Written by Timothy Ferriss, this book had presented some interesting ways to deal with a big problem in the entrepreneurship business. Ferris had brought up the point that 80% of your productivity comes from 20% of your time. The other 20% of your productivity eats up 80% of your time. Ferris called this the 80/20 rule. Ferriss also presents intuitive ways to handle/eliminate the 20% of the productivity that eats up most of your time so that you may not have to work as hard.
The book is divided in four sections to tell you how to handle that 20% all summed up in a lovely acronym, DEAL. The first section, D is definition, talks about defining your objectives. This is more of a planning phase. In this section we are meant to set goals.
The second section, E is for Elimination, discusses the cutting away of fat and gristle. Sure that shit may be tasty, but it isn't needed and in fact is unhealthy for you in the long run. By fat and gristle i mean distractions. Don't focus too hard on the 20% of the crap that takes up most of the time, go on a "low-info diet", and learn how to say "no".
A is for Automating cash flow. It is used to increase income. Basically Outsource your life by hiring a virtual assistant to take care of the menial tasks. Develop your business to run automatically.
Finally, L is for Liberation. Liberation in the sense that you free yourself from traditional expectations and design your job to increase mobility. This could mean working from home in your pajamas with some ciggies and bourbon or utilize geographic arbitrage.
Thursday, March 13, 2014
John Dimer Lecture Thoughts
There is a lot i learned from John Dimmer when he visited class.
First and foremost Mark Cuban is an ass. After Dimmer spoke (well more or less gestured) about Dick Cheney-ing him, i went and watched shark tank when i got home. That dude is a legit ass. Like the sight of him is like chewing on glass... absolutely painful to see his assdom in effect. He is even an ass to the other sharks! The dude is Mark-centric that i bet if his c**k was long enough, he'd suck it himself to avoid having to deal with other people.
Anywho, back to Dimmer. John was probably the best guest lecture (well maybe second best... Graham Evans British accent was just too enchanting) we had in class due to the nature of his discussion. He Discussed how to get funding, and everyone know funding is the most important part of a business. Because without money, any business will stop dead cold.
The biggest thing i took out of his lecture was the stages of investment. When is still a concept or idea, it is mostly the owners money that is going in the project. Then when you have proof of the concept, you go to friends and family. There should be a stage in here that wasn't mentioned and that is crowd sourcing. Next is that when you have a product designs, go to individual investors or Angels. When you feel like expanding from there, go get some Venture Capital.
First and foremost Mark Cuban is an ass. After Dimmer spoke (well more or less gestured) about Dick Cheney-ing him, i went and watched shark tank when i got home. That dude is a legit ass. Like the sight of him is like chewing on glass... absolutely painful to see his assdom in effect. He is even an ass to the other sharks! The dude is Mark-centric that i bet if his c**k was long enough, he'd suck it himself to avoid having to deal with other people.
Anywho, back to Dimmer. John was probably the best guest lecture (well maybe second best... Graham Evans British accent was just too enchanting) we had in class due to the nature of his discussion. He Discussed how to get funding, and everyone know funding is the most important part of a business. Because without money, any business will stop dead cold.
The biggest thing i took out of his lecture was the stages of investment. When is still a concept or idea, it is mostly the owners money that is going in the project. Then when you have proof of the concept, you go to friends and family. There should be a stage in here that wasn't mentioned and that is crowd sourcing. Next is that when you have a product designs, go to individual investors or Angels. When you feel like expanding from there, go get some Venture Capital.
Friday, February 28, 2014
Being an Entreprenueur. First step... Learning to Spell Enterprneueuer.
From the Tech Entrepreneurs Guidebook there was a lot of info to digest. Approximately 88 pages of digestion. But the info is good and useful if you are trying to start a business.
For instance, after the statistics page of IPO's and failure, they tell you how to write a good business plan. It is a very long process starting with the executive summary. The summary appear to be one of the most crucial parts of the plan. "If they don’t get most of the information they are looking for in under one minute, your business plan has high chances of being filed under 'never'" (p. 6). The rest of the section about writing a business plan involves a company description, the market size, technology description, competition, sales/revenue generation, finances, and management.
But one of the most important bits of information i found in this guidebook is the legal part. It seemed like professor Fry couldn't emphasize how important getting an LLC is to a company. Also it is important to protect your intellectual property as well as your physical property. The guidebook explains all about copyrights, patents, trade secrets, and protection by private contract.
Oh and taxes are a bitch.
For instance, after the statistics page of IPO's and failure, they tell you how to write a good business plan. It is a very long process starting with the executive summary. The summary appear to be one of the most crucial parts of the plan. "If they don’t get most of the information they are looking for in under one minute, your business plan has high chances of being filed under 'never'" (p. 6). The rest of the section about writing a business plan involves a company description, the market size, technology description, competition, sales/revenue generation, finances, and management.
But one of the most important bits of information i found in this guidebook is the legal part. It seemed like professor Fry couldn't emphasize how important getting an LLC is to a company. Also it is important to protect your intellectual property as well as your physical property. The guidebook explains all about copyrights, patents, trade secrets, and protection by private contract.
Oh and taxes are a bitch.
Jim Kastama Visit
When Jim Kastama visited the class the other day, i got a real sense of the politics involved in a business. Besides the fact that Kastama is a politician, when he was showing us his slide show with all the images, i was curious as to how many elbows he rubbed to get where he is. I imagine that is how he became a politician. Then afterwards, used his contacts to fund/grow his business. Don't get me wrong, it is a smart move and it sounds like he knows what he is doing with his life. But i felt like it was a little odd for him to speak to the class because not everyone is going to get the opportunities he got.
More about his lecture, he gave some great advice and he did a lot of cool things. So he does strategic planning for other business to grow. One of the businesses he did planning for was the 3 second microwave. I thought the product was genius, and it was pretty neat to hear about. Imagine if i could cook my ramen noodles in 3 seconds! oh the possibilities could be endless with 3 second noods.
More about his lecture, he gave some great advice and he did a lot of cool things. So he does strategic planning for other business to grow. One of the businesses he did planning for was the 3 second microwave. I thought the product was genius, and it was pretty neat to hear about. Imagine if i could cook my ramen noodles in 3 seconds! oh the possibilities could be endless with 3 second noods.
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Bruce Kendal Lecture
When Bruce Kendal came to the class to guest lecture, he discussed how bringing in foreign business, or exporting, is helping the economy. One example he gave was Amazon. The state of Washington wants their business and wants them to open a distribution center in Seattle because they bring in money from other countries. Same as Boeing. We want them to stay in Washington so bad because, besides being close to the number one name in transportation besides Pakcar, they bring in business and outside money from foreign countries.
Kendal also explained why it is important to bring in the foreign money. It helps our economy grow. If everything was internal, all that is occurring is circulation of current money with no growth. When we introduce foreign money, new currency is coming in and bolstering the economy. Likewise, small businesses that don't get international business stunt growth and don't help the economy as much.
I suppose If i were to run a video production service, like many other service companies in general, finding a way to help the economy grow would be tough. I suppose one would have to get foreign contacts that extends the service internationally. Like most airlines, they are a service, but serve many countries.
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
dot com to dot bomb to dot blogpost
The dot com boom certainly was a something. I honestly don't entirely know how to feel about it. on one hand it was scary as crap and caused alot of people to lose alot of money, but on the other hand, it makes me want to invent a time machine and cybersquat some domain names like walmart.com and google.com.
Like the whole thing of it was that the web was invented by a man named Tim Burners-Lee and everyone used it to market the hell out of it and made a shit ton of money. Naturally there were a few large conglomerates in the beginning that hosted the service, now there are fewer. Since it became a huge thing when it did, like anything else, it over inflated and collapsed upon itself. The websites, the dot coms, took on too much venture capital and ceased to turn a profit, so when the market crashed in 2001 the dot coms turned into dot bombs. Like Amazon dipped from a stock price of 107 to 7 after the crash but they are still around. Some companies like Pets. com failed entirely.
Like the whole thing of it was that the web was invented by a man named Tim Burners-Lee and everyone used it to market the hell out of it and made a shit ton of money. Naturally there were a few large conglomerates in the beginning that hosted the service, now there are fewer. Since it became a huge thing when it did, like anything else, it over inflated and collapsed upon itself. The websites, the dot coms, took on too much venture capital and ceased to turn a profit, so when the market crashed in 2001 the dot coms turned into dot bombs. Like Amazon dipped from a stock price of 107 to 7 after the crash but they are still around. Some companies like Pets. com failed entirely.
Monday, February 3, 2014
Startup.com the Documentary, Thoughts... dot com.
No doubt the documentary was enjoyable. I mean, it is hard as hell to get a classroom of students to stay for a whole doco even when the professor leaves. I personally enjoyed it because it gave me insights as to how a business operates on a more human level and the hardships that will undoubtedly occur. Like the third founder, though a huge vaginal cleaning product, was smart to sell his stock when he did. Though he should've gotten more money.
I think that Kaleil lost sight of the things that really mattered in life. sure the business brings in the money, but he just neglected his woman the whole time and didn't give, not one, but two shits. I really don't like the man he became and I'm kind of glad his business failed in the end.
Tom douched it up as well. When it comes to technology, you got to keep improving. If your site stays the same, then you surely will fail in the end. He lived in denial thinking it was all perfect when it wasn't. I think at some point he should've taken a back seat and let some proper CS people taken over.
But my overall impressions of the film are much more grimm. To be honest, i really dont think i want to own a business anymore, at least not a large one. If you you are an emotionless person and don't give a shit about the people you love, go ahead. But quite frankly, there are things out there that are way more important to me than beaucoup bucks.
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