (i.e. the entrepreneur)
• Ideation - emphasizes the creation of the initial product/service via an iterative process
• Valley of Death - emphasizes selling and refinement of the product/service in order to achieve product/market fit
• Growth - the stage after product/market fit is achieved, with emphasis on scaling and capturing maximal market share
• Rebootstrap - the stage at which the established venture works to grow organically by repeating the bootstrap process (often with a portfolio of complimentary new products/services)

The model’s concepts can be further simplified into a few principles/mantras:

• Demo, Sell, Build - shorthand for the life-cycle stages and their essential activities
• Constraint Creates Innovation - think Apollo 13 and the highly constrained innovations required for mission success
• Right Action, Right Time - good timing is essential
• Capital is an Accelerant (my addition)- right or wrong, it will propel you faster in whatever direction you are already going. If you turn on the afterburners when you are pointed at the ground the crash will quite spectacular, as we witnessed with many of the dot coms of the late 90s.

If you have a few minutes (about 5) I recommend listening to Bijoy Goswami explaining the model himself…

As a newly minted entrepreneur, working from home and without a partner (for now), one of the things I have started to contend with is a lack of social interaction. While working for a large company I was very used to having lots of group discussions, meeting new people (networking), going out to lunch, etc. These are essential activities at any relatively large organization, since keeping communication flowing and maintaining understanding is the only way to effectively harness the collective work effort of many people. Failure to maintain coordination will generally lead to the common phenomena of working hard, pulling in different directions, and getting nowhere.

On the other hand, the challenge is a different one when working alone for extended periods, as freelancers, consultants, telecommuters, and solo entrepreneurs often do. As social beings, one of the main ways we grow and thrive is through interaction. Like it or not, we need the mental and emotional stimulus that comes from working with others. Good working relationships can help us stay out of the intellectual and emotional ruts that can sometimes kill creativity and productivity. Of course, the inverse corollary applies as well, making the choice of cofounders/coworkers in an early stage venture like mine critical.

The new bi-weekly solution to this lack of social interaction (or perhaps even just a stale office environment) is Jelly. Jelly is just a semi-organized gathering of people who want to work in a different more social environment… a lot like working at a coffee shop and actually meeting all the interesting people working around you. I attended the very first Austin Jelly yesterday, and can say that while productivity took a bit of a temporary dive, morale definitely improved, and I met a great bunch of interesting people… many of whom could become future business relationships or even friends.

So, if you are experiencing a bit of social interaction drought at work, come join us at the next Austin Jelly on November 15th.